Page 70 of Valley Girls
“It was about coming out. I don’t care who is involved. It was about exposing something intensely vulnerable to a mother who has never been safe for Thea. A mother Thea has always had to take care of. It’s not even remotely your business. Only Thea gets to decide that.”
“But our parents are ...”
“It doesn’t matter, Rilla,” Lauren said. “What matters is you need to respect Thea and her decisions about how to handle her family. Thea deserves an apology from you.”
Rilla kept her head ducked. “I mean, she knows ...”
“Not unless you tell her. She loves you and is here to help you. She was the one who suggested bringing you out here. When she heard what happened with that boy, she spent hours on the phone with your mom, convincing her that you needed to leave West Virginia.”
That ache started up again in the back of Rilla’s throat.
Lauren looked at her, waiting.
Rilla exhaled and closed her eyes. “I didn’t know,” she croaked. “I thought my mom asked her to take me.”
“Nope.” Lauren shook her head.
The silence was deafening.
Rilla felt sick to her stomach. All this time she’d thought Mom had wanted her to go, and Thea had just been the closest person. She hadn’t realized Thea had been convincing Mom ... wearing her down, getting her to see how serious it was. That definitely made more sense. Ugh. Rilla put her face in her hands.
“Need in the bathroom? I’m getting a shower,” Lauren said, standing up.
“I’m good.” Rilla bolted for the door. “I’m going to get some sunshine.” Closing the door behind her, she sat on the porch and put her chin in her hands. How could she fix this mess?
With a sigh, she slid off the edge of the porch and started walking for Yosemite Village. As she left the meadow and joined the asphalt path, someone whistled behind her.
She turned as Walker pedaled up behind her in shorts and a fluorescent T-shirt with SAR printed in bold, black letters on the back. “Climbing today, Rilla?” He stopped and leaned the bike between his legs.
She tried not to grin like a goober, awkward conversation with Lauren forgotten. “Not today. You on call?”
“Just got back from carrying a hiker down from Half Dome,” he groaned. “I’m going to eat before something else happens. You going that way?”
“Yep.”
“Well, hop on then.” He straightened the bike and Rilla gleefully stood on the back, hands on his shoulders. She was pathetic, but it was okay, she’d accepted that about herself.
“I know you’ll probably say no, but ...” He pedaled toward dinner. “Want to lead tomorrow?”
The California sun hung in a cloudless blue sky, but she was sure, at that moment, the clouds parted somewhere and shone brighter. “Yes!” She completely forgot to flirt or tease him in her desperation to have someone teach her to lead a route without having to ask Petra or Adeena.
They rolled through an intersection and Rilla spotted Thea, standing to the side, holding a long line of cars at a stop. Thea looked tired and sweaty. She waved as Rilla rolled past.
Shame crawled up Rilla’s spine.
Twenty Two
The smell of the swollen river and wood smoke led Rilla under the cedars as she walked into Camp 4 the next morning.She was going climbing with Walker.
Her hair was braided, and she wore her mom’s cut-off “Southern X-Posure” T-shirt and a pair of Thea’s fancy outdoor pants she’d stolen. Gage had wrapped a cord around her sunglasses so they would hang on her neck if she knocked them off while climbing, and her old West Virginia Mountaineers hat rested snugly on her head. In her backpack she carried her booty from turning in all her homework to Thea and spending all her money—a harness, shoes that seemed to fit, a helmet, Grigri, and a chalk bag. It made her feel equally legit and fake. But she gripped the gear and tried to look like she belonged.
She was determined.
Hoisting the harness on her shoulder, she blocked out the image of everyone laughing at her behind her back, and walked into the sacred realm of white tents of the SAR site.
Four people—not including Walker—sat at a picnic table under one of the tarp porches, sharing what looked like a cozy breakfast. Two girls and two men. Tanned and strong and worn out in the way Walker often seemed—not in the physical sense, but where his clothes and his patience didn’t suffer fools. The girl on the end closest to Rilla, with her coltish limbs and a smattering of freckles, noticed her first and they all paused and looked quizzically at her, confirming her suspicion that entering this part of the camp was like entering into someone’s house unannounced. She’d just waltzed into their kitchen, during breakfast. She swallowed quickly and her face burned. “Walker?” she choked out, thinking the less she said, the better she’d be.
“What?” the girl asked, tilting her head further.
