“Maybe someone should go with you,” I say.
“I will,” says Cassidy’s mother. She puts her arm around Cassidy. “No splitting up, remember?”
We give the two of them our water bottles and they disappear down the trail. Jess and her mother and I dig through our backpacks and come up with one pink T-shirt, one orange T-shirt, a pair of yellow-and-blue striped socks, and a red bandana.
“Do you guys have anything else that’s bright?” I ask Megan and Becca.
They look through their stuff and we add a bright pink bikini (Becca’s, of course) and a white baseball cap.
The rain starts just as Cassidy and her mother return. We all take shelter in the biggest tent, squishing together cross-legged on the floor. We huddle there, listening to the raindrops pelting down on the fabric roof.
Mrs. Sloane distributes the water bottles while Cassidy takes stock of our pile of bright items. “This will be perfect,” she tells us. “We can tie them to trees along the trail in both directions in the morning.”
There’s a sudden loud CRACK! of thunder overhead and everybody jumps. Becca turns white as a sheet. She leans over to me suddenly and whispers, “If we don’t make it out of here, I just want to say I’m sorry I was mean to you last night.”
I nod. “It’s okay,” I tell her, my teeth chattering. “I shouldn’t have called you a Pye.”
Lightning flashes, and I squeeze my eyes tightly shut. I’ve never much liked thunderstorms, and I move closer to my mother. She puts her arm around me and pulls me close.
“This is all my fault,” says Mrs. Wong miserably. “I should never have tried to take us a different way home.”
“It could have happened to anyone,” my mother says consolingly. “Besides, just think about all the great stories we’ll have to tell about our adventure after we get back. Lost in the White Mountains!”
“I would have planned things much better if I had been in charge,” says Mrs. Chadwick, flinching as lightning flashes overhead.
“Put a sock in it, Calliope,” says Mrs. Sloane, throwing one of the yellow-and-blue striped socks at her.
Mrs. Chadwick looks shocked. Cassidy gives Megan and Jess and Becca and I a sly glance and wags her foot. That gets us thinking about last night, and we start to snicker. Pretty soon everybody’s laughing, even Mrs. Chadwick. “Sorry,” she says. “I guess I’m just a little nervous being out here.” Thunder rolls overhead and she flinches again. “Especially in a storm.”
“Let’s sing,” says my mother. “That always helps.”
Because it’s the Fourth of July we sing “It’s a Grand Old Flag” and “Yankee Doodle,” and then we launch into “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.” Every time the thunder crashes we skip to the refrain, shouting “GLORY, GLORY HALLELUJAH!” at the top of our lungs, which of course makes us all laugh again.
“Our own private fireworks display!” hollers Mrs. Delaney as the lightning flashes overhead again.
We sing until we’re hoarse and we can’t think of anything else to sing. Fortunately, we don’t need to. By now, the storm is slowly moving away.
Mrs. Wong checks her watch. “I’m sure they’ve figured out by now that we’re lost.”
We all grow quiet. I think about my dad and Darcy, back at the cabin. They must be really worried about us. All of our dads must be. I look over at Cassidy, and wonder who she’s thinking about. I doubt it’s Stanley Kinkaid. She’s kind of resigned herself to the wedding, but she’s still not happy about it.
Then I remember that Stewart is down at the cabin too, and I get a funny fluttery feeling inside. I glance over quickly at Becca, worried that maybe she can read my thoughts and will decide to tease me again. But she’s having a thumb war with Megan.
I wish Becca didn’t know that I like her brother. It’s worse than her knowing I want to be a poet someday. I haven’t told anyone at all until now—not even Jess, and she’s my best friend. I’ve just kind of wanted to keep my feelings to myself.
I don’t know if Stewart likes me back. He’s never said anything to me about it, but he always seems happy to see me. And he always sits next to me during our newspaper staff meetings. It’s different with Stewart than with Zach Norton. I still get butterflies when Zach is around, but lately I’ve been thinking maybe it’s just out of habit. I’ve liked him for so long—since kindergarten—but the truth is, we don’t have anything in common. Unless you count the fact that we both happen to work for the school newspaper. I’m much more comfortable around Stewart. He’s funny, and he makes me laugh, and he’s easy to talk to and we like the same books and movies and music and stuff. Plus, I like his calm gray eyes. I can’t imagine myself writing poetry about them the way I did about Zach’s last year, but still, Stewart is definitely cute. I thought so even before the fashion show.
Cassidy’s stomach growls.
“I guess it’s getting to be about that time, isn’t it?” says Mrs. Wong, starting to look unhappy again. “Unfortunately I didn’t plan for two dinners on the trail.”
“I’m sure we can come up with something,” says Mrs. Sloane briskly. She grabs the red bandana and spreads it out on the middle of the tent floor. “Why don’t we pool our resources and see what we have left.”
We all dig around in our backpacks and pockets. Mrs. Wong comes up with two energy bars and a handful of rhubarb cookies. My mother adds a box of raisins and half a packet of graham crackers. Mrs. Delaney offers up two pieces of string cheese, a pack of airplane peanuts, and an apple. Mrs. Sloane has some trail mix, Becca has a pack of gum—“Rebecca!” scolds her mother, “your braces!”—Megan has some sour-drop candies, Jess has nothing at all, and I have a couple of marshmallows that I stuck in my sweatshirt pocket last night and forgot to roast. They’re stuck together and covered with lint, but I put them in the pile on the bandana anyway.
“Cassidy, how about you?”
Cassidy holds up two wrinkled packets, one of instant noodle soup and another of hot chocolate. “They’re kind of old,” she says. “They been in my backpack since—well, since California—but they’re probably still okay.”
Her mother nods and she tosses them onto the pile.
“Calliope?”
Mrs. Chadwick pulls out a bag of peanut M&Ms.
“Score!” crows Cassidy.
“Holding out on us, were you?” Mrs. Sloane teases her.
“Certainly not,” Mrs. Chadwick replies stiffly.
Cassidy’s mother surveys the bounty. “I’d say we have a feast in the making, ladies.”
“Do I sense an upcoming Cooking with Clementine episode?” says my mother. “Dinner on the trail?”
Mrs. Sloane gives her a wry smile. “I doubt it. But let’s see what we can do here.”
It’s still raining, so we can’t build a fire. Mrs. Wong manages to get the stove going under the shelter of a big pine tree, but it runs out of fuel while she’s heating up the packet of noodle soup. Meanwhile, Mrs. Sloane cuts up the apple and the cheese for an appetizer. We each get a few bites, plus a few sips of lukewarm soup, and then for dessert we split the peanut M&Ms.
“I’ll save the rest of the food for tomorrow, just in case,” says Mrs. Sloane.
Even though it’s not that late, we’re all tired. We girls decide that we want to sleep with our mothers tonight, so the Chadwicks head for one tent, the Wongs for another, and the Sloanes for another. Jess and Mrs. Delaney and mom and I say here inside the big tent, which we’re sharing.
“Are you scared?” I whisper to Jess as we get settled in our sleeping bags.
“Yeah, how about you?” she whispers back.
“Uh-huh.”
We’re quiet for a while and then she asks me, “How come you didn’t tell me about Stewart?”
“I don’t know,” I tell her, feeling a little uncomfortable. “I guess partly because for the longest time I didn’t even realize that I liked him. And then once I did, I kind of just wanted to keep it to myself. All that stuff last year with
Zach was so embarrassing.”
Jess thinks this over. “I can understand that.”
We’re both quiet again.
“What if nobody comes for us?” I ask her, changing the subject.
“Of course they’re going to come for us.”
“Well, then, what if they can’t find us?”
“Cassidy thinks they will.”
“I wish I were home in my own bed.”
“I know. Me too. I miss Sugar and Spice.”
“I miss Melville.”
“I miss the twins.”
“Liar.”
There’s a pause.
“Yeah, okay,” she whispers. “I don’t really miss them.”
We giggle.
“Girls, stop talking now,” says my mother. She’s using her librarian voice, so I know she means business. “You need to get your rest. We may have a long day ahead of us tomorrow.”
I hope not, I think, as I snuggle down into my sleeping bag. I close my eyes and drift off to sleep, listening to the eerie sound of the wind high in the pine trees overhead.
Breakfast is pretty dismal. The rain stopped sometime before morning, and Cassidy managed to get a fire going, so at least we have something hot. Well, a sip of something hot—we share the mug of cocoa from the ancient packet. Mrs. Sloane pops my marshmallows in, which helps it taste better, but still, a sip is hardly enough. Also there are half a dozen raisins each, a few sections of graham cracker, and some trail mix that Mrs. Sloane beefed up with the extra peanuts from Jess’s mom.
“Don’t worry, girls, they’ll find us today, and just think how good that BBQ is going to taste!” says Mrs. Wong, as she distributes our meager fare.
Our moms are working really hard at keeping our spirits up. Except for Mrs. Chadwick. She’s crabby again. I guess she’s not a morning person.
“How am I supposed to keep my energy up with this?” she grumbles.
“Now, Calliope,” says my mother. “There’s no point complaining. We should set a good example for the girls here.”
“I still feel terrible that I got a little disoriented,” says Mrs. Wong.
“A little?” snorts Mrs. Chadwick. “We’re lost in the White Mountains, the most dangerous part of New England. We could be eaten by bears!”
Jess smiles at me. I smile back. It’s hard to imagine any bear brave enough to try and take a bite out of Mrs. Chadwick.
“Let’s focus on the positive, shall we?” says my mother, which is mom-code for shut up already. “It’s not raining, and by now they’ve probably launched the search party.”
Mrs. Delaney hands out baby wipes, and we all spend a little time cleaning up. I feel like I’m covered with grit. Plus, I’m alarmed to discover I could really use some deodorant.
Cassidy has us pack everything up so we’ll be ready when they come to get us.
“What if we need to stay over another night?” asks Megan.
“Then we’ll set up camp again.”
“That’s stupid.”
“No it’s not,” explains Cassidy. “It gives us something to do, which is good for morale.”
After we’re done striking camp, we take the bright T-shirts and socks and tie them to branches a short ways up and down the trail. “Like Hansel and Gretel leaving breadcrumbs,” says my mother.
And then we wait.
We don’t have to wait long, fortunately. About an hour later, we hear whistles and shouts in the distance, and we all start yelling our heads off. A few minutes later the rescue team comes crashing through the bushes into our camp. There’s a guy with a big mustache and an even bigger German Shepherd, which Jess immediately has to go over and pat, plus a forest ranger and Stanley Kinkaid. As the guy with the dog radios the other search teams to tell them that they’ve found us, we all cluster around Mr. Kinkaid and the forest ranger.
“We would have come for you last night, but we couldn’t because of the thunderstorm,” the ranger says.
“I hope you weren’t too scared,” says Mr. Kinkaid.
“Nah,” scoffs Cassidy. “We were fine.”
Mr. Kinkaid bends down and rummages in one of the pockets of Mrs. Sloane’s backpack. The top of his head is sunburned.
“Oh, honey, you forgot your sunscreen!” cries Mrs. Sloane.
Mr. Kinkaid straightens up. “How could I think about sunscreen when my Clemmie was missing?”
Mrs. Sloane kisses the top of his head. Behind them, Cassidy pretends to stick her finger down her throat.
“How did you find us so quickly?” Mrs. Wong asks.
“Because we stayed put, right?” says Cassidy smugly.
“Well, actually,” says Mr. Kinkaid, holding up a small, round, black, plastic thing, “it was this.”
Cassidy frowns. “What’s that?”
“It’s a GPS tracking unit,” replies the forest ranger. “He tucked it into your mother’s backpack, as a precaution. We couldn’t get a fix on you last night because of the storm. The nearest transmitter took a direct hit by lightning. But we’ve had you pinpointed on one of the computers at headquarters since they made the repairs this morning.”
“You have?” says Mrs. Sloane.
“I’m an accountant,” Mr. Kinkaid tells her. “We like to keep track of things. And you are what I treasure the most.”
“Stanley!” says Mrs. Sloane. “That’s so romantic!”
Cassidy looks like she’s going to barf for real this time. “They would have found us without your stupid GPS tracker,” she says flatly. “We didn’t need your help.”
Mr. Kinkaid looks a bit taken aback. “Well, I, uh—”
“Cassidy Ann! You apologize this minute!” orders her mother.
“You did all the right things, young lady,” says the ranger. “Stayed put, built a fire, put up markers—somebody taught you right.”
“My dad,” Cassidy says proudly. The ranger glances over at Mr. Kinkaid. Cassidy glowers. “He’s not my dad.”
“Ah,” says the ranger, looking uncomfortable. “I see. Well, we would certainly have found you eventually, but Mr. Kinkaid just saved us a little time. All’s well that ends well, right?”
A little over an hour later we’re back at the cabin. My dad and Mr. Delaney cook us up a huge breakfast—by now it’s almost lunch—with pancakes and scrambled eggs and bacon, and we eat out on the porch, all of us talking at once as we tell everybody about our adventure. I notice that Stewart keeps looking over at me, and every time he does my tummy does a little flip-flop.
“We didn’t get to do fireworks last night,” says Dylan.
“Because of the storm,” says Ryan.
“That’s right,” says Mr. Delaney. “We saved them for tonight, didn’t we, boys?”
The twins nod vigorously.
“Along with the barbecue,” adds my father, winking at me. “It’ll be a Fifth of July feast, to celebrate your safe homecoming.”
“I need a shower,” Becca announces.
“No kidding,” says Cassidy, holding her nose.
“How about you all go for a swim first?” suggests my mother.
By the time we get changed, the boys and our dads and Mr. Kinkaid are already in the lake. I’m a little shy about being in a swimsuit in front of Stewart, but not as much as I would have been last summer. This year I don’t even really need to suck in my stomach. I race Cassidy down the dock and we do cannonballs off the end. The cool water closes over my head and I just float for a while.
My brother organizes a volleyball game, and we play for hours, boys against girls, then kids against grown-ups. It turns out that mild-mannered Mr. Chadwick has a killer spike. He’s also a good sailor, and we all take turns going out with him in the cabin’s little sailboat.
Later, we shower and put on clean clothes and hang out on the porch in the shade, playing board games and Old Maid and talking some more about our night in the woods. Cassidy brags about her part in the rescue, and Darcy says he couldn’t have done any better himself, which is sayi
ng a lot since he’s working toward his Eagle Scout rank.
Mrs. Sloane, who is sitting on the porch swing holding hands with Mr. Kinkaid, keeps calling him “my hero” and “my knight in shining armor,” which everyone finds hilarious because nobody looks less like a knight in shining armor than Stanley Kinkaid. He’s a good sport about it, though, and cracks jokes about being “Sir Counts-a-lot” and one of the “Knights of the Bald Table.”
Cassidy keeps her distance.
Mrs. Chadwick says that in spite of our “misadventure,” it’s been a perfect weekend.
“Don’t you agree?” she says, elbowing Mr. Chadwick.
“Yes, dear,” he replies.
Mr. Wong says the only thing that could possibly make it any better is room service.
The afternoon passes quickly. I beat Stewart at Scrabble—or maybe he lets me win, because you’d think somebody in ninth grade would know how to spell “abominable”—and pretty soon my dad is firing up the barbecue, and it’s time for our feast. His special Fourth of July cake, which is now a Fifth of July cake, is just as good as always.
When it gets dark, Mr. Wong breaks out the fireworks. He must have spent a ton of money, because there are boxes and boxes of them. Mostly little stuff, of course, but a whole lot more than we ever get to set off at home in Concord. Only firework displays by pros are legal in Massachusetts. The twins run around on the beach with sparklers in each hand, shrieking with glee, and the rest of us set off poppers and jumping jacks and spinners and pinwheels.
After a while I wander out onto the dock by myself. I’m barefoot, and I sit down on the edge and let my feet dangle in the water. The air is cool, and the water feels warm and silky. I sit there contentedly, swishing my feet back and forth as I watch my family and friends. Our dads are starting to shoot off the bigger fireworks now, fountains and rockets and roman candles that soar out over the lake, where they burst and rain down like multicolored shooting stars.
A lanky figure detaches itself from the group and heads out onto the dock. When it gets closer I see that it’s Stewart. He has a sparkler in each hand.
“Hey, Emma,” he says, passing me one.
“Hi,” I reply, suddenly feeling shy.