21. Serena
Serena
Graham is waiting for me in the gravel parking lot when I arrive.
He’s dressed like a safari guide without the weird-looking hat, leaning against a dusty silver Rivian truck with a huge pack on the ground beside him. The early-morning sun slants across his brown hair, bringing out the golden highlights.
I whip into the parking lot in a frenzy, hoping I’m not dinging up Lillie’s minivan as I do. I’m ten minutes late. If the look on Graham’s face means anything, he is not happy about that fact.
“Hi!” I say, tumbling out of the van and nearly tripping over my own feet. He makes no move to catch me this time. Why am I so clumsy around this man? It’s like my body yearns for him to sweep me up into his arms.
“You’re late.”
“Yeah, sorry about that.” I laugh, ducking into the back seat for my brand-new bag—a gear pack that holds my change of clothes, toothbrush, and extra camera gear.
Proudly, I take my camera itself and clip it to a holder on the strap.
This was a purchase made expressly for this trip, and it makes me feel far more legitimate.
I can do that—invest in my business—now that I have money from all these wealthy men flowing into my freelancing checking account.
“It’s a long hike,” Graham says, turning and walking toward a break in the fence. I huff and puff to catch up to him, looking wildly back toward the lot, where our two solitary vehicles sit like unlikely friends.
“Hey, wait.” I touch his wrist, pull back, and ask, “What about everyone else?”
Graham stops, turns back to face me. I can’t see his eyes through the polarized glasses. “…everyone else?”
“You know,” I blink and gesture back toward the cars. “Like, the videographer? Writers? Other people on your team?”
For an uncomfortable moment, we stand there, staring at each other.
Then, Graham sucks his teeth, nodding sharply. “I can see now why you would think more people were coming. No—I just need photos. The whole team came out before. All the other promotional materials are fine. Just the photos need re-taking.”
I stare at my reflection in his sunglasses, my heartbeat picking up slightly.
“You’re uncomfortable being alone with a man out here,” Graham says matter-of-fact, taking a step back from me and raising his hands. “That’s understandable. We can reschedule, and bring?—”
“No!” I step forward and take his wrist in my hand. Or, I try to. My fingers don’t touch. “Sorry.” I drop his wrist when he stares pointedly at the contact. “It’s okay. I was just surprised. You’re Ryan’s friend—that’s good enough for me.”
Graham studies me for a long moment, probably thinking that I’m stupid. If Georgia was watching this—in fact, if any of my roommates saw this—they’d make fun of my actions like the stupid girl in the horror movie who goes to check out the noise in the basement.
Yes, objectively, it is stupid for me to venture into the mountains with this man. With no cell signal. Relying on him for all our supplies. The best he could do is leave me behind. The worst is that I could end up on Dateline.
But Graham is high-profile. All my roommates know that I’m here, even if they don’t know I’m alone with him. He’s Travis’s brother and Ryan’s friend. If he murders women in his spare time, it doesn’t make sense that he would pick me. It wouldn’t be ideal for the whole, not-going-to-prison thing.
“I’m not sure I want to know what you’re thinking,” Graham deadpans, looking between me and the path ahead. “But if we’re going, we need to go now. Daylight is wasting.”
“I didn’t know people actually said that,” I laugh, once again working hard to catch up with him. It’s already startlingly apparent that I am not in good enough shape for this.
Graham doesn’t laugh.
It’s going to be a long day.
The path starts out through grass—a strip mowed down shorter than the rest, which rises up and sways well over my head. Then, slowly, we’re enveloped by trees, which grow thicker and thicker as we move along.
The foliage is a vibrant, almost painful green right now, but I can see in the way the leaves move on their branches just how beautiful they’ll be come fall, when the state is plunged into a mix of yellow, orange, and red. I’m not afraid to admit that I love autumn, even if that makes me basic.
It’s a little chilly when we start out, but it quickly grows hot, so I’m shrugging off my jacket and tying it around my waist. Graham stops promptly every hour, spraying me down and forcing me to hydrate.
“Ticks out here,” he says at one point when I admit I have no idea what permethrin is. When I agreed to camping, I’d thought of it more like the few Girl Scout outings I’d been on—a park with hook-ups. Tents. Hot dogs and s’mores.
Not this. Tromping through the woods, following a trail I’m not entirely convinced is really there. Graham is confident enough, pulling tree branches aside for me and navigating forks in the trail without any hesitation on where to go next.
“You need to eat,” he insists, pushing a granola bar into my face when we stop again. At least now we’re out of the sun, but even being in the shade, it’s sticky and humid. I lean against a tree and ask myself if this job is really worth the money.
I’d be lying if I tried to act like I didn’t say yes to it because of Graham himself.
But he seems to have no interest in me. And even though he’s probably not going to murder me and leave me out here for the birds, I might die of a heart attack anyway.
Then he’d have to deliver my corpse to my roommates, and none of them can afford a funeral.
“I’m not hungry,” I say, pushing the fruit and nut bar away and trying to reach around to get my water bottle from my bag. Graham plucks it out, hands it to me, then tries to push the bar into my hand again.
“You don’t feel hungry,” he says, peeling the wrapper down like it’s a banana. “But your body needs fuel. Trust me.”
I glare at him, but he surprises me by taking a huge chomp from the bar. “Here,” he says, holding it out to me as he chews. “Take half, then.”
Stupidly, I take it, apparently happy enough to consume the remnants of his spit. I’m truly and completely fucked if this is the kind of thing I’m into now. So the man can take big bites—he’s large. It’s not that unusual. Lots of men are big.
Still. I can’t stop thinking about what else on him might be… large.
The hike is torture. My entire body is sticky from the layers of bug spray and sunscreen Graham keeps coating me with.
Sweat runs down from my hair and into my eyes, stinging with a particular fervor because of all the protective chemicals.
And, to top it off, Graham doesn’t say a single word to me except when he feels I need to drink water, apply more sunscreen, or rest.
The only upside is that any time I stop to line up a shot, Graham waits patiently. He doesn’t hurry me along or ask when I’ll be finished. He just goes still, waiting until I’m satisfied with the pictures.
It’s calming to be with someone who doesn’t feel the need to hurry, even though I know we didn’t get started when he was hoping to.
On the way out, my pictures are mostly subject-based—some of the wildlife, a shot of a plant that Graham quietly informs me is endangered. I get a shot of the sunlight filtering in through the kaleidoscope of shapes created by the tree leaves, and a close-up of the patterns in the tree bark.
They’re nothing groundbreaking. I start to worry Graham might find my photos lacking.
Then, like fog clearing in a sudden, robust push of wind, we make it to the top of the incline we’ve been trudging up for hours, round the corner into a cool, damp cave, and are upon the single most beautiful scene I’ve ever witnessed.
Graham continues gallumping down the path, keeping one hand on the wall, but I come to a complete stop in the entrance, suddenly more breathless than I’ve been during the entire hike.
It’s a grotto—at least, that’s what I think it is, if I’m using the word right.
A sort of cave-room, with a spiraling path of steps all the way down to the bottom.
Three larger waterfalls crash down from varying heights, while a dozen smaller falls trickle out in thin streams, like you just barely turned the handle for the tap.
You could stack several houses across, then up to the top. It’s huge. Cavernous.
At the very bottom, when I lean in and look down, is a shimmering, deep-blue pool of water, which reflects the light from the opening.
It’s unreal.
Fantastical. Ethereal. Unreal.
The words aren’t right, aren’t enough, but I can capture it with a photo. Inspiration rises up inside me like a great, powerful sob, and I let it simmer in my throat, let tears spring to my eyes. I’m going to use it all. I’m going to make sure it comes out in every single picture I take.
“Serena?” Graham must finally realize I’m not behind him, because he turns and looks, sharply, over the edge of the steps and to the pool, like I might have slipped right off the stones and fallen all the way down without him noticing.
“Sorry,” I say, not for the first time today. When I clear my throat, the sound is somehow swallowed by the waterfalls and also echoed back to me. Magic. “I just… I needed a second.”
Graham has pushed his sunglasses up onto his head now, his dark hair made even more so by the misting of water that cascades down and over him. Those rocks must be slick, but he stands casually, confidently, like it never occurred to him that he might be the one to slip and fall.
I don’t think twice, I just raise my camera, line up the shot, and capture him there, standing among the waterfalls in his safari outfit, one of his large hands outstretched and resting on the slick cave wall.
Later, I know, when I edit these pictures, I’ll get to see the look of wonder on his face, something boyish and unguarded. And later, I might just realize that look is aimed at me.