Lucas
011.
She quickly pulled her hand away.
"Shit." Mike said.
"What is it Wheeler?"
"She has a tattoo. Zero One One. I'm guessing that's not going to be a good thing. It's going to be really messed up."
He looked at the girl, "Can you tell me what the tattoo is for?"
She looked at him with those eyes, and pointed to herself.
Mike had been afraid of that. "I think her name... is Eleven." He looked at her for confirmation. She seemed very embarrassed, looked down and nodded her head.
"Ok, that's Max, short for Maxine but nobody calls her that, I'm Mike short for Michael, but only my….mom called me that." Mike took a breath.
"Um, we can call you El? Short for Eleven?"
The girl looked at him then at Max, and back to Mike again, she gave them both a small smile and nodded.
"El, meet Max. Max is my friend. We're on our way to the west coast." He looked at Max, "it's ok if she tags along Max? she would have ended up there anyway if she'd followed us."
El held out her hand for Max to shake.
"Are you kidding me?" Max said, "no way I'm shaking your hand. She crawled over to El and gave her a tight hug.
"Friends?" El asked Max.
"You bet your ass we're friends. Except for Wheeler here I didn't have any. I'm not about to start turning down them down now."
El looked at Mike. Mike looked back, lost in her eyes.
Several seconds later Max said, "Mike, you guys are staring at each other."
Both El and Mike looked down and said, "sorry" at the same time. Both had the outline of a smile.
"Mike, I need to use the ladies restroom."
"Did you forget how?"
"Don't be a mouthbreather Wheeler. You told me I shouldn't walk on this ankle, and...I can't believe I'm going to do this but I need your help, I really have to go."
"I will help." It was El. She unzipped the tent and crawled outside, she turned around, held her hand out for Max.
Max and El made their way a few dozen feet behind the tent farther into the tree line. It was awkward, but El did a good job of allowing Max to hop on one foot and keep her from stepping with the other foot.
"Are you with Mike?" El said quietly.
Max was confused, and said "what do you...oh am I with Mike. No, no, we are just really good friends."
"You sleep in the same tent. The same sleeping bag."
Max blushed, "that was for you. We have separate sleeping bags, wait...do you...like him?"
El turned crimson, and looked down nodding.
Of course she did, Max thought, El had been following Mike for a month, never mind that Max was there too. Who knows how long she'd actually been watching him when he went in and out of his house. Probably too scared to approach him.
"You know he may not feel the same way about you...right?
El was still looking down...nodded.
When they had gotten back to the camp, Mike had a big fire going, and was hanging up El's clothes on makeshift hangers to dry them out.
"Uh, sorry I had to handle your, um, ah, frilly things" Mike turned red.
Max looked at El who had a matching shade going. She rolled her eyes. "That's what it's like to do laundry Mike, welcome to our world."
"So Wheeler, new sleeping arrangements. El and I in the same tent, you in the spare."
Mike was about to agree when he saw the pleading look on El's face. "I get nightmares," she said.
"Last night was the first night I didn't."
"Max how about a compromise? Um, same tent separate sleeping bags?"
They gathered up more firewood. Mike and El did most of the work to allow Max to stay off her feet.
They were a few dozen yards away from camp when Mike felt like he was being watched. He looked at El, "I feel it too," she said. They made their way back to the camp and a brisk walk.
"We're being watched, " Max said as soon as Mike and El returned.
"Yeah," probably by that guy I was telling you about."
Max looked at him sharply, "I thought you were talking about El?"
"I know the difference between a random guy and a pretty girl..." As soon as he said it he blushed. He couldn't even look at El.
Max rolled her eyes.
"El, do you know who he is?" Mike asked.
"No."
"We sit by the campfire and wait for him to make himself known. We need to wait for Max's ankle anyway. We aren't in any rush."
That night they were in their separate sleeping bags, Max and El had gone to sleep hours ago. Mike was still awake listening to their breathing and for any noises outside. He heard a sniffling and then someone trying to be quiet while crying."
"Nightmare, El?"
"Yes."
"It's ok, El, get in my sleeping bag if it will help."
Without a word, she got out of hers, and slipped in beside Mike. Her arm was around his waist, head on his his chest and she was sleeping soundly within seconds.
How am I going to deal with this? Mike thought. What the hell was Max going to think?
"You have a problem, Wheeler."
"Tell me about it."
"You can't lead her on, if you aren't interested you have to let her know. As soon as possible."
"I'm not leading her on, Max."
"Wheeler, she spent the last two nights in your sleeping bag, practically wrapped around you. That's not quite sending the right signal."
Mike sighed, "how did I get lucky enough to have girl problems with one of the last two girls in a thousand miles."
"Do you like her?"
"I don't know her Max. I mean, I don't know if she's even...stable? I hate to say it, but we don't know anything about her. I don't want to create...a problem for any of us."
"You better figure something out. It's going to get awkward."
"It's already awkward, she wasn't in your sleeping bag. You and I are ok, though, right Max?"
"We're always going to be ok, Wheeler. Doesn't make any difference to me how bad you screw up, or screw this up, " she said referring to El, "but we have a friendship that you don't walk away from because one of us can't get his shit together. Oops, did I say that out loud? Fix it Wheeler, El deserves to know one way or the other."
Shit, Mike thought. he had no idea how to handle this. You can't feel anything for someone you just met this soon can you? El is obviously comfortable around him...maybe a little too much. Mike didn't have a lot of experience with girls...ok, none. Max didn't count, they never had that kind of relationship.
"She's been out there for awhile, can you go check on her, I'll build a another fire."
Max found El gathering more firewood.
"I waited." El said to Max.
"Something on your mind, El?"
"I need to tell you about my nightmares...why I have them."
Max thought of herself as a pretty tough cookie. Only Mike had ever seen her cry, and she'd always managed to make a smartass comment to try and cover up her feelings, and recover quickly.
When El recounted the last few years of her life, something unlatched inside of Max. She began sobbing to the point of hyperventilating.
When El hugged her and told her everything was ok now that she didn't need to cry. Max dropped to her knees unable to stand on one leg anymore. This girl didn't just have nightmares, she had lived a nightmare, and she was comforting Max? How resilient did your spirit have to be to survive that and still show kindness towards others? Max was unable to grasp even a basic understanding of it. El hugged her until she had stopped crying. She was amazing. Mike should be so lucky.
It was some time before they returned back to camp, El was holding Max up letting her lean on her when they walked.
Mike had the fire going. He saw they had more firewood and nodded to them both, "thanks."
He noticed Max was...different. Something was off in her demeanor.
"You doing ok Max?"
"I'm fine Mike."
Mike? Not 'Wheeler'. Something was definitely off...
"I have...a...gun pointed at you!"
The voice was from across the road. "Turn around and put your hand in the air."
Mike whispered to Max and El, "get behind me, lay on the ground, hide behind me."
Mike turned around and shouted , "no!"
"Just put your hands in the air then." The voice said again, Mike guessed it was someone his age.
"No!" Mike shouted again.
"I have a gun pointed at you!" The voice sounded more than a little unconvinced this time.
"Then shoot it instead of shooting off your mouth or better yet, don't be a little asshole and come on over here."
"Shit." Mike heard the voice, lower across the street, and smiled. His suspicion was confirmed. No gun was pointed at him or anywhere in sight.
"Ok, just don't stab me with that knife of yours once I get over there."
Mike was right, as the guy made his way across the highway Mike could see he was no older than any of them. Mike sat down between Max and El, "you guys ok?"
"That was a little risky wasn't it Mike?" Max said.
Hmm, 'Mike' again. He'd have to talk to her alone to find out what was going on. "Only if he had a gun."
"How did you know he didn't?"
"He hesitated on saying he had a gun pointed at us...like he was pointing something else."
"Welcome to our little party," Mike said as the guy sat down opposite the campfire from them. He took a longer look at Max than was necessary. It immediately put Mike on the defensive.
"You gonna tell us your name? It's the least you could do after pointing a gun at us."
The guy was clearly embarrassed, "yeah, sorry about that, I think I've watched too many movies. I'm Lucas Sinclair."
