There is no ground beneath me, just rushing water and jagged rocks.
I scream as I begin to plummet, but suddenly I'm jerked backward.
Someone has hold of my shirt collar and is pulling me back. They hoist me back onto the soil and I tumble into them before flopping to the ground.
Olivia looks down at me, panting for breath. She must have caught up with us just in time to stop me falling to my doom.
"Thanks," I say, huffing.
"That was close, chico."
We both look across the ravine. Jasper is there, watching us. I could have died and he knows it. Does he look sort of relieved?
There's not enough time for me to figure out the answer to my question. Jasper lifts an eyebrow cockily, before sprinting into the woods like a majestic stag.
I take Olivia's hand and she pulls me up.
"You nearly had him, bonehead," she says, patting me on the back.
"You're full of surprises."
"Ha, yeah…" I still have no idea how I, the boy who's managed to get out of every PE class since middle school, nearly caught up with Jasper. He's literally a genetic masterpiece. His dad is the alpha, the strongest wolf in the pack.
He's a purebred and I'm just a geek from the suburbs. But I was keeping up with him. How?
"Must be a blue moon miracle," Olivia says.
In the distance, we hear cheers of victory echoing through the forest.
So, we lost the game. At least now we can stop running around and nearly dying, right?
Olivia and I head back to the meeting point. I ponder what she said about the blue moon and wonder about the impending luna phenomenon.
Maybe it can boost a wolf's speed as well as their libido. Or maybe I just really didn't want Jasper to win.
Olivia is still limping a little from when she tripped.
"Is your ankle alright?"
"I'll live," she says and accelerates.
As soon as we're back at the meeting point I find Katie.
"Congratulations," I say.
"You look kind of rough," she says, appraising the dirt stains on my shirt, the graze on my leg, and the more-ruffled-than-usual state of my hair.
"You must have gotten involved after all."
"Meh, I mostly just hid in the bushes."
"Did you have fun?"
"Let's just say I gave Jasper a run for his money."
"No way," Katie says. Her mouth drops wide enough for a whale to come swimming out.
"But I wasn't fast enough."
"Oh well, maybe you'll get another chance to catch him in some other game."
"Maybe," I laugh. We join the other sweat-drenched wolves heading back to camp.
We emerge from the forest and immediately I spot a black town car parked out front of the alpha's lodge. Standing by the rear end of the car is a Louis Vuitton suitcase.
"Who does all of that belong to?" I ask, but Katie has no response.
She's as shocked as I am.
A second later a driver comes out to collect the suitcase followed by a statue-esque, dark-skinned girl with long flowing waves of hair like a waterfall. She's wearing a turtleneck sweater in cream and white skinny jeans. From this distance, it's hard to make out her face behind her large, ostentatious sunglasses.
"Is that…?" Katie trails off mid-question.
"What? Who is it?" I ask.
"Don't you recognize her?"
I turn back, squinting to see better, as the movie star-level-gorgeous girl whips off her sunglasses, shaking her hair out in slow motion.
I gasp. "That's Aisha Miller!"
The other campers continue to flow past us, like a river around a boulder. But we can't move. Our favorite werewolf dancer superstar is here!
"Of course she has the sense to turn up after capture the flag," I say.
Aisha discusses something with her driver before he nods politely and takes her suitcase through the doors of the main cabin. I don't even blink twice about the fact that she's staying in the alpha's lodge.
Because...of course, she is!
Then she turns to face us...us! And she waves… Oh my Moon God! Is she waving at me?!
Tentatively, I raise my hand and wave back, just as someone knocks into my shoulder, throwing me off balance.
When I look back, Aisha's no longer looking in this direction. I'm suddenly sure she was never looking in this direction. Because Jasper is jogging over to her, returning her wave.
Like a barely competent fifth grader, I put two and two together.
Aisha is staying in the main cabin, where Jasper is staying. Jasper was at the ballet in the city. She even looked for him when she was taking her bow.
They know each other!
How could someone so graceful, someone who can bring hundreds of people so much happiness, be friends with someone so devoid of emotion?
"Wow, they look pretty close," Katie says as Jasper wraps his arm around Aisha and walks her into his father's lodge.
My sudden excitement turns to bitter-ass disappointment. I would love to say hi and tell her how great I think she is. But there's no way I can do that if she's with that jerk. I can picture his condescending smirk. I bet he'd think it was pathetic and look down his perfectly straight, completely proportionate nose at me.
Some of the festival volunteers have set up barbecues down by the canoe shed. Cleaned up and starving we find our way down to the water.
My mouth starts watering as the aroma of barbecued pork wafts under my nose. My eyes nearly jump out of my head at the sight of four whole hogs being spit roasted.
It's a sunny day and the surface of the water is calm. The lake itself is wider than I first thought, disappearing behind the trees as it bends.
Katie and I make a direct line for the food. A couple of picnic tables are laid out with plates and cutlery and, of course, potato salad. A queue has already formed where one of the volunteers is serving up succulent pork, so I grab a plate and ignore the creamy spuds.
I join the back of the line and my stomach growls like a wolf who's found its mate.
"That smells so good," a smooth voice behind me says.
"Tell me about it," I say, glancing over my shoulder and freezing.
The owner of that voice is Aisha Miller. The prima ballerina is standing behind me in line for barbecue!
"I'm so hungry I could probably eat the whole hog," she says, laughing.
I struggle to form words. Whatever I'm trying to say comes out as weird gurgling noises.
"You...your...I...uuunnnhhh…" "You ok?" she asks.
"I…" "Are you always this articulate?"
"He's just really hungry," Katie says, popping up next to me and saving my, literal, life. "He nearly outran Jasper this morning and hasn't quite recovered."
"Wow," Aisha says. "That's impressive. You must be fast."
"I'm so fast," I say, and instantly want to slap myself in the face.
"That's great. I'm Aisha by the way. How are you two enjoying the festival so far?"
"Oh, we know who you are," Katie says. "We're actually big fans."
"Is that right?"
"Yeah, really big, right Max?"
Katie elbows me in the ribs, hard, jolting me back to life.
"YES!" I shock everyone–even myself–with how loud that comes out. "Sorry, yes. We're big fans. We just saw you in New York a month ago."
"He does speak," Aisha says, smiling.
"Sorry," I say. "You just surprised me. My name is Max and this is my best friend Katie."
"It's nice to meet both of you." Aisha glances up, looking impatient.
"Man, these guys are slow. I'm going to shift and kill someone if I don't get fed soon."
Eventually, we all get some meat on our plates and Aisha asks if we want to eat with her.
"I always get overwhelmed at these things, there's too many wolves hungry to find a soulmate," she says, as we find a spot to sit on a lush, grassy knoll.
"You've been to a festival before?" Katie asks.
"Yeah, just one. About three years ago when I was sixteen."
"You didn't find your mate?" Katie's eyes are swimming with romantic daydreams, and little love hearts float around her head.
"No, but that's fine. I'm already mated."
Aisha can tell we're shocked by the way we both stop shoveling food into our mouths.
"To dance," she says, laughing. We both roll our heads back in recognition. "I'm committed to ballet, I don't have time for some wannabe alpha thinking he can claim me as his mate."
"Maybe you'll find one this year," Katie says, never one to give up on love.
Aisha shrugs. "Maybe."
"Katie is really into all that mate stuff. She's super excited about the Mating Run," I say.
"That's great," Aisha says, "I hope that works out for you."
She touches Katie's arm, showing her sincerity, and then turns to me with a raised brow.
"And what about you? You're not excited about the Mating Run?"
"Me?" I ask, suddenly flustered. "I haven't really thought about it."
"Max is an artist like you," Katie pipes in. "He's more focussed on his art this festival."
I shoot Katie a look and she shakes her head like she doesn't understand. It's not that I want Aisha to think I'm all mate-thirsty. I just don't want her to think I'm a complete party pooper.
"What kind of art do you do?" Aisha asks.
"Drawings," I say. "Mostly landscapes."
"Well, I'd love to see them sometime."
My cheeks heat up as I remember all those sketches I did at the river. The ones where I drew Aisha dancing and...the one of Jasper's face.
"So are you friends with Jasper?" Katie asks.
"Oh yeah, we went to boarding school together," Aisha says, shrugging like it's nothing.
"It's his first festival isn't it?"
"Yeh, Jasp is younger than me by, like, six months, he was still fifteen when the last festival happened."
I have to stop myself from giggling at her nickname for him. Jasp! I never imagined he would be the type for cutesy epithets.
"Do you think you two might be…?" Katie asks, unsubtly bringing the subject back to mates.
Aisha guffaws. "Me and Jasper. No way, girlfriend! He's like my brother. We go back too far for that."
"You never know what the Moon Gods have in store," Katie says.
I don't know why but I'm relieved finding out there's nothing romantic going on between Jasper and Aisha. Maybe there's a chance Aisha and I could wind up being mates. I don't feel a strong pull to her besides thinking she's an amazing dancer, but we are getting along.
"Speak of the devil," she says, interrupting my train of thought.
I look up and see Jasper approaching. He's wearing black jeans which taper in at his ankle, new trainers, and a perfectly crisp white t-shirt.
"Hey dude," Aisha says, waving him over. "I was just talking to these cool kids."
Jasper tilts his head so that he can see us over his sunglasses.
"Kids, sure," he says, huffing.
That jerk! Now he wants to embarrass me in front of Aisha!
"Be nice, Jasp. Did you know Max here was an artist?"
"Can't say I did."
"Come on, join us," Aisha says.
I'm in love with how chill she is around him. She talks to him like he's just another wolf.
"I have some pork I couldn't finish if you want?" I say, holding out my plate. I notice Aisha trying not to laugh and I wonder why on earth I just said that. Or why I was suddenly feeling generous. I totally wanted to finish my plate of food and it's not like I want him to sit with us. Do I?
Jasper looks at the plate of food like it's a rotting corpse.
"I'm vegetarian," he says.
"Oh."
"Right everybody! It's time for canoeing!" Eleanor's chirpy, high-pitched voice interrupts the conversation. The rest of the camp-goers chuck their dirty paper plates in the bin and head over to the boat shed to get a canoe.
"That sounds fun!" Aisha says. Jasper doesn't look so impressed though. "Don't mind him, he's just really bad at rowing."
I have to stop myself from exploding with laughter. Even Katie can't help but giggle behind her hand.
"Two people per canoe!" Eleanor pronounces. "Only two people per canoe, find a canoe buddy and get paddling!"
"Hey Aisha," I say. "You fancy being my canoe buddy?"
I'm shocked that those words came out of my mouth and from the way Katie is looking at me so is she.
"You two don't want to go together?" Aisha says, looking as awkward as I feel.
I go to start speaking, to say that yes, of course I will go with Katie.
But she stands and stomps off before I have a chance.
Instantly, I feel awful. I've just completely snubbed my best friend and I've done it in front of everyone.
"That was really shitty of me," I say, very aware of Jasper standing off to my side, looking down on me like a pathetic ant at a picnic.
"I'm not much for canoeing anyway," Aisha says. "Why don't you run and try and fix things with Katie?"
"Good idea," I say.
I hop up and jog over to where people are already launching their boats into the water.
"Katie! Katie! I'm sorry," I say as I catch up to her. "I shouldn't have left you hanging like that. Can we still canoe together?"
Katie turns and the look on her face is a message. She is not ready to forgive and forget. Her lips are pressed together and her glare is stonier than the mountains in the distance.
"Don't worry about it, Max, I found someone else to go with."
Eleanor exits the canoe shed holding a fiberglass boat.
"Coming partner?" she asks Katie.
My best friend glares at me for a moment longer before replying, "Yes." She helps Eleanor launch the boat into the water.
The shore is quiet now and I feel as if everyone has managed to find someone to canoe with except me.
I turn around. Jasper and Aisha are still back at the picnic site. I think they see me looking but I'm too embarrassed to go over and speak to them. I don't want Aisha to think I'm coming back to ask her again and I don't want Jasper to see me when I'm feeling shitty and lonely.
Aisha is speaking to Jasper, gesturing in my direction, but I don't want to seem like I'm prying so I turn back around. I decide I'll sit here by the lake and watch the others out on their boats and when Katie gets back I'll do my best to apologize. Hopefully, I can make it up to her.
There's a sudden noise from inside the shed and I'm bowled over to turn and find Jasper carrying a canoe toward the shore.
"I'll go with you, come on," he says.
"Why?" I ask, making no attempt to hide my surprize.
"Because it's part of my duty to make sure everyone participates in the festival. And because Aisha is making me."
I turn my head over my shoulder––Aisha flicks her hands toward the water, encouraging us both to get going.
"Are you coming or not?"
Jasper is looking at me like I'm the biggest imposition in the world.
Spending time out on the water with him is not my idea of a good time either. But my only other option is storming off like a big sooky baby in front of Aisha and my future alpha.
"Fine. As long as you don't call me bonehead."
I get up and head to the boat, together we push it out onto the water and jump in just as we leave the shore.
I grab my oar from inside the hull and grip it tightly.
I can't believe I'm about to spend my afternoon in a tiny boat with Jasper. The jerk who has been antagonizing me since before we arrived at this stupid festival. Maybe it's what I deserve after the way I dropped Katie.
One thing is for sure: spending this much time with Jasper will be punishment.