pulled at me, urging me to do thing I’d have never even contemplated before.
I didn’t want to disappoint her.
So I got to my feet. This brought a round of laughter from my brothers. She held my hands in hers, a little lower
than shoulder height, leaving a space between us so we could see each other’s feet. I tried to mimic her
motion, but failed miserably. Feeling foolish, I stopped moving “I can’t do this”.
“No, you were doing it, just keep trying!” She giggled and held my hands tighter, and I started moving with her
again. “See, you’ve got it” She smiled encouragingly. “You’re doing good!”
“Yeah! For a drunken octopus!” A brother teased from the far side of the campfire. I flushed with
embarrassment. Somehow my mind linked that feeling with her, as though it was her fault.
“Shut up!” Anna snapped angrily as I pulled away and stopped moving.
“You’ve pissed her off now!” The older of the two mocked.
“Hey, you guys be nice.” I heard my dad saying over my shoulder as I stepped away to the darkness towards
my tent. No moon had risen as of yet, so it was dark—near pitch black. I felt confused and hurt. Something
about the whole situation made me feel vulnerable in a way I’d never felt before. It was stupid really. I wanted
to impress her in some way and I though my brothers’ comments would somehow reveal the truth about me.
They might reveal that I’m just some geeky nerd with nothing to offer.
I caught a flash of light from the corner of my eye and turned to see someone striding towards my tent with a
flashlight—though they were approaching from a different angle. I stopped and waited. I could just make out
Anna’s pretty face in the reflected light. She stopped a few paces from my tent, the ring of light on the
entrance. She called out my name softly, a look of anxious worry marring her beautiful features. I’m not sure
why I kept quiet. I saw her silhouette shift and sigh before turning and heading off towards her own tent.
The heat of the sun baking my tent brought me from sleep the following morning. I climbed from my tent and
made my way towards the sound of voices at the main camp.
“We lost you last night.” Mark said when I walked up.
“Yeah, I just felt real tired so I went to bed.” My brothers snickered a little. From the corner of my eye I could
see Anna watching me, pretty much staring. I look everywhere else to avoid eye contact.
“Got any plans for the day?” Mark asked.
I suddenly felt as if everyone was watching me, waiting for my response. “Um.” I paused, my brain slowly
working for a response. “I thought I might walk out to Beggar’s Point and go swimming.”
“Beggar’s Point?” This was a place we went cliff diving at. There was a number of different cliff faces of
varying height that all dropped down into an absurdly deep pool in the lake. It had been named such because
of an incident when I was eleven where I had been brought to tears by my father while I was begging not to be
thrown off the highest point—a nearly sixty-foot drop to the water. Somehow the name stuck and we’ve been