Page 48 of You Know You Wanna

“Seriously?” Lulu asked disbelievingly. “You’ve never left the state?”

“Nope. Why would I want to?” Cassidy batted her eyelashes. “I’m a country gal.”

Lulu chuckled before turning to me. “So are you, right? A country gal?”

“To the core of my being and back out again,” I said.

Heather came to sit down, a little jumpier than the others as she darted a wide-eyed look around. “There are no critters out here who will eat us, right?”

“Nope,” I said reassuringly. “We’re safe here. I promise. Okay, technically, a bear could come by, but none have been in this area for years and we have bear spray. So we’ll be good.”

Lulu waited until Heather relaxed a bit before she glanced between Cassidy and me. “What’s it like, growing up way out here?”

“It was a wonderful childhood,” I said, settling in to share some stories about when I was a girl. This tended to come up when I brought city kids out to the campground. “I stayed out every night riding my bike until the streetlights came on and everyone in my neighborhood knew who I was. We spent our weekends walking out to the lake and just swimming and horsing around, and I don’t think the TV in our house was ever on unless my dad wanted to watch the game.”

“That sounds nice,” Lulu said, surprising me. Her brow furrowed as she thought about something. “I know Mrs. Pilar who lives next door to my dad’s house, but none of the other neighbors. I have a bike and I know how to ride it, but I’ve hardly ever used it.”

“When I was your age, my bike was basically attached to my body,” I said, enrapturing them all.

I kept telling my stories, knowing it would encourage them to open up too. Cassidy shared some of her own childhood stories, and they were remarkably similar to mine. Heather eventually relaxed enough to tell us about growing up in Texas, but Lulu didn’t seem to have many stories from her gilded childhood.

She just shrugged every now and then and tossed out tidbits like, “My mom took me to a spa at least once a month,” and, “I had my hair highlighted the first time when I was eight.”

I nodded and tried to encourage her to share more, but she seemed bothered by the fact that her childhood hadn’t been much of a childhood at all.

As I cooked our food, the girls kept talking, but Lulu was getting quieter and quieter, crawling back into her shell as she seemed to realize that she’d been treated as a mini grownup practically since birth.

My heart bled for her, but at least she was here, doing one thing that kids were supposed to do. I smiled during a break in the conversation. “I’ve heard those kids’ spas are very fun. Don’t they include things like face painting and little gift bags?”

She laughed dryly and shook her head. “I wouldn’t know. I’ve never been to a kids’ spa. I had the regular adult treatment with my mom.”

“Wow.” My eyes begged to widen as I imagined myself as a kid, being cooped up in place where you had to lie still for treatments you didn’t need. “Well, I’m sure it was a good bonding experience for you.”

“We weren’t allowed to talk much,” she said softly, then smiled at Cassidy. “What was that you were saying about pouring food coloring into your neighbor’s pool?”

Cassidy launched back into the story, having us all in hysterics at the mischief she’d gotten up to regularly and only finishing once we were done with dinner. The excitement levels had waned by the time we’d eaten and cleaned up, and Heather was the first to call it a night.

She got up, stretching her arms up above her head and trying to stifle a yawn. “If it’s okay, I think I’m ready to turn in. All this fresh air is making me sleepy.”

“That might be tree pollen, but of course, it’s okay,” I said. “Do you want me to walk you to the washrooms to get ready for bed?”

Dusk had fallen and the light was fast disappearing. The kids were sometimes scared to do the short walk in the dark by themselves, even when armed with flashlights, but Cassidy shot up before Heather had the chance to answer.

“I’ll walk with her. I want to brush my teeth and get ready for bed too. I’m beat.”

I smiled at them. “I’m right here if you two need me, okay?”

Cassidy winked. “We won’t. I can take on any frogs or bugs myself.”

Heather squeaked a little and Cassidy laughed as she linked her arm with her friend’s. “I was joking. Calm down. Birdie will save us from the bugs and we’re just going to wash our faces. Jeez.”

She and Heather kept talking as they walked away, and while I was surprised Lulu hadn’t followed, I wasn’t even sure she’d noticed them getting up. She was staring into the fire, her arms folded on her thighs, her expression knitted in thought.

“Hey.” I reached out to rub her back. “Are you okay? We seemed to have lost you somewhere in that conversation.”

She didn’t respond for a long minute, just staring into those flames with an almost longing look on her face before she suddenly turned to me. “Do you sometimes wish that you’d grown up differently?”

“Excuse me?”