pulp of youth

“And good food,” said Adam loyally -- resentful as he was at having spent his childhood wiping tables, he sort of loved their restaurant, greasy tables, Paris By Night on the T.V., persistent smell of fish sauce and all. (The fish sauce was the least forgivable -- now that he was spending so much of his life away, it was always the first thing he noticed when he got there. It was disturbing that that was the smell of his home. He sort of wished it’d been, like, Febreze.) He laughed -- “Yeah, exactly.”

Adam didn’t know Lila well -- she was more Atticus’s friend than his, though he sort of felt like he should know her by virtue of the magbob thing. “Wack,” he said, “For a pool or a beach?” The closest beaches to him were all the way in dipshit Santa Cruz -- but, frankly, he didn’t think he wanted to have a literally life-saving job. He also could not swim well.

The ocean is cold? Yeah, no shit. “Definitely in the Bay,” said Adam, "‘Cause we got all this, like, fog in the city.”

“There’s like an amusement park near me,” he said, “That’d be my dream summer job.” He’d just pull levers and push buttons all day, he imagined, plus he’d get to be in an amusement park all day. But he shrugged -- “I think I’m gonna be stuck with the restaurant. Straight up, I don’t even know what I wanna do for, like, a real job.” A wizard job or a nonmagical job, he meant -- an adult job. He and Atticus were two years away from having to decide that -- what the fuck.

Atticus jerked to a stop, and Adam came up short right behind him, leaning to the side to see around his friend -- “It’s orange, dog,” he said, in the same hushed tone. They were pretty cute, though, and he’d never seen squirrels in that color before -- he fumbled for his camera, but they were gone before he could get it out. Sucked to be his sister. Arms out to his sides to navigate the rocky downhill, he nodded in agreement before remembering that he was walking behind Atticus and could not be seen. “We’d better be,” he said, “I don’t have a flashlight.”

"What kinda food?" The first reaction was to get all of the details but then his stomach churned, hungry. On second thought, the less he knew, the better. "—actually, don't answer that, I'm starving," Naturally, he'd depleted what was left of the trail snacks on their way up.

"At the beach, it's called Kiawah," Atticus thought back the coast where he would likely be spending a lot of his time that Summer had he not been in Vermont at camp. Despite knowing that South Carolina wasn't going anywhere, he felt like he was missing out, like he needed to be in two places at once. "Amusement park, with the—" Atticus made a sweeping loop motion with his arm. He forgot the magbob word, but he'd definitely seen them before, big metal structures that whirled pulling people around the sky.

Think if they got their hands on a broom,  Atticus grinned to himself.

They had seen a couple birds on their way up, a hare in the distance, but the squirrels had by far been the most exciting animal spotting of the journey. Atticus figured they would have seen something far more exciting by then. "We'll be alright, I know how to start a fire, remember?" He let out a laugh as they finally turned the large bend that opened up into a familiar area.

"Hey, I remember this!" He pointed ahead. "I think we just head down that path, there," He gestured to the clearing that they had come through earlier in the day. "Breweries, what, ten minutes, from that?" He wondered aloud, looking back over his shoulder to Adam as he picked up the pace slightly, grinning at the thought.

“Korean,” deadpanned Adam, right before Atticus changed his mind about wanting to know; he grinned. “Didn’t you bring snacks?” At least every step they took was a step closer to loaded fries. Hopefully. (Adam had not ruled out the possibility that he’d gotten them lost -- neither he nor Atticus seemed to have that great a sense of direction.) He was hungry too, and he hadn’t brought snacks.

He nodded with understanding, but Atticus was still forging the path ahead of him, which meant he couldn’t see anything Adam did (probably for the best) so he added, “Roller coasters?” It cracked him up that wizard English was like, a different language than no-maj English; there was a real kinship in a white boy struggling for a foreign word.

“Wouldn’t that be sick, though?” he said, “Just pull a lever all day.” That was how he imagined it -- a brightly colored lever that rocketed the car forward. It’d been a long time since he’d been to any amusement park.

Atticus knew how to start a fire the real way, but Adam couldn’t let himself be left out of this: “So do I,” he protested. The cheater way, perhaps, but a cheater’s fire was still a fire. They emerged into a clearing and Atticus laughed with what sounded suspiciously like relief, picking up the pace.

“Fuckin’ finally,” said Adam. “You try any of their butterbeer yet? They got a flavor that turns your tongue green.” He was not entirely sure what the flavor was supposed to be -- it was like the novelty was in the effect. A lot of magic things were like that, he thought. (Who the hell actually wanted jelly beans with every flavor in the world? It was all about novelty.)

"Those are long gone," Atticus' green eyes thoughtfully studied the sky where it met the vastness of the treetops, his voice lingering off as though his depletion of snacks was that serious. He'd ambitiously packed only some mixed nuts and a couple of apples, clearly miscalculating the duration of their journey. In hindsight they probably should have packed a full lunch or something.

He had to stop thinking about food.

"I don't know, man, sounds a little boring," Atticus wondered how he would fare at a job like that. It seemed more and more that summer he felt the weight of figuring out what he was going to do with his life (not that rollercoaster level-puller was on the shortlist). "Guess jobs are supposed to be boring, though..." He thought briefly of his older brother who was interning for MACUSA. Now that was boring.

Adam agreed that it was the same clearing they started at and it put a kick in his step. All at once, Atticus forgot how hot he'd just been, the cool early evening breeze in control. "Right on time, too," He smiled to his friend after nodding at the sinking sun. If his instinct was correct they had just shy of an hour of sunlight left. Plently of time to make it to the brewery.

"Nah, not yet," He planned on trying everything on the menu before the camp was done. Back home he would never be so adventurous with his eating, but when in— Vermont. "The burgers, though," Atticus stumbled dramatically, kissing the tips of his fingers like a chef. "What d'ya think you're gonna get?" They were close enough that it was safe to talk about food again.

“Dunno where you put it,” said Adam; he pressed his lips together to keep from grinning. He should’ve brought snacks too, but his mom had only packed him so much, and he didn’t want to run out. Most likely, he’d end up with three gallon bags of food he had to share around on the last day of camp to get rid of. (Or he could take it back home -- but his mom would think he hadn’t liked it, and he could do without the guilt.)

It did sound dull to Adam too, now he’d said it aloud, but he shrugged -- “Still beats waiting tables,” he said, “Least you get to sit down most of the time.” At least, he thought so. He supposed he should check it out and verify it before he tried to get a job there -- but then, it was a pipe dream of a job anyway.

It wasn’t sunset in any way that mattered; wherever the sun was, presumably sinking past the horizon, the prettiness wasn’t visible over the trees yet. Most sunsets looked sort of the same, to Adam, anyway.

“Burger,” he said. Hot sauce and mushrooms, he was thinking. Caramelized onions would cost extra but would be worth it. “And fries. What you want?”

The path finally met perpendicular with an actual sidewalk -- Adam, grateful for the smoother trek, found the brewery’s tall chimneys over the Stowe rooftops, tantalizingly close. Finally. He kicked a crushed soda can along the sidewalk to watch it skitter around the concrete -- “God, that was a hike. I think I’ve got enough of the outdoors for the rest of camp.” It was untruthful -- tomorrow they were signed up for some rowboat thing (Adam wasn’t sure what the difference was between a kayak and a canoe and he did not care) and he couldn’t wait.

They were in sight of the brewery now; Adam jogged the last few steps to catch the door as a family of five was leaving, and was hit with the strong smells of barbecue and butterscotch. “Move faster,” he said over his shoulder, and held the door open.

A burger. Atticus' stomach churned again and he ran a hand roughly over his torso and the cool damp fabric of his dirty t-shirt as if that might help to alleviate the hunger. "Probably the same..." He said dreamily. "Maybe two burgers," He didn't have to tell his mom how he'd used the money she'd given him for camp so long as he returned home with a few useless Vermont knick-knacks. At the thought, the teen willed himself to remember to go into town so acquire said trincketts that would undoubly end up tucked away somewhere as to not clutter the house.

"What do you mean, we've still gotta hit Mill Trail?!" He let out a laugh that reverberated agaisnt the tall trees around them that opened up to civilzation. It was jarring to go from nature right back into town, like stepping into a universe forgotten. If Atticus had it his way, he would stay out there in the wild forever— assuming there was food, of course.

"Oh noow you run," He shook his head as Adam picked up the pace, chastiszing him along the way. "Alright, alright," Atticus followed suit and jogged through the open door to the familiar smell of barbeque, the kind that stayed on your clothes and in your hair for the rest of the night. "Oh, I'm getting ribs..." He stumbled toward the counter and greeted the girl behind it with a grin. "Two, please," He gestured to Adam, turning to give him a wink before all too willingly following her to the table.

fin

Now that Atticus wanted two burgers, so did Adam, just to prove that he could; this was a wasteful and frankly moronic thing to prove, so he said, “Mmhmm,” and let it drop. He wanted to get a butterbeer float, anyway -- he’d found out from a Castelobruxo student that the camp mediwitch had magic Lactaid or whatever. (He’d have to learn how to make it -- he wasn’t that awful at Alchemy. Salinger seemed like the kind of lame-ass teacher who’d encourage him to learn stuff outside of class.

“Mill Trail?” echoed Adam -- fuck no, was his instinct, but they still had another week of camp left. He’d have recovered from this hike by the time they did another. He assumed.

He waved off Atticus’s good-natured ribbing (yes, he was running now) and let the door swing itself back shut, watched with mild fascination as it oscillated (insane!) before turning to follow Atticus following the hostess to a slightly greasy table. With amusement he realised how gross they probably were (they’d spent most of the day in the great wilderness, after all) but -- whatever. There was great satisfaction in having battled the elements, and in returning like rugged explorers to chili fries and burgers, so Adam propped his menu open and scanned for the soda.

[out]