Page 43 of Finding Her
Poppy nodded earnestly. “Absolutely. I totally understand.”
Tracey’s face relaxed, her smile returning. “Fantastic! The last tent is right over there,” she said, pointing to a bag on the far side of the field. “You two can grab it and get set up. If anyone asks, just say Bear’s helping you because he’s being kind.”
Poppy grinned at me. “Ready?”
I nodded, resigned. “Lead the way.”
CHAPTER 28
poppy
As it turned out,I was horrific at setting up tents. I’d never really been one for outdoorsy things—camping, canoeing, or any of the stuff that Hartwell seemed to promote as the hallmark of its favorite activities. I was a city girl and always had been.
So now, being surrounded by all these kids who had grown up doing things like this and not knowing how to put tent poles together was a little embarrassing. On the bright side, Bear seemed to be a master at it. By the time I figured out what all the pieces were supposed to do, he already had the whole tent set up.
I stared at him with wide eyes. “How?”
He shrugged. “It’s easy once you learn how to do it. I’ll teach you sometime.”
And then he ducked into the tent, leaving me standing there, running those words over and over in my mind.I’ll teach you sometime. Like there was a future for us. Like he wanted to spend more time with me, even outside of class.
I was still standing there like an idiot when he poked his head back out of the tent and said, “Are you coming?”
I blinked at him, trying to hide how I’d zoned out, and replied, “Of course, but I’m listening to her instructions—making sure we don’t go in one after the other so nobody gets suspicious of what’s going on.”
He shook his head and just headed back inside. I waited the requisite two minutes before following with my own bag. By the time I stepped inside, Bear already had his sleeping bag set up on the far side of the tent. He glanced at me and said, “Unless you’d prefer this side. I don’t mind being next to the door if you’re worried about intruders or something.”
He said it in such a flat, deadpan voice that I couldn’t tell if he was joking or not. I glanced at the door of the tent, briefly wondering if that was something I should actually worry about. But then again, what kind of intruders would we have here? It wasn’t like any of the other girls would try climbing in. And if it was something like a bear or wolf, I doubted they’d bother using the tent door.
“Do you think I should be worried about that?” I asked slowly.
He just stared at me, and I decided he had been joking. I needed to stop taking him quite so seriously. So I rolled out my sleeping bag on my side of the tent and lay down with a sigh. I was sure we’d get called out to do something else soon, but for now, I could enjoy being in here for a little bit, couldn’t I?
“Can I ask you something?” Bear asked as he lay down on his own sleeping bag. He had an arm tucked behind his head, using it as a pillow, but he wasn’t looking at me. He was just staring straight up at the top of the tent.
“Of course,” I said. I wanted to roll onto my side to look at him but didn’t want to seem too uncool, so I stayed on my back like him.
“How are you so happy all the time?”
I frowned, not expecting the question. “What do you mean?”
“I mean...” He sighed, waving a hand around like that explained everything. “You’re just always happy. You’re neverupset or frowning. I’m pretty sure it would take somebody, like, murdering a person in front of you to make you hate them. So, why is it?”
I shrugged. “What’s the point of living my life being upset?”
I heard his sleeping bag crinkle as he turned to look at me, but I kept my eyes trained on the ceiling of the tent.
“Because there are bad things in the world. Because not everything goes exactly as planned. Because sometimes you just feel upset.”
“Well… I mean, there are times when I feel upset, just like anyone. But… the world doesn’t seem half as bad as people think it is. At least, I don’t think so. I’ve moved around a lot, and if I’ve learned anything from that, it’s that there’s no point in getting all worked up about things not going as I planned or letting one small thing ruin a time that could be good for me. Being upset about it doesn’t change it, so I might as well enjoy it while I can.”
“Enjoy it while you can?” He echoed softly.
“Yeah, you know.” I sighed as I tried to think of the best way to explain it to him. “Like, every time I move to a new school, I hope it will be the one I stay at forever. Or at least, it will be the one where I make friends who last. Everybody I meet promises that they’re going to be my best friends forever, that even when I move away, they’ll call and text, and we’ll never forget each other. And then, without fail, within three months, everything falls apart. I never hear from them again.”
I swallowed thickly, hating that even talking about it could still bring me to tears. That went and poked a hole in his theory that I was happy all the time. I guess I was just good at not showing it.
“Now, I could get upset about that,” I said, “and wonder what I did wrong or think about what could have been if we hadn’t moved. But then one day, I realized that wondering about that wasn’t going to fix it for me. All it did was make sure that I wasalways upset and for a while, it meant that I never made good friendship anywhere else. So now, I just accept that my friends will be my friends while I’m at school. And when I leave, I know we probably won’t keep in touch. And that’s fine. Because they don’t need to be my friends for life.”
