The
Expedition
The early day provided boy issues
and frustrating family issues, so an adventure was needed. That dark warm
summer night had the howl that only sounds when a storm is coming. Ariel was
always the most adventurous of us all. The four of us crawled into her little red
car, Sarabi as we called it: Ariel and Stephanie up front, Cassandra and me in
the back, knees pressed against seats and legs touching. We were ready for the
adventure Sarabi was about to take us on.
We made it maybe a mile, before we saw that first great flash. Bright
enough for us to see each other’s faces clearly, even at midnight.
We were giddy.
Wanting to get a better view we drove until we saw the darkest corner we could
find, in a city filled with bright lights skewing our view of the sky that
awaited us. We parked and we waited. The first boom rattled the entire car and
some of us possibly peed a little bit from the frightening call. With our attention
focused on the show that mother nature was providing us, no one noticed the red
and blue lights flashing behind us. When the tap of a flashlight against the
window came there were no longer any dry panties in the car. I don’t think any
of us have screamed that loud before and I don’t think the poor young man in
uniform was expecting to see four high school girls in that car. He had us roll
down the window and asked if we were okay. We explained that we were just
trying to get a better view of the show, and he explained that he was just
looking for drug dealers. Considering this was a common dealing corner we all
agreed it wasn’t the best place for us to be parked. Once apologies were made
and everyone was calm, it was time to head home. That was enough excitement for
one night.
Or so we thought.
Driving down the long empty road home, we saw a car parked off the side in the
distance. As we approached, there, on the hood of that grey SUV were two very
naked adults showing the world just how much they love each other. I mean they
had the idea, sex during a thunderstorm, yes please. But on the side of a main
road, perfectly placed for four innocent high school girls to see them do things,
and hear them make noises that none of us had experienced yet? We couldn’t look
away, but we couldn’t look straight at them. So we sped past and put all of our
energy into just simply getting home.
The excitement of
the night must have gotten to us. We were not ready for calm or ordinary, just
yet. It was summer, we were young, and the weather was perfect. It was time for
skinny-dipping. Ariel had the perfect pool and the perfect way of convincing
you to be a rebel, and yes, skinny-dipping was very rebellious for us in those days. We stripped down and jumped
in. Splashing and laughing and trying to remember that we were in this
together, we forgot all embarrassment, all heartache, all anger we may have
been feeling earlier that day. We were on top of the world. We jumped out, our
bodies glowing in the night, we ran through the long raspberry fields behind
the house. Feeling the dirt between our toes, tasting the sweet red juices,
laughing until we fell over. We were feeling the freedom of the couple on the
side of the road; we were alive. Every time the lightening came down we paused.
Every time the thunder growled we clapped. It was the most magnificent feeling
in the world that we thought four high school girls could ever feel. It was a
night for adventures, a night for daring expeditions. Mother nature challenged
us with her adventurous calls of terror and we accepted.
