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Camp Green Pine was supposed to be the safest place in the world for Lottie Matthews. She knew every inch of that place like the palms of her scarred hands. She handled the inner workings of the entire facility far better than she managed the processes of her own traumatized mind. Camp Green Pine wasn’t meant to surprise her. Ever. Sure, some residents brought with them unexpected stories and challenging problems. And, of course, sometimes money was tight, reparations were necessary, and things went wrong. It happened everywhere. It was nothing that could even remotely shake Lottie’s peace of mind.
Until the day someone approached her to tell her there was a blonde woman waiting for her in her office. The woman claimed she knew her from her high school soccer team.
The news had Lottie stumbling across the entire camp. She tried to consider all the options, tried to imagine it wasn’t who she wanted and feared it would be. She nearly got lost in the middle of the camp, she missed steps and knocked against things on a path that, on regular days, she could walk with her eyes closed. She didn’t feel like herself and her home was no longer hers. Time was suspended, the world was thrown off its axis, and nothing could right itself until Lottie reached her office.
She pushed people apart, waved them away, mumbled apologies and explanations, she did everything she could to usher them away for the single most important moment of privacy she had required in twenty-five years.
Finally, Lottie opened the door of her office.
She had to lean against the doorframe. She couldn’t believe her eyes. She had stopped breathing and her heart would’ve stopped beating if the woman in front of her didn’t act soon.
The woman was sitting on a chair in front of Lottie’s desk. She looked over her shoulder quickly when she heard the door practically yanked open. Then she promptly moved to her feet when she saw Lottie in the doorway.
Her blonde hair was darker, her eyes were surprisingly wary but still brighter than the clearest summer sky. Her skin looked soft and still youthful, and there were hints of laughter lines at the sides of her mouth, because of course the passing of time didn’t- could never stop her generous smiles.
Lottie almost expected to see her in the soccer uniform, her cozy cardigans, her angelic nightgowns, or even the wild combinations of clothes they all used to share during the darkest months of their lives. Instead, she was wearing a sort of sophisticated blazer over a pretty white blouse, a casual pair of jeans, and a low pair of shoes. Even from a couple of feet away, Lottie could see she still towered over her, it made her desperate and terrified of closing the distance between them.
“Lottie?” she finally said.
That voice could’ve brought Lottie Matthews to her knees any day. That voice could heal, haunt, and bring Lottie home anytime. She had waited to hear that voice again for so long…
“Laura Lee?”
“Hi,” Laura Lee finally smiled, making everything much better and worse for Lottie. “Oh, God. You’re… I startled you. I shouldn’t have dropped in on your out of nowhere, I should’ve called ahead. I’m so sorry, Lottie. I don’t know what I was thinking, I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine. It’s okay,” Lottie interrupted her gently as she could.
It wasn’t fine . And she was far from okay .
Everything she ever wanted was standing within reach for the first time in over two decades and Lottie felt like it was the end of the world. Despite the feeling of her chest caving in on itself, Lottie regained control of her limbs, convinced her hands to close and lock the door behind her, and her legs to step into the room, around Laura Lee, and to her own seat behind the desk.
It felt wrong . Laura Lee wasn’t a stranger, she wasn’t a troubled resident of the camp looking for guidance. She was Lottie’s guidance . She had been the light at the end of the never-ending tunnel that Lottie had made a home in. She was Lottie’s greatest hope, her greatest fear, the reason she was still alive and, if she kept looking at Lottie like that, she was about to be the death of her too.
Everything felt out of place, but Lottie took the small bits of comfort where she could. She settled in comfortably in that familiar chair, she rested her hands over her old sturdy desk in a practiced motion, and she let herself try to pretend like she still knew who she was and what she was doing with her life even when Laura Lee was staring at her with an unspeakable combination of nerves, concern, and something that in all these years Lottie had never finished putting into words. Something holy, was the closest description she had managed.
Lottie cleared her throat and asked, “Why… How are you here, Laura Lee?”
She immediately regretted how distant and professional her voice came out. She chastised herself even more when she saw Laura Lee deflate in front of her. Her nerves transformed into tension. Her hope vanished, and she looked down at her lap. It was a knife through Lottie’s back. She remembered a younger version of Laura Lee looking exactly like that after the team mocked or snapped at her at a party, at a game, anywhere really. It was an additional knife through Lottie’s heart.
“Are you alright?” Lottie asked, before Laura Lee could reply to the first question, even though she didn’t look like she was planning on answering any time soon.
That earned her a better reaction.
“I am,” Laura Lee replied with a smile and a lack of hesitation that wasn’t common to see anywhere in the world, let alone in someone just stepping into Lottie’s wellness center. “I really am alright.”
Lottie nodded, satisfied, and realized she started smiling as soon as she caught Laura Lee’s smile. She tried to reign it in, and then accepted there was no reason for that. So, she went for a lighter and even teasing tone when she added, “That makes me very happy. But you have to give me something more than that. Come on, it’s been…”
“Twenty-five years,” Laura Lee finished for her with a sigh. The reminder seemed to bring in a cold breeze across the room, but Laura Lee’s smile pushed the chill away, and her next words immediately warmed Lottie’s entire world again. “Well, I… I went to college, you know? As soon as I could. I went to college because… Oh, there was just so much that I wanted to know…”
Lottie could perfectly picture it. She had spent her entire time in high school watching Laura Lee with her eyes glued to one book or another. A little too often, it was the bible. But there was also every book assigned for English class, every textbook for every other class, fantasy books that put a lovely smile on her face until someone dared to tease her about it, romance books lent by Jackie that made her frown more than anything else, and whatever books Van let her borrow that actually made her blush deeply and hide them in her backpack before anyone could get a good look at the cover. One bone-chilling memory jumped to the forefront of Lottie’s mind: Laura Lee lost in the pages of a plane’s manual.
“Then I just couldn’t stop,” Laura Lee’s voice mercifully pulled Lottie out of her spiral and back into the pleasant and unexpected conversation in the present day. “I just had so many questions, you know? And I didn’t… It wasn’t about finding answers, I think. Not really. But about continuing to ask more and more questions until one thing led to another and…”
“Let me guess,” Lottie hummed thoughtfully, completely delighted at everything she was hearing, “Is this your way of telling me that you got a Ph.D. in something fancy like… Literature? Psychology?”
“Theology,” Laura Lee answered with a firm nod.
“Of course.”
“It’s not like that,” Laura Lee said with a discreet little frown. It took Lottie by surprise. She hadn’t meant anything harmful with her words, but in hindsight, she wished she’d answered literally anything else. “I have kept some of my faith, in my own way. But this was about questioning what was beyond and under the surface of religion, to try to understand, and teach, and share…”
“Teach?” Lottie asked. “Are you a college professor?”
Laura Lee indulged her with a smile and the knowing look of a merciful god failing at scolding a devotee. “Really?” she wondered, “That’s what you took from everything I just said?”
Caught in the act of picturing Laura Lee, always patient, always thoughtful, always eloquent Laura Lee commanding the attention of a lecture hall, wearing a polished pantsuit, gently questioning God, carefully prying open Pandora’s boxes of her student’s minds… Well, it was a powerful image. Had it been anyone else, Lottie might have smirked and added a playful comment. But she couldn’t hold back her head from dropping. Her dark hair shielded most of her face, her discreet blush and bashful smile.
At least, she was able to hold back the apology. Instead, she said, “That’s very impressive, Laura Lee. I’m so proud of you.”
Laura Lee didn’t look down. She wore her sheepish smile proudly, and she blushed much more noticeably than Lottie. “Thank you,” she answered simply, but then made it a point to look around them, nod at the wide camping site surrounding them, and add, “ This is impressive, Lottie.”
It allowed for a moment of reprieve, enough for Lottie to take a deep, steadying breath. She could see her options so clearly in front of her. The things she could admit, the questions she could ask, everything burning in the middle of her chest. But Laura Lee’s words, the acknowledgment of their location was an opportunity Lottie couldn’t miss.
“Would you like a tour?” Lottie offered.
Perhaps it wasn’t what Laura Lee wanted to hear. It was pretty obvious that Lottie was merely choosing the safest option, going for a familiar route, a planned and practiced conversation that she could control. Plus, if it wasn’t what Laura Lee was expecting, she didn’t show it. She actually perked up at the suggestion. She smiled, nodded, readily agreed, and followed Lottie out of the office.
The tour was a miscalculation on Lottie’s part.
She hadn’t counted on the fact that it would mean walking side by side with Laura Lee for the first time in twenty-five years. Lottie had to walk around Laura Lee again to open the door, stand beside her and endure the excruciating reminder that they hadn’t touched each other yet. There was no impulsive hug, no slaps, no desperately clutching each other, no trying to strangle one another, no kisses on cheeks, knuckles, lips, throat, forehead, wrist, sternum, palms, temple, anywhere their lips and knives had been before.
Lottie had to keep her head up and her hands to herself and walk around the compound with Laura Lee by her side as if it was a normal Monday. As if she hadn’t caught a wisp of Laura Lee’s perfume, floral and light and nothing short of magical. As if she could look away from the other woman, as if she could remember where and who she was when Laura Lee smiled at her. As if she wasn’t at the risk of physically collapsing every time their shoulders brushed and as if she wasn’t terrified of the visceral reaction of her body if she dared to let her arm fall at her side and let her hand brush Laura Lee’s.
At first, Lottie’s speech was instinctively professional and impersonal. Here’s the kitchen - the resident’s quarters - offices - sauna - beehives - garden… all of it.
Naturally, it only took one well-placed comment from the other woman to get Lottie to really open up.
“I want to know everything,” Laura Lee said at some point, when Lottie dared to suggest she was boring her talking about the process of dyeing their clothes.
Everything , she had said. As if it wasn’t a big deal. As if clothes dye and Lottie’s excruciating transition from wilderness to society to hospital beds to nothing to this , held the same importance. Lottie, who, throughout twenty-five years, never gave up the part of herself designed to yield to and follow Laura Lee’s guiding light, revealed everything , as requested, almost seamlessly.
Still, she started by going into private details about the problematic farmer’s market competition against their Green Pine Honey, “It’s a vicious market, but we’re the only ones that look like we show up in uniform, and that sells well.”
It transformed into the history of the center’s occasional bad image, “People throw the word cult around like it’s nothing. As if it was easy. I mean… They just don’t know anything about cults or about this place.”
Eventually, though, of course Lottie welcomed Laura Lee into the details of how exactly she ended up there.
“My dad thought I was building a hotel. A resort. Even a luxury spa,” Lottie confessed with a nostalgic smile that didn’t actually display an ounce of affection for the man in question. “The money magically ran out as soon as he realized what my real plans were. But the property was already mine, the main buildings were built, I just had to… I really did build this place up with my own hands, you know? It’s not just an expression. I had help, obviously. I had my savings to hire workers and I had already made some friends that worked in exchange for a place at the camp. But, I mean, the paths, the paintings, the furniture… Shit. I helped build that deck, believe it or not.”
They were nearing the lake when Lottie finished talking. Laura Lee held onto each word tightly, but she couldn’t help the shudder that passed through her when they faced the deck. Lottie understood perfectly. If she hadn’t been so adamant about the need for a lake, she would’ve avoided bodies of water for the rest of her life. If she hadn’t been so determined to heal on her own terms and style, she would’ve definitely allowed herself to stay away from things that brought back the worst memories. But she lived in- she built a camp that in so many ways emulated an experience that anyone else would consider a nightmare, and every day she woke up and she looked at a lake that inevitably reminded her of a plane catching fire, a body falling from the sky at the last minute, swimming toward her until she couldn’t move anymore, and then continuing to fight because she had to bring an unconscious Laura Lee back to the shore.
“I’m sorry,” Lottie apologized without the need of putting the uncomfortable situation into words first. “We can keep talking elsewhere.”
“No,” Laura Lee answered softly but with a tone that left no room for arguing. “I want to stay here.”
It was unexpected from her, and Lottie should’ve expected it for that exact reason. Just watching Laura Lee like that, facing the lake, choosing to stay close to it like Lottie had tightened her fists around the memories that everybody else wanted to erase, it made Lottie feel just a little weak on the knees, so she was grateful for the wooden seats just a couple feet away. But first, she knew exactly what she had to do.
Lottie took her chance while Laura Lee was still staring at the peaceful waters that brought back the reminder of nearly inevitable death. Lottie stopped fidgeting with her rings for one moment and took a deep breath. Slowly, she let her hand fall to her side. Her eyes were focused on Laura Lee’s face, ready to catch any positive or negative reaction. Then, at a slow pace but with determination, Lottie reached out and took Laura Lee’s hand in hers.
The reactions fell on the scene one by one like dominoes. Laura Lee’s eyes widened. Her fingers twitched in Lottie’s hold. She started blushing. Her hand shifted to hold on to Lottie more tightly. Then, after a sharp inhale, she smiled.
Laura Lee turned her head to the side to look at Lottie and say, “This is a really beautiful place, Lottie. You did a really great job.”
Lottie smiled and nodded, taking the words directly to her heart. But she couldn’t help but tilt her head and ask, “Do you really think so? You don’t think it’s… odd?”
The pause between her words told a long, hurtful story. It was as if both of them could hear all the unsaid words. Parents, strangers, psychiatrists, anyone close enough to be heard as they called Lottie, and everything she had achieved was strange, insane, unwell, eccentric, obsessive, sick.
“I think it’s brave,” Laura Lee said firmly, “And generous, and completely unique.” After a brief pause, to let Lottie really absorb the words, she added, “None of which comes as a surprise to me, you know? It’s exactly what I would expect from you.”
Between holding back tears and holding back a smile, Lottie had to allow the grin that took over her face, or else she wasn’t sure she wouldn’t break down in the open in front of Laura Lee and all the residents.
“You don’t think it’s wrong that I haven’t… That I won’t move on?”
Lottie whispered her question. She hadn’t even wanted to ask. She didn’t want to revert to old patterns and overwhelm Laura Lee with questions like they were still children and Lottie looked up to her for every significant answer about herself and the dangerous world around them. It probably wasn’t what Laura Lee was there for. But the question just escaped past her lips and, thankfully, Laura Lee didn’t look bothered in the slightest. However, she was thoughtful for a moment, until she finally answered.
“Maybe moving on isn’t a requirement for healing.”
Lottie nodded. She really appreciated those words. She had needed them.
Still, she couldn’t help but smirk a little bit and ask, “Do you think any of us is capable of either of those things?”
Us being an obvious mention of the team, the group, the terrible and wonderful creatures they used to be back when they were free.
“Maybe not,” Laura Lee answered, not hiding her amusement, which made Lottie feel on cloud nine.
With a nod and a gentle tug on Laura Lee’s hand, Lottie led them toward the seats that overlooked the lake. They sat side by side and when Lottie took their intertwined hands to her lap, Laura Lee made no move to pull back. If anything, she sat as close to Lottie as she could without falling on her lap as well.
“Do you want to tell me about you now?” Lottie asked, and after a moment of staring into gorgeous and slightly confused blue eyes, she added, “I’m sure there’s more than college.”
She wondered if Laura Lee understood the myriad of things that Lottie was trying to ask in those scarce, careful words. She wanted to know about the immediate aftermath of their rescue. She wanted to know if Laura Lee’s family helped, rejected, ignored, loved or condemned the person that returned from the wilderness in the body that used to be inhabited by their precious, faultless, impeccable teenage daughter. She wanted to know if college was a healing experience, a different kind of trauma, a blur, a compulsion, a punishment, or an indulgence. She desperately wanted to know if there was… someone. If there was someone waiting for Laura Lee in the reception of the facility, in the parking lot, in a hotel a few miles away, at some airport, or at home. She wanted to know everything, if Laura Lee finally started drinking coffee, if she ever played piano again, the details of her current stance on religion, her favorite movies, her favorite restaurant, what she did in her free time, her morning routine, if she had any pets, any and all of it.
“There’s not much, really,” Laura Lee answered, “I seriously turned myself completely to my studies. Don’t get me wrong, I love it so much, it’s a whole world that I adore, and I can’t even explain how I feel about all my students, it’s just… Outside of the classrooms, and the books, and the research… It’s mostly just going on autopilot.”
It was not what Lottie had been expecting to hear. As much as the most selfish part of her didn’t want to hear about Laura Lee being happy with someone else, there was no part of her that ever wanted her to be anything but happy. So many times throughout the years Lottie had found comfort in the thought that somewhere out there Laura Lee was happy, healthy, safe, thriving, and enjoying her life to the fullest. This was genuinely upsetting for both of them it seemed.
Lottie brought her other hand to cradle Laura Lee’s between both of hers. Her right thumb gently caressed the back of her hand.
“Why did you come here, Laura Lee?” Lottie asked slowly. She understood they were treading delicate ground, and she would move as carefully as she was capable of, and then some more, anything Laura Lee needed from her.
“I saw you in a dream,” Laura Lee answered truthfully, right before she blushed and stuttered a little at her next words. “I mean… Mostly you. It’s… Everything that happened to us. And it’s not just a dream, really. It happens almost every night since…”
Laura Lee’s voice trailed off and Lottie held her hand just a little tighter. Nightmares . Of course. That was to be expected. She was well acquainted with her own brand of nightmares. But almost every night for twenty-five years?
Laura Lee sighed, and with her free hand she gently rubbed one of her temples with her fingertips and then closed her eyes. Lottie eased her hold on her other hand, in case Laura Lee wanted to use it as well. But Laura Lee’s only response was to hold on tighter to Lottie.
“I’m just so tired,” Laura Lee confessed with a whisper.
To hell with caution, Lottie thought.
She couldn’t stand the sight of Laura Lee broken and exhausted and hurting right in front of her. She would do anything in the world to help her, to ease her pain, to assist in putting the pieces together, and cut herself on the sharp edges so Laura Lee could remain unblemished.
Lottie raised their hands slowly to her mouth and the movement caught Laura Lee’s attention. She was staring directly at Lottie’s eyes, with her lips parted slightly, the moment that Lottie’s lips softly kissed her knuckles.
“What finally convinced you to come here?”
Lottie’s timing was just right.
Laura Lee’s eyes were wide, and she was still blushing, looking back and forth between her freshly kissed hand and Lottie’s deep, gorgeous eyes. She smiled a little at the gesture. It wasn’t entirely unfamiliar, it only hadn’t happened in so long.
“It was a difficult decision, and it didn’t happen at once, as a moment of a revelation. It took some time,” Laura Lee explained. “I wanted so badly to… Well, to be honest, I’m not sure what I wanted. I tried to understand what happened, to justify, to explain, to forgive. I wasn’t moving on, or healing. I processed only the idea of what happened to us, the theory. But my body, my mind, and my heart were still out there. I have to think about my decisions very well. You know spontaneity doesn’t always work in my favor. It took me years to agree to therapy, and then to admit it wasn’t working because I wasn’t sharing everything, years to decide to find you, and then to actually find you, and then years to find the courage to drive all the way here.”
As Laura Lee talked, Lottie latched onto every word as if their lives were on the line. She had read between the lines. She had to picture Laura Lee throwing herself at the pages of her books to avoid the reality of what she had survived. It was surprisingly easy, to picture her through the years, pondering her options, considering drastic changes, putting them off again and again until it was impossible to avoid the problem any longer, until she had to try to fly that plane… metaphorically, this time.
“I wish I had looked for you sooner,” Lottie said in a whisper, but then she immediately shook her head. Her hands tightened around Laura Lee’s one. Her emphasis on her next words took them both by surprise. “But I couldn’t ,” Lottie said, “I couldn’t drag you into this again. I couldn’t bring more burdens to your door, love. Not again. I wanted you to be free.”
It was almost confusing to see all the reactions slowly take over Laura Lee’s face as she took the full depth of Lottie’s words and the term of endearment that escaped her. She blushed, she smiled, her eyes turned just a little glassy, and she said, “Free from you?” After a timid nod from Lottie, who would’ve sworn she’d left timidity some twenty-something years ago, Laura Lee added, “I would never want that. I’m here, aren’t I?”
It was only then that Lottie realized she was even closer to tears than Laura Lee. She felt like the tectonic plates of her soul had performed somersaults from the moment she saw Laura Lee sitting in her office and had only settled into a peaceful order that she had never know, and had only come close to experiencing exactly twenty-five years ago, when it should’ve been the worst time of her life, but she was free, conscious, and had Laura Lee at her side, just like she seemed to be in that exact moment.
Laura Lee reached out with her free hand and she cradled Lottie’s jaw in her palm. Call it gravity, a magnetic pull, or the weight of a love she never let go of, but Lottie instantly leaned into the delicate touch. It was enough to make some of her tears escape and roll down her cheeks. Laura Lee’s gentle thumb did its best to wipe the tears away and offer the unmeasurable comfort of caressing Lottie’s warm skin. Lottie realized she was struggling a little bit to breathe through the tears, the pressure and the freedom in her chest at finally feeling at home with a single touch. She turned her head slightly to the side, as if she meant to kiss Laura Lee’s palm, but she hesitated at the very last second, scared to push things too far too soon. It was enough though. That small movement had been enough to let her lips just brush against Laura Lee’s hand, and her breath ghosted the sensitive skin of the inside of her wrist. When Lottie felt Laura Lee’s fingers twitch, both of them shuddered at once.
“Lottie,” Laura Lee whispered her name in that particular tone that Lottie had come to know very well. It seemed some sort of obvious fact to say Laura Lee pronounced certain words like a prayer, because she was that careful and heartfelt with most things she said. But there was nothing, nothing compared to the way she said Lottie’s name sometimes. That devotion and tenderness were for nobody else but Lottie. Jesus could die of jealousy on his cross, Lottie thought with pride.
With her face in Laura Lee’s hand, just like her heart had always been, Lottie allowed herself to smile. Her voice trembled, and she didn’t attempt to disguise her desperate hope when she asked, “Laura Lee, are you staying?”
Lottie got her answer in Laura Lee’s smile and in her bright and beautiful eyes before even hearing the blessed words.
“If you’ll have me.”