Chapter 3
Lexa and her grandma were sitting on the porch when they saw Lincoln's car approaching.
"You know, I remember a time when Lincoln was about as tall as my knee." said Freya. "Now he could probably lift me over his head and throw me a hundred yards."
"He definitely could." laughed Lexa. "But he wouldn't. You know him, he wouldn't hurt a fly."
"We can all only hope." sighed the woman while watching Lincoln pick up some big chunks of fire wood from their shed like they were pieces of cardboard.
"Hi, nan!" Lincoln smiled when he was finished loading the car and headed to the porch. He walked over to Freya and gave her a hug.
"Don't squeeze too hard now, I bet you you can literally break me." the woman hugged him back.
"Grandma is forever amazed by how strong you are." Lexa teased.
"I remember when you were so small, you could barely climb up the porch steps without help!"
"Until Lexa showed me the handrail trick."
"Yes. And then we couldn't keep you off." laughed Freya, reminiscing. Lincoln smiled sweetly at the older woman, his eyes sparkling with affection. Freya held his hand and patted it a couple of times.
"Strong muscles, gentle heart." she said.
"Alright you two." Lexa said softly. "Off we go now, nana. Don't wait up."
"I never do. I need my beauty sleep anyway." she mused, to which Lincoln chuckled loudly. "Have fun, kids." she waved and went inside.
It was unusually chilly at the beach that night but Lexa still took off the long sleeved shirt her grandma had made her wear, before starting to dig a hole for their fire.
"Put that back on." Lincoln warned but broke into laughter after Lexa shot him an almost murderous look.
"So, I'm guessing I will be solely responsible for keeping this fire going, tonight?!" Lexa said almost under her breath. Her mood had not really changed much since that afternoon and she was getting increasingly annoyed at the fact that she would have to deal with new people tonight. Lincoln on the other hand was in a marvelous mood. Lexa's remark did not even scrape him.
"You always end up solely responsible anyway!" he simply said and gave Lexa a squeeze while setting up some towels around the hole as sitting space. "Because you love it."
"Yea. More like, you fools just mess the whole thing up if I let you touch it." complained Lexa, but she smiled a bit to herself. She did love it. She had distant memories of her parents having so many friends over, that some of them had to camp at their back yard because there wasn't enough space in the house. They would frequently have big bonfires, either at the beach or at their fire pit at home. Lexa would stick by Indra, a family friend who was always responsible for the fire, for the entire time.
"She needs patience and breathing space." Indra used to say.
"Why is the fire a girl?" Lexa had asked one time.
"You'll understand when you grow up, Lex." Indra had patted her head.
Soon after her parents died, Indra disappeared too. As did most of her parents' friends except Gustus. When Lexa asked Freya about her, she had said that Indra was ill. The next sentence her grandma said had haunted Lexa and she never asked again.
"Her fire is going out, kid." the words rang through Lexa's mind.
"You know how to work a lighter, yea?" Lincoln's voice brought her back from her thoughts. She had stacked the wood: pine needles at the base, thin sticks after that and bigger branches on top. She must have been staring at it, holding the lighter for a minute of two before Lincoln talked.
"I mean, I could probably find a couple of stones for you to bang together, or however that works." he kept on joking.
"Very funny." Lexa smiled. "And you need a certain kind of stone for it to work, idiot!"
"Aaaand she's back!" Lincoln announced and clapped a couple of times. "Now, can we make this fire EXTRA special? Octavia has not been to one, ever... So, you know..."
"What do you want me to do, Linc? Throw a magical powder in there that will make the flames heart-shaped or something?"
"Fire always special, got it!" he said in a funny accent and danced around a little bit. He was so excited and he could not contain it like he usually would. Lexa softened around the edges a bit. She had not seen him this happy in a long while. It was nice. She reached into her backpack and grabbed three little packets of something.
"Actually, as usual, I am one step ahead of you." she smiled and carefully threw the packets in the still unlit bonfire.
"What in the world is that?" Lincoln said confused.
"That's a surprise. But I promise you, it is going to make the fire special." Lexa smiled at him, making air quotes for the last word.
"I am worried." he said seriously. "You scare me, Lexa Elwood. You're not gonna blow us all up, are you?" he raised an eyebrow.
"Well, we'll just have to wait and see, won't we? she matched his expression.
"Have I told you how awesome you are, lately?" Lincoln looked at his best friend from across the perfectly stacked wood. He, of course, knew that Lexa would never do something to undermine this night. He was certain that she knew how important it was to him, and neither one of them had to even speak the words.
"Probably. But it always bears repeating." Lexa said cheekily.
"Why are we doing this so early?" Anya grunted looking at Lincoln. The woman walked heavily towards them, carrying a cooler filled with beer.
"It's nine o' clock!" Lincoln half-whispered rolling his eyes. He took a look at Anya's sleepy face. "Did you seriously just wake up?"
"She hasn't woken up yet, that's the problem." said a voice behind the tall girl. Anya's sister appeared holding two bottles of gin. She shook them and winked at Lexa.
"Oh sweet, I love gin!" Lincoln exclaimed and moved swiftly towards Lily. She quickly hid the bottles behind her back.
"No, no! You, mister, will be drunk in love as Bey calls it. The gin is for us single folk, who will have to just be regular drunk." the young girl said and kissed the air when Lincoln sighed in disappointment. She was there when Lincoln had met Octavia. In fact, she was the one to introduce them. She knew Octavia's friend, Monty, and was having a drink with them one night, when Lincoln happened to be in the same bar. She could immediately tell that sparks were flying between her friend and the girl.
Much like her older sister, she was not one to hold her tongue. Probably the only thing they had in common though. Anya was a strong, strict and stoic figure while Lily was what Lexa affectionately described as "a sorority party girl with a heart of gold". Their outside looks also the opposite of one another and quite reflective of each girl's personality. Anya was tall, slim, with brown hair and serious eyes. Her face clearly defined by her predominant cheeckbones and clear-cut lines. Her sister was of average height, strawberry blonde, with curves. Her big lips and soft, hazel eyes framed in a heart-shaped face. They did nothing but fight but Lexa had never before met two people who loved each other so deeply. The 'would kill and did for' was an understatement when it came to those two.
Lexa walked over to her, grabbed one of the gin bottles and kissed it.
"This is why you are my favourite Forester sister."
"I heard that!" Anya warned and Lily answered back with an arrogant rise of the eyebrow, before breaking down in giggles.
"They're coming! That's them!" Lincoln said impatiently. "Are you going to start the fire, or...? They might miss us if it's not... because they're coming!"
"How do you even know..." Lexa started her question, staring at the four black figures walking in the distance, where Lincoln had been pointing towards. "...there's four of them?!" she changed it halfway through.
"Awww, he already recognizes her shadow!" Lily said, earning a laugh -or more like a puff of air- from her sister. Lincoln was running around like a frantic man, making sure everything was in place and lighting some candles he had placed in little holes in the sand, all around them.
"Jeez..." Anya breathed while laying on a towel, beer in hand.
"I know!" Lexa whispered in response. Lily hit her sister's arm.
"Shut your unromantic mouth, An." she warned. "You too!" she said pointing at Lexa and got up to help Lincoln. Lexa grabbed a box of matches from her backpack to light the fire. By the time she was done and got up, Octavia and her friends were much closer and Lincoln raised a hand to flag them down. Lexa took a deep breath to prepare for the night and then sat by Anya, after getting a beer for herself and a second one for her friend, at her non-verbal request.
