He reached out his hand and cupped the back of my neck, pulling my head toward him. He pressed his lips to my forehead.

“Y’know, I think I’d rather sleep up here than in that stuffy tent,” I said after a minute of quiet.

Elias pursed his lips and thought about it, then his head bobbed in agreement. “Not a bad idea,” he said and stood up. “Let’s go back and get the blankets.” He reached out his hand to me.

“I can wait here,” I said. “Unless you want me to go with you.”

“No, I can go,” he said. “It’s not that far. I’ll be right back.”

He leaned over and kissed me on the lips, then walked across the opening and disappeared among the trees.

It was so peaceful sitting on the top of the ridge all alone, looking out at the dark landscape and how the river snaked a path through the trees below. I gazed up at the sky and closed my eyes again to savor the wind on my face. It had been a long time since I felt this free, not since I was kid. I hated that with growing up came the knowledge that life won’t always be like it was when we were children. I wished we could just grow backward.

I heard footsteps behind me coming from the trees, and I thought initially that Elias was back sooner than expected. Two figures emerged from the woods far away from where Elias had gone back in.

As the two moved closer into the moonlight, I saw that the skinny blonde-haired one was Jana. The other was a girl with supershort black hair whom I had never seen before.

I stood up as Jana stumbled toward me, the black-haired girl following close behind.

“What the fuck are you looking at?” I thought I heard Jana say, but I wasn’t completely sure, as her words were slurred and choppy.

She was clearly drunk. And maybe high on something, too. Her more so than her friend, who didn’t have any trouble standing up straight.

“Are you all right?” I asked, peering at Jana.

Her black bikini top sat sloppily over her breasts, barely containing them. The straps were left untied from around her neck and hung freely. She had on a pair of men’s shorts, and she wore no shoes. I noticed one of her big toes was bleeding.

“I’m fanfuckingtastic,” she said with a big drunken smile. “Hey, aren’t you Elias’s girlfriend?” Her finger unfolded from her hand and pointed at me shakily.

Then she looked over at her friend and said, “This was the girl I was telling you about.”

Jana stumbled again and almost fell. I grabbed her instinctively and held her up by the elbow, but she shoved my hand away. “I got this,” she snapped. “Don’t… I’m great, I told you.”

I didn’t really want to help her anyway, so I was happy to let go.

“Yes, I’m Elias’s girlfriend,” I finally answered.

She attempted a grin, but it was quickly overrun by the lazy fluttering of her eyelids as though she was struggling to keep her eyes open.

“He’s a good lay,” she said to me and then smiled at the black-haired girl, who looked bored, or just ready to get back to the party rather than stand up here with the two of us.

I gritted my teeth at Jana’s comment but held my composure.

Jana laughed and almost fell over again. This time I didn’t try to stop her. I wanted her to fall.

“They both fucked me at the same time,” she added, that grin finally winning its battle with the inevitable unconsciousness. But she didn’t seem to be gloating about it, just reminiscing a little too openly. “Him and Mitchell. God damn.” Then she looked right at me and pointed again. “Have you done them both? Surely you have, since you lived with them and all.” She said it so casually, as if she and I were talking about what to have for breakfast. Clearly she wouldn’t be saying these things if she wasn’t so messed up. No, I take that back—she definitely would.

“Ummm, no, I haven’t,” I answered, trying to stay calm when really what I wanted to do was hit her in the fucking mouth.

“Let’s go back to the fire,” the black-haired girl said.

“Well, you should,” Jana said to me, ignoring the girl’s suggestion. Her upper body swayed backward slightly like a tower hit by a gust of wind.

Then she stuck her finger in my face. “Hey. Oh my God!” Her breath was rancid. “We could totally have a foursome. You game? Or shit, a fivesome!” She pointed at the girl and the girl’s face soured. “Wait”—she had a dumb moment look on her face all of a sudden—“that’s an orgy, right?”

I swallowed hard and took a step back away from her. “No,” I said. “I think I’ll fucking pass.”

“Uh, yeah, me too,” the black-haired girl said. “Jana, I think you need to find your tent and sleep it off. Seriously.”

“Fine. Whatever,” Jana said, but she wasn’t responding to the girl. She was still talking to me. Her eyelids started getting heavy again. “Probably better, anyway. I think I fucked up when I screwed them. I mean it wasn’t that long ago, but I think I might be pregnant with your boyfriend’s baby.”

The breeze burned my eyes as they widened and I sucked in a sharp breath. “What the hell did you say?”

The black-haired girl shook her head and took a step back. “I’ll see you later. No bitch drama for me tonight.” And then she walked off toward the path that Elias took and left Jana and me standing alone.

Jana’s head swiveled on her shoulders and she tried to stifle a laugh, pressing the side of her index finger against her lips.

Now she was gloating.

“Yeah, I’m like five days late,” she said twirling a hand in the air, pleased to be filling my head with this information. “And I’m never late. So yeah, I’m pretty sure I’m knocked up.”

I punched her right between the eyes and her head snapped backward. I don’t know how she managed to stay on her feet that time. It was an uncontrollable reaction to hit her, in retaliation to her taunting me about it. I regretted it a second after I pulled my fist back. My knuckles stung painfully.

With her hand cupping her nose, she just laughed.

“For your sake,” I said with anger rising in my voice, “you better hope that’s not true.”

I started to walk away, back through the clearing and toward the trees. She followed.

“Or what?” she mocked me. “You won’t do shit except babysit our kid on the weekends. Fuck you.” She laughed.

I kept walking toward the trees, but I was blinded by anger and hatred and so many other emotions that I didn’t realize I was walking in the wrong direction, more toward the area Jana had come from rather than to where Elias had gone.

She kept following me, and I kept walking. All the while, she yelled curses at me and taunted me. Tears streamed down my face. My fingernails dug into the palms of my hands, almost breaking the skin. I couldn’t get the images out of my head: her pregnant with Elias’s baby, him divided between the two of us, him leaving me to be with her, thinking he was only doing the right thing. I even saw him marrying her. Their life together flashed before my eyes, and before I knew it I was standing at the edge of a ravine. I had taken a wrong turn at some point, and the only way back was past Jana, who was closing in on me from behind with her hateful, spiteful words and that laughter in her voice that made me want to kill her. Figuratively, of course.

“Move!” I said, turning to face her. I went to push my way past her, but she grabbed me by the arm.

“Fucking move!” I roared.

A white-hot pain seared through the side of my head. I spun on one heel and fell backward, tripping over a rock. Before I could get to my feet, I reached up and touched the side of my face where she had hit me, letting the realization of what she did sink in. Then I sprung to my feet and was mere seconds from beating the shit out of her. I was in her face, our noses practically touching, my hands clenched into fists at my sides.

But I couldn’t bring myself to hit her again. If she was pregnant, I couldn’t hit her because I felt like I’d be hitting that baby, too. I hated her. I fucking hated that bitch for coming into my life and ruining what Elias and I had gone through so much together to have. But I couldn’t hit her back. I started to walk away, but she grabbed me from behind, both of her hands winding tightly in the back of my hair. She became violent, like an animal, so quickly it made my head spin. She screamed something I didn’t understand, and all I could do was try to pry her hands off me.

Finally, I managed to whirl around at her, flinging her hands away and into the air above her.

“GET! OFF!” I wailed and pushed her in a last desperate attempt to be free of her.

She stumbled backward.

I froze and watched in absolute horror as she missed the tree, tripped over her own feet, and fell right off the side of the ravine.

Through the seemingly infinite silence that suddenly consumed me, I heard her body hit the rocks below with a stomach-turning crunch.

I stopped breathing in that moment. No, everything stopped in that moment. The wind. The sky. The river. The world. Everything….

Chapter Nine

Elias

When I made my way back to the top, I found Bray wasn’t sitting near the edge of the ridge where I had left her I moved farther out into the clearing with our blankets draped over one shoulder.

“Bray?” I said, looking around.

I brushed it off for a second, thinking she was probably just taking a piss behind a tree somewhere, and I set our blankets on the ground.

But then I got a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach.