Hold on to Hope

“There,” she whispered. “All done.”

Evan got all her hearts. Even when her daddy said she wasn’t allowed to give it to him.

Thirteen

Frankie Leigh

I jolted upright with a gasp, drenched in sweat and clutching my sleeping bag.

My eyes darted around, everything dark save for the glow of the moon that seeped through the thin material of the tent.

The world was quiet.

Bugs trilled and an owl called from somewhere high in the copse of trees, the lake still doing its gentle patting at the shore, the waterfalls crashing in the distance. I felt drawn to the solitude. To the whisper of the world that promised it was all gonna be okay. That there was something bigger and better and more beautiful out there waiting for us.

I quietly crawled out of my sleeping bag and over to the tent flap. I cringed when I pulled down the zipper and it came off sounding about twenty times louder in the dead of night. I opened it only enough so I could squeeze through, and then I slipped on my flip-flops.

Quieting my footsteps, I started for the path at the back of the camp in the direction of a place that my heart would always know.

A place that was filled with memories of so much joy that it would always feel like stepping into a sanctuary.

The moon was high, close to full, the milky haze sweeping over the smooth gray rocks that had been my playground as a child.

I started to climb the path that felt so familiar.

Higher and higher to where the rocks became slick, smooth from the years of water flowing in different directions, small crevices carved out from ages ago.

Once I made it over the cusp of the ridge, the expanse of the lake came into quick view.

Glittering and dark.

Fascinating and foreboding.

I crossed the invisible barrier that I’d been forbidden to pass when I was little, and I climbed toward the summit.

With each step, the crash of the waterfalls grew louder, the vibration of them reverberating underfoot, my spirit feeling lighter as I made my way toward the place the felt like freedom.

It tasted of childhood dreams.

Murmured of teenaged hopes.

I kept going until I made it to the boulder that was almost shaped like a heart.

A big crack down the middle.

Evan and I had deemed it the Heart of Stone.

Fractured but unbreakable.

It had always been our favorite place.

Where we’d played and jumped and laughed before it’d become the place where we’d dreamed.

With a shaky hand, I dragged my fingertips through the narrow crater, as if maybe it was real and alive and would hold all the answers I was searching for.

We’d climbed this thing like we thought we had to conquer it, put a flag in it and call it our home, sneaking up here most every time we came to the lake.

Our sacred place.

A shiver rolled across my flesh when I felt the presence approaching from behind.

Like instinct.

Intuition.

The boy my sixth sense.

The same as I was his.

Both of us drawn here the same.

I slowly turned around.

Evan stood in the opalescent beams of the moon.

Wavering.

Hesitating.

Like he didn’t know if he should trust to step into the thousand secrets and regrets that toiled in the distance between us.

His hair appeared almost white in the glow.

His face this mix of torment and desire.

Damn him.

He still wasn’t wearing a shirt, and my gaze was gettin’ unruly again, unable to stop myself from drooling over all that firm, packed muscle.

Never had I understood the phrase a sight for sore eyes better than in that very moment.

Finally, I managed to drag my attention back to his face. That wasn’t any better because my pulse was racing through my veins like a freight train.

A collision right up ahead.

We stared, locked in that moment.

I didn’t know for how long.

The only thing I did know was something fierce and unrelenting rose up in the middle of it.

Pushing and pulling and compelling.

WHERE IS EVERETT? I found myself asking. I thought it would be a safe topic, but there was no way to hide the way my hands moved like a plea.

A song.

Everett.

Evan gruffed an affectionate sigh. The sound of it wrapped me like a dream.

I wondered if that was what this was. If I was still back in my tent and the nightmare that had chosen to torture me tonight was this.

Loving him and never being able to touch him again.

My favorite froggy.

“My mom has him. He was fussing, and she claimed they have more space in their tent so he might be more comfortable, but I know she really just doesn’t want to let him out of her sight.”

“She’s already madly in love with him,” I murmured, knowing he would feel it, the emphasis of what I meant.

He gave a tight nod. “Yeah.”

“They missed you.”

“I missed them, too.”

“God, Evan. I wish you wouldn’t have gone away. I wish you wouldn’t have done this to us.”