“Agreed,” Michael said as he looked around for a safe place to camp for the night.

Between the cold, the wild, and the possibility of there being someone else in the woods with us with less than peaceful intentions; it was important that we pitched a secure tent in a relatively secluded and hidden area. Once the guys found a suitable spot, Michael began to set up the tent while Adam started a fire. A new layer of snow was falling, and the temperature was dropping. I pulled my furry hood closer around my face to edge out the biting wind that was starting to pick up.

“The fire will help,” Adam said as he looked over at me while I shivered.

I sat next to the growing fire and watched Michael put up the tent. It was big enough to hold all three of us, although we would definitely be close together in it. After the fire was hearty enough to be left untended, Adam went to go and help. He pulled the blanket out of his backpack and wrapped it around my shoulders before he went. I stared at the flames for a while and thought about Rob. If we were this cold and this tired, after just having spent a day in the wilderness and with the luxury of a tent, and blankets, and food; I wondered how he was faring.

When the guys finished pitching the tent, they both came to sit down beside me. Michael held his hands out against the warmth of the fire, and Adam pulled a whiskey bottle from his pack.

“Really?” Michael laughed at him. “I told you to pack lightly and you brought a full whiskey bottle in your backpack?”

“You told us to pack what we would need,” Adam said. “And I sure as hell knew that we would need this. Besides, it will help keep us warm.”

He was right about that, and as he passed the bottle around and we all took a swig from it, I think we were both grateful that he had the foresight to bring it. The alcohol stung my throat and fell into my chest with a blossoming warmth that heated me from the inside out.

“Where do you think Rob is?” I asked with a distant stare that looked past the flames into the empty darkness of the woods.

“I don’t know,” Adam said. “But I know that we will find him.”

“Alive?” I asked.

I hadn’t even intended to ask that, especially not to blurt it out so abruptly, but it just spilled out of my mouth because I felt like I needed someone to answer it.

“Yes,” Michael answered resolutely. “Alive.”

The three of us sat without any more talking for a while as we warmed by the fire and chewed on pieces of dried beef jerky that we washed down with whiskey until we were both warm and numb.

“We should get some rest,” Michael said after a while.

I wondered how we were all three going to share a singular blanket once we got inside the tent to sleep, considering that Michael was having a great deal of difficulty trying to stay away from me. Searching for Rob had definitely been at the forefront of my mind, but the torturous turmoil of still not knowing whether Michael was actually my brother or not was always underlying my every thought.

“We can leave the fire going. It’ll keep away any of the larger mountain animals that get curious about what we are doing in their home overnight.”

“How long are we prepared to stay out here for,” Adam asked, “before we need to go back for supplies?”

“Couple of days,” Michael answered. “I’m sure we’ll have found him by then.”

The confidence in Michael’s voice seemed so strong that I got the feeling it was being faked for the benefit of keeping us hopeful and calm. I think he was even trying to convince himself that things would be okay, and that Rob was just lost in the woods somewhere nearby, soon to be found. But I was not so confident. I had a really bad feeling about all of this, and I felt even worse not knowing where the sense of dread was coming from. We didn’t have any enemies remaining anymore and I just didn’t know what could have happened to Rob. Michael put his arm around my shoulder and helped me up with him as we stood to go into the tent.

The tent was surprisingly cozy, with the trapped air inside and the protection against the wind; it was a comfortable temperature. The blanket that Adam brought was large enough to cover all three of us, and it made me feel like we were all curled around each other in the bed together like we used to be; with the exception that Rob wasn’t here, and neither was Julian. I didn’t want to think about that. I didn’t want to think that I might lose Rob too.

Michael, Adam, and I laid there and tried to fall asleep. At any other time, it would have been a peaceful and cozy place, snuggled up on a chilly night under the stars and listening to the sounds of nocturnal animals in the wild. It was the kind of thing that set the perfect scene for a Zen moment in nature; except for the fact that we were all too worried to sleep. Adam closed his eyes to try and rest, even though I could tell by his breathing that he was still awake. Michael was having trouble sleeping too, but his was for a far different reason. Our bodies couldn’t help but be closely pressed up against each other in this tent and even though Michael was still trying desperately to keep things platonic with the uncertainty of whether or not we were actually siblings (which I still just couldn’t believe that we were); he couldn’t help but have a visceral reaction to our bodies rubbing against each other.

I could feel a throbbing, hot bulge pressing against the back of my thighs as Michael laid against my back. Even amidst the current tense situation, and even within this cramped tent with Adam here; and with the nagging thought that we might share the same father; he couldn’t stop himself from wanting me. I wanted him too. My mind was so troubled as we laid here practically on top of each other in this tent, both emotionally charged in a million ways. Our bodies rubbing together was only adding to the tension and angst, and the need to release it somehow. I heard his ragged breathing and felt his tight chest rise and fall slowly against me as he tried to keep himself under control, and it killed me to know that there was nothing that I could do. I couldn’t roll over and hold him, because that would put us face to face and our bodies even closer together which would only make the torture more unbearable. I couldn’t reach back to touch him because it would have the same result. I couldn’t even really talk to him about it in here with Adam right there, and to be honest I didn’t know what to say. We had already said everything that we could, and without a concrete answer, I wasn’t quite sure where to go from there. The only thing that seemed to remain unchanged, was how much I yearned for him.

Adam and I were lying facing each other and when Adam’s eyes opened, I could tell that he could sense Michael’s longing too. Adam stared into my eyes for a few minutes and I didn’t know what to say or do to make the awkward situation better. So, I just closed my eyes and pretended to be trying to sleep. Finally after some time, all three of us eventually drifted off.

In the morning when I woke up, I was alone in the tent. I could hear Adam and Michael’s voices talking just outside. I could tell that Adam was very worried about Rob. He was talking about there being a lot of things that could be life-threatening in the mountains, especially without supplies. I stayed inside the tent for a while to listen to them, knowing that if I got up and went outside, they would probably stop talking in order to make things seem not as bad as they really were for my benefit. I didn’t know why they continued to do that and treat me with kid gloves as if I couldn’t take the harshness of reality. I had been through enough to know exactly how brutal reality could be. I didn’t need to be coddled, and I would make a point to yell at them both about that later. But right now, I really just wanted to hear what they were both really thinking.

“I just don’t think you’re taking a clear look at this,” Adam said. “You keep downplaying it as if we’re just going to find Rob and go home.”

“Isn’t that what you want to do?” Michael asked him.

“Of course it’s what I want to do,” Adam answered. “But it’s obviously not what’s going to happen.”

“Well, that’s a pretty shitty attitude to have,” Michael scoffed. “I mean, what do you expect to happen then? Why are we even out here wasting our time looking for him if you have already given up any hope of finding him.”

“I didn’t say that I’d given up hope of finding him,” Rob said.

The rising volume and escalating tension in their voices was indicative of an argument that was closing in.

“But I think that we need to be real about the possibility that if and when we do find Rob, that he could very well be gravely injured, or sick, or maybe worse. Even if he wasn’t kidnapped or a victim to some other kind of foul play, the fact that he has been out here alone in the wilderness for going on an entire day now, with no supplies and no tent, isn’t really a good situation; especially if he’s been hurt.”

“I understand that,” Michael said.

“Do you?”

Adam’s voice was saturated with an accusatory sarcasm.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Michael asked him defensively.

“It means that I think you are too distracted by your feelings for Lisette to think clearly right now, when you need to be. Your conflicting feelings about whether she’s your sister or not, while also still wanting to have her, are starting to get really irritating. You should be more focused on being helpful in locating Rob.”

“What exactly do you think I’m doing here?” Michael yelled at him. “I am locating Rob. That’s the whole point of this jaunt through the mountains. Or did you just think that we’re out here camping to have a good time?”

“I think,” Adam shot back, “that you’re trying to avoid having to deal with the fact that you and Lisette might never be able to have each other again, instead of just dealing with it and moving on. And I think that it’s starting to affect your judgement. I think you need to get your fucking head on straight and think about the fact that the fate of our friend is more important than the fate of your cock.”

I knew that I needed to get out there right now, before things got even more ramped up and carried away. I unzipped the tent quickly so that it made a loud sound that caught their attention and immediately paused their argument and made them both look over my way.

“Morning guys,” I said with a small smile. “Everything okay?”

“Yes,” Michael said. “Everything is fine. How did you sleep?”

Adam made a sort of huffing noise and whispered something under his breath about “sleep having been the last thing on Michael’s mind”.

“I slept okay,” I answered, hoping to diffuse the situation and move on. I felt as if I had barely slept at all though, and was still quite exhausted. I could see that they both were too, which probably didn’t help matters.

“Are we leaving now?” I asked, noticing that they were packing up and making sure the fire had completely died out.

“Yes,” Michael answered as he came to take down the tent.

I grabbed the blanket and folded it in my arms as I walked out of the tent. When I passed by Michael, the urge to reach out and touch him was nearly debilitating. He paused ever so slightly when he passed me, and I knew that he had felt it too. I handed the blanket back to Adam and he stuffed it into his pack. The tightness in the air was stifling between the two of them, and I knew that it never ended up being a good thing when Michael and Adam were at odds.

2

We spent another full day hiking deeper into the mountains in search of Rob.