Free She Matters by Susanna Sonnenberg

the latest,” he whispered. I eyed the departure board behind him, restless as any teenager leaving familiar adults behind.
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    I’d already lied to my mother, told her I was flying to Colorado to see Claudia—we missed each other so much . I had to lie bigger now—lies stacking up on top of one another, needing close attention to stay organized—that Claudia wanted me earlier. I changedmy ticket, arrived sooner than my teacher and I had planned. Out of the jetway, I saw Claudia tearing up the corridor, and I felt the eagerness I always did with her. Breathless, she hurtled into my arms. Her new boyfriend, Mick, came up and stood near, and I tried not to examine him directly. I didn’t want it to seem like I was spying. He was a lot older than we were—older than our teacher—which I hadn’t trusted in description, and I didn’t like him here. The skin on his face was pitted, spots peeling with sunburn. She reached behind herself for his hand and leaned her forehead against mine. In a stage whisper she said, “I had it today!”
    â€œBut I was going to be with you,” I said.
    â€œIt’s okay. It was fast.”
    It impressed me that Claudia had actually been pregnant. True, my affair and its power to devastate, these spoke of the adulthood we were fiercely courting, always inspecting, but she had entered a maturity vaster and more purely female than sexual accomplishment, had surpassed me.
    Mick walked ahead to the car lot. Claudia squeezed my arm and gushed nonstop, the way we used to come into the dining hall, our torrent of ideas, pretending to be oblivious of the boys, but we were so very, very attuned. She was talking about Mick, telling me things he’d built, personal philosophies he’d explained to her.
    â€œWe’re going straight to the root cellar,” she said. “I can’t wait to show you.” I tried to muster enthusiasm, although I didn’t know what “root cellar” meant. She kept using it to refer to where we’d stay, and I pictured us climbing over potatoes to find a perch. I didn’t want to get into Mick’s truck; I knew I didn’t want to leave the city. My teacher had my itinerary, and, aware I’d landed, he’d be pacing for me, dying for me, like I was for him. We were going to stay in a bed-and-breakfast. But first this. Claudia believed she was my reason for being here, so I had to make that look true.
    We drove out of the city a way I’d never been and more than an hour up a sandy highway, higher and higher. My ears popped. I gripped the door’s metal handle, was bounced in the cab as Mick took the curves with speed. Was he trying to get a reaction, did he mean to scare? He smoked a joint, spit out the window sometimes, showed no interest in our talk. Claudia was listing her family’s Cincinnati summer habits, gleeful that she wasn’t home. Mick’s right hand played between the steering wheel and Claudia’s thigh. She rested most of her weight against me.
    When we stopped, Claudia reached across my lap, busted the door open, and pushed us out. “We can take a walk later,” she said and lifted her hand, but her gesture was undecided, scanning a wide swath of land that showed me nothing but trees close together, no roads, no houses. I liked known space, classrooms, airplane cabins, motel rooms. What did she do up here, where nothing could happen? I followed. Mick had built the root cellar, a hump of soil, a door shoved into earth, which opened into darkness, coolness. The floor was untended dirt. In dusty recesses hollowed into the walls, dishes, cast-iron pots, and a bong sat next to oil lamps and matchboxes and little rectangular cans. It was like sleeping quarters on a boat, maybe. No, I couldn’t compare it to anything I’d seen. It was all strange. I hated when Claudia knew a lot about something before I did.
    There was