On the Mountain (Follow your Bliss #5)

by Riordan Hall, Deirdre

  In the afternoon, Baskia slipped into the pool, the eyes of girls and guys alike unashamedly watching her every move. She was eye catching even in a sea of bronzed skin, shiny hair, and toned muscles. For the first time in her life, attention, adulation, and fame didn’t matter.

  As she slowly swam across the pool, her thoughts landed on London. She wondered where she was, if she was still modeling, and if she’d gotten her act together. Baskia noted that something in her settled, she wasn’t eager to meet guys or get drunk. She looked forward to enjoying Mellie’s company and getting to know her sorority friends.

  When Baskia returned to the lounge chairs to towel off, Mellie and Becca were gone. Ilana didn’t acknowledge Baskia’s return, but Allison giggled.

  “What?” Baskia asked.

  “Mellie said—” She giggled again. “Mellie said you—never mind.” She kept giggling and Ilana cracked a wry smile.

  “What did Mellie say?” Baskia asked, not sure if there was animosity there or just a girl who was buzzed on free drinks.

  “Nothing.” Allison took a sip from a frilly coconut tumbler.

  “Tell me.”

  “She said you’d show us how to pick up guys. She said you’re really good at it.” She erupted into another fit of laughter.

  “I’m all set, thank you,” Ilana said, not moving or looking in their direction.

  “Did she say anything else?” Baskia asked.

  Just then, Mellie appeared with Becca hanging on her shoulder. “Hey, there’s another pool over there. It’s way more happening. There’s a DJ and tons of hot guys.”

  Allison jumped to her feet. Ilana stayed put. Baskia said, “I’m good here, I’ll come find you in a little while.”

  They paraded off. Laughter, brought on by fruity cocktails, fading in their wake. Baskia settled on the chair, adjusted her sunglasses, and pulled out a magazine. She had to admit that although she was virtually doing what she did at the cabin, she vastly preferred the warmth of Mexico. But the din in the background made her miss the quiet.

  The next couple of days passed poolside, with nights spent dancing at clubs and the girls consuming more liquid calories than solid. As such, Baskia grew more concerned about Mellie and her increasingly hard partying. But she couldn’t score a private moment with her. After losing track of how many guys had hit on her, she longed for Trace and grew increasingly worried why he hadn’t returned. As she slipped into sleep, she alternately worried he might show up while she was gone and wondered if those flashes of passion had meant anything at all.

  ^^^

  After nursing matching hangovers, the girls took up their spots by the pool. Mellie talked about a guy she’d hooked up with the night before. “If I see him I’ll point him out. He had dark hair and an incredible tan. Said he went to Brown, so…”

  “What about Will? And, uh, Wes? ” Baskia asked without thinking. She’d wondered about the two of them, but wanted to respect her brother’s privacy.

  “This is spring break, Baskia. What happens in Mexico stays in Mexico. Speaking of which, that guy at two o’clock has been eyeing you since we sat down.”

  “Everyone has been eyeing her since she got here,” Allison said. “I thought you were going to show us how to pick up guys.”

  Baskia surprised herself by wanting to say, Picking up guys was trashy and adding the suggestion to let it unfold naturally. The alcohol didn’t help them. She wanted to go to a nice dinner, snorkeling, or surfing, and check out some of the scenery. But she bit her tongue. She was Mellie’s guest and what was more, in the past, she’d inhabited each of these girls: looking for fun, pleasure, and escape. She was one of them, no different; she didn’t have a boyfriend, at least not officially. In that sunny setting, she was a defacto college student and, up until recently, loved to party. She convinced herself to let loose, help them have some fun, and maybe, just maybe, have a good time herself.

  “Let’s do this,” she said, pulling a bottle of suntan lotion out of her bag.

  “Huh?” Allison said, eyeing the bottle. “I thought you going to help us with guys.”

  “I am, but you’re going to burn and well, you’ll see.” Baskia winked before repositioning herself so she was in the guys’ line of sight. After squirting a generous amount of suntan lotion in her hand, she massaged it into Allison’s fair skin, caressing her gently, but meaningfully, smiling flirtatiously. “Five, four, three, two, one—” Baskia whispered.

  Two of the four guys approached and asked if they could join the girls. Shortly after, the other two appeared. In no time, they ordered another round of drinks, one of the dudes had tossed Becca in the pool—the two of them making out and then disappearing—and Mellie was in the lap of another. A guy named Trip assigned himself to Baskia while the fourth tried unsuccessfully to gain Ilana’s favor. Baskia knew the dark-haired girl’s ploy was playing hard to get, but was certain that by the night’s end, they’d hook up.

  Trip liked to say his own name, leading Baskia to wonder if it was his real name, or an identity he used to woo girls. He didn’t remind her of Trace in any way; in fact, she couldn’t imagine him among the spring breakers. She envisioned the two of them walking down the beach, the sun setting, and the seagulls cawing. She pictured him wearing baggies with an easy surfer-vibe.

  Dully, in the background, Allison extolled Baskia’s modeling career as if cashing in a form of sexy currency. She tried, in vain, to bring her attention back to memories of Trace, but in a blink, the vision was gone.

  “So you’re a model, huh? Have I seen you in anything?” Trip asked haughtily, more interested in redirecting the conversation back to himself, but more than happy to be sitting alongside her.

  “What? Oh, yeah. Sure.” Baskia flipped open a fashion magazine Ilana had discarded. In the center of a spread for a denim brand, she straddled a horse saddle wearing jeans and nothing else.

  Trip gazed at the magazine a moment too long.

  “Hey, where did Mellie go?” Baskia asked, but Trip had placed another drink in her hand, and the question went unanswered as he directed her to the DJ area where crowds danced in one heaving mass. He moved in close to her, grinding up against her thighs. She laughed remembering so many clubs, so many drinks, and so many guys. As the lights came on around the pool, Baskia found the girl she’d left behind when she escaped to the mountain: the party girl, the all-night rager, the easy laughter, and the even easier kisser.

  Trip’s lips closed in on hers. “You’re so hot,” he whispered, barely audible over the blaring music. The crowd surged and jostled her. The grin Trip wore said he was going to get lucky. But it wasn’t Trace’s smile and they weren’t Trace’s lips.

  “I have to find my friend,” she said. Worry about Mellie and longing for Trace carried her out of the throbbing crowd away from Trip and back to the mountain of serenity in her mind.

  “Wait, she’s fine,” he called after her. “She’s just with Cruz. Don’t worry. She’s having fun.”

  Baskia paused. “I need to find her.” She continued to push her way through the crowd.

  “I thought we were having fun,” he asked, catching up.

  “I just have to find—”

  “She’s a big girl. She doesn’t need you to babysit her.”

  That’s exactly what she needs me to do, Baskia thought emerging into open space. She scanned the lounge chairs, looking for the others, but she didn’t see them anywhere. Two girls in nothing but thongs ran by, clutching their chests and giggling. Trip followed them instead. A thought flashed in her mind, she didn’t want Mellie to do anything Facebook-post-regrettable. She’d been there. It wasn’t pretty.

  Baskia trekked back toward the room they shared, while the other three girls stayed in an adjacent suite. She spotted a figure, slouched against the wall in the corridor. Her teal cover-up was askew.

  “Mellie,” she shouted, running toward her friend. “Are you okay?”

  “I juss…”

  “Come on. Let’s
get you in the room.”

  “I juss wanna dansss,” Mellie slurred.

  “I know you want to dance, but you can’t dance out here.”

  She hefted Mellie to her feet and brought her into their room. She propped her up in a chair and brought a bottle of water.

  “What happened? That guy wasn’t rough with you, was he?”

  “Did we have sex?” Her eyes drooped sleepily and she nodded answering her own question. “I think so. It was good. Not as good as Will. Your brother, he’s really good in bed. But I had fun dansssing with Wes. He’s a good danssser.”

  Baskia’s eyes widened. “TMI, Mellie.”

  She started to get to her feet. “Let’s go find the guys and dansss.”

  Baskia gently set her back in the chair. “I think we’ll stay here a little longer.”

  “I just wanna dansss.” Mellie swayed in the chair as if she could hear the beats pumping from the pool deck.

  “We’ll dance later, but you need to get some rest.”

  “I don’t need to rest. I need to party. Don’t you like to party? I thought you were like the party star. I thought if I invited you here, we’d have fun together. Like we used to. We had fun, right?” she asked, almost like an afterthought.

  “Of course we did.” Maybe Mellie hadn’t invited her there to make sure she stayed out of trouble, but as a way to bring them together again, on what Mellie thought was Baskia’s playing field. “On New Year’s, do you remember?”

  “That was a party.”

  “It was something.” Baskia considered waiting until morning to have the conversation. But she figured she could just say it all again if she had to. “I’m sorry if I haven’t been a good friend. You’ve needed me, and I haven’t been available—selfishly caught up in my own drama. But I’m here for you now.”

  “I just need to dansss.”

  “Yeah, but don’t make it a habit.”

  Mellie looked at her then, her eyes brimming with tears. “I miss my mommy.”

  Baskia pulled her close. “I know you do. I know.” She guided her to the bed, brushed her hair away from her face, and settled her under the sheet. Mellie cried softly. Baskia took her in her arms again.

  “I’m all alone,” Mellie sobbed.

  “No, you’re not. You have me. You have a sister.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  As Baskia tried to sleep, the strobe lights and thumping drum and bass flashed and faded. She’d been turned to that frequency for years, but recently nudged the dial enough to actually hear the nuances in the music, the crescendos and arpeggios. She heard the words between the notes whispering her purpose. She tuned in. It was the sound of happiness and fulfillment. It was the music she’d seen in Brighton’s smile, captured in a photo, before she’d fled to Vermont. She understood. Love.

  The next morning, Baskia woke up, alone in the bed. Mellie sat on the stucco deck overlooking the ocean and the pool. She joined her out there, breathing in the fresh salt air.

  “Nice day,” Baskia said, taking a sip of water.

  “Rough night.”

  Baskia passed her the bottle. “Are you okay?”

  “I will be. I don’t know what’s gotten into me. I just want to—”

  “Be loved? You are. I’m sorry I haven’t been—”

  “I know, I accepted your apology last night,” Mellie said meaningfully.

  “I wasn’t sure if you’d remember.”

  “I was wasted, but those kinds of things pierce even the drunkest facades. And that’s all this is. Just an escape. Truly, what happens here, stays here. The pressures of school, confusion about where Will and I stand, thoughts of Wes, and the ever-present absence of my mom nearly crushed me. I miss her so much. You know we fought all the time. We hardly ever got along. My dad says we’re exactly the same, that’s why we were always at odds. He misses her too, and being with him is almost worse, the two of us drowning in our grief.”

  “I’m so sorry—”

  “Don’t be. This is just part of my life, loss. I’ll get through it. I just thought I’d try on the party lifestyle, you seemed like you were having fun, so I figured why not.” Mellie shrugged.

  “I was just escaping too.”

  “Not anymore, I can tell. You’re different. That mountain changed you. It’s like you’re more rooted. Calmer,” Mellie said thoughtfully.

  Baskia nodded. “You’re welcome to stay with me. There’s nothing more humbling than waking up to subzero temperatures and having to shovel your way to the stack of wood.”

  Mellie laughed. “Or oversleeping for an exam.”

  “Ouch. Really?”

  “I got a warning from my advisor. I let things slide, but from here on out, I have to focus.”

  “Well, you know what they say about all work and no play…”

  Mellie giggled. “There’s Wes…”

  “So do you like—”

  Mellie made the “my lips are sealed” gesture with her thumb and forefinger.

  “Uh, but what about Will?”

  “We’re good friends. But he’s really busy, and I’m about to get really busy. We gave it a shot. It got confusing; we’ve known each other how long? It was,” she closed her eyes, “amazing, but—”

  “Right people wrong time?”

  “Something like that.”

  Baskia took in the bright rays in shades of melon and tangerine. The sun soaked her skin. “So you’re going to be okay?” Baskia asked.

  “Yes. I will. You?”

  Baskia nodded. “I’m still not sure what my future holds. It’s unnerving. It seems like everyone knows what they want to do. That part of me, where I once felt pressured to study for a career following my parent’s wishes, vanished. Instead, now I feel this pressure to follow my hopes and dreams, only I’m still not sure exactly what they are.”

  “It sounds like you’ve been searching.”

  “What do you mean? The mountain?”

  “I mean your blog. You have a passion for fashion and food.”

  “Wait, you know about my blog?”

  “All I can say is four girls in a suite and a pot of baked beans is no bueno. Those cupcakes on the other hand…”

  The two friends erupted in laughter.

  “And Maisy. That’s an amazing story. Also, I’ve been wanting to say, I think you hit your quarter life crisis, just a bit early.”

  “My what?”

  “It’s like a mid-life crisis only minus the flashy cars and plastic surgery. It’s like an existential crisis of being. Who am I? Where do I belong? How do I become an adult? What is an adult? The big questions.”

  Baskia nodded slowly.

  “You know what I say? Screw that.”

  Baskia’s mouth fell open. “Mellie Winthrop, I’ve never heard you say screw anything. Except last night you were going on about—”

  “No, I mean all the pressure. Let yourself evolve naturally into the woman you’re meant to be. It’s okay not to know who you are yet. And if you want to be a food blogger, taking the culinary world by storm, and then study nutrition demonstrating what it is to be a healthy fashion model, so be it. Yanno, just as an idea. But there’s no rush. Or if you decide you want to become an astronaut, a politician, or a philosopher, or a space exploring democrat extolling the merits of existence, then by all means…”

  Baskia laughed. “The democrat wouldn’t go over well with mother and father Benedict.”

  “The great thing is you can go down any of those roads and then blam, change directions. What I’ve learned about growing up is you get to make up your own rules. Life’s too short to follow someone else’s, even your mother’s, however well-meaning she may be.”

  Baskia closed her mouth, amazed at her friend’s truthful and honest outpouring. “You just said everything I’ve been searching for the words to express. How’d you know?”

  “I know you, Baskia French Benedict. Oh and by the way, happy birthday. Now, tell me about this Trace guy and then I have a p
resent for you.”

  The two friends relaxed on the deck for the rest of the morning. Baskia had nearly forgotten it was her birthday, but she’d celebrated back home and was glad for the simplicity of a deck chair in the sun and her best friend.

  That afternoon, Mellie led Baskia down to the beach where a handsome blond surfer waited for them.

  “Who’s that?” Baskia asked, unable to help herself.

  “He’s my cousin Donovan’s friend. “

  “You mean Van?”

  “Yep. He’s become a sports writer. That fella there is Jamie Burke, world-class surfer, hottie, father of two.” She sighed. “I’m just sorry that he’s unavailable.”

  “What about Wes?!”

  “I’m kidding. But he’s here to teach us how to surf,” Mellie said cheerfully.

  Baskia’s eyes widened. “Seriously?”

  “I can think of nothing better than learning to ride the waves.”

  That night, exhausted, after being tumbled in the water, paddling their hearts out, and surfing until the sun had nearly set, they had a lavish meal with the others. Nearly the entire resort restaurant sang to Baskia after a server brought out a giant sundae lit with sparklers. When they fizzled out, she wished she’d see a guy named Tracey Wolfe when she got home.

  For the rest of the week, Baskia and Mellie never left each other’s side. Not even when guys asked them to dance, or when Becca begged Mellie to enter a wet t-shirt contest. They stuck together when a pre-med student asked Allison on a dinner date, inviting the others along. When Ilana wandered off with a guy and a girl, calling back, “Double the pleasure,” they laughed, knowing they’d hear about it later.

  The trip was a girl’s getaway, a chance for two old friends to reunite and learn to surf, and they weren’t letting anything else come between them.

  ^^^

  After a warm goodbye, Baskia was on her way back to New England, glad to have mended things with Mellie and able to tell Wes she was interested.

  When the plane landed, the scene was a black and white photograph with slush covering the ground, and snow mounds practically abutting the steel-grey sky.