BE TRUE.
Loo took Marshall’s map out of her pocket and held it under the light. There was a small round dot close to the trailhead with the same words. Farther along on the path she found other stones, each next to its own corresponding black dot on the map: BE CLEAN. SAVE. TRUTH. WORK. LOYALTY. KINDNESS. INTELLIGENCE. IDEALS. IDEAS. INTEGRITY. SPIRITUAL POWER. And PROSPERITY FOLLOWS SERVICE. They were markers, and she followed them through the forest, each giving her courage, until she heard voices and music and came to a clearing and saw the whale lit up in the dark.
The bonfire was right underneath the jawbone, flickering against the granite. There were nearly a hundred teenagers gathered around different parts of the stone whale, clambering up its side or perched on top of its nose or leaning against the blowhole. Now that she had gotten herself here, Loo wasn’t sure what to do. She had never been to a party before.
She expected to see kids from her class, and she did spot a few but didn’t know them well enough to go up and say hello. Most were older. Everyone was holding red plastic cups and drinking and some of them were smoking cigarettes and some of them were smoking weed and some were roasting marshmallows. Loo saw a girl catch a marshmallow on fire, turn it until all the sides were blackened, then blow it out, peel the goo off and stuff the whole thing in her mouth before turning to the boy next to her and kissing him, the white insides dripping between them and the rest of the crowd hooting their approval.
Marshall was back in the woods, pumping the keg and serving beer. He was wearing a Greenpeace T-shirt and a pair of faded jeans. Loo stood in line and took a cup from him.
“You came,” he said.
“I got lost. But the boulders helped. They’re huge.”
“I know. My stepdad used to bring me here to hike when I was little. This place is like Stonehenge. These giant rocks got picked up someplace else a million years ago and then dropped here when the glaciers melted. They’re called ‘erratics.’ Some guy named Babson carved slogans into them in the thirties.”
Marshall’s words came out hurried and slurred and Loo realized he was drunk. His eyes looked straight at her, not ducking away as they usually did in science class.
Loo took a sip of beer. It was warm and flavorless. She wiped her mouth.
“Do you have a favorite?”
“?‘Never try,’?” he said, “?‘never win.’?”
Some kids came forward and asked for drinks. Loo stepped to the side and watched Marshall work the tap, holding the spigot in place with the finger she had broken. If she touched it, she was sure she would be able to feel the split in the bone. Marshall poured her more beer, tipping the cup to keep down the foam, and then he told another kid to take over and walked with Loo to the fire.
“Who are these people?” she asked.
“My cousin’s friends,” Marshall said. “He graduated last year.”
“I thought Jeremy and Pauly junior would be here.”
“They don’t talk to me anymore. Not since my mom started that petition for the marine sanctuary.”
“Want me to beat them up for you?”
Marshall laughed. “No thanks.”
They sat down on a log in front of the fire, not touching but close. The heat felt good after the long walk through the forest. Everyone was in silhouette, the flames animating their faces.
“My stepfather showed me how to tap the trees in these woods,” said Marshall.
“For maple syrup?”
Marshall nodded. “The sap runs when it’s below freezing at night, but above freezing during the day. I’m out here most of February and March. It’s a lot of work.”
“I can imagine,” said Loo, and for a moment she did imagine—the branches dropping their leaves and turning bare, the snow rising up around them, and Marshall passing through the icy drifts in his boots, carrying his buckets and a small mallet to drive the spiles into the bark.
“Do you want to see it?” Marshall asked.
“See what?”
He kept his eyes on the fire and took a long gulp of beer. “?‘Never try, never win.’?”
Loo watched the smoke rising, splitting around the whale’s jaw. “Sure,” she said.
Marshall led her away from the party, down the path. They passed a few more carvings and read them with their flashlights: USE YOUR HEAD; BE ON TIME; IF WORK STOPS VALUES DECAY.
“Do you think any of these slogans made a difference?”
“Probably not,” said Marshall. He finished his beer and threw his cup into the woods and then he took her hand. She could feel the hard bump of his broken finger against her palm. His finger will be like that the rest of his life, she thought. But she still didn’t feel bad about breaking it.
“If I lived here I would have hated Babson. For trying to tell me what to do.”
“Come on,” Marshall said, and pulled her into the trees.
The music from the party was softer now and the light faded as they moved away from the bonfire. They walked through the bushes and along a trail until the woods got dark and quiet. Eventually they reached another boulder, half buried in the earth. Marshall ran the beam of his flashlight along the length of it—the words were barely recognizable underneath the moss. NEVER TRY NEVER WIN. “That’s it,” he said and then he turned off the flashlight. Blackness closed around them. Loo could hear everything. The rustle of the trees and Marshall breathing beside her and then she felt his hands and he pushed Loo against the rock and then he kissed her.
His mouth tasted like beer. His lips pushed hers open, his tongue exploring her teeth. It was strange but not terrible. He touched her hip and this time she took hold of his thumb and held it tight. She could feel his pulse, just underneath the skin—a silent, insistent beating. And at once the familiar rusted flavor was there, flooding Loo’s mouth and washing away his beery kisses. She squeezed his thumb. Marshall’s body went stiff. He pulled away from her.
“Don’t,” he said.
Someone shouted in the distance. There were footsteps close by, and then the woods around them were suddenly full of movement. People rushing down the path, flashlights going in all directions, boys calling out and girls screaming.
“Cops!” someone yelled as they hurried past. Loo released Marshall’s finger. And then she ran, leaving him behind in the dark. She dug her flashlight out of her pocket and dove into the bushes, crawling on her hands and knees through the thicket until she was far away from the path and the bonfire was nothing but a glimmer through the branches.