Page 96 of Valley Girls
Someone said something, and Walker looked away.
Rilla stared at her plate until her pulse resumed a semi-normal speed, and Gage passed her a platter with spicy tuna rolls.
“Rilla, you doing anything tomorrow? Want to do a route on El Cap with us?” Tam—a visiting climber—asked.
Rilla sat up straighter, theyesimmediately on her tongue. Then she sank. “I agreed to work. I’m sorry. But I would have loved to.”
Tam moved on, but Rilla glowed with the feeling of being invited—being part of them. Maybe she could bail on the shift she’d picked up.
The house was full, the windows open to the cool mountain breezes, and the beer and sake were poured liberally. Rilla eyed the platters of fish Petra kept bringing, unable and unwilling to calculate how much this had cost, or how far Petra had to drive to get to a town where she could buy it all. For the first time, she realized everyone but her pitched money in for these meals. After this, she decided, she’d pull her own weight.
She ate until she was bursting, and drank until she was warmed and glowing and could practically feel Walker at the other end of the table. Their eyes kept connecting in between the laughter and the stories; and when his eyes grazed over her, she felt it as a pulse of electricity in her whole body.
Long after dinner had ended they sat there, drinking slowly and sipping tea Petra had put out. Rilla’s thighs were sweaty and stuck to the chair, and her cheeks ached from smiling.
Walker stood and patted his chest. “I’m stuffed. That calls for a smoke.”
It was like her whole body had been waiting. She jumped up. “I’ll ... uh ... come with you.” She tried to be cool, but Adeena laughed outright, and Gage even covered his mouth with his hand.
“Shut up,” she muttered. “Can I bum a smoke?” she asked Walker. And then she blinked, because she had been bumming smokes all summer—which didn’t really amount to quitting, but it was something like once or twice a week, which was basically quitting. And hey, look at her.She’d quit!
“I was going to ask you,” Walker said. He winked. “I can lend you one.”
She pushed out her chair.
Adeena smacked her on the ass on the way out, and she yelped.
Walker glanced back at her with a confused face. “You all right?”
She swallowed her laughter. “I’m good.”
“She’s spectacular,” Adeena said.
“Y’all are juvenile,” Caroline said.
“What are they talking about?” Walker said, holding the door for her. “I missed it.”
“I have no idea,” Rilla said with a roll of her eyes.
And then they were outside.
She took a deep breath of the cool breeze, the moonlight bathing the wide-open meadow, and the mountains.
Walker started down the road, lighting the smoke and then handing it over for her to share.
“Thanks,” she said, suddenly shy.
His white shirt glowed in the moonlight, blue on his skin. “Man, that was good.”
She exhaled and nodded. “Oh my god, yes. That was the first time I’ve had sushi. I didn’t expect it to be that good.”
“Petra’s a good one. She’s got some ...quirks, but she’s never stingy about sharing an experience. Did you see the bathtub in that house yet?”
“The copper one?” Rilla asked. It was the only bathtub she could imagine him meaning.
“Did you try it yet?”
“Is the experience worth its weight in scrap?”
