Blake glances over at me, her fingers opening and closing around the steering wheel. “I guess both,” she says, not like I’ve made her feel uncomfortable or awkward, like she actually wants to know.
And I actually want to tell her. Someone separate and outside of it all.
“I don’t know. I guess… My friends and I were always up to something. Always trying to pull off some wild scheme or plotting some fun adventure. I spearheaded the eighth-grade prank of filling the halls with Ping-Pong balls. I set three of Jake’s family’s chickens loose onto the field during a Huckabee High football game. I helped plan the best eighth-grade formal Huckabee Middle School has ever had. If something happened at school, people used to assume I was involved somehow and… they were probably right. But now…,” I say, turning my head to look out the window at the rolling fields. “It’s just different. I don’t like the risks anymore, I guess. It stopped feeling… worth it.”
Blake glances over at me but doesn’t say anything, so I shrug. “I try to keep a low profile now. But that’s pretty hard to do when everybody knows everybody else, and you go from the girl who was always ‘fun’ or ‘up to something,’ the person everyone wanted to be around, to that ‘poor girl whose mom died.’ ”
And, yeah, I mean, it’s also pretty hard to do when you kiss someone other than your boyfriend at junior prom.
“What about you?” I ask, reminding myself we still barely know each other. Why do I keep telling her so many things? “What’s your plan for senior year?”
Blake lets out a long huff of air. “I don’t know! I’m more of a doer than a planner. Probably just make a few friends. Try to pass my classes. Join the soccer team.” The corner of her mouth ticks up as she gives me a teasing look. “Keep a low profile.”
I swat at her shoulder. “My friend Olivia plays on the soccer team,” I say, before I realize what I’m saying. I think back to her icy glare at Snyder’s Orchard. Former friend? “Jake can probably introduce you,” I add, quieter now.
“That would be cool.”
“Make a right turn into the parking lot in half a mile,” the automated GPS voice says. I swallow hard, trying to ignore the destination dot getting closer and closer.
I feel the truck slow as Blake puts her turn signal on and pulls into the parking lot, the sun reflecting off the pool of sparkling water as she parks.
“Are you nervous at all? For school to start?” I ask.
“Why would I be nervous?” she replies. The most Blake answer of them all. Completely free from overthinking.
We both fall silent, peering up at the cliff, sitting atop the lush, green tree line. It is… enormous. Just looking at it, I can feel my vertigo taking over, Blake’s words from a moment ago echoing around my head.
Why would I be nervous?
“All right!” Blake says as she turns the car off, her keys jingling as she pulls them out of the ignition. “That isn’t too bad!”
My eyes widen, and I give her a “you have to be kidding me” look. “That’s not too bad?” I say, aghast.
She ignores this and hops merrily out of the truck, completely barefoot, while I crawl out, wondering what the statistics are on people passing out from fear and falling to their deaths.
I kick my flip-flops off as Blake pulls off her T-shirt to reveal a white-and-orange-and-navy-striped bikini, the colors standing out against her tan skin.
I feel my gaze lingering on the toned lines of her stomach, the curve of her…
I swallow hard on whatever that was and preoccupy myself with ripping off my own clothes, tossing them onto the passenger seat of her truck. I look down at my black bikini, a stark contrast to Blake’s brightly colored one.
Crossing my arms tightly over my stomach, I look up to see she’s giving me one of her big, enthusiastic smiles.
“Let’s do this?”
“Let’s do… this,” I echo, with markedly less pep.
We start walking through the tree-covered trail that will lead us up to the top of the cliff, the path carefully labeled with light blue arrows etched into small wooden signs. Blake leads the way, her steps smooth and even, despite the small twigs and rocks along the path.
Meanwhile, I’m in my own personal game of hopscotch, the soles of my feet getting stabbed every time I put my foot down.
I watch as the sunlight trickles softly through the branches overhead, casting shadows on Blake’s shoulders and legs. We make a sharp turn, then begin the climb to the top. The path suddenly becomes steeper as we near the water, crystal blue eating hungrily away at the shoreline.
“Did you know your mom had a fear of heights?” Blake asks as we walk.
“I actually had no idea,” I say between breaths. “I was pretty surprised when I saw it on the list.”
We went on a family vacation when I was younger to Puerto Rico, where she did this crazy zip line in Toro Verde. I was too young to go on it, which had really bummed me out at the time. My dad stayed behind with me, the two of us peering up at the tree line, watching in awe as people rocketed past above us. I remember watching her pass by, high above the trees, completely unafraid of the space between her and the ground below.
“That was my mom, though. Never afraid of anything.” I think back to months before her diagnosis, when she first started getting bad headaches, writing it off as nothing, even when the pain relievers stopped really working. “Even when she should’ve been.”
I try not to get woozy the farther we go, focusing on the steady rhythm of Blake’s feet, falling right, left, right, left, one after the other, slower now as we near the top, the bright blue sky coming into
