I’m exhausted, but I remain awake for a long time after that, wishing I was still just Ilina Andreyev, living in some shitty apartment I can barely afford, and curled under a blanket with a doctor named Josh. Whose brother I’d never met.
29
JOSH
February 1st
I wake in the morning, hard as nails.
It’s not entirely a surprise, as that’s how I spent most of the previous night.
It doesn’t help that I’m currently pressed—insistent and throbbing—against Drew’s ass. I roll away from her, willing it to retreat, and she wakes.
“Is it just me or did the temperature drop about forty degrees?” she asks, yawning.
I’m pretty sure it did—another reason I was up most of the night. Cold weather and significant temperature changes can trigger asthma. I spent the night alternating between checking her breathing and trying to will my erection away. I want to ask her about it even now, but I’m worried I’ll trigger a panic attack if she senses I’m concerned. My fury at Joel has only grown over the course of this trip.
She rolls over, clinging to my back for warmth. I can feel her nipples even through her sweatshirt.
Fuck my life.
"You talk in your sleep," I tell her.
"You're making that up,” she says, but when I don’t argue, she concedes with a sigh. “What did I say?”
"You were talking about how hot I am.” I can feel her cheek curving against my spine as she smiles. "Fine. I might have misinterpreted that part. No seriously, you just kept repeating numbers.”
“That lines up," she says. "I'm extremely good at math, having made it all the way through the eleventh grade."
I laugh. “It was less math and more like…you were ordering Chinese food. You kept repeating the same numbers again and again saying ‘the one-ninety-nine’ and ‘the eight-eight’。 Do you remember what it was?”
She stiffens and rolls away. “No.”
There are no jokes about Chinese food or implications that they were sexual positions.
That’s how I know she’s lying to me.
The river is deemed passable when everyone wakes. We pack up our stuff and plunge in, tethered to one another. The water is surprisingly cold, and I place a hand on Drew’s shoulder—in part because the stream is still rushing fast enough to sweep someone to sea, in part because it allows me to silently assess her breathing once more. She still seems fine, thank God.
When we reach the other side, everyone is soaking wet and filthy but buoyant, thrilled to have made it. There are cheers and laughter and it’s a relief, but I don’t feel all that celebratory. When Drew and I say goodbye at the airport tomorrow, that will be it…unless she actually stays with my brother, which would be even worse.
The commentary grows bawdy as we descend toward Hanakapiai Beach and our final river crossing.
Dietrich, Anna’s husband, says something to Kathy and Samantha about noises coming from their tent and says he was tempted to watch.
“We heard you in your tent last night too, Dietrich!” shouts Kathy in reply. “Sounded like you needed to be watching someone because you were definitely doing it wrong.”
There is laughter and then Kai says, “If we’re watching people, my vote is for Josh and Lina because how does that work? He’s, like, twice her size.”
“I bet they make it work,” says Kathy with a throaty laugh.
I shut my eyes momentarily. God help me, but I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about how we’d make it work. Drew buries her face in her hands, simultaneously amused and embarrassed. “We’re both virgins, actually,” she announces.
“Josh, dude, tell me she’s full of shit,” begs Kai, sounding personally wounded by the possibility.
“She’s full of shit,” I mutter. There’s literally no way that would be true if she and I were a couple.
We cross the last stream, make our final climb, and then descend at last. At the end of the trail, the women hug and Kathy pulls Drew aside and asks for an autograph.
“You don’t look that different with darker hair,” she says, winking at me.
We head to the parking lot. Even from a distance, I can see Joel there, sitting on the hood of the Jeep. He hops down and starts to approach with a bouquet in one hand, a bottle of tequila in the other—and a shit-eating grin on his face like he’s already sure he’ll be forgiven.
That grin is what has me walking faster. Drew grumbles behind me, accusing me of trying to compete with her, but that’s not what this is.
Joel steps forward, still smiling, holding out the bottle of tequila, which I suppose is some kind of Thanks for taking care of my girlfriend gift.
My fist swings out before I’ve even thought it through. He bends over, airless and gasping, and I hit him again.
“What the fuck, dude?” he shouts, but I’m not done. I throw him against the Jeep, and it all spills out. All the tension I’ve held inside me for two days has corroded my patience with him down to nothing.
“You had her fucking inhaler!” I shout. “She could have died because you couldn’t be troubled to show up!”
“I didn’t know!” shouts Joel. I have no idea if he’s telling the truth. It hardly matters. He should have checked. He should have killed himself not to abandon her.
“Josh,” Drew says behind me, soft and shocked.
I let him go and he walks straight to Drew, pulling her against his chest. She is stiff in his arms.
“I’m so sorry,” he says. “I had no idea. Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” she says, stepping away from him. “We should get going. I want to shower before we head to the airport.”
“I’m really sorry,” Joel says again. “I meant to meet y’all at the stop, but the interview ran long.”
His hand goes to the small of her back, as if she didn’t need any assistance along one of the world’s deadliest trails but needs assistance now, across ten feet of flat parking lot. He picks up the flowers he dropped when I grabbed him and hands them to her. “These are for you.”
“Jesus fucking Christ,” I mutter, reaching over to remove her backpack.
Her eyes meet mine. Her smile is apologetic. I hope to God it doesn’t mean she’s letting this all go.
PART IV
OAHU
“Say what you will about the other islands, there’s no doubt Oahu’s medical care is second to none.”
Oahu: The Adventure of a Lifetime
30
DREW
I’ve lost count of the number of times Six has tried to hug me between leaving the trail and boarding this plane. He’s constitutionally incapable of believing he isn’t forgiven. I might have been able to put up with it all if I hadn’t seen my toiletry kit dumped out on the bathroom counter, my inhaler clearly visible.
I cried then, but my tears weren’t over him. I’ve always known what he is and what he is not, and any hope we had of a relationship died days ago. I cried because of me, because I’m fucked up enough to have put up with it all. And because somewhere in the world, Josh will continue to exist without me—big, beautiful, endlessly protective—and I’m the piece of shit who will never deserve him.