Page 56 of Just Say When

The sneakers gave me pause. We had chosen an easyout-and-back trail that totaled three miles. Minimal elevation gain but excellent payoff. Still, her shoes weren’t known for being grippy and it had rained the night before, leaving everything slick.

“Stop worrying,” she said, giving my shoulder a push to get me moving in the direction of the trailhead. “We’ll be fine. I’ve hiked in these before.”

“You’ve walked, you mean.”

She rolled her eyes and gave me another encouraging shove. “That’s what hiking is, silly.”

“All right, let’s go,” I said. Essie was a competent hiker and she wasn’t reckless. She might seem wild and rash to other people, but I knew her better. She took risks, sure, but only with careful thought.

Still, I slowed my pace once we passed the trailhead marker, letting her take the lead and set the pace. It was only polite, since my longer legs gave me an advantage, plus it meant I could keep my eyes on her.

I breathed an unwarranted sigh of relief when we reached the viewpoint. Essie had been right. She was fine. The trail was wet and sometimes slick, but it wasn’t hard to safely navigate. And this was our reward. It wasn’t the top of a mountain, but the view was nearly as good. The Rocky Mountain range stretched around the outcropping where we stood, pines and aspens giving way to gray peaks, some still patchy with snow.

Essie’s cheeks were pink from exertion, her eyes brighter than the sky, her chest rising and falling deeply.Looking at her made me dizzy in a way the height could never do, stole the air right from my lungs. I had to look away to steady myself.

She spread her arms wide and tilted her face to the sky, letting the wind whip her hair into a frenzy behind her. Her tee shirt tightened around her torso. It felt like torture, but I didn’t think it was on purpose. Sometimes, moments like this, where I saw a little too much of her, I suspected itwason purpose. Like she was testing me to see if she could make me react like every other boy who couldn’t resist her. But right now, I figured she just wanted to feel free. Essie loved the wind.

I took the lead on our way back down. Most of the trail was gently sloped, but there were a few steeper spots. She’d be more likely to fall forward if she slipped going down, and I’d be right there to break her fall.

“You know what, we should skip school tomorrow, too,” Essie said behind me. “Say we have food poisoning, and that’s why we had to leave school so suddenly today. No one will believe we were only sick for an afternoon.”

I turned to face her. “Essie, we are not skipping school tomorrow. We have two weeks left of school. Suck it up, buttercup.”

She grimaced. I laughed and took a step backwards.

And the earth crumbled beneath my foot. My other leg buckled and I flailed for something, anything, to hold onto. There was nothing. I was going over the edge and there wasn’t a damn thing I could do to stop it.

And then suddenly Essie’s face was all I could see, so close it blocked out the sky and the trees. Her blue eyes on mine with all the determination and focus she normally reserved for running barrels. It all happened so fucking fast.

The feeling of falling.

Her face.

My teeth clanking together as my body was forcefully wrenched from one place to another.

A scream.

I was back on solid ground, but Essie was no longer beside me.

“Essie!” I roared her name over the edge, my heart in my stomach. Her body lay flat against the incline, face down, maybe ten feet below where I stood on the edge.

“I’m alive.” She lifted her head and slowly moved her hand to push the hair from her face.

I inhaled a shallow breath of air, suddenly aware that my lungs were burning from lack of oxygen. “Jesus fucking Christ, Essie. Don’t move. I’ll get you.”

“No, it’s not safe. Stay up there. The ground here feels pretty unstable. It’s all scree. If you try to climb down, you’re going to slide and all those rocks are going to come right at me. Just give me a second. My foot’s wedged in these boulders.”

Her prone body wiggled as she carefully pried herself free of the boulders. I nearly died a hundred times over watching her, helpless to do anything, terrifiedthat if I tried, I might send her falling another thousand feet.

“There, I’ve got it,” she called. “Okay, I’m coming up now.”

I straight up panicked. “No! Stay there. I’ll go for help.”

“That could take hours. I’m not going to wait here alone for hours. I can do it.”

Fuck. I roughed a hand over my head, tugging at the strands, full of nervous energy I had no release for. “Don’t stand up. Crawl, okay?” I struggled to keep my voice calm. The last thing Essie needed was to worry about me falling apart. “Go slow, grab onto anything that looks safe.”

She didn’t answer, but she stayed on her hands and knees. Her progress was painstakingly slow as she paused between every movement, sometimes sliding back an inch or two on the loose gravel.

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