Valley Girls

by Sarah Nicole Lemon

  “Love you, Rilla. Tell Thea I said to call me.”

  She hung up and stared out at the shifting afternoon light and the cloudless blue sky. It wasn’t like that, she found herself repeating in her head about Curtis. But she laid her head on her arms and closed her eyes. Yes it was. It was exactly like that. And it had been wrong. She didn’t completely believe it yet, but she was starting to.

  And she cried, hurting all over again.

  •

  “I want to maybe do an overnight climb,” Rilla said, twiddling her pencil as she sat on the bear boxes, notebook on her knee, supposedly scribbling an outline for an English paper. The fire flickered under the cedar boughs and the hum of Camp 4 reverberated around them. It was the end of a long, hot climbing day, and they waited for stragglers at Olivia’s campsite in Camp 4. Rilla should have gone home, but couldn’t bring herself to leave when everyone was still there. She’d hoped, by announcing that, someone would invite her along on a trip they’d already planned—but no one jumped at the bait.

  “All right,” was all Petra said, lazily from the chair where she looked half-asleep. She looked up as Walker stepped into the circle. “Look at the man whore himself.”

  “Love you too, honey.” He made a kissy face to her. “What’s up?” He said it to the group, but his gaze flickered to Rilla.

  She straightened, grip tightening on her pencil.

  Petra kicked at his leg. “I heard a rumor Celine Moreau is coming.”

  He shrugged. “That’s the rumor,” he said.

  “I need updates. You can send it via carrier Rilla.”

  He snorted. “Is she your bird carrying messages down here, then?”

  “Well, it’s the best I got. What you been climbing?”

  “Nothing special.” Walker sighed and sank into a chair. “I’m stuck.” He poked at the fire, gaze flickering over to Olivia. “We haven’t met? Have we?”

  Olivia’s eye widened. “No. But I think I’ve met your sister. She beat me at a youth worlds in Germany when I was sixteen. I didn’t realize she had a brother.” Olivia visibly blushed, even in the light of the fire.

  Rilla snapped her chin to study Walker, grateful for her dark corner to hide the flush of jealousy. The skin of her wrist burned. “He’s everyone’s vacation fuck boy,” Rilla said before she thought all the way through the sentence.

  He didn’t look at her, but his mouth visibly tightened. “Yep,” he said lazily.

  That terrible sense of just having made a mistake sank in her stomach. What had she just said? Despite what Thea and Petra had said about him, she’d never really seen any evidence of him being like that. Appalled, she buried her nose back into the outline and tried to ignore everyone as they kept talking.

  “Caroline!” Petra said as Caroline slumped in and dropped her pack in the dirt.

  “Move,” she ordered her brother.

  Rilla kept her nose in her notebook.

  “Ugh.” He moaned, but rolled out of the chair and sat on the box next to Rilla.

  She swallowed. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

  He didn’t reply. But his arm touched hers. Warm and reassuring in the dark.

  “How is freeing The Nose going?” Petra asked Caroline, almost teasingly.

  Caroline huffed into the chair and didn’t answer.

  Rilla’s stomach clenched. She couldn’t tell if Caroline regretted taking her climbing, or was just focused on her own climbing, or just exhausted and hadn’t noticed Rilla was there.

  Probably just tired.

  Or all of it.

  “Hey, that climb you did the other day. I heard there was a loose block on the fifth pitch,” Petra said.

  Caroline leaned over and poked around at the snacks Hico had brought. “Are these Oreos?”

  “They’re Hico’s.”

  “Huh?” He was on his knees at the edge of a spread-out tarp, busy packing for the next day’s climb, paying no attention.

  Caroline held them up. “Mind?”

  “Help yourself.”

  Caroline sat down and opened the package, finally turning to Petra. “The block is loose right below the fifth set of bolts. Even touching it seemed like a bad idea. I stayed far away. It’s definitely coming off soon.”

  “Soon meaning, anytime between now and a hundred years from now,” Petra said.

  “Speaking of which,” Hico said. “Did anyone get updated beta for the huge chunk of Half Dome that came off?”

  “I have an update. I’ll copy the page for you,” Walker said.

  “Everything changes. Even Yosemite,” Petra said with a sigh.

  Rilla looked up at the ridge—blue and shadowy in the moonlight above the warm glow of camp. At home, the mountains changed in theory, but not really in practice. The flood had changed things, but not really the mountains. Here, the ridges changed at a rate you could see. Young gods versus the old. Rilla balanced her pencil on her finger—the old gods had seen fit to kick her out, but it felt as if the new ones had yet to see her.

  Deep down, she wanted to be seen. To be accepted. The pencil tipped and she caught it, coming back to the conversation.

  “There used to be this really cool sign in the front of the hotel, with an etching of Half Dome on it. I guess they got rid of it when they changed the name,” Caroline was saying. “I wish I would have just taken it.”

  “It’s still there,” Rilla said. She’d seen it while weeding for Aiden. “It’s just in the garden. Yard decoration sort of thing.”

  “Caroline, you should take it,” Petra said. “She knows where it is.”

  “There’s also an abandoned tennis court back there,” Rilla said.

  “Really?” Caroline bit another Oreo. “I feel like I need to see that.”

  “And there’s a school in the Valley,” Walker said. “I found that out when Rilla arrived.”

  Rilla nodded. “Yeah, there’s a school. It’s teeny.” She slapped her notebook. “Hence, this slog.”

  “Why don’t you just take your GED?” Caroline asked. “That’s what Walker did when we left Ohio.”

  “It’s not hard,” Walker said.

  “What?” She could have avoided all this mess with one test? Rilla tilted her head. “I didn’t even know that was an option.”

  “You have to be eighteen. There’s a study book. Ask Thea.”

  “I turned eighteen last week.” Rilla slapped the notebook closed. “I’m done with this shit.”

  “Wait.” Walker held up his hand. “Your birthday passed?”

  “Rilla!” Petra wailed. “Why didn’t you tell us?”

  Rilla shrugged. “Well, it was when the park was evacuated.”

  “Oh,” Petra said. “We’ll have to celebrate.”

  “Happy birthday!” Caroline said.

  Everyone echoed.

  Rilla ducked her head, embarrassed. “Thanks, guys.”

  “Okay. Take me to see this tennis court,” Petra said. “On our way to take Caroline to get her plaque.”

  “I can’t steal the sign,” Caroline said.

  “They obviously don’t care about it,” Petra said. “Come on.”

  Caroline groaned. “Fine. I want that stupid plaque. Let’s do it.”

  Petra pumped her hands and glanced to Adeena. “You coming, Dee?”

  “Yeah, that’s a hard no.”

  “Do I have to do a dance for you? Are you just jealous?”

  There was a pause and Adeena looked up with her eyes narrowed. “I’m not about to risk my visa over your pranks.”

  Everyone froze. It wasn’t necessarily that Rilla had forgotten what was going on outside of the park—it was that she hadn’t ever applied it to Adeena. Suddenly, it called into question how she thought about the rest of the world . . . it made everything more personal when it applied to her own community.

  “Sorry, Dee,” Caroline said quietly. “We won’t go without you.”

  Adeena waved her hand. “Don’t do that. Go steal it for me.” She cle
nched her fist. “Show the man who’s boss.”

  Petra laughed. “Come on, Caroline. Rilla will lead us.”

  “You coming?” Rilla asked Walker, fingers crossed.

  His gaze met hers and then dropped. “Nah, I gotta sleep. I’m on call again tomorrow, and it’s supposed to be really hot. I want to get some good sleep.”

  Fine. Be that way. She wanted to snap and flounce off, but she just shrugged and tried to make it look like she didn’t give two hoots that he was still sitting by the fire with wide-eyed Olivia.

  Rilla fell into step beside Caroline and Petra as they left the camp behind and headed down the dark path still randomly populated with tourists. Caroline and Petra were always polite together, but she’d never seen them hang out. It was a new, strange dynamic.

  “Olivia was super into your brother,” Petra said.

  “Do I look like I give a shit?” Caroline asked.

  Petra rolled her eyes and gave Rilla a look like, OMG.

  Rilla’s stomach tightened.

  “I don’t want to talk about my brother’s dating life,” Caroline said.

  “Ugh, yeah. I hear you,” Petra said smoothly, even though she’d brought it up. “Did you hear that rumor that Celine is coming to the park?”

  “Not a rumor,” Caroline said. “She’s coming at the end of July.”

  “Rilla, do you know who Celine is?” Petra asked.

  “Um. Vaguely,” Rilla answered, dodging dazed and sunburnt hikers through Yosemite Village and trying not to feel dumb she didn’t really know. “A famous climber, right?”

  “Hopefully she’s not so celebrity she can’t climb with us,” Petra said. “I’m friends with one of her climbing partners, and I’ve heard she’s nice, but we’ll see.”

  “She’s nice,” Caroline said.

  “Oh, you’ve met her?”

  Caroline was quiet, but she must have nodded, because Petra moved on. “Rilla wants to do a big wall,” she said.

  “Oh yeah?” Caroline’s tone picked up excitedly.

  “We should all do one together. You’re the queen of big wall logistics,” Petra said.

  “Mmm . . .” Caroline said. “Yeah, maybe.”

  Petra and Caroline were going to climb together? She’d never seen that. But more importantly, they would climb with her. Rilla nearly skipped with glee, off the asphalt, onto one of the grass beaten meadow paths that the employees used to shortcut the Valley.

  “Why are you so loud?” Caroline said to Petra. “Quit trampling through the undergrowth. We’re stealing something, not waltzing in and announcing our presence.”

  “I am being quite stealthy,” Petra shot back.

  Caroline laughed.

  Rilla slowed, trying to be quieter, just in case.

  Petra shoved her elbow into Caroline’s side, and Caroline jumped. “Quit trampling through the undergrowth, Caroline,” Petra said.

  Caroline covered her mouth to smother her laughter.

  Rilla crept through the gardens with Caroline and Petra in tow. Her mind ran circles around Walker, her schoolwork, and how to convince Thea she should take the exam for a GED, only half aware of what she was doing.

  The oaks shivered and the moon reflected off the walls above them. A thrill rushed into her fingertips—she was going to climb those. That was all that mattered to her. As long as she could keep climbing—keep being a climber—she’d be happy.

  She showed them the tennis courts, cracked and broken and shrouded in vines. It was the only thing in the Valley that hinted at eerie. “The plaque is somewhere over here” she whispered.

  Creeper covered the ground. No paths through—it was a barrier island of drought-resistant grass to keep the plebeians and the proletariat in their part of the Valley.

  “Did you see it?” Petra whispered. “What does it look like?”

  “Why are we whispering?” Caroline asked. “Is someone going to catch us?”

  “We’re technically trespassing,” Rilla said quietly. If Ranger Miller suddenly appeared, she was screwed. Thea was screwed. She should have thought of that back at the fire.

  “I’m not interested in seeing how technical,” Petra said.

  Rilla kicked around in the grass, head bent. Her toe stubbed on something hard. “I think I found it.” She bent and felt in the dark. “Nope, just a rock.”

  “I got it,” Petra said.

  “Really?”

  “Yeah . . .”

  They were interrupted by a flashlight and an all too familiar voice. “Put your hands in the air.”

  Shit. Inwardly, Rilla groaned. Why, oh why? Ranger Dick Face was back.

  “What do we do?” Caroline asked frantically.

  “I’m running,” Rilla whispered.

  “Are we all running?” Petra asked, grinning in the dark.

  “On the count of three.”

  “One.”

  “Different directions,” Rilla said, just in case—she wasn’t sure she trusted either of them to know to scatter.

  “Two.”

  “Three,” Rilla whispered.

  They tore off through the brush and trees.

  Ranger Dick Face hollered after them.

  In the chaos, Rilla ran as fast as she could through the brush, heading straight for home. The memory of running from Vernal Falls flashed behind her eyes, but home was a short distance away and no sirens followed. The flashlight dropped off quickly and she slowed to a walk as she reached the edge of Yosemite Village. Ranger Dick Face was nowhere in sight. She touched her pockets, looking for her phone to check the time to know whether to expect an angry Thea. But her phone wasn’t in her pockets. Shit. She must have lost it . . .

  Rilla frowned. Where had she left her homework? On the bear box? Oh my god. She did not lose her homework.

  Rilla trudged up the steps with a sigh, opening the door. “I’m back, but I’m just getting—”

  “Hey!” Thea interrupted. “Did you forget something?”

  Twenty Eight

  Walker patted her phone and notebook, neatly sitting on the table beside him.

  “Oh.” Rilla gave a nervous laugh. “Hey. Thanks for bringing those back.”

  “I swear, Rilla, you are the most scatterbrained person I know,” Thea said.

  Rilla frowned.

  “How’d it go?” Walker asked, a grin on the corner of his mouth.

  Rilla glared him.

  “How did what go?” Thea asked.

  “Nothing,” Rilla said quickly. “I was showing Petra the tennis courts.” Rilla opened the cupboard and got out a mug, steadying her still-shaking hands.

  “Okay.” Thea looked at Walker as if he was supposed to explain; but he just shrugged.

  “Want some tea?” Rilla asked Thea.

  “I gotta head to bed,” Thea said.

  Rilla held the tea box up for Walker. “Peppermint?”

  He leaned forward on the counter, his long ropey arms tensing under the thin T-shirt. “Ah . . .” He nodded. “Sure. Why not? I’ll take some.”

  A rush of warmth ran up her spine, and she had to turn quickly to hide the smile on her face by getting a mug out the cupboard and setting the kettle on the stove.

  “So, in that situation you’d want to use a clove hitch, right?” Walker asked Thea.

  Thea looked up. “Oh, yeah.” She stretched. “Sorry, I was distracted. All right, I have to sleep. You’re in for the night, right, Rilla?”

  Rilla nodded, busying herself with the mugs and teabags. “Want honey?” she asked.

  “Nah. I’ll just drink this and be heading back. Night, Thea. Thanks for talking.”

  “Anytime,” Thea said. “Thanks for bringing Rilla’s stuff back.”

  They were left in silence.

  Walker’s gaze flicked to hers. Judging by his tensed mouth and furrowed brow, he was holding something back.

  “What?”

  His mouth twitched. “Nothing.”

  She raised her eyebrow.

  With a
wide-open palm he rubbed his mouth, eyes somehow exasperated when they flickered to her.

  Her heart raced. “Oh come on, what?”

  The kettle began to whistle and she turned off the stove and poured the water.

  He straightened up sober and his expression in control, accepting the mug. “So I’m just everyone’s vacation fuck boy?”

  She cringed. “That was not okay. I don’t even . . . I was . . . Everyone just . . .”

  “Everyone what?”

  She shrugged. “You have a reputation. I’ve been warned.”

  He nodded, lips pursed. After a minute of awkward silence, he said, “What are their warnings?”

  Rilla swallowed. If she told him, her feelings would be obvious. Explicit. She turned away and put the tea back. “Just that you move through girls quickly.”

  He didn’t respond. Didn’t look at her. She slid over his mug and waited.

  “Climbing any better after Caroline?” he asked, changing the subject.

  “I think so? I still suck, but like in a better way?”

  He smiled. “That’s all you can ask for.”

  “Hopefully I won’t be there forever.”

  “You don’t think the best climbers feel that way?”

  “Do you feel like you suck?” she asked.

  “All the time. On and off the wall.”

  She rolled her eyes. “You’re supposed to tell me about your feats of nerve and daring.”

  He blew softly on his tea, sending ripples over the liquid. “Sometimes it’s nice not to have to lead with that.”

  She smirked. “If I had that to lead with, I would.”

  His eyes popped up in amusement. “What about you with that whole . . .” He shimmied his shoulders.

  “Wait, what is that? That’s not me. I am offended.”

  Now it was his turn to roll his eyes. “Right, who’s that guy you run with?” He drummed his fingers on the counter.

  “Jonah is actually just a friend,” Rilla said primly.

  “Sure.” Walker nodded. “Sure. Do you have a boyfriend back home?”

  Something flashed hot and panicky across her chest. Rilla sipped her tea. It burned the tip of her tongue. “No. I’ve actually only had one boyfriend. A few other casual things . . .” Just at that moment, the memory of being backed against the truck and slapping Curtis across the face shimmered alive in her head. Her palm stung. Her heart raced. She swallowed and looked down, trying to regain control. She was fine. It was fine.