Finn pointed to an orange dot on the northwest quadrant of Washington State. “Mount Ire.”

“Yeah! Mount Ire. Man, that shit was scary.”

“Well, get ready,” Finn said as she folded up the map, “’cause that’s where we’re going next.”

They wouldn’t make it to Mount Ire by nightfall. It was summer. The days were long, but not long enough. They would have to make camp somewhere in the old-growth forests of northern Oregon, a land where trees dramatically outnumbered people. While Zadie appreciated the oxygen they provided, she did not appreciate the cover they gave to a host of creatures that might want to eat her. Snakes and scorpions seemed like windup toys compared to the cougars and bears that roamed the wilderness of the Pacific Northwest. Even the vegetarians—elk, bighorn sheep, moose—had menacing horns protruding from their skulls. What were those horns for if not to gore her to death? Zadie knew she was spiraling down, but just because she knew it was happening didn’t mean she could stop it.

It took her several seconds to realize her marshmallow had ignited into a ball of flame. Finn leaned in and with a quick puff of air extinguished it, leaving behind a blistered black lump of sugar on the end of Zadie’s stick. Zadie barely glanced at the marshmallow before her gaze was dragged back to the dark wood beyond the ring of firelight.

“You’re freaking out, aren’t you?” Finn said.

“No,” she said, defensive. “Why would I?” Zadie couldn’t see the moon. Where was it? When she looked up, all she could see were dark spires of ponderosa pine looming over her. They must have the moon—an irrational thought that made perfect sense in the moment.

“Are you gonna eat that?” Joel said, pointing to the cremated marshmallow on the end of her stick. Zadie shook her head and handed it to him. “I like ’em crispy,” he said and ripped the charred remains from the stick with his teeth.

Finn draped an arm around her sister’s shoulder. “It’s okay to be scared. I mean … these woods are haunted.”

Zadie elbowed her sister in the ribs. “Ow!” Finn recoiled, clutching her side, and laughed. “Sorry, I forgot you were scared of ghosts.”

“I’m not,” she lied. At twenty-three, Zadie still hadn’t gotten over her irrational fear of the paranormal. I have Mom to thank for that, she thought bitterly, remembering the time Nora had recorded spooky noises on her cassette player and left it playing under her bed.

“The woods are definitely haunted,” Joel said, sucking marshmallow out from behind his teeth. “I saw a ghost out here once.”

“Joel, cut it out.”

“I’m serious! His name was Tom and we shared a pineapple. It was dope.”

“That wasn’t a ghost. You just ate pineapple in the woods with some stranger.”

“Classic, Zadie,” Joel muttered under his breath.

“What was that?”