Chapter Eleven #3
Aspen followed suit, quickly sticking her hiking poles in the sand.
Mo then watched her walk around the area, moving some rocks while bringing others to the middle.
Once she was satisfied, she returned to her pack and began pulling out larger covered bags.
As she opened her own pack and looked inside, Mo felt her lack of knowledge coming back to bite her in the ass.
“Tents?” Mo asked as nonchalantly as she could.
“Ground cover then tent,” Aspen replied, her tone tense but patient.
“Okay.” Mo looked through her pack, bringing out item after item, searching for the bag with the tent. She found a small, folded tarp, a tag on it denoting ground cover, and she felt a small bit of pride poke through her nasty mood. “Ground cover.”
“Put it anywhere away from the rocks but not too far out. Flat is preferable, as you will be sleeping there,” Aspen explained, already putting together rods connected by string.
Mo plopped the ground cover away from her things, returning to search for the tent. After another few minutes, she became worried. The only large items in a stuff sack were her sleeping bag and some thin rectangular pad that reminded her of naps during kindergarten.
“Everything okay?” Aspen asked, her deep-blue tent already taken shape.
“My tent…” Mo stated in annoyance, standing to her full height. “I don’t understand.”
Aspen slid the blue cover over her tent before strolling over toward Mo, asking tentatively, “Did you pack it?”
“Do I look stupid to you?” Mo immediately snarled, her chest now throbbing along with her tired muscles.
“Mo,” Aspen warned lowly, slinking to her knees to look through her things. After careful inspection, she looked back up. “Yeah, it looks like you forgot—”
“This is your fault!” Mo yelled, her frustration finally reaching its boiling point. “You made me go on this stupid trip, to hang that stupid phone, to talk to my stupid wife.”
Aspen kept her focus on the ground, her arms pulling in across her chest in a protective motion.
“Who fucking died. Why the fuck would she do that? And why the fuck”—Mo waved wildly around—“would she love this place? It’s wet and dirty and fucking hard to walk to. My feet hurt, my back hurts, my everything hurts. And for what?”
Aspen was frozen solid, her face distorted as she listened to Mo’s complaints.
“To be poetic? Yeah, some poetic final trip that will make me magically forget the love of my life. Like that is even possible…it’d be more poetic to die.
” Mo shook her head, beginning to pace. “No, this trip is something else entirely. I’m here to please some random woman who convinced—no, forced—me to go and be poetic—”
That comment made Aspen’s head shoot up. “I resent that!”
“Do you?”
“Yeah.” Aspen moved to stand, her eyes on fire. “I’m not the one who acted like I knew how to backpack.”
“Oh, so you knew, huh?”
“Not officially, but now, yeah I do.” Aspen’s hands moved to her hips. “Even novice backpackers are taught how to properly wear a pack or”—Aspen pointed to her boots—“not wear someone else’s hiking gear.”
Aspen was right about that.
“I just wanted…” Aspen breathed in deeply, her lips beginning to tremble. “Whatever. We will sleep in my tent tonight, I’ll take you back in the morning. I’m sorry I ruined…” She waved her hand around Mo’s torso and head. “This.”
And with that Mo watched Aspen return to building her tent, not another word said. All the anger seemed to drain from her body, leaving only anguish behind.
* * *
Mo was dumbstruck.
It was obvious now that the feelings Mo had for Aspen had led her to dumping years of built-up anger, resentment, and depression on a woman she had known for less than two weeks.
And all Aspen did was apologize. Mo knew, deep down, that she was being incredibly ungrateful and downright mean.
Aspen hadn’t done anything remotely wrong to her, but Mo had selfishly decided she had.
Now, a few hours later and a backpacking meal consumed in silence, Mo was seeing it all differently.
How did Mo turn a sweet woman, who was only trying to connect, into her personal punching bag? And even more, how could she make it right?
The rocks Aspen had gathered earlier were for a fire, one that was now burning between them.
Aspen’s eyes were firmly on it, while Mo’s were on her.
She kept thinking over and over that all Aspen had done was apologize.
Mo, on the other hand, had blown everything out of proportion.
So while Aspen’s reaction was somewhat defensive of her own honor, in the end it was just apologetic. Like Aspen had done something wrong.
Mo had to make it right.
“Aspen?” Mo asked softly, watching the fire dance in her eyes.
Aspen sat unmoved and unanswering.
“I’m an asshole,” Mo said with more conviction. “What I said was unacceptable.”
Aspen looked up, meeting Mo’s gaze.
“I’ve been really unfair to you and…” Mo gulped. “It might not mean much, and I respect whatever you decide, but…I’m sorry. I truly am.”
Aspen looked back at the fire.
“I don’t think there is an apology that fits. I’m gonna sleep out here on the ground cover tonight and, uh…I hope we can talk about it more in the morning?”
Like expected, Mo didn’t receive a response. Instead, she listened closely to how the bubbling of the creek mixed with the crackle of the fire, and she pondered her regret.