Curtis Streuli, A Blues For Eden

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one sort or another but it was nothing that required their attention the
way school had. Andrea had decided to actually live at Andy s house,
paying small amounts of rent when she could and helping around the
house in a way that by now seemed old and familiar. She truly felt like
they were her family now and the independence of early adulthood was
as wonderful as the evenings they spent together. They resumed their
visits to the mountain also, no longer needing to ask Andy s parents the
permission they had always been granted.
Mountain Girl had enjoyed her forays into the rest of the world
more than she had realized and was almost disappointed when they
returned to the routine of coming to see her but they reminded her that
it would be fall again soon enough. In the meantime several months of
warmth and freedom beckoned with a promise that was almost
palpable. They could do what they wanted.
Andrea first response to this feeling was to try to reorganize her
band but too many people were away and there just wasn t enough time
for planning and preparation. But that was okay. Just as she had felt
during the first summer that she had been friends with Andy, this
seemed to be a moment in time when life was about to be launched in
an unknown direction. She felt powerful, strong, young, and confident;
ready to embrace the world, and this time would not come again. She
wanted to make the most of it and her friends felt the same way. They
began to make plans.
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What Would You Do If I Did That To You ?
It had seemed like such a good idea at the time. Mountain Girl had
enjoyed her explorations of civilization so much that they had decided
that this summer she really needed to see more of the world, and so
with only a few weeks remaining before college resumed they had
loaded a tent and some food and a bunch of other paraphernalia into
Andy s car, and had set off for a place they had only read about, the
ocean. So far it had gone well and they were all pleased with their little
journey of exploration. On the way they had stopped at a couple of
national parks and gone exploring, hiking up to other peaks even
grander than where Mountain Girl lived, and other times just spending
the night at the local bar and then sleeping by the side of the road or
occasionally even spending money on a hotel and staying in a city,
which always delighted Andrea with the possibility of sampling the
local music scene. And they d enjoyed the whole feeling of meeting
new people, getting to know them, having a feeling for a place by
befriending those who lived there. They had a book filled with
addresses of those they d met who they had promised to write or to
visit again someday.
It was a little known lake in a hollow far up in the local mountains.
There were no other cars at the trailhead and they hadn t gotten any
permits or anything; it wasn t that kind of place. From the looks of
what passed for a trailhead no one had been here in months. Andy had
heard about it from a local in a bar the night before and wanted to see it
but the directions he had gotten had been vague and it had taken several
inquiries at the forestry service to even find out where to go. Then just
as they were locking up the car, hoping that they were in the right
place, Bill James and Ken Gregory had driven up. They were going up
to the same lake to spend the night and even though they weren t locals
they had been there the year before. They knew the route, why not go
together? They parked their cars near each other and started off up the
trail.
Andrea had been against it from the start. There was something
about them that just rubbed her the wrong way. She d had a lifetime of
gauging people and discovering the worst about them and her instincts
were usually right but Andy seemed to think they would be okay even
though Mountain Girl had some doubts also, and so against her better
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judgment Andrea had convinced herself that they at most would be
obnoxious companions. Besides they had offered to pack up a whole
bottle of Jack Daniels and some weed and to share it later. Andrea
didn t trust that offer either but still it sounded good.
They didn t seem so bad on the hike up. It was a faint trail that
looked like it was hardly ever used but Bill and Ken remembered the
route well enough from before and led the way. Finally they got to the
lake and Ken and Bill put their tent up while the others put their things
a discrete distance away at Andreas insistence. They made dinner as it
got dark and then it was time to party. Andrea didn t feel like drinking
much and neither did her friends that night but eventually almost half
the Jack Daniels was gone along with some of a bottle of Blackberry
brandy they had brought and that was when the trouble started.
It began with not too subtle teasing of Andy leading up to the
question they all knew had been on Ken and Bill s mind ever since they
had met at the trailhead. What was Andy doing with two gorgeous
women anyway? Didn t he think he should share? Andy was acting
too buzzed to really respond although Andrea knew this wasn t really
the case. It was more a case of Andy trying to be thoughtful and letting
his two friends make their own decision. It was something they had
agreed on at the beginning of their trip but Andrea wished he would be
less thoughtful and polite tonight, or at least less seemingly oblivious to
just how uncomfortable Andrea was feeling about everything.
The two men began to describe the time they had come here last
year. They d been accompanied by a woman who had turned out to
need forceful persuading and they described the details of what Andrea
thought was a clear cut major felony. Then Ken began playing with a
hunting knife that he produced from his pack, talking about just how
deadly it could be. Andrea was suddenly far beyond uncomfortable,
now worried and disgusted with the whole situation and seething over
the story they had just told. She hoped it was at least partly fabricated.
She thought it probably it was; these two seemed to have too much to
lose to engage in any serious violence. But you never knew, people
were often full of unpleasant surprises. She responded to Ken's
demonstration by cleaning her nails for a few moments with an equally
ominous looking knife and then said she was going to go to sleep,
rather pointedly commenting that she had better be left undisturbed.
She wished Dennis was here. Between the two of them they could
have a lot of fun teaching these two punks a lesson. But she hadn t
seen him in months and he certainly wasn t here now. She started off
through the woods towards their sleeping bags wondering why her
friends hadn t picked up on her cue. She was having a really bad
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feeling by now and wasn t tired at all; worrying that she might have
been wrong in her estimation of how far Ken and Bill might be willing
to go with what they seemed to think was a game. She had begun to
think that maybe it would be prudent to stay awake and perhaps even
quietly pack up their stuff and bug out if the chance came. But her
friends were still by the fire and not showing any signs of following
her.
She wondered what was going through their minds. Andy just
looked confused but she was having trouble figuring out what was
going on with Mountain Girl tonight. Andrea could tell that something
about the two men was rubbing Mountain Girl the wrong way also.
But indecision about something was in plain sight on her face as she sat
by the fire. Andrea couldn t quite figure it out even as a feeling
resonated deep inside her, as if she too was trying to revisit some
unacknowledged thought.
She decided they would be better off with an unseen friend and so [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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