Begin Again(106)
Shay lets out a snort in lieu of listing my many mishaps since joining the yellow team, which include and are not limited to falling butt-first out of a tree during apple-picking season, toppling off the dock as Piper was teaching me how to lead wilderness tours over the summer, and somehow, against all odds, locking myself inside the chicken coop for several hours before Jamie found me in a sea of feathers and eggs.
Mishaps aside, sometimes I’m still surprised I chose yellow, too. My dad was right in that I had more than enough ribbons to join the voting boards for any of them, and even if I didn’t, I was still welcome to join any of them as a member. At first the answer seemed simple: join the yellow team for myself, and join the red team I’d worked so hard to be in, just like my mom.
I had a few weeks to decide for sure, and those few weeks were pivotal—they were weeks when the ribbon hunt was over, and my world opened up in a new way. Aside from studying, my weekends were completely my own. Instead of chasing after ribbons, I found myself wandering around the paths in the arboretum, signing up for different volunteer activities to get to know the area better, even taking a few excursions off campus with a group of students who met up every few weeks.
It was all the magic of the hikes my parents took me on, but with a new kind of magic all its own—the independence of it. Of knowing I could explore anything I wanted, whenever I wanted, and it didn’t have to amount to or count for anything. A sense of purpose that wasn’t driven by any kind of reward, or a fear of consequences. Something that was just mine.
When the choice came, it stunned me how there suddenly wasn’t one to make. I’d join the yellow team, and only the yellow team. It was the current under my skin, the one that felt like the perfect mix of inherited and earned—a love not just for a place because of what it means for your history, but for your future. A love for a place so deep that you feel compelled to make it the best it can possibly be. And so I decided to focus solely on what brought me the most joy: I’d help preserve the natural beauty of this place I’d fallen in love with, water to trees to mountains to sky. I’d make my own path at Blue Ridge State, one winding trail through the woods at a time.
Well. Not without my fair share of tripping on tree roots and poison ivy and near frostbite. But at least Mother Nature always keeps me humble.
“Behold,” says Shay as we round the bend into the main street of campus. She comes to a dead stop and puts her hands on her hips, breathing in deeply. “Soak it all in. Twenty-thousand-plus students pretending they haven’t just mutually destroyed all their livers as their parents descend on campus.”
Only then does it occur to me that November 1 being the school’s annual Family Day is either the most careless or the most cruelly calculated move on the planet. Because even in the five seconds we’ve been on campus, I’ve spotted a student with Resting “I’m Going To Upchuck” Face lodged between beaming parents, another student with enough mascara under her eyes to put raccoons to shame begging her mom to get her a Gatorade, and what appears to be a still-drunk bee wandering around campus singing the “I’m bringing home a baby bumblebee” song to himself.
I stifle a laugh as what appears to be a world-weary roommate steps in to collect the bumblebee. “Okay. This is quality entertainment.”
“Be nice,” says Valeria, playfully swatting at Shay. “This would have been us if Andie hadn’t been in charge of food and hydration last night.”
“I’ll be nice again on November second. Today?” says Shay, scanning the expanse of our deeply hungover campus. “Today is for me.”
We maneuver our way through the figurative and occasionally literal zombies to let ourselves into the back of Bagelopolis. None of us actually work here anymore—Milo spent his last month as the Knight pushing his work-study program agenda more aggressively than ever before, and between his efforts and his newly public identity letting him take a more hands-on approach, it’s actually started to work. Since the new program expansion kicked in, Shay’s been able to do her hours at the local bookstore, and Piper’s taken me on as an assistant for her wilderness tours. But Sean still treats us to our old employee discount, which was never formally explained beyond “take as many bagels as you want as long as Sean gets his beloved chocolate pretzel bagel first.”
We set to work, Valeria making standard sesame bagels with honey-nut cream cheese for her parents, Shay going the savory route for hers, and me grabbing my dad’s signature strawberry cream cheese with the cheesy garlic bagel along with some plain bagels with cookie dough cream cheese for me, Kelly, and Ava. I’m about to wrap up an extra with unicorn cream cheese when I’m interrupted by a hand swooping from above to grab it, and the familiar press of a kiss against my temple.
“I’m assuming this is mine,” says Milo, his mouth already poised to take a bite.
I turn around to find Milo close enough that I can lean my forehead into his shoulder. I breathe in his familiar sweet, earthy scent as I tilt my face up to meet his gaze. “We’re picnicking in literally ten minutes.”
“Yes, but I’ve been up since zero o’clock,” says Milo. His internship has him up absurdly early every weekday morning, but he only goes on the air a few times a week. I can tell from the gleam in his eyes that today was one of those days. “I need sustenance to stay awake.”