Page 35 of Love Never Happens with your Brother’s Best Friend

We follow the stream as it runs downhill, jumping from rock to mossy rock. Then the track bends away from the water, looping around a headland before joining up where a rickety wooden footbridge has collapsed. I arrive first at the crossing.

“I’ll give you a piggyback,” I say unclipping my backpack. Rita joins me on the bank. “Come on. I carry you across then come back for the bags, okay?”

“You won’t. That would spell disaster for sure.”

“Nah. Rita. I’m big and strong. And, I’d say you weigh about the same as my backpack, so yeah, no problem. Hop on board.” I bend down slightly with my back to Rita and reach out my arms ready for her to jump on. But Rita ignores me. She unclips her pack.

“Those rocks are super slippery and unstable,” she says sliding her backpack to the ground. “And I’m not risking concussion when you fall and drop me on my head.”

“I won’t”

“Okay. What about that time when we were kids, and I was stuck up in the treehouse? You and Dylan said, ‘Jump we’ll catch you’?” Rita hunts around at the base of some trees.

“Ah, yes. Dylan reminded me of that. I’d almost forgotten.”

“Yes. Well, I haven’t.” She picks up a sturdy stick around waist high.

“To be fair, Rita. Although we didn’t catch you in the traditional sense...”

“Traditional sense? You didn’t catch me at all.” She pulls off some twigs from the stick, then leans on it, testing its strength.

“Alright. We didn’t do a great job of judging your velocity or trajectory. This is true. But did you or did you not, land on the ground?”

“No, I did not land on the ground.” Rita stares at me. “I landed on you and Dylan. You both crumpled when I jumped down on you!”

I start laughing as I remember the tangled heap at the base of the treehouse ladder as Dylan and I cushioned Rita’s landing.

“It was pretty funny.”

“I could have died.” Rita’s eyes are fierce.

“But you didn’t,” I say quietly smiling at Rita. I want to gather her into my arms and kiss her, she is so adorable.

“I don’t know why I trusted you,” she says untying her boots.

“Maybe because you were eight years old?”

“Yeah. I soon learned that my brother and his idiot friend were not Marvel comic heroes with the superpowers they believed they had.”

“Idiot friend? Is that what you think of me?”

“Yes. Well, I did back then.”

“But not now?”

Rita doesn’t answer. She glances up at me, slowly shaking her head as she pulls off her boots. She yanks each foot free of her socks, balls them up, and shoves them inside one of her boots. Rita faces me, barefoot.

“Oh man, the stuff we got up to,” I say recalling our adventures growing up.

“I know. It’s a miracle we’re still alive,” she says as she ties her bootlaces together. She slings the boots around her neck. Then she picks up her backpack and hoists it onto her shoulders. “Ready?” she asks, looking at me.

“Ready.”

“Aren’t you going to take off your boots?”

“Nope.” I look across the swirling water to the bank on the other side. “I can get across there, no problem.” The stream isn’t that wide, and I judge there are enough rocks to step my way across.

“Alright. See you on the other side, compadre.”

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