Chapter Nineteen
Morning light arrives reluctantly on the first day of We’ve Got This—the last phase before the capstone trip.
The cloud cover is dense and low, the light drizzle nothing too unusual for a coastal rainforest. The river, on the other hand, is high and moody.
Familiar surface-level sieves of rocks have turned into brand-new underwater hazards.
Beneath my hiking boots, the ground squishes, the spongy forest floor saturated after yesterday’s downpour.
Sloane looks stiff with the drop in barometric pressure. She, Lori, and Mitch sit together at breakfast, joking about weather-predicting joints.
Jasvinder’s breakfast was the only reason anyone got out of bed.
He’s hooked up a waffle iron to the solar-powered battery and is doling out top-shelf morning calories: delightfully fancy yeasted Belgian waffles topped with a savory combination of shaved ham, poached eggs, and a generous ladle of silky, shiny hollandaise or a sweet-tart pairing of dark chocolate curls, whipped cream, and supremes of yuzu.
Lyle ambles to the front for morning announcements. It feels different today when I position myself by his side, my head not quite reaching his shoulder. I’m not sure if he’s consciously shifted his weight to make a space along his ribs I could tuck myself into if I dared.
I don’t quite dare, but I consider it long enough that when I turn to face the room, Sloane’s eyebrows arch with surprise.
She and I haven’t yet had a sisterly chat, given that we spent most of yesterday waiting for Fisher to get out of our way while singing “The Quartermaster’s Store.
” My favorite verse was Sloane’s There was Brent, Brent, who we tried hard to prevent.
Lyle clears his throat. “As expected, the river is very high today, with a big pushy current and unfamiliar hazards. Stellar and I have decided to postpone paddling until the water’s friendli—”
“We can handle it,” Brent interrupts. Willow pushes back her chair, grabs her plate, and heads to the fresh fruit station; he doesn’t seem to notice. “We have six days of experience, and my guidebooks describe the rapids at all water levels.”
“Guidebooks can’t cover everything. Trees fall. Rocks roll downstream.” Lyle speaks affably enough, but after last night I’ve discovered a new ability to diagnose tiny changes in his body language. His hipshot posture fractionally straightens, his shoulders pulling back and down: he’s not happy.
“We’ll inspect the rapids,” Brent argues, frowning as Willow finishes loading her plate and walks to a different table. “I don’t get the problem.”
“I can see that,” Lyle says, a snap in his voice like an elastic band hitting its breaking point. It’s more surprising than scary, but the guests’ eyes widen. Lyle flushes a deep crimson, flicking his eyes at me in the signal to jump in.
“What Lyle means is this is a relationship course, not a whitewater course. Even if we could meet our safety standards on the water today, we’d get caught up in technical elements of paddling and lose the opportunity to work on our partnerships.
So we’re heading for dry land. Dry ish , anyway.
” Lyle’s field journal has a whole section devoted to local places, events, and challenges the Love Boat can turn to when bad weather pushes us off the water.
“Pack your phones and lots of lunch. If you need to charge your devices, plug them into the solar battery now. We’ll do a shorter yoga practice this morning, then meet up in the parking lot for a mystery road trip.”
The clients bus their dishes and exit the pavilion more quietly than usual.
Lyle turns to me, uncertain. “Did I go too far with Brent?”
“No. You sounded a little sharp, maybe, but no one died. It’s a low bar, but you cleared it,” I say, deploying one of my favorite dark medical jokes.
“Be serious.” He presses his lips together. “People get frightened when I’m angry. Situations can spiral fast.”
“You’re fine.” I rub his arms briskly, but not without care.
“Our problem child pushed it too far, and Dad got snippy for one second. You’re human, and Brent has thick skin.
Come here,” I say when his mouth stays unhappy, pulling him down for a quick kiss at each corner of his lips.
“It’s very hot when you stand up for safety,” I whisper.
His mouth turns upward where I kissed him. “You think so?”
“Oh, absolutely. The rain’s stopped—I’ll deal with the breakfast cleanup if you want the outdoor chores.”
I’m halfway to the cookhouse with a tub of dishes when Trevor trots up, flashing a cute smile to go with his nice haircut and good skin.
Of all the guests, I’ve gotten to know Trevor the least, and Petra is a close second.
It’s easy to bond with out going people like Lori and Mitch, and we have to keep a close eye on troublemakers like Brent whether we like them or not.
But Petra and Trevor don’t make friends and don’t make waves.
When others are chatting around the campfire, they prefer to go paddling or take an evening stroll.
Maybe I should’ve worked harder to draw them into the group.
“Hey, Stellar. I was wondering where we’re going today.”
Usually Lyle gets the curriculum questions. I might’ve been wrong about people being scared of him when he’s angry.
I try to rebalance the heavy dishes while giving Trevor my best twinkle, the one I used when I told pediatric patients I wanted to look for giraffes in their ears. “The mystery’s kind of the point, Trevor.”
“Valid, but it would help Petra’s anxiety if she knew what to expect.”
“Oh. Right.” She didn’t put that on her intake form, but I can roll with it. “Tell her to meet me at the van a few minutes early? I’ll brief her as much as I can.”
“McHuge always briefs us before his road trips, though. Location, level of difficulty, hazards, learning goals.”
“This is one of McHuge’s road trips.” I try not to clench my teeth at the implication that an inferior road trip must be my idea. “Tell Petra to come see me. We can talk through any specific areas of anxiety.”
“Sure. Thanks,” Trevor says, mouth tight with dissatisfaction. He spins on his heel, leaving me with an unsettled feeling.
The parking lot for the Pendleton Farm trail system is jammed with cars and people. A rainbow-lettered banner reading NATIONAL GEOCACHING FESTIVAL drapes between two poles planted on either side of the trail map.
“Circle up, my forest friends,” Lyle calls.
“Today we’re challenging the beginner courses our friends at the geocaching society have opened to the public.
If you’ve never geocached before, it’s like an outdoor scavenger hunt to find hidden treasure using your phone and your observational skills.
The ‘treasure’ can be anything from a fun object to a secret message.
Tag the location and leave the treasure for the next geocachers.
“During the We’ve Got This stage, you can expect fun and excitement, plenty of personal development, and flexible problem-solving within your team.
Today we’re doing one last exercise in self-awareness and relationship awareness by geocaching with people other than our partners.
In what ways do you miss your partner’s input when you’re with someone else?
What are you doing—good and bad—that you’ve stopped noticing, and what are they doing that you’ve stopped noticing? ”
We pair off the clients and reinforce the emergency instructions: if anyone gets lost, use the emergency heading—due east—to find the main road, then turn north to get back to the parking lot.
First to go are Lori and Trevor. Lori grins when McHuge says, “May the forest be with you,” although Mitch looks none too thrilled to be separated from her wife.
She pulled Lori aside when we assigned the partners, but whatever she was concerned about, Lori seemed to dismiss it.
I wonder if keen-eyed Mitch knows something about Trevor I don’t.
“It’s weird to hold a phone again,” Sloane says, turning hers over in her hand as she and Willow wait a few minutes before following the first group—we didn’t want everyone to clump up like peewee soccer players.
The two of them pause at the trailhead to talk strategy, the occasional word filtering back to us over the hum of the crowd.
Willow points at her phone, then looks up at Sloane, lips moving.
“Yeah, good idea,” Sloane says, nodding.
Willow’s eyes widen; she shakes her head like she’s changed her mind.
“No, it’s good,” Sloane says. “If it’s wrong, we’ll backtrack and try again.
” Willow looks at Sloane like she’s having an epiphany that’s equal parts wonderful and horrible.
“This exercise would be better with our own partners,” Brent says, watching Willow walk away without looking back. He sounds uncharacteristically pensive, and even a bit worried.
Wife , his confused expression seems to say, echoing what I told him on the first day. That’s my wife , and she looks happy for the first time in days, and it might be because she’s not with me.
Mitch and Brent set off, Brent clearly trying to catch up to Willow, Mitch equally obviously trying to slow him down. Five minutes later, Petra and I hit the trail. Lyle will drift between groups, helping where he’s needed.
The forest is mostly cool and dim, but occasional light breaks through where larger trees have fallen, opening up space for scrubby saplings to reach for the sun.
Some of the trails are wide and well maintained, rocks stacked on their downhill sides to prevent erosion; others are narrow and braided with secondary tracks that show where hikers have avoided muddy ground.
Some hardy passersby have repositioned fallen trees into makeshift footbridges across puddles large enough for a protected wetland designation.