Chapter 2: Been Caught Stealing

Lara wore the most priceless look as I approached a campsite that was now occupied by three extra girls. Alana greeted me warmly, that same honest smile on her face. For a second I imagined I had x-ray vision, since I could easily strip away her short shorts and form-fitting tank top to imagine her in her translucent underwear. Then I put the thought out of my head.

Things were awkward for a bit, but once I reminded everyone that we were all hungry, we got to work. Sophie unpacked a paper sack that was on the table, producing some chips, a jar of dip, and a few smaller paper sacks that appeared to contain bottles of wine along with accompanying cups. While Lara went to fill the large pasta pot with water, Alana approached me.

“How are you going to cook the fish?” she asked.

“I was going to fry them up. In butter.”

A mischievous grin crossed her tanned face. “Let’s smoke them instead.”

“Smoke them?” I was dubious and I was hungry. Smoking sounded like a long process.

“For a little bit, yeah. Do you have any wood?”

“Under the tarp there.”

“Can I get a fire going?” she asked, her eyes twinkling.

I shrugged. “Sure, go ahead.” There was no way I would deny her anything, not with that look.

Alana moved to grab some logs. “Megs, please ... Don’t exert yourself!”

Megan was sitting in one of the camp chairs, stretching her legs onto another one, the picture of comfort. “What should I do?” she asked lazily.

“You can help Matt clean the fish,” Alana suggested, an evil twinge in her voice.

“Me? No way!”

“Come on, I’ll show you,” I called, taking the hint from Alana’s eyes.

I had the feeling that Alana was a deft hand at gutting fish; her friend, not so much. Megan reluctantly rose from her recline and took a seat somewhat near me at the picnic table, already scrunching up her face in disgust. I unceremoniously plopped one of the trout onto a sheet of newspaper in front of her.

“All right, just grab the head,” I instructed, feeling like Melissa might when she taught me some new cooking technique.

“Eew!” Megan squeaked as she poked a finger at her fish.

“Oh, come on. It’s dead.”

“City girl,” Alana explained as she stacked logs in the fire pit. “Scared of nature.”

Megan shot her friend a glare before gingerly grabbing the head. I laughed to myself. Megan sure did seem like the kind of person that wouldn’t even know what boiling water was.

“Okay, now what?” she asked warily. She seemed fixated by the gelatinous eye that stared up at her.

“Cut off the head.”

“What?” she blurted out.

“Just watch.” I grabbed another trout, drew a careful cut behind the gills, and pulled the head free.

Megan was watching with a look of extreme distaste. “I’m not doing that,” she announced, dropping her knife to the newspaper.

Sophie laughed as she came around the table toward us, each hand holding a plastic cup full of wine. “Here, drink. Maybe that’ll make it easier. For both of you!”

I had to laugh as Megan took a desperate swig of the ruby liquid and made another face.

“You said you wanted to help,” I reminded her, taking a sip myself.

With a disinclined glance at her clean white t-shirt, Megan grasped the fish again. With some encouragement, she managed to lop off the head. Her knife work was appalling, though, so it ended up looking like a blind bear had bitten it off. A rusty spurt of blood leapt onto her sleeve as she wrenched the body free.

“Eew! Eew! The head juice got on me!” she cried, pulling the fabric away from her skin. “That’s so gross!”

I heard Alana guffaw from behind me. The fire she’d built was burning solidly.

“Aw, it’s just a little blood,” I consoled. “Look, now you need to cut open the stomach. Put your knife in like this and give it a slice.”

That was the end of her assistance. She abruptly stomped off to the bathroom to wash the offending glob from her shirt, gooky hands held fearfully out to her sides.

Alana took Megan’s place at the picnic table. She sat much closer to me than her friend had. “Mind if I take over?” she asked cheerily, Megan’s discarded knife already in her palm.

“Do you know what you’re doing, or are you going to freak out on me too?”

“I’ve fished a few times.”

Deft hand, indeed. Within five seconds, she’d removed the guts and bloodline. She tossed Megan’s fish on the plate.

“Next!” she called loudly.

Grinning, I handed her another trout. We speedily finished cleaning the four, after which we took them to the river to rinse off the remnant bloody bits.

“Do you fly-fish, then?” I asked her.

“Nah. Mostly lake stuff. My family owns a boat shop near the Ashokan reservoir.”

“In Kingston, you said?”

“In West Hurley, actually. But no one knows where the fuck that is, so I say Kingston.”

“I don’t even know where that is, and I’m from around here!”

Alana giggled as she massaged one of the trout under a tiny waterfall. “See? Most people hardly even know where Kingston is!”

“Yeah, we definitely live in the sticks,” I agreed. “How’s Albany, then?”

“It’s funny: Megan thinks Albany is a small town, but I still see it like a giant city. Luckily it’s pretty close to here so I can sneak back and get my outdoor fix. You know what they say: you can take the girl out of the woods, but...”

I sniffed. “Yeah.”

Alana grinned at me. “You understand, right? Being in grad school and all?”

“Funny.”

Back in our campsite, Lara had the Coleman fired up and was heating the pasta water. She gave us a grin as she took a long swig of her wine.

“Can you clean that up? It’s gross!” Megan complained, pointing at the spattered newspapers that still lined the table like a crime scene. Sophie, while not petrified like her friend was, also kept her distance as if the guts might jump onto her shirt if she got too close.

“What are you talking about? That’s actually our tablecloth,” I deadpanned, getting a laugh from everyone except Meg. She only offered me a patently sour look. I disposed of the newspaper in the fire, noticing that Alana was searching our site for something.

“What do you need?”

“Grill?”

I winced. “Crap. I didn’t bring one.”

“Hmm.” Alana pursed her lips, glanced at her friends, and then said, “I might have some skewers at our site. I’ll be back.”

She gave me a look as she started to head off. I felt the urge to go with her, but I didn’t say anything. With a small smile, she walked away.

“How old are you guys?” Megan asked, sitting at the table after checking the area for anything that might have escaped my casual cleanup.

“Seventeen,” Lara replied, before I could answer.

I stared at my sister, but she ignored me.

“So you’re going to be like, seniors next year then?” Sophie asked.

“Yeah.”

“Sweet.”

Megan said, “Yeah, that’s the best time, you know. Especially after you get accepted to college. It was non-stop partying in New York. Good times, for real. Do you party much out here?”

“Sure,” Lara answered, shrugging.

“But you don’t have like clubs or anything, right?”

“Pfft. No, not here.”

“I didn’t think so. It’s hard to find a decent place in Albany, even. So what do you do?”

“We go to people’s houses, or up into the woods. There’s lots of places to drink and hang out.”

“That’s cool. The clubs get boring sometimes. But aren’t there like, bears and stuff out at night?”

“All the time,” I said. “There’s tons of bears in these woods.”

Lara gave me a look of both amusement and disapproval. The other two girls stared at me.

“Get out,” Sophie finally dismissed.

“Serious.”

The two friends eyed each other for a moment. “Really?”

“You can hear them thrashing around in the woods at night. Are you staying in a tent?”

“Yeah, why?” Megan answered, her mind seemingly racing.

“Then you’ll probably hear them tonight.”

She narrowed her eyes. “You’re shitting me.”

“I’m not.”

“People wouldn’t be in tents if there were bears,” Sophie observed pointedly.

“Exactly,” Megan agreed, nodding with confidence at her friend’s logical conclusion.

“Really, they don’t bother you,” I continued, “unless you have food in your tent, or if you have the smell of food on your clothes. You know, chocolate, or bread, or ... fish guts.” I couldn’t stifle the laugh completely.

Megan was close enough to slap my arm with her free hand. “Oh, whatever!” She then sniffed at the red spot on her shirt, recoiling at the smell. “Ugh! Are you sure this will come out?”

I shrugged. “Never said it would. You should probably rinse it out as soon as you can, though.”

“I think he wants you to take it off, Meg!” Sophie teased.

I immediately felt my face heat up as Lara and Sophie hooted.

“I didn’t—That’s not—” I stammered a few more words before realizing that Megan was giving Sophie a look of disapproval, not me.

She eyed the ruddy spot and then sighed. “Ah, whatever. It’s not my favorite shirt anyway. I’ll just trash it after dinner.”

Alana returned with some skewers and a pair of metal rods. “Old tarp poles,” she explained, as everyone eyed the collection.

“What the hell are you doing?” Sophie asked her.

“Rigging something up for the fish.”

“We actually want to eat, like, tonight, MacGyver?”

“Don’t worry. What’s the hurry anyway?”

“I told them about the bears that live around this river,” I elucidated.

For a moment, I could see her debating whether she was going to act like a city girl or a country girl.

“Matt,” she chided, “I wasn’t going to tell them!” She was grinning at me even as she faced away from them.

“Sorry. It’s not a big deal, though,” I added, stifling a smile of my own.

Megan maintained a dubious look, but she also took a piece of paper towel to her shirt and tried again to rub the spot away. Lara looked on with amusement.

I helped Alana drag one end of the picnic table closer to the fire. She then placed one of our camp chairs on the opposite side of the fire ring, allowing her to span the two long poles in parallel over the flames, forming a trestle. After pressing the skewers through the fish tailbones, she set them to rest across the poles. The trout now hung head down above the blaze, out of the direct heat but enveloped by the rising smoke.

“Nice,” I murmured, admiring her improvised setup.

Megan came to get a closer look. “Seriously, this looks like some fucked up pagan ritual. Hmm ... Actually, this explains a lot about you, Alana.”

“Shut up, Megs,” Alana retorted with a grin. “Wait until you taste it.”

“I don’t think that’s going to happen, babe.”

We spent the smoking period drinking wine and picking at the chips and dip. Sophie and Megan admitted that they’d never been camping before. Sophie seemed mostly unperturbed about roughing it, just as she’d been mostly indifferent to me seeing her in panties and bra earlier. Megan brought up the bears again, but as the wine took hold of us even she began to relax. That lasted until she shot up from the picnic table, shrieking and swatting at her arm.

“Eew! What is it? A slug! Get it off me!”

At last she managed to flick the offending slime from her elbow. Sophie eventually figured out that Meg had set her arm down on a glop of fish innards that had escaped my table cleanup.

Alana was fully enjoying the scene. “Relax, Meg. It’s not like it’s the fucking Blob coming to get you!”

We all burst out in fits. “The Blob!”

Only Meg glared at me, still shrill. “You said you cleaned the table!”

Sophie didn’t help me out by adding, “You’re going to be popular with the grizzlies tonight, girl!”

I was saved by a hissing sound as the pasta pot started to boil over on the camp stove. While Megan stamped off to the restroom yet again, the spaghetti went into the water. Alana wanted to shift the fish lower over the fire, which had mostly settled down to embers. We rearranged the table and chair carefully, allowing the catch to sizzle in the newfound heat.

“Time to eat,” Alana announced a minute later, using a stack of newspapers as a makeshift glove to grab the scorching hot skewers. She slid the four smoked trout onto a plate and placed them on the table.

Megan started complaining at once. “Gross. Do you have to eat the skin?”

“You don’t have to eat any of it at all,” Alana answered, cleanly slicing off a filet from one flank and laying it on her plate.

After long consideration, Megan served herself a small section. Warily she put a piece into her annoyed mouth, but straightaway removed it with her fingers. “There’s bones in it!”

“Jeez, Megs, just pick them out as you eat!”

Megan held her hands up in exasperation. “That’s too much work! Shit. I mean all that, and now you have to pick out the bones? Fuck that. I’ll just wait for pasta.”

“More for us then!” I sang.

Megan rolled her eyes as she shoved her plate across the table at me. Alana and I glanced at each other, shrugging happily before splitting the bonus serving between us. The trout was exceptionally good, far superior to the butter fry I was going to do. It disappeared quickly amongst the four of us.

Conversation and laughter flowed easier now, due to satisfied stomachs and a wine buzz developing in our brains. After we devoured the pasta, which Megan did eat, Sophie wanted to roast marshmallows. While the three girls went to their site to fetch the treats along with some camp chairs, I added some logs to the fire and got it burning nicely again.

“Bears?” Lara asked, once they’d disappeared into the gathering darkness.

“Seniors?” I retorted.

We both laughed.

I nudged her elbow. “You dig Sophie, huh?”

She raised an eyebrow at me. “Why do you say?”

“You do! He calls it!”

“She is cute,” Lara admitted. Then she nodded at me with some respect. “Pretty good, for a blind guy. When did you get all observant?”

“I could just tell.”

“I figured you were too busy flirting with Alana to notice.”

“I wasn’t flirting.”

Lara sniffed in amusement. “Okay, you still are blind, then.”

“Well, I wasn’t flirting,” I repeated. “Not everything has to be about that.”

“Then what is it about?”

“She’s cool. I like someone who doesn’t mind cleaning fish.”

“So you’re into Megan, then?”

I laughed. “She is a bit annoying,” I agreed, keeping my voice down.

“Yeah, I’ll say.”

I spotted some shadows moving on the road. “They’re coming back.”

“What are you going to do?” Lara asked.

I frowned. “With what?”

“With them?”

“What are you talking about?” I whispered.

Our new friends had arrived at our site again, so Lara just shrugged as she took a seat. Marshmallows were distributed as we gathered around the reborn blaze.

“This is the life,” Alana mused, watching me as she pulled a perfectly melted creamy ball from the heat. The lightly toasted orb quivered on the point of her whittled branch as she took a bite. Some dribbled out of the center to run down the side of her mouth.

“Oops!”

Alana wiped at the mess and then cleaned her finger with her tongue. There was no deliberateness in her movements to suggest any innuendo, and yet it seemed like something Heather would’ve done, on purpose. Just to tease me.

Megan and Sophie talked of raves, while Alana and I spoke of fishing. Lara remained unusually quiet. A third fifth of wine was consumed, so the banter grew more fluid. In the darkness, the flickering fire painted everyone’s visage with an unsteady orange glow. It seemed like Lara and Sophie looked at each other often. Perhaps I even caught them exchanging smiles? No, I was fast getting drunk, so it was surely my imagination.

Headlights in the night startled me as I abruptly realized that our parents could have changed their minds and come to check on us. Here we were, getting fucked up with some college kids, drinking wine. If not my folks, a ranger or even the camp host might notice us and start to wonder if we were of age. We’d been far too cavalier about the revelry.

“Who the hell is that?” I blurted out, squinting against the brilliance.

“Camp security?” Sophie offered.

“I hope not, or we are so busted,” I said nervously.

“Why?” Alana asked. “I have no blood in my alcohol stream!”

We all laughed at that as the car drove past and went to a different site, but I decided a little more surreptitiousness would serve us well in case of any unsolicited visitors. With the excuse of having to pee, I slipped the three empty wine bottles into the paper bag along with some other trash and carried it all to the restroom with me, where I furtively dropped it into the garbage can.

Upon returning to camp, Megan was standing at the table riffling through her purse.

“Hope you didn’t set that down on the other glob of fish that Matt left for you!” Alana was saying.

“Ha-ha, babe!” Meg retorted. She soon returned to the circle holding a pack of cigarettes. “You two smoke?” she asked Lara and me.

“Sometimes,” Lara answered, to my surprise. This time I wasn’t sure if it was a fib.

Megan pulled out a hand-rolled cigarette and said, “Talking about pot, right?”

She lit the joint and toked it to life. After a couple of puffs, Sophie took it from Meg’s outstretched hand and put it to her own lips. As the weed passed to Alana, I realized I had a decision to make, and soon. A few tobacco cigarettes were the extent of my experience with burning plants. I’d seen older kids smoking bongs at some parties the previous school year, but pot hadn’t diffused down into my own group of friends yet.

I glanced at Lara for guidance, but she was poking at the fire with a thick branch. Alana took a last, long drag. She raised her brow at me as she held out the white twig. There was a pregnant pause as she kept the drug within her. Finally, I took the offering from her. My head seemed to spin as I put it to my mouth. I was aware of Lara watching me as I inhaled a drag of the smoke. A strange sensation coated my insides as I reached full breath. Rather quickly, my lungs expelled of their own accord, unsure if this new thing was a heavenly insult or a devilish delight. Feeling self-conscious, I passed the joint to Lara right away. To my relief, she also took a hit.

“Good shit, huh?” Sophie said, intently watching my sister.

“Yeah,” she agreed, her voice throaty as she exhaled. She gave the joint to Megan, completing the circle.

“Meg scored us some prime leaf last week, down in the Bronx,” Sophie explained.

I laughed a little, though I didn’t know why. My perception was already changing slightly. It was an odd sensation, but not unpleasant.

“Come on, Meg! Don’t bogart it,” Sophie called out.

Megan was taking her third pull of the joint. “Chill, Soph.” She flashed her the open cigarette package, which was stuffed with five joints as plump as the one we were working on. “There’s plenty to go around.”

After some twenty minutes, I understood the term ‘stoned’. I found myself speculating if my blood had stopped moving through my body. Everything was so incredibly relaxed. We talked of things I couldn’t recall later, but I did remember laughing a lot and eating an excessive amount of chips. At one point we all became captivated by watching marshmallows burst into flame. The dance of the conflagration was intoxicating to watch. The dripping remains seemed to stretch out time as they sagged into the embers like a living, rustic Dali canvas.

Megan fell off her chair at one point, laughing uncontrollably despite a close call between the iron fire ring and her right temple. It was very funny, for reasons none of us could have explained, then or now. Once she regained her seat, she pointed to the splotch of fish blood on her shirt.