Count Me In (3 page)

2+3=5. 3+5=8. Since she was little, she'd fallen asleep by counting, but the Fibonacci string was way more interesting than counting by twos. Ashley's and Cedar's voices drifted upstairs and broke her concentration.

“Did you hear about Jason's trip to Cerise Creek last year?” Ashley said.

“No.”

“He was walking to the outhouse, and he heard something in the bushes. Guess what it was?”

“A bear?

“No, a snake!”

“Big deal,” Cedar said.

“It was a rattler.”

“Whatever,” Cedar said.

Tabitha shivered in her sleeping bag. Could there be snakes way up at Lake Lovely Water? She hated snakes. 5+8=13. 8+13=21.

“I'm serious!” Ashley said.

“There aren't any rattlesnakes around here. Jason was lying.”

“Mom, Cedar won't believe me. There are rattlesnakes in BC, right?”

“In the Interior. Not around here,” Tess said.

“Well, maybe Jason was wrong about the rattler, but I'm sure he saw a snake.”

Cedar snorted. “Right. Or maybe he thought he'd tell a good story.”

Tabitha stuck her fingers in her ears to block out their voices. 13+21=34. Cedar must be right. There couldn't be any snakes this high in the mountains. And definitely not any rattlers.

Once she shut out the noise from downstairs, it didn't take long to fall asleep—somewhere around 987. In the middle of the night she woke up and needed to pee so badly, it hurt. She lay there, tossing and turning, willing her body back to sleep. Squeezing her eyes shut, she tried to recite the Fibonacci string, but it didn't work.

She sat up and tried to unzip her sleeping bag quietly. Loud breathing ate up the air in the room. Tess's was the high-pitched whistling breath, Cedar's the rumbling followed by a snort and Ashley's—she paused. There wasn't a third breath.

“Watch for snakes,” a low voice called from Ashley's bunk.

Tabitha froze. “There aren't any snakes. Nobody believes your story.”

“How do you know? Maybe I'm right and they're all wrong. Maybe it's hiding in the outhouse, waiting to slither out and bite you.”

Ashley was so full of it. Tabitha stalked to the ladder, no longer trying to be quiet. But as she climbed down, a cold feeling threaded its way from her stomach to her throat. What if there really was a snake hiding in the outhouse? She shook her head to get rid of the idea. Ashley was trying to scare her. She'd probably made up the whole story just so Tabitha would hear it.

The light from her headlamp flashed on Max, sleeping by the door. She grabbed her jacket. “Wake up and come with me.” Max didn't move. “Let's go for a walk.”

He labored to his feet, took a few steps away from the door and plopped back on the floor.

“Fine, I'll go by myself.”

She started shivering the moment she stepped out the door. A mottled, inky sky loomed over her. No moon lit the path. Not even one star winked at her. She hurried to the outhouse, scanning back and forth with her headlamp.

The outhouse door squeaked as she pushed it open with her toe. She shone the light into the pit. Disgusting. But no snakes. She closed her eyes, held her breath and peed as fast as she could, imagining writhing serpents below her butt.

Her headlamp bounced on her head as she hurried back to the hut. Max's snores greeted her at the door.

“Night. Some help you were.” She clambered up the ladder and into her sleeping bag.

Everyone else was sleeping. She closed her eyes and tried to sleep, but the fresh air and the fear left her wide awake.

Ping
. Something clanged on the metal roof. She tensed, listening hard. More
pings
. Louder and faster. Was the hut being attacked by squirrels? What if they found a hole in the roof and came looking for food?

Her body relaxed as she figured it out. Not squirrels, rain. A lot of rain by the sounds of it. The
pings
grew closer and closer, faster and faster, until they blended into a solid roar. She'd made it back from the outhouse just in time.

She groaned. Tess had planned for them to hike to a nearby peak the next day. Would she make them go in the rain? Which would be worse, hiking in the downpour or being stuck inside the hut all day? If they stayed inside, Ashley would spend the day reminding Tabitha that she didn't like her. She rolled over and tried to find a comfortable position. It was no use. The wooden slats of the bunk pushed through the thin foamie.

Finally she drifted off. Minutes later, it seemed, Tess got up and went downstairs to make tea. Cedar followed. Tabitha lifted her head and peered out the window. Gray fog stretched across the trees like cobwebs. She couldn't even see the outhouse, let alone the mountain ridges. She snuggled farther into her sleeping bag. Surely they wouldn't be going anywhere.

A teacup clinked on the wood table. “What are you doing up so early, Cedar?”

“Thought you'd want some company.”

Tea poured into a second cup. “Just because your dad used to get up with me doesn't mean you have to.”

“I was awake, that's all. And thirsty.”

Silence for a moment. Tabitha imagined Cedar gulping hot tea.

Footsteps moved to the window. “No point in hiking to the ridge this morning,” Tess said.

“The weather report looked good for the weekend.”

“Bad timing,” Tess said. “We need the rain though. And it'll make finding water easier on the way home.”

It had been a hot, dry autumn. Tabitha's classroom at school was so hot that no one could concentrate, not even the teachers. Everyone had been grumpy.

Thinking about school made her grumpy, too, as she lay in her sleeping bag. She hadn't had a good start to the school year, thanks to Melissa Rogers. Even thinking her name made a knot twist in Tabitha's stomach.

“Nice shoes,” Melissa had sneered as Tabitha sat at her desk on the first day of school. The girls sitting around Melissa—girls Tabitha had known most of her school life—giggled.

She was wearing the same runners she'd worn all summer. Pale blue. Used, but not ragged. Comfortable. She didn't think about them, she just put them on. Melissa and her giggling friends all wore ballet slippers decorated with shiny sequins.

“Do you have dance class today?” Tabitha asked, bringing on another fit of giggles.

“Where've you been all summer?” Melissa said. “Everybody's wearing ballet flats this year.”

“Oh.” She didn't bother telling them that she'd been at math camp in Manitoba for half of August.

Things got worse day by day. Girls snickered behind her back. Groups in the hallways broke apart as she approached. Kids pretended not to notice her. And no one told her what she'd done wrong, why she'd been singled out this year.

Over the summer almost every other girl in the class had grown breasts and an interest in makeup. Tabitha still had a flat chest and didn't own any makeup. She figured she made an easy target. But even when she tried to fit in by wearing some of her mom's lipstick to school, it didn't make a difference.

Getting out of bed in the morning became the hardest thing to do. Her mom had to force her to eat breakfast and make it to the bus on time. She even sent Tabitha to the school counselor, which only made things worse. The counselor told her everything would be confidential, but after they spoke, Melissa was called to the principal's office.

When she came back to the classroom, she made a detour past Tabitha's desk. “Snitch,” she hissed.

After that, nobody talked to Tabitha anymore.

She overheard her mom on the phone with a friend. “Tabitha's depressed.” Hearing that had made Tabitha feel even worse. She wanted to storm over to her mom and shout, “I am not!” But she couldn't force herself off the couch. Her parents had thought hiking with her cousins would make her feel better. Not likely.

Max woofed at the bottom of the ladder. At least he liked her. She unzipped her bag. There was no going back to sleep now.

“Morning, Tabitha,” Tess said. “How'd you sleep?”

Tabitha gave Max a morning rub and kiss. “Okay. I'm not used to sleeping on a bunk. Or with other people around.”

Tess nodded. “I remember the first time I slept in a hut. There were fifteen other people in it, and it was minus ten outside. One guy snored so loud I thought he'd start an avalanche, and another kept farting in his sleep.”

Tabitha laughed. She couldn't imagine her parents ever saying something like that. In her family, they didn't fart; they were flatulent.

Max walked in circles by the door, wagging his tail and barking.

“Oh,
now
you want to go out, do you? All right.” Tabitha grabbed her jacket and boots and turned to her aunt. “Do I need a leash?”

“No leash laws up here. Max is pretty good at staying nearby.”

Cedar threw her a paper bag. “Catch. You'll need this.”

Tabitha grabbed the bag off the floor where it had fallen. “What's this for?”

“Your pooper scooper.”

She cringed. It was too late to back out of taking Max; he was wagging his tail and waiting for her at the door. “What do I do with it when it's full?”

“Empty it into the outhouse, then bring the bag back and we'll burn it,” Tess said.

Tabitha sighed. She never knew there was so much poo involved in camping. “C'mon Max, let's get this over with.”

As she opened the door, she caught a movement out of the corner of her eye. Ashley hung her head over the edge of the loft, smirking. Tabitha walked out the door. After it shut, she turned and stuck her tongue out in Ashley's direction.

The rain pelted her face and ran down the back of her neck. It was completely different outside than it had been the day before. Gray waves churned up the water, which looked dark and uninviting. She shivered at the thought of swimming in it. Even Max stayed away. He did his business by the path, and she scooped it up.

They ran to the outhouse. At least in daylight, she wasn't worried about snakes. She emptied the bag into the pit as quickly as she could, holding her breath.

“Let's go back, Max. Even spending time with Ashley is better than this.”

Before this trip she hadn't seen Ashley for several months. Her cousins' house in Squamish was an hour's drive from Tabitha's home in Vancouver. Since Uncle Bruce's funeral, they hadn't seen much of each other, although Tabitha's mom had tried. She'd even tried to convince Tess to move to Vancouver and live with them for a while. Thank goodness Tess had rejected her mom's idea.

When Tabitha and her cousins were little, they used to play together all summer while Tess took classes to upgrade her midwifery degree. One time, Ashley and Tabitha played doctor. Of course, Ashley was always the doctor. Ashley had said Tabitha's belly button stuck out too much. To fix it she put a marble in it and told Tabitha to lie very still in the grass for half an hour. Tabitha lay on her back in the hot sun, trying not to let the marble roll out. Ashley was off playing with Cedar. After a while Tabitha's mom called them for lunch. Tabitha lay like a statue. Had it been half an hour? After the third call she got up, worrying as the marble rolled onto the grass.

“Where were you?” her mom asked, annoyed.

“In the backyard.”

Ashley finished off her sandwich and grinned. “Is it an inny now?”

Not much had changed between them since.

CHAPTER FOUR

Inside the hut, Tess and Cedar were making oatmeal and tea for breakfast. Tabitha's stomach growled. Oatmeal sounded much better than curried chickpeas. She scooped up a huge bowl to make up for the night before.

“We won't be doing any hiking today,” Tess said.

Tabitha nodded. She wasn't at all broken up about it. Her shoulders ached, and a blister on her heel was leaking clear liquid onto her sock. Her legs were so sore that each step made her wince. “It's really wet out there,” she said.

“Rain's not the problem,” Tess said. “We could get lost above the tree line in this fog.”

“Are we going home early?” Tabitha tried to keep the hope out of her voice.

Cedar shook his head. “The weather forecast was for a decent weekend. Maybe tomorrow it'll be clear enough to scatter Dad's ashes on the ridge.”

Tabitha's heart sank. She nodded.

Tess pulled a box off the shelf and handed it to Cedar. “Why don't you guys play Monopoly?”

“Not me,” Ashley said. “I'm going back to bed.”

“I'll play.” Cedar turned to Tabitha. “You in?”

“Sure.” It wasn't like she had anything else to do. Ashley paused as though she wanted to change her mind, then climbed the ladder to the loft.

“You playing, Mom?” Cedar asked.

Tess grabbed the ax from beside the stove. “No, I'll go chop some firewood.”

Cedar let the box clatter onto the table. “I was going to do that later.”

Tess shook her head. “I can handle it.”

“But I want to.”

“You don't have to do everything he did, Cedar.”

“I just wanted to chop the wood,” he said.

“I need exercise. You can chop more later.” Tess marched out the door.

Cedar stared at the door for a moment, then shook his shoulders and started setting up the board and counting out the money.

Tabitha remembered Cedar at Uncle Bruce's funeral. The ceremony had been on a rock bluff overlooking Squamish—one of Bruce's favorite climbing spots. The guests wore T-shirts and shorts, and person after person spoke about Bruce's climbing career, his passion for life and his strong work ethic.

Tabitha had stood on tiptoes to see Cedar and Ashley as their faces floated in and out of view between the heads of people in front of her. Ashley's back was to Tess. She pulled away from her mom's arm, clinging to Cedar as the tears streamed down her face.

Cedar stood with a straight back, staring at the cliffs. Every once in a while, he had rolled his shoulders up to his ears and let them fall.