Tie Him Up to His Steaks and Feed Him to the Bears

I was on my last face off. It had been a long day, and I was almost done. I was looking pretty awesome in my black ninja suit. I was fast. No one could catch me. I was ready for battle, and my opponent looked scared. He was enormous, like the Hulk. He carried a sword that was taller than I. we were getting ready to battle when I heard “How to Save a Life” by the Fray playing. It was time to get up. I was coming back to reality as my phone alarm was going off. It was six o’ clock in the morning. I liked to get up early to watch the sunrise and do my quite time. I grabbed my blanket and bible, and I went out on the deck. There was a breeze going, and it was pretty cold. Spring is great during the day, but it’s freezing in the morning and evening. Still, it’s worth it to see the sun rise over the mountains. I couldn’t believe it was already the third day since we arrived in Boone. It’s so pretty there. I didn’t want to even think about leaving.

I opened my bible up. Galatians 5:22; the fruits of the spirit. It’s so easy to read and say we have all of these abilities, but then we go out and do the opposite. As I was reading and praying I heard footsteps from inside. Jonathan and Meaghan were coming out to be with me. Jonathan is the best youth minister I could hope for, and Meaghan is my best friend. I can tell them anything.

“Hey Tori!” Meaghan said sounding excited.

“What do you want to do today Tori?” Jonathan asked.

“Well, what does everyone else want to do?”

“Jay, Georgia, and Naomi are still asleep, and Meaghan and I don’t care.”

“Well we went hiking at Grandfather Mountain yesterday, but I still want to go hiking some more,” I said. I love to go hiking.

“We can do that,” Jonathan said. “We will see what the others want to do. If majority of us want to go hiking we can go, and whoever doesn’t want to go we will leave behind.”

“Sounds good to me.”

“Okay, we will leave you alone now,” Meaghan said.

“Well I was just finishing so I will come in and help y’all fix breakfast,” as I said that Meg rolled her eyes and laughed. Immediately I knew it was because I said “y’all.” Being from Tennessee I don’t think a thing of it. I’m still trying to get use to the fact that Meg is from California where everything is said correctly.

As Meg and I were walking into the kitchen J-Dub was already fixing eggs. It was really weird to see him cooking. Usually when we are around him and his wife Wynter, she is the one that is cooking.

“What can I help with?” I asked him.

“Absolutely nothing, I got it covered.”

“Okay we will go wake everyone up,” Meg said while being her usual cheery self.

“It’s seven thirty. Are you sure that’s a good idea?” I asked.

“Probably nit, but I’m going to do it anyway,” she said.

“Okay, but let’s start with Jay first.”

We walked up the stairs. That’s where both the boys slept. They were lucky because they both got their own room. The girls were two to a room. It wasn’t bad though since I was with Meg. As we were walking over to the door to Jay’s room I started to wonder what Meg said aloud. “We should probably just bang really loud to wake him up. I don’t want to know how Jay sleeps,” she said, and we immediately busted out laughing and banging on the door. It wasn’t working though. That boy could sleep through the rapture if he wanted to.

“Let’s just go in Meg. Surely he will at least be covered with blankets.”

“Okay let’s tackle him when we go in.”

We slowly opened the door, and as soon as we noticed that Jay was decent we jumped on him. It worked. He was finally awake, and we were all laughing. Once Jay was no longer drowsy, Meg and I went out into the living room and waited as he got dressed.

When we all got down stairs the other two girls were awake, and breakfast was ready. We had eggs with peppers and mushrooms, sausage for those that ate meat (I didn’t eat the meat), and biscuits with jelly

As we sat down J-dub asked everyone what we wanted to do today. We were all in agreement with hiking. “There is a nice place that my dad took me to go hiking. I will take y’all up there. After we are done eating we will give everyone thirty minutes to get ready and we will head out.”

After breakfast everyone went to their rooms to get ready. Meg and I went to our room. We were both already ready. We just had to brush our teeth. For the remainder of the time we just hung out and talked about how excited we were.

Meg and I were at the van while everyone else was running late. I had my flip though so I made a video while we were waiting. Shortly everyone came out and we were on our way. The van rides were always a lot of fun. We had two tone deaf girls singing in the back, a boy who made up his own lyrics to the songs in the front, and j-dub driving with Meg and I in the middle laughing at the three of them. It was great.

Thirty minutes later we arrived to our destination. We parked the car and were on our way. It was so peaceful. We were slowly going up until we reached a cliff. From there we could see the most beautiful waterfall. Immediately I wanted to go see it, but there wasn’t really a way down there. Once we were done admiring the nature that was around us we continued on the trait. As we were walking jay noticed what seemed to be an off trail. It looked pretty cool so I followed him down it. Meg came to if course.

“Come right back up.” J-dub said.

We all said okay and began trekking down the trail. It was really steep in some places. I was sliding in a few places. “This is going to be really hard to get back up,” I said.

“We can do it,” Jay said. So we kept going. About twenty minutes later we were all the way down the trail to the bottom of the mountain. We took some pictures.

“We need to get back up Jonathan is going to get worried,” Meg said.

“I agree,” I said.

Jay kept walking away though. Then he got the bright idea to start jumping the rocks that were going across the water. He even got stuck on one and fell in trying to get back. That took thirty minutes of our time. Meg and I were freaking out. Jay would not listen to us at all. By the time he did we were pissed at him.

Finally, we started back up the mountain. We knew J-Dub would be worried about us. I was ranting on and on. I was so mad at Jay I couldn’t see straight. Meg was too. It was so hard to get back up. We kept sliding back down it was so steep.

By the time we got back up I was dehydrated. I collapsed. Meg stayed by my side, but Jay left us. We were furious. I was so mad I was crying. Finally I gained the strength to get up and keep walking.

“We have to get to Jonathan before he goes to the ranger station,” Meg said.

We went as fast as we could. When we got close to the beginning of the trail we spotted J-Dub, and he spotted us. Immediately he began to run to us. He put his arms around us and began to weep. We did too.

When we got back to the van everything was awkward. Jay was crying. Who knows why? The other girls were in the back of the van with the most frightened look on their face.

“Let’s go. I know this cool little store at the bottom of the mountain that has neat little trinkets and candy in it,” J-Dub said. He was trying to make everything go back to normal, but it wasn’t really working. We went on anyway. When we got there Jay walked with J-Dub, Meg walked with Georgia, and I walked with Naomi.

“Is J-Dub okay?” I asked Nay.

“I don’t know, Tori. He really scared me. He was yelling for y’all over and over. When y’all weren’t answering he began crying and running around. Eventually we went to the van. He told us to get in. he was going too fast. He almost hit 90. He didn’t know where the ranger station was at so he turned around to go back to the map. When we got back Jay was at the beginning of the trail. Jonathan got out of the van and yelled at Jay not to talk to him, and he started running down the train. That’s when Jay started crying. I think J-Dub was just mad cuz he wasn’t with y’all.”

“Wow, I feel awful. I’m going to go tell him sorry. Come one lets go.” Nay and I went into the store. I found J-Dub and told him sorry. He told me not to worry about it. What was done was done.

We spent about twenty more minutes there and then decided to go. On our way back Georgia spotted a place she wanted to go to. It was a house that was built parallel to the ground so you were standing at a 45 degree angle. It was really neat. Jay didn’t go in with us though. We were still too angry with each other. When we were done there we went back to the cabin.

Meg and I were in our room, Nay and Georgia were in theirs, Jay was cooking, and J-dub was making his way into our room. “Hey girls.”

“Hey,” we said back.

“What is Jay cooking for diner?” I asked.

“Steaks that he marinated,” he said.

I looked at Meg and said, “We should tie him up to those steaks and feed him to the bears.” She nodded in agreement.

“What happened?” J-Dub asked. We told him what had happened. “It needs to be fixed.”

I’m not apologizing first because I think he should. I’m tired of always being the one to say sorry first when he started the whole thing.” I said getting more irritated just thinking about apologizing.

“Tell him that then.” Meg and I looked at each other and agreed to go fix it. J-Dub left us to it. Jay was out on the deck grilling the steaks. We both walked outside and shut the door.

Jay must have known it was us. “I’m sorry about today. I was taking out my frustration.”

“Frustration about what?” I asked.

“My dad died. I have only seen him once in my life. I planned on going to meet him myself and now I can’t. I’m frustrated about it, and I took it out on y’all.” Meg and I looked at each other. We both felt horrible. We had no idea. I felt awful about wanting to feed him to the bears now. We both went over and grabbed jay and held him. All of us were crying.

“You can’t hold this kind of stuff in and not tell anyone, Jay. It’s bad for you as well as us. We need to know so we don’t push your limits, and you need to get it out so you don’t blow up.” I said.

“We want to help you Jay,” Meg said.

“I know, but I don’t like putting my problems on others.

“We aren’t others. We are your best friends,” Meg said.

Thank goodness. Things were fixed. “I need a plate for these steaks.”

“I will get one,” Meg said. When she went to open the door, though, it was locked.

“He would lock us out here,” I said. We began to bang on the door, and J-Dub came and opened it. “All better?” he asked.

“Yea, but why did you lock us out here?” he swore up and down the rest of the time that he didn’t lock us out there. I don’t know how the door got locked though.

The rest of the night was very enjoyable. We ate dinner, had bible study, and fellowshipped the rest of the night.

I couldn’t wait for tomorrow’s journey, zip lines. But that’s another story.