Wildfire: A Novel (The Maple Hills Series)

Why is saying you’re going to work on yourself easier than working on yourself?

I want to leave my self-destructive habits behind and yet here I am—day one of Project Aurora, cellphone in hand, watching Norah’s story knowing it’s going to upset me.

And it is upsetting me. My manifestation technique requires some work because Dad’s team smashed the Spanish Grand Prix and he’s super happy about it. Which I know from the sweet videos Norah posted of him celebrating with her daughter at his house.

Stuffing my cellphone into the back pocket of my shorts, I try to forget about the perfect family I’m not part of and speed walk in the direction of the fire safety training, which I’m already running late for.

While the team building exercises take place in larger groups across roles, all our specific training is done in our group of six, making it impossible to sneak in undetected.

“You are’—Jenna looks at her watch—’six minutes late, Rory.”

Normally I wouldn’t care about being late, but feeling everyone’s eyes on me is making the blood rush to my cheeks. Well, all but one person. I mutter a “sorry” quietly and keep my head down as I fill the empty seat between Emilia and Clay. He leans in, lowering his voice. “You haven’t missed anything. Basically, fire is bad.”

“I’ll try to remember that.” I fight the urge to chuckle and try to concentrate on Jenna starting with the evacuation drill procedure. He offers me a grape from the bag in his hand, which, after yesterday, feels a little like a gesture of goodwill.

Jenna is busy explaining the campfire rules, when I feel a tugging on my foot. Looking to the floor, there appears to be a ball of fluff chewing on my shoelaces. Picking up the chubby puppy, I turn the tag toward me. “Which one are you?” Salmon. “Where’s your brother, little girl?”

As soon as I look up, I spot Trout cradled like a baby, snoozing on Russ’s chest. Oh man, this is not fair. I can’t drag my eyes away from the cuteness, which is a mistake, because when Russ finally looks up from the sleeping dog, he looks right at me.

We stare at each other and it’s as awkward and weird as it sounds, right until Salmon decides to chomp on the ends of my hair, distracting me. When I look back at him, he’s focused on whatever Jenna is saying.

The rest of the training flies by without any further staring contests and by the time we’re all walking across the main lawn on our way to our teambuilding activity, I’m feeling better than I was a couple of hours ago, snooping where I shouldn’t be snooping.

“I’ve decided I don’t care,” I announce to Emilia.

“That’s good,” she says nonchalantly, trying not to trip over Salmon who’s weaving around our feet as we walk, trying once again to eat shoelaces. “What are you talking about exactly?”

“Everything.”

“That feels healthy and definitely not like it’ll backfire on you in the future.”

She expertly dodges my elbow when I try to poke her in the ribs. “I’m going to delete my spam account and lock my cellphone in my suitcase. If I don’t see it, it doesn’t exist.”

“I support it. I’ve said it before, nothing good can come from putting your faith in a man. Let Chuck and Norah play happy families online and you concentrate on you.”

“Jesus, it was like being with my mom for a second,” I tease.

Tired of dodging her, Emilia bends to pick Salmon up, tucking the puppy under her arm. “You’re so annoying,” Emilia groans.

The dog’s tongue lolls out of her mouth as Emilia struggles with the deceptively heavy golden retriever. I reach over to scratch behind Salmon’s ears as we continue toward the activity. “Aw, she’s not annoying. She’s a baby.”

Emilia’s brows pinch together as she looks over at me. “I was talking to you.”

We finally reach the rest of the counselors standing around several planks of wood and platforms arranged in groups of four. “I don’t know what the hell we’re going to have to do,” Maya says.

I’ve seen this activity before, but I’ve never done it. “You have to get your entire team from the first platform to the one at the end, but it gets harder to move between them because the gaps gets bigger and the platforms get smaller. Nobody can touch the floor.”

“Bedlam then,” she smiles. “I’m going to say hi to my friends, I’ll be back in a sec.”

“I wonder if you’d annoy me less if you still had a British accent,” Emilia says quietly, watching Maya as she walks away from us.

“I never sounded like Maya. I still sounded mostly American. It got stronger depending on how much time I spent hanging around at Dad’s work.”

Xander, Russ and Clay finally stop whispering with each other, turning to face Emilia and me. “Okay, game plan,” Xander says seriously. “We’re going to jump between the platforms.”

Emilia bursts out laughing and I immediately shake my head. “No, we’re not.”

“Why not? It’ll be the easiest way,” he immediately counters.

Emilia is still laughing at the idea of us trying to make those jumps. Xander looks genuinely surprised, while Clay is trying to fight a laugh too. Russ is . . . observing. “Maybe for you Mr. NBA hopeful, but for the rest of us mere mortals, jumping that far isn’t possible.”

“We’ll help you. You’ll be fine.”

Xander’s mouth doesn’t move and that’s when I realize the person talking to me is Russ.

“Oh.” Say something, Aurora. “Cool.”

I hate myself.

Russ does that nod thing guys do, without saying anything more. It was nice to hear him speak, so now I know he is real and he’s not just a figment of my imagination haunting me like the ghost of hook-ups past.

“Is this thing on?”

We all turn our attention to Orla standing at the end of the challenge with a megaphone. She’s had that megaphone for as long as I’ve known her and every time it breaks, she gets the maintenance team to fix it for her instead of investing in one from this century.

I stole it once. Used it to scare the shit out of Jenna when she was flirting with one of the other counselors and ended up in a time out for the rest of the afternoon, but it was worth it.

Orla goes over the rules, explaining that you can’t start moving to the next platform until your entire team is together. If anyone in your team falls off, your team has to start again from the beginning and whoever makes it to the end, managing to stay on the platform for thirty seconds without falling is the winner.

Maya wanders back to our group and Xander immediately turns to her. “We’re jumping.”

“No, we’re not,” Emilia and I say in unison.

“You’re tall—” Maya says, looking him up and down.

“Thank you for noticing . . .”

“—if you’re so confident, why don’t you just lie down between them and we can all walk you like a plank?”

“Yeah, Xan,” Russ says, grinning. “Why don’t we just walk you like a plank?”

“I don’t think I’d like being crushed by a hockey player, funnily enough.”

“Don’t knock it until you’ve tried it,” I say quietly, without thinking.

Thankfully, most of the group didn’t hear my little admission, but Russ and Xander did and Russ’s cheeks flush pink.

Xander’s eyes flick between us quickly, but the whistle blows, putting an end to anything he might be about to say. The six of us rush toward the first platform, only just fitting on comfortably.

“We are at a distinct disadvantage because the three of you are so massive,” Emilia groans into Clay’s back, which is pressed up against her face.

“Aurora, I’m really sorry my hand is touching your bum, but I can’t move it,” Maya says.

“It’s touching mine too,” Xander adds.

Russ sighs. “No, that’s mine.”

The platform creaks as Russ jumps to the next one, followed by Clay and Xander. There’s enough room for the three of us to maneuver now the boys are gone and we coordinate moving the plank of wood we have to the next platform to walk along it.

“Just jump!” Xander shouts.

Maya holds her arms out to keep her balance as she walks to the next platform. “I am not bloody jumping when there is a walkway!”

“Come on, Mary Poppins,” Clay says, holding his hand out to Maya, helping her to take the final few steps. It’s easy to follow and when we’re all together on the next platform we start the whole ordeal again.

“Xander, you’re going to push me off!” I cling to Clay behind me and his hands immediately land on my waist. I switch to holding onto Emilia beside me, looking up at him over my shoulder. “It’s okay, you don’t need to hold me.” He lets go slower than I’d like.

We realize that the wood hardly reaches the next platform, which is further away than the last, and the guys work out a plan that has one of them jumping over last, then they’ll help those of us who aren’t part kangaroo get across. The sound of all the other teams shouting instructions at each other is flooding the air and realizing that we’re slightly in the lead kickstarts the competitive part of me.

Xander easily jumps to the next platform, kneeling and reaching to accept the end of the plank that isn’t long enough to rest against the edge of where he’s standing. He keeps it steady with his hand and we all pat his head as we climb over him, keeping as close to the edge as we can to let Russ and Clay jump over too.

“Oh my God,” Emilia squeaks. “Someone jump before we lose our balance.”

The guys all spring across, making it look ridiculously easy, but as soon as they’re all on the final platform together it’s immediately clear that there is not enough room for six people. Even if there was enough room, there’s no way we’re making that jump.

“How the fuck are we supposed to do this?” I’d put my hands on my hips but there isn’t enough room without nudging Maya off.

“Is anyone concerned about the weight limit of these platforms?” Clay says, looking at the creaking box beneath their feet.

“Was anyone a cheerleader?” Xander asks.

“This isn’t the type of teambuilding we’re supposed to be doing right now, buddy,” Emilia says sarcastically.

Rolling his eyes, he points at the distance between us. “Two of you can launch the other across the gap. We can catch.” We’re all silent. “You’re telling me nobody was a cheerleader in high school?”

“Yeah . . .” Maya says. “That’s not a thing where I live.”

“Aurora got kicked off the cheerleading squad freshman year and, as for me—ballet and human pyramids aren’t a good mix.”

“You also aren’t very cheerful,” I mutter under my breath.

“What did you get kicked off for?” Clay asks immediately.

“Not importa—”

“She stole the other team’s mascot and lost it.”

“Emilia!”

Xander peers over to the other teams, his face twisting in concern. “Guys, we really need to get moving . . .”

“How do you lose a mascot?” Russ asks, looking right at me.

“I, uhm, it ran off.” That gets his attention. His eyes widen and I immediately feel the need to clarify. “It was a pig, not a person. They found him a few hours later, he was totally fine. He was hanging out with the janitor’s dog, but, uhm, they felt my actions did not align with the team’s core values. Anyway, can we get on with this? Who are we throwing?”

“Guys, if we lose because you’re all short and Aurora is a pig stealer, I’m going to be so pissed,” Xander snaps.

“Everyone’s short when you’re a freaking giant. Maya, you’re up,” I say, linking my fingers together and bending for her to put her foot into the cradle my hands have made. Emilia copies me and Maya holds onto us both as she tentatively steps into our hands.

“For the record,” she says quietly, “I think this is a terrible idea.”

“Be ready to catch her! Three . . . Two . . . One . . .”

It feels like we’re playing human bowling as Emilia and I launch poor Maya in the direction of the guys a little too enthusiastically. Thankfully, they catch and squish her against them to keep her on the platform. There is physically no more room for people and I’m not sure how we’re supposed to do this.

“Get on someone’s shoulders, Maya!” Emilia shouts. Russ and Clay hold Maya’s arms and help Xander move her onto his shoulders, once again creating a tiny bit of space for another person. Emilia nudges me lightly, something she can do now there’s a tiny bit more space. “You next.”

“Absolutely not. You next.”

Xander is once again looking at the other groups. “Aurora, as much as you think you’re not, you are tall enough to jump.” If he thinks I’m more qualified because I’m five foot seven to Emilia’s five foot three, he clearly doesn’t know she’s capable of leaping across a stage like a freaking gazelle. “Emilia, I have an idea, do you trust us?”

“Not even a little bit,” Emilia calls back. I shake my head too, trying not to smirk when Xander immediately looks irritated.

“Can you learn to trust us in the next five seconds? Jump forward with your arms out. Like you’re diving to catch a baseball.”

“Do I seem like the type of person who knows anything about baseball?” she snaps.

I’m laughing before I’ve even said what I want to say. “You know a lot about third base . . .”

“No! No! No!”

I manage to stay on the platform by clinging to Emilia, even though she’s the one trying to push me off, much to the horror of our teammates and their screams.

“Jesus Christ this is stressful,” Clay groans. “Arms out, Emilia. Me and Russ will grab your hands and pull you over, you just need to get far enough for us to reach you.”

“I hate you for convincing me to come here,” she mumbles before setting herself at the edge of the platform with her arms out. To Xander’s credit, it works perfectly and within a few seconds Emilia is across and sitting on Clay’s shoulders.

There’s no way that Clay can help pull me across with Emilia on his shoulders, which means I’m really going to have to jump. The urge to just step off the platform and make us lose is overwhelming. “I’m scared,” I yell, trying and failing to visualize myself being able to cover the distance. There’s a lot more room now I’m over here on my own, but it’s not enough for me to have a run up before jumping.

“You can do it, Rory,” Emilia shouts from above Clay. “Please do it quickly though, I think I’m developing a fear of heights.”

“I don’t think I can . . .”

“Aurora,” Russ says softly, shuffling so his body is the one closest to the last space on the platform. “Look at me. You can do it, you just need to jump toward my arms and I’ll catch you, okay?”

“What if you fall?”

“Then we’ll fall together.” He smiles at me and my heart bashes brutally against my chest like the traitor she is. We’re supposed to not be caring about anything, remember? “And Xander can be pissed at both of us.”

“I will be pissed at both of you,” he grumbles.

“Ignore him, just look at me,” Russ says. “I believe in you. Take a deep breath, I’m going to count down from three and then I want you to jump as far as you can.”

“And you’ll catch me?”

“I promise I’ll catch you. Three . . . Two . . .”

He leans forward with his arms out and I zone out when he reaches one, instead concentrating on launching my body toward his. His hands are on my arms almost immediately, dragging me forward until I hit his chest.

“Brown Bears! Thirty seconds to be the winners,” Orla announces through her megaphone.

“Nobody fucking move,” Xander snaps.

I wiggle my arms free from the position they’re locked in against Russ’s chest, but he doesn’t loosen his grip on me and my body stays flush against his, keeping us both on the platform. He smells like clean laundry, sandalwood and vanilla and when I look up toward his face, his eyes are shut tight and he’s quietly muttering names of hockey teams.

And then I feel it against my stomach and his hold on me finally loosens, but it’s too late.

It’s the slowest thirty seconds in history, as Russ desperately tries to lose the boner pressing into me.

“Brown Bears win!” Orla announces, much to Xander’s delight.

I step off the platform and away from Russ. Thankfully the other guys are distracted by getting Maya and Emilia off their shoulders and when Russ looks at me, I can’t help but wink.

His blush reaches his ears this time.