We stepped out of the van and Tristan’s boyfriend came around to help her with the baby. Or so I thought. He kissed her on the lips, and I awkwardly looked up to the white, fluffy clouds, not expecting it to be that kind of kiss.
Tristan giggled and pushed him away. “Jesus, Ty.”
Ty laughed, too, leaving her with another quick kiss. He kissed the baby’s head and slammed the van door with a very happy smile. “I gotta get busy. I’ll see you in a little while. I love you.”
Tristan turned to me like she was saying it to me and not him. “Love you back. Come on. I’ll give you a tour of your new condo.”
“Great,” I sarcastically said, being a comedian for my new friend at my expense. She laughed at my sarcasm, but I didn’t. I couldn’t understand any of this. Why on earth anyone would want to live like this was beyond me, and I had a gazillion questions but didn’t ask. Following Tristan, I wondered where I would sleep, what I would eat, where I would shower, where I would use the bathroom, and what on God’s green earth I was doing, sure it had finally happened. I’d lost my flipping mind.
Reaching around Tristan, shifting the baby with one arm, I helped her pull open the bus doors while she talked. Like we really were stepping into a five-star hotel, Tristan waved her hand around. “If you want, we can do like Ty did in ours. Depending on where you want your room to be, you can put a door on this side like we did. Look at this view, Atlantis. You can put a small deck right out here. Can you imagine having your coffee here in the morning? Wait until you see it. I swear you’ve never seen anything like it.”
Tristan slid into an old green bus seat, staring out to the blue sky and mountains, with a smile, of course. Like she was in love. She kissed her baby and turned to me when I didn’t answer. This time with a different kind of smile. A pity smile I didn’t need.
I slid into the seat across from her and looked past her. There was no denying the beauty, and I was sure I’d never seen anything like it in all my life. Miles and miles of mountains, blue skies, and puffy, white clouds. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to sound ungrateful, it’s just.”
Tristan dropped her head and looked at me through hooded eyes. “It’s just that you’re lost and you have no idea where you belong. I know this is hard for you to see right now, and I wish this place was finished so you could see what I see, but I think it was meant to be this way. You weren’t good by yourself in that condo.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Her head leaned toward the right and spoke her mind. That was something I learned about her early on. Tristan spoke her mind whether you wanted to hear it or not. The best part was her honesty. She spoke the brutal truth.
“You don’t have to pretend with me, Atlantis. I’m your friend and I’m not pointing fingers at you. You just got out of prison, and it was silly of me to think you would be okay there by yourself. Maybe if you would have walked across the road and got the book like I told you. Aren’t you tired of being who everyone thinks you should be?”
I smiled but didn’t really have any words. She was right. I was lost, and it didn’t matter where I called home.
“Come on, we’ll go look at the other one. You might like it better.”
Sliding from the seat, I once again followed Tristan to the bus, which was exactly the same as the other one but with ugly brown seats. Even though it was the same, and as crazy at it sounded in my head, I did like it better. There was a small slope behind it and I barely had to step up at all. For unknown reasons, I also liked the layout of the pine trees behind it. Like they were expensive pieces of furniture or something.
As though she read my mind, Tristan elaborated on my thoughts. “These trees were placed here by a farmer back in the eighteen hundreds. The old man we bought it from told us there used to be a barn and a house on the edge of the field there. He planted them to break the wind. I’m so glad he did. Wait until you tie a hammock up out here and read a book. You’ll forget about anything else. Scout’s honor.”
As much as I tried to see the vison, I just couldn’t do it. Tristan waved her hand around the old bus, tossing out ideas like we were on one of those HGTV shows. Only we weren’t and we weren’t flipping houses. This was a bus. A school bus built out to be a makeshift house with old junk. No matter how pretty she tried to make it sound with words, the truth was the truth. I was homeless, and my mind couldn’t see what her mind saw.
That is, until we stepped into their bus. A mattress still in plastic was the first thing I saw. It was still just a shell, but it had walls made of mostly light wood and a beautiful floor that reminded me of an old ship deck. Only this was smooth and shiny. Tobias was at the back of the bus on the ground lightly hammering a piece of trim. Listening to her describe where their room would go, the bunk for Baby-T, and the crib right across for the new baby, her one wall kitchen, her deck, and even an old potbelly stove Ty was working on for the winter. I was stunned.
I hadn’t thought about winter until that very morning. “Oh, yeah. Winter’s coming. We’re not staying here in the winter, are we? The mountains get snowed in, away from civilization, right?”
“Yes, Atlantis, and you’re going to love it. There’s no better place to be trapped in a snowstorm than the mountains. Wait until you’re sitting in front of your own wood burner with a book, lounged out on a comfy bed, watching it snow.”
Refraining from not telling her how much I hated the snow, I stifled a groan, failing to hide the sarcasm. I wasn’t so sure I’d be there for that, but at the time, I didn’t have many options. “Great.”
“Come on, let’s go make some lunch.”
With my breath held in my lungs, I followed her out to an outside kitchen. If that’s what you wanted to call it.
Tristan worked with one hand, talking while she prepared something green on a long wood table. I thought about asking her if she wanted me to take the baby, but I couldn’t. Besides, she looked like she was used to it. She did just fine without me. But then Ty came from out of nowhere with a baby seat. He took Baby-T, kissed Tristan again, and tossed the baby to the air.
“Ahh, thanks, babe. I appreciate you.”
And there it was again. That strange compliment nobody but she said.
“You’re welcome. I’ll eat later. I want to get our bed framed up so we can sleep in it tonight.”
“You can’t work without energy. You can take twenty minutes to eat.”
“I can help,” I offered when he walked away.
Tristan sliced into an onion and smiled. “No, you sit. I’ve got it. We’ll eat and go for a walk to the falls. Tomorrow we’ll go to town while Ty works and get you some more clothes. I was going to tell you to take anything of my mom’s you wanted, but I didn’t think you would want to hammer nails, wearing Gucci and Ralph Lauren.”
“I’m afraid I might be better at wearing the designer clothes. I don’t know if I’ve ever held a hammer in my life.”
That was the truth. But it was also before I spent almost twelve months in the same outfit as everyone else, no makeup, and my hair long and stringy. Looking down at my jeans, a little on the snug side, I thought about what I would have been wearing if I would have been home. Thursdays were always a good day for me. Daniel worked until eight every night but Thursdays, which meant I would have been in sweats or the baggy jeans Danny hated. The ones I wore now. Only now they were a little more fitted. Rather than blaming it on myself, I blamed the circumstances.
Tristan whipped up a salad talking to me like a mentoring friend I didn’t want. “Where are your parents?”
Even though I didn’t want a mentor, a nosey friend, or this conversation, I answered, but not the made-up story Daniel concocted for me. He didn’t want people thinking any less of me because of my alcoholic dad who took off when I was sick, or my bipolar mom who changed her address and men every other month. She wasn’t really bipolar, not medically diagnosed anyway, but she was selfish. “My dad took off when I was six. I was in the hospital with pneumonia and who knows where my mom is. She was never much of mom. I’ve pretty much lived with my Aunt Jo most of my life. Full-time since I was eleven.”
“Your Aunt Jo is your mom’s sister or dads?”
I’m not sure why that mattered, but I answered anyway, my lungs filling with the warm mountain air. “My mom’s. I never really met my dad’s family. They were mostly from Texas.”
“Do you have siblings?”
“No, just me.”
“Cousins from Aunt Jo?”
“Yes, two boys, but they were older. My cousin Jack had just gotten married when I moved in, and Mark left a few months later for college.”
“I’m an only child, too, raised by a nanny and then a boarding school.”
For whatever reason, I felt the need to tell her about my friend. She was better than any sibling I could have asked for. Even if it was short lived. “I had a best friend, Jaycee. She died on our nineteenth birthday from a heroin overdose.”
“Oh, honey. I’m so sorry. Sometimes we don’t understand the lessons, but they’re necessary.”
I didn’t mean to snort, but I couldn’t help it. Tristan wasn’t as smart as she thought she was, and she didn’t know me. At all. If Jaycee wouldn’t have left me, I wouldn’t be here. I wouldn’t be having this stupid conversation, and I wouldn’t be sleeping in a bus in the middle of the mountains. I’d be with her. No doubt about it.
“I know you don’t get it right now, sweetie, but you will. Maybe Jaycee was never meant to be there throughout your life. I’m not so sure you would be here if you had a best friend to talk you off the ledge.”
Again, I blew out a knowing puff of air, assuring her and myself of her truthful words. “I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t have even married Daniel if she hadn’t taken the easy way out.”
Tristan handed me a bowl of salad without offering a choice of dressing, and sat beside me, handing her baby his dropped toy. “This is the best salad dressing ever. I got the recipe from my friend Toni. It’s made from grapes, vinegar, and pineapple juice.”
Even though I smiled, thanking her for the food, I pouted to myself. I liked ranch, I always ate ranch on my salad, and I didn’t want some grape tasting, vinegar and juice crap. “Thank you.”
“Jaycee was your person?”
I took a bite of the salad, humming. “Hmmm, you’re right. That’s good. Yes, Jaycee was that girl. She lived in a trailer practically in our back yard. We hit it off from the first time I walked out back and caught her on my tire swing. God, I miss her.”
“So, you married a guy you knew your bestie would hate?”
Laughing more at myself than her, I stabbed a chunk of tomato and plopped it in my mouth. “Right? How dumb was I?”
“Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why’d you marry him?”
I shrugged and let out a deep breath of air, my shoulders dropping with the release. “I don’t know. I thought I was doing the right thing. Daniel was the first guy I’d ever gone out with who had his shit together. I’m somewhat of a douche magnet. It’s like they smell me coming a mile away.”
“Hmmm.”
Looking up with a frown, I turned to the condescending hum. “What?”
“Nothing, I get it.”
“What? You get what?”
“Nothing, I’m just trying to be easier on you than I am with Ty.”
I took another bite of the salad with my new favorite dressing, and frowned her way. “What’s that even mean?”
“It means, I know you think you’re in a bad place right now, but you’re not. Whether you stay here or not, you’re going to leave a lot better off than when you got here. Just trust me. I swear I know what I’m talking about.”
Emphasizing my words with an animated bob of my head toward her, I countered. “I’m not sure you know what you’re talking about. I do know I’m going to eventually have to stop running and face reality.”
Tristan picked up the toy truck again and talked around the food in her mouth. “That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. Stop facing reality. Face your own created reality. Imagine what you want in great detail, feel the feelings of having it, and focus on it with all your might.”
“And you think that’s going to work?”
“I know it’s going to work. I’ve been putting together a whole program for you. Well, not just you. I’m going to share it with people at the next meet. You’re just the first one going through it, so I might have to do some tweaking.”
“Oh, great. You want to use me as a human guinea-pig?”
Tristan giggled again, her eyes disappearing with the laughter. “I’ve been using it my entire life and you’re not the first one.”
“I am,” Ty announced, his hand giving her long braid a tug.
I swear their eyes lit up when they looked at each other, a twinkle I had never seen in my life. “Sorry, babe. You’re still a work in progress.”
Ty looked at me while taking his own bowl of salad, shoving a fork full of spinach leaves into his mouth. “She’s sort of passionate about other people’s lives.”
“I am, because everyone is doing it wrong, but sometimes it’s way stronger. Like with you and Ty. Like I don’t have a choice. I want you to live your life to the fullest, and you’re not. I doubt you ever have, but it’s not your fault. You’ve just been doing it how you’ve been programmed to do it.”
“Programmed? How so?”
Ty sat beside his baby, playing with him while Tristan talked to me like nobody had before. She made more sense than I gave her credit for, and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t intrigued.
“I don’t want to talk about that with you yet. You’re just going to blow it off and judge me because you’re not ready for it. Let’s just stick to the law of attraction stuff. That part will come when it’s time.”
“Law of attraction?”
“Yes, something you should have been taught since you were born. How much power your own mind has, but you’ve never been taught to use it. You were taught to fall in line and do what the other kids are doing. Sit at a desk and learn the exact same thing every other kid learned. I can’t wait until we get this place up and running. I’ll guarantee the first thing the kids are going to learn is that their authenticity comes first. You know? It makes no sense to me at all. Why on earth would you force a kid to learn physics when he wants to paint a mountain? Why would you force a kid to write an essay about Abraham Lincoln when he wants to build a bridge? Really? Come on. Does that make any sense at all to you? Do you even remember anything from that physics class?”
Without even thinking about it, I replied. “Not one damn thing.”
“Why?! Ugh.”
Ty leaned against her leg, calming her excitement with a light bump. “Easy tiger.”
“Sorry. Anyway, that’s my purpose on this earth. I’m here to wake as many people up as I can and hope it spreads like wildfire. There’s no reason for all this anymore. It’s not for the people, it’s for a few elites and their big fat piggy banks. Think about it. Why the fuck are we letting a handful of people turn the whole world against each other? War never changed anything. Just look in your fake history books. Love. That’s it. Love is what’s going to change it, and that’s what I’m spreading. Either you’re throwing hearts, or you’re throwing darts, and there’s no in between. It’s either black, or white.”
“You’re still on a rampage, babe.”
Tristan ruffled Ty’s hair and smiled down at him on the ground. “I know. I’m just excited we have one more person tired of the rat race. It doesn’t have to be that way, Atlantis. It doesn’t.”
It wasn’t the rat race I was running from, but mentioning it would defeat the whole point in running. Rather than keeping the deep conversation going, I commented on the waterfall. Even though we couldn’t see it from where we sat, you could still hear it in the distance. “Is that sound from the waterfall we passed?”
Excited about something I said, Tristan beat her chest, swallowing the water she’d just tossed to the back of her throat. Her hands clapped and she animatedly waved them around, her eyes lighting up like bright stars. “That’s perfect. Think about that for a while. Nothing else. Every time you want to go on a self-pity rampage, tune in to that. Listen to the birds, the bugs, the water flowing over there, and the waterfall over there. Think about the pine needles rustling together up there, the buzzing bees, the fresh air. See how many sounds of nature you hear. It’s Mother Earth talking. She’s very wise. All you have to do is listen.”
I nodded but refrained from responding. One minute I thought this girl was on fire, and the next I wondered about her sanity, or was it mine I was worried about?
After lunch, Tristan and I walked toward the stream in the back, a football field away, through some sort of grain field ready to be harvested. At least, close to it anyway. Amber waves of grain. My fingers glided across the tall grass, tingling with the tousling tops. I followed close behind listening to Tristan talk, Baby-T on her back.
“Straight up there is where we’re going to build the labyrinth. I can’t wait. The deer have already made a path up the side of the mountain. We’ll go there tomorrow.”
I understood what she was trying to do, but I wasn’t a nature person like her. I was a mall girl not nature girl. The waterfall really was magnificent, but it was just a waterfall and I didn’t have the same enthusiasm about it as she did. Nonetheless, my options were limited and for now this was all I had, and for unknown reasons, it was enough.
Tobias worked inside their bus home, building a bed frame so I could have the van. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that until after we’d eaten bean burgers. Tristan left Tobias in charge of Baby-T and walked to her van with me, parked nose to nose with her bus. I followed, watching her open the back doors where the crib was built. She folded down a table and pulled out a sink, and without asking, I knew it was my shower for the night. I knew exactly how I felt about that. I hated it. I wanted to go back to the condo with the five heads of hot water hitting my body anywhere I wanted it to.
Attaching a hose to a plastic container of water Tobias must have carried, she explained the instructions. “Here’s a nozzle if you want to wash your hair. I brought you a fresh bar of soap. That’s all you need for your hair, too. A friend of mine makes it. It’s all natural.”
Of course it was, I thought, my eyes going to the caddy hooked to the back of the door and the fat bar of soap. I glanced around at the open forest, hearing the brook we’d visited earlier winding down the mountain close by. “Don’t you have a curtain or something?”
Tristan frowned, looking through the darkening forest. “Who is it you’re afraid of seeing you? We’re the only ones here. Nobody can see you.”
I thought about it with a deep sigh. “Fine, whatever.”
“You know you’re screwed if we have an apocalypse, don’t you? How on earth would you live without Walmart?”
“I wouldn’t. I would die.”
It was joke, but I felt like she didn’t take it that way. She looked at me with pity, but didn’t elaborate. “You should climb up on the roof and watch the stars.”
In my mind only, I grumbled. Sure. Sure, I’ll climb on top of a van in the middle of the forest and wait to be eaten by a wild animal. “Yeah, okay. Goodnight.”
“Goodnight, Atlantis. I put a couple books on the counter for you. Do the one on top first and if you can’t sleep yet, you can read the other one. It’s the one you were supposed to have already read.”
I smiled because she smiled first, and then she hugged me. Ugh, I hated people like that. Hugging her back, I awkwardly waited for her to let go. “Thanks for everything, Tristan. I mean it. I don’t mean to sound ungrateful. I’m not.”
Just when I thought she was about to let go, she hugged me tighter. “I know you’re not. Hang in there, girl. I swear you’re on to something big. I’m not sure what it is yet, but I’m very of aware of it and it’s very strong. Something big is coming your way.”
A three-hundred square foot school bus with a bed wasn’t the big I needed in my life right now. “As long as it doesn’t have a penis, I’m open to it.”
Tristan squeezed one more time and then let go. “No, I totally agree. That’s the last thing you need right now. I’m going to try really hard not to be as hard on you as I was Tobias, but I’ll probably fail a few times. I don’t know what it is, but there’s something about you. There’s a reason you came into my life when you did, and I swear to God, Atlantis, if you’ll be open to it and just let it flow, you’re going to be knocked off your feet. Trust me.”
My head bobbed and I earnestly replied, wanting to believe her with all my might. I couldn’t help it if I was skeptical. Some hippy kid with long hair and a hard body in a bus wasn’t my thing. “Okay. I will. I’m trying.”
Trystan turned toward the bus, her head instantly shaking and that same twinkle lighting up in her eyes. Tobias was flying Baby-T from the front of the bus to the back. “I know you are. I better go make the bed. Ty’s had enough for one day. He needs to play.”
I smiled, happy for her. Happy she had Ty and she was being her own authentic self. Happy she had her land and this bus community thing she was so passionate about. That didn’t mean I wanted the same thing.
I’m pretty sure that was the fastest shower I had ever had in my life. Not only was I freezing, I was paranoid about someone seeing me naked right out in the open. I’m not sure who. Maybe a bear. The thoughts of a big hungry bear staring at me like a big bowl of chocolate ice-cream rushed me right along. The shower wasn’t as bad as I had anticipated, and five gallons of water was more than enough to feel refreshed and clean. I even liked the lavender scented all-in-one bar of soap. It made my hair feel soft, but not in the same way the traditional conditioner did. This was more of a stripped kind of soft. Once I’d cleaned up, I slid my one and only pair of sweats on, a tee-shirt, and my borrowed pair of flip-flops.
I quickly cleaned up, putting things away the way I had watched Tristan get them out, and jumped into the van, sure I was seconds away from being eaten. With deep breaths, I calmed my nerves, telling myself how ridiculous I was being. Even so, I wasn’t this brave, wild girl like Tristan was. I belonged in a house with a real bed, a shower, television, and my clothes. Everything I had left behind. Things I needed. Things I would have to go buy again, and things I wanted because they were near and dear to my heart.
Shivering from the cool September night air, I covered myself with a handmade quilt and looked toward the bus. Tristan was ripping plastic from the mattress, and Tobias was trying to help, dancing with her from behind. I smiled watching her shove him away. They were so cute together. Fake, but cute. Not wanting her to think I was spying, I closed the curtain behind me and took a deep breath. The van was roomie, and the lantern Tristan had left me was more than enough to light the small space. It wasn’t bad at all. Ty was a very talented guy. That wasn’t the problem. It was barely nine, and although I hadn’t gotten much sleep the night before, I found myself bored. What the heck was I supposed to do now?
Of course, my eyes landed on the notebook Tristan had left for me. Only it wasn’t just a notebook. I picked it up and slid the tips of my fingers across the top and as farfetched as it sounded in my mind, it felt special. Like she’d taken her time picking it out just for me. The cover was white with a black silhouette. Near the bottom was the backside of a girl with her arms stretched holding peace high into the air with two fingers on each hand. At the top it read, Our Tribe, and the bottom said Unapologetically Me. I turned the page feeling a deep frown grow across my face when I turned the first page. It wasn’t a new journal at all. It was full. Full of handwritten, I don’t know what. Across the very first page was one simple statement.
"We can complain because rose bushes have thorns,
or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses."
The next page caused the same reaction. I skimmed through her reasoning’s of why it was important for me to love myself, my eyes rolling more than once. This was so stupid and I hoped she hadn’t spent much time on it. Something about starting my day with intention and writing it down. She even made a list as an example, made it fancy, and even colored them. I was supposed to do the same thing on with my own blank page. The next page was something totally different, just as stupid, but I didn’t read it. And not because she told me not to in bubble letters either. I had no desire to read it.
I lay down and turned off the light, wishing I could just sleep my life away. Tristan didn’t know me. She didn’t know who I was or the things I’d done in my life. I wasn’t worthy of her kindness. My days started how they started and no amount of intention was going to change that and I sure as hell didn’t have thirty things I loved, to write down. It sort of pissed me off, like she was mocking me but my heart knew better. That wasn’t Tristan and as tired and grouchy as I was, I couldn’t deny it.
Before the sun was even completely gone for the night, I was covered up to my chin with my eyes closed, but I didn’t sleep. Not for a while anyway. I thought about everything there was to think of except for the one thing I was avoiding. And then I tried Tristan’s trick. Listening for sounds, I heard the pine trees above rustling in the breeze, the water flowing from the left, an owl and then two owls, crickets and bullfrogs, and then finally sleep.