Language of Love Ch. 01

LANGUAGE OF LOVE, CHAPTER 1

A Ford Explorer jostled down the Forest Service road, trailing a wide plume of light brown dust. Anyone following would have had to stop in their tracks, for a few minutes, to give the choking particulate matter a chance to settle. There was nobody for miles around, though, as the vehicle had turned off of a lightly-trafficked highway nearly three hours earlier.

"I'll bet you anything," the girl began.

"They're doing each other," completed the boy. They were sitting in the back seat of the bouncing Ford, holding hands.

"Would you guys stop already!" said the woman driving the SUV, exasperated. "Hank, please tell your son to use English!"

"Right after you get your daughter to," replied Hank, from the passenger seat. He was laughing softly. The woman groaned theatrically.

"I bet you they'll make some excuse for staying at the trail head after dropping us off," continued the girl, seemingly oblivious to her mom's frustration.

"What'll you bet?" asked the boy.

"Foot rub?" ventured the girl.

"Hmm, sounds nice, but I'm gonna get one anyway. And," he started.

"You know you'd lose," completed the girl. The boy squeezed her hand in acknowledgment.

"Hank, I know they're talking about us!" the woman continued. The large man shrugged. "And I think they're completing each other's sentences again."

"How can you tell?"

"From, like, how they're pausing and stuff. It's creepy!"

"I dunno," Hank replied, "they seem happy. And this is all about their birthday present, so we gotta indulge them."

The pair in the backseat, now both eighteen years old, had been born about twenty-three hours apart.

"Do we ever not indulge them?"

"Do we ever not indulge each other?" Hank riposted.

"Fair point," the woman conceded. A smile crept over her face, as she considered what manner of indulgence was about to come her way.

"She forgot about us already!" the boy said.

"All she really cares about is gettin' Chocolate Bear's pants off," the girl suggested. They squeezed each other's hands in mutual agreement, turned to face each other, and grinned. It took all of their self-control not to burst out laughing.

Ten minutes later, the black vehicle, encrusted with dust, pulled into a crude parking area at the very end of the Forest Service road. There were no other cars. Before everyone unloaded, Hank informed them, "We might, uh, hang out here for a bit, to catch up on messages and stuff."

He was worried the kids might see the car still there, from the trail, and then wonder if they were having mechanical problems.

"Dad didn't notice there's no cell reception here," the boy said. He gripped the girl's hand with desperation now, narrowly staving off another round of uproarious laughter.

X X X X

"Are you two sure you're gonna be okay without your phones?" the woman asked.

"Mom, we're, like, safer out here than back home," the girl said, hugging the older woman. The gesture was awkward with a fifty-pound backpack on her back.

"Here, you might need this," her mom said, slipping a metal object into her daughter's hand.

"What is it?" the girl asked.

"Maker's."

The girl flushed red, and hurriedly stowed the flask in her pack.

"Um, thanks, mother."

The boy had just finished saying his goodbyes to his dad, and was heading over to the two women.

"What'd she say?" he asked, noting the girl's red face.

"She gave me some bourbon," she explained.

"That's very," he started.

"Sandy," she continued.

"Then again, it's very," he said.

"Linda too," she completed. Linda was the boy's mom. "What do you think her and dad are up to right now?"

"Kids! I'm standing right here!" Sandy exclaimed. "Stop with the Freech! Or whatever the fuck you call it."

"Sorry!" the pair said, in perfect unison. This only seemed to aggravate Sandy more.

"Okay, gotta go, or we'll be setting up our tent in the dark!" said the girl, hurriedly. She kissed her mom briefly on the lips, as did the boy. She took his hand, then marched off, towing him behind her, in the direction of the trail head. "Bye, uncle Hank!" she shouted, over her shoulder.

X X X X

"Do you think it's okay for them to be off by themselves?" Sandy asked. She and Hank were sitting in the back seat of the Explorer.

"Isn't it a little late to be the responsible parent?" Hank replied.

"Yeah, I guess so," Sandy said, not offended in the slightest. Hank marveled as the concern that had been so evident on her face mere moments before disappeared in an instant. She leaned towards her brother-in-law. "So, time to check our 'messages'?"

"I got you a message right here," Hank said pointing towards his midsection with both index fingers. He had intended for this motion to come across as suggestive and mildly lewd. The effect, however, was spoiled by the fact that Sandy was already unbuckling his belt. Several minutes later, had the two hikers turned around, which they did not, they would have seen the SUV gently rocking from side to side.

X X X X

The teenagers did not think to look back, having already walked past the trail head, up a small incline, and around a corner. Once they were out of sight, the girl felt a gentle wave of relaxation radiate across her body. The boy felt the same sensation. They almost always did, when they transitioned from being together, among other people, to being all by themselves. The effect was more pronounced at this moment, knowing that not only were they alone, but that, once the two adults finished whatever they were doing, nobody else would be anywhere near them. Both experienced backpackers, they had chosen an obscure trail that was not well-maintained, not well-publicized, and which required a long drive to even reach.

They were feeling garrulous; the conversation was non-stop. Had an eavesdropper been around, however, they would not have recognized a single word being said. The two were speaking a language that was a combination of Pig Latin, a variation on Pig Latin called Earz, and a number of nouns and verbs selected from Finnish and Hungarian. They had begun speaking the language with each other at age nine, in order to have secret conversations in front of close friends and family. At first, they just used Pig Latin. They practiced continually, and could speak it so fluidly that nobody could understand them. Or so they thought. After a few months, Linda, the boy's mom, let slip that she knew they wanted to pitch a tent in her backyard, something they'd only ever discussed in -- supposed -- secret.

This kicked off a minor arms race, of sorts, in which the kids evolved their made-up tongue into an ever-more complicated form. First they folded in Earz, figuring that using both it and Pig Latin at the same time would be too mind-bending for anyone else to follow. They were smart enough, having learned their lesson from last time around, to conduct tests that would validate the security of their communications. Sure enough, after a while, Sandy slipped up and, as her sister had, revealed a secret the kids had deliberately never spoken of in English.

The ultimate form of the language solidified when they were ten. They began adding in words from Finnish and Hungarian, chosen for their lack of cognates with English. Both kids began using the Dualinga app to build up familiarity with the two tongues, and regularly practiced new vocabulary with each other. Since they still applied the rules of Pig Latin and Earz to the foreign words, even someone who knew either language would have great difficulty recognizing anything. The pair dubbed their language Fraytch, which was a portmanteau of "Finnish", an "R" sound, just because it sounded good, and the "aitch" sound people used to describe the letter "H". "H" stood for Hungarian.

For the first hour, the trail wound its way, uphill, through a forest of pine trees. Where possible, they held hands, but let go whenever it got too narrow. They spent most of the time discussing college. They were both to attend the local university, which would save on cost as they could continue to live at home. Excellent students both, with nearly identical academic strengths and interests, they were planning on applying to the Mechanical Engineering department as sophomores. They were strategizing how to pack enough credits into their first year to have the right prerequisites so early on.

"Thank God you pushed for us to take AP Statistics," the girl said, at one point. "I don't see how this would work otherwise."

"You saved my ass in that class," the boy said.

"Aw, shucks," she said. For some reason, he had struggled with the teacher's explanations of statistical concepts. She had helped, to be sure, but not to the degree he seemed to think. "But I'll accept a kiss as a way of saying 'thank you,'" she added.

The boy kissed her on the lips, something that they did a few times each day, for one reason or another. This time, when he kissed her, she felt a faint, electric tingle shoot from her navel up to her chest. The boy felt something similar, too.

"Hmm," she said.

"Hmm what?" he asked.

"Just hmm."

They had just reached the border of the pine forest. In front of them was a rocky plateau. The trail was nowhere in sight. They got out a topological map and compass, but despite years of experience, could not come to an agreement about which way to go. The part of the trail they could see did not correspond to what was on the map at all. The boy, mostly operating on a hunch, felt they should continue straight, and the girl felt they should follow a dried-up creek bed that led off to their left.

They entered into a brief, heated argument about which direction to take. This was not unusual for the pair. Since neither one felt nervous around the other, they tended to express themselves without any filter or artifice, and, as a result, often found points of conflict. "You two sound like an old married couple," Linda liked to say when they would get into it. She could rarely understand what they were saying, but could tell from their tone of voice when they were bickering. These conflagrations were inevitably short-lived. Their usual mode of reconciliation was to get out a notepad -- they always had a notepad handy -- and write out the pros and cons of each other's point of view. Furthermore, each of them had to, in good faith, briefly take the other's side and attempt to argue their point. In most cases, this resulted in a logical resolution to whatever they were disagreeing about. Their parents marveled at this, and frequently gave each other grief for being so much less mature.

In this particular case, however, there was no obvious way to determine who was right. The trail, on the topological map, appeared to be drawn incorrectly. They had a solution for this sort of problem, too: rock, paper, scissors. Or rather, a variant of the well-known game. It was difficult for them to play as most people would, because they could read each other's micro-expressions too well, and guess, with high probability, what the other would choose. Neither could explain how, exactly, but they had proven it many times over. It spoiled the game for them, turning it from a way to generate a random result, into a battle of who could react faster to the other's body language.

Thus it was that, having determined no logical way to resolve the conflict, the pair turned their backs on each other. The boy made a fist with his right hand, and the girl flattened hers. They turned around.

"Awww!" the boy whined.

"The fates are with me!" the girl crowed.

"Nerd!"

"You're one to talk!"

They headed down the gulley. After about thirty seconds, the argument was forgotten, and they picked up a discussion of Settlers of Qatan strategy, a continuation of a debate they had begun on the previous day. It was easily their favorite board game. Not only did they track wins and losses against each other -- she was ahead by fifteen victories at the moment -- they most enjoyed playing together as a team, in a two-versus-two variant. In the local region, they were the top-ranked co-ed team within their age bracket. Nearly half an hour passed, and they barely noticed the terrain, so engrossed they were in their discussion. Suddenly, the boy realized that the ground beneath their feet was a lot flatter than it had been: they had stumbled across the trail again.

"Dang, I guess you were right," he conceded.

"You owe me another kiss," the girl informed him. He kissed her on the lips, for the second time that day. She quirked up one side of her mouth.

"What?" he asked, instantly reading her expression.

"I dunno. That was... dissatisfying," she said.

"How was that any different than usual?" he protested.

"Well, we're older now, I think I might want real kisses from now on."

Her face took on a thoughtful expression. The boy knew from long experience to keep his mouth shut when she got like this.

They started walking again, climbing up a scree of small, granitic rocks. As they crested a rise at the top, an expansive vista revealed itself on the other side. Far in the distance, they could see a large, treeless valley, ringed by snow-capped mountains. They climbed onto a sizable boulder, shrugged out of their heavy packs, and sat down next to each other. Both were covered in a sheen of sweat. The girl slid her fingers into those of the boy's hand. They stared out at the breathtaking scene for a full five minutes, in silence, then turned towards each other.

"It's so much better," the girl started.

"Than the picture!" the boy completed. The website where they had found the trail had included a snapshot of this view, but it had been taken with a low-resolution camera, and hardly did justice to the panorama in front of them.

"This is the best day of my life," they said, in unison.

The boy kissed the girl again. He had been pondering what she might have meant by wanting a "real" kiss, and had decided to open his mouth when he made contact, something he had never done before. Both of their families considered kissing on the lips a normal form of greeting -- with a closed mouth, of course. The only way he could think of to make the kiss more "real", was to open up.

When she felt his lips on hers, and then felt them part, the girl's heart began to race. 'So much better than I thought this would be!' she thought to herself, and opened up slightly, herself. His lips brushed against her upper lip, sucking it in briefly, then her lower. She wanted to stick her tongue deeply inside his mouth, and was only barely able to restrain herself. As it was, she ever so briefly licked his upper lip as they disengaged. Then she smiled.

"That was better, Marc," she said.

Marc's eyes went wide. His cousin only used his name when she was experiencing strong emotions.

"Maybe we should do it again sometime, Elora," he said, knowing full well that she, too, would understand the significance of his choice of words.

X X X X

They spent the next few hours hiking, sometimes chatting, sometimes enjoying each other's company in companionable silence, scrambling up boulders, losing and finding the trail, and holding hands when the situation allowed. Shortly before sunset, they reached the first night's campsite, and swiftly and efficiently set up their tent, stove, and other equipment.

"Is it, like, a rule that something has to go wrong with gear on every trip?" Elora asked. She was only pretending to be upset, and Marc knew it.

"Yup, it's a rule," he affirmed. "What is it this time?"

"Mom packed the wrong sleeping bags," Elora complained. "I knew I shouldn'ta let her help me."

A half-form thought tried to break through, at the back of Marc's consciousness, but it failed to materialize.

"Which ones did she pack?"

"The Summer ones," Elora said. "I guess it's an understandable mistake. It is Summer, technically. It's just, we're at pretty high elevation here."

With everything set up, they busied themselves with making dinner, heating up a chicken and pasta dish that came from a plastic bag. To save on space and cleanup, they only brought one bowl and one spoon. Elora ate a few bites first, then handed it to her cousin.

"Yum, we're talkin' some Michelin starred grub here," she said sarcastically.

"Wow, that's... pretty bad actually," Marc said, after removing the spoon, which had just been in her mouth, from his own. He ate some more, then handed it back to her.

"This might help," Elora said, after rummaging through her pack and pulling out a silver flask. She opened it and handed it to her cousin. He took a swig, then made a sour face.

"Whoa!" he said. He had never drunk anything stronger than beer, before, so the bourbon made his face pucker up as it burned its way down his throat.

"Hey lightweight!" she teased.

"Okay you try then!" he responded, handing the flask back to her. She downed a small mouthful and immediately her face adopted a sour expression. "See!" he chided. He took a bite of the pasta. "On the other hand, the pasta tastes better after that!" he added, brightly, and handed the bowl back to her.

She took a few more bites. "You know, it really does!" she said, with a smile. "Alcohol one, nasty backpacking 'food', zero!" She held up her fingers to make air quotes as she said the word "food", which made Marc laugh. Elora felt pleased with herself, as she stared into her cousin's large, brown eyes. Second only to his dad, the impossibly attractive Hank, Marc was the cutest man she knew.

'I could stare into those eyes forever,' she thought to herself.

"What?" Marc said, reading her expression with casual ease. Elora blushed.

"Nothing!" she said, too hastily. Then, perhaps emboldened by the liquor, she added. "Well, actually, I was just thinking about how cute you are, Marc, if you must know."

Now it was Marc's turn to look embarrassed. Although it was hard to tell with his brown skin, blood rushed to his face, in part because of what she said, and in part because she had used his name again.

"Thanks," he said, trying to sound casual. "You're more beautiful among girls than I am among boys, though, Elora." Now the two of them were both blushing furiously. Both felt slightly dizzy.

"No way. There were so many chickas hotter than me," she countered.

"Nuh-uh," he said.

"You're saying you think I'm cuter than," she thought for a few beats, "Olivia?"

There were multiple Olivias at their school, but they both knew she meant Olivia Carmichael, the homecoming queen and captain of the cheer squad.

"Definitely," he said.

"Liar!" she responded, although it was impossible for them to lie to each other, and she knew quite well that he was being truthful at that moment. He knew that she knew, too.

"What about Alyssa?" she asked. That was Marc's ex-girlfriend. They had gone out for a few months.

"No," he said, simply. Elora began to wonder if she was about to experience cardiac arrest, even though, intellectually, she understood it was almost unheard of for an eighteen-year-old. Her heart had somehow found a higher gear to shift into, and was pounding violently against her sternum.

"Do you ever think we're too close?" she asked, attempting to change the tack of the conversation. She took a few more bites of food and handed it back to him.