Find Tessa

I waited too long. That’s the thing about decisions. Sometimes making none is the same as making one.By the time I stepped outside, Tessa was already at the edge of the parking lot.

Only she wasn’t alone. A guy I’d never seen before leaned against a pickup truck. Camp sweatshirt. Broad shoulders. Easy smile. Definitely another counselor. Probably from one of the camps farther down the lake.

They were laughing. He said something. She nudged his arm. I stopped walking. For a second I considered turning around.

Instead, I walked over. “Hey, Tessa.”

She looked up. “Oh! There you are.”

The other guy glanced at me. “Friend of yours?”

She smiled. “This is the guy I came with.”

He extended a hand. “I’m Nate.”

I shook it.

His grip felt like a hydraulic press. “You work at Orgee?”

I nodded.

“I’m the gopher.”

He laughed. “Seriously?”

“Seriously.”

He looked me over for a second. So you’re still in high school?”

“I graduated.”

“When?”

“This spring.”

He whistled. “You’re a baby.”

“I’m eighteen.”

“Exactly.”

He smiled in the effortless way people do when they know they’re winning. “I’ve got socks older than you.”

Tessa laughed politely.

I tried to.It came out wrong.

Nate looked back at her. “So, anyway…”

The conversation flowed around me. They talked about rugby. Australia. Travel. Life way beyond me.

I stood there searching for somewhere to fit. There wasn’t one. I tried adding something.It landed like a brick in a swimming pool.

Nate grinned. “No offense, kid.”

There it was again. Kid.

“You’ll catch up in a few years.”

Tessa gave me an apologetic smile.

Not cruel. Just… Elsewhere.

I nodded. “It’s fine.”

It wasn’t. I walked away before either of them had to pretend not to notice.

The bouncer hadn’t been there when we’d arrived. Now a mountain of a man occupied the top of the stairs. He held out a hand. “ID.”

“I was already inside.”

“You left.”

“I know.”

“So now you need an ID.”

“I don’t have one.”

“You don’t come in.”

I looked past him toward the music. “I’ve got friends in there.”

He shrugged. “They’ll still be your friends in the parking lot.”

I considered arguing. Instead I walked back outside. There wasn’t much else to do.

I sat on the hood of an old pickup truck at the edge of the lot. The stars looked close enough to touch. Country music drifted faintly from the basement below. Every so often the door opened. Laughter spilled out. Then disappeared again.

I thought about home. About how badly I’d wanted to leave. Home was shit but I least I knew I belonged. What to expect. You won’t be disappointed if you don’t hope for more.

About how convinced I’d been that adulthood would make everything simple. Instead it just gave me more ways to feel confused.

A gravel crunch interrupted my thoughts. Amanda. She stepped out of the bar back into my life.

She spotted me immediately. “There you are.”

“I got locked out.”

“I noticed.”

She looked toward the entrance. “No Tessa?”

I glanced toward another corner of the parking lot. She followed my eyes. Tessa still stood talking with Nate. Neither of them had noticed us.

Amanda didn’t comment. She simply jingled her keys. “Ready?”

I nodded.

The drive started in silence. Amanda didn’t ask what happened. I didn’t volunteer it. The BMW rolled through the sleeping woods. After a mile she reached toward the center console.

A CD clicked into place.

Static. Acoustic guitar. “Almost Heaven…”

John Denver. Take Me Home.

Amanda turned the volume up. Loud. She rolled down every window. Cool night air flooded the car. Dark trees, bright stars.

“You like this?” I asked.

“My father raised me on it.” She smiled faintly. “It’s impossible to be miserable while John Denver is singing.”

“I think I’m proving him wrong.”

She glanced sideways at me. “No.”

Then, without warning, she pressed harder on the accelerator. The engine answered immediately. The trees blurred. The speedometer climbed. Sixty. Seventy. Eighty. Ninety. One-thirty down the straight,

The road stretched ahead, empty beneath the moonlight. Amanda’s hair broke free from behind her shoulders and whipped wildly through the open window. She laughed.

Not politely. Not professionally. A real laugh. The kind I’d never heard from her before.

She looked younger. Freer. For just a moment she wasn’t the consultant with color-coded flowcharts. She was simply a woman driving too fast on a summer night.

The speedometer crept even higher. The wind roared through the cabin. The chorus filled the car.

“Country roads… take me home…”

I found myself singing.

“To the place…I belong.”

Quietly at first. Then louder.

Amanda joined in. Completely off-key.

I laughed.

She laughed harder.

Something inside my chest loosened. The embarrassment. The rejection. The awkward conversation in the parking lot. The feeling that I’d somehow lost something.

The wind carried it away.

Amanda drummed the steering wheel in time with the music.

“Better?” she asked over the song.

I looked out at the dark Maine forest rushing past. Then back at her, smiling into the night as her hair streamed behind her.

“Yeah,” I admitted.

She whipped the car into the parking lot of camp. She slid into a parking spot as the last note faded. She rolled up the windows, and killed the engine.

“We’re home.”

I couldn’t help but smile. Only three days in but this camp was my home.