Pee Break

Becca was sick and we were camping, attempting to retain body heat in our respective sleeping bags. It was around eleven and everyone else was heading to bed in a tent separate from ours. Becca's nose made disgusting noises as she tried to keep boogers inside her body with violent breaths. We laid on our stomachs, turning our heads to face one another. Becca's eyes were closed.
"Are you crashing?" I asked.
"What?" Her voice was small and nasally.
"Are you going to bed?"
"No," she sat up on her elbow. "We can talk."
A few minutes of conversation later, I asked Becca if she was there when I was doing my best to explain relationships to the other softball girls.
"The best friend thing?" she asked.
"Yeah. That."
"I only heard the end of it."
I paused, attempting to put the right words in the right order. "But best friend is so exclusive."
"I agree."
"It's like-- it's that-- I just..."
"You're my person," she said simply.
"Yeah. You're my person." Then we giggled at the prospect of being each other's "people."
Eventually we said goodnight.

Around three, I got up and went inside to go to the bathroom, trying to unzip and zip the tent quietly. When I came back, Becca was sitting up. I apologized for waking her and in between shivers and coughs, she explained that she couldn't sleep because she was cold and sick and definitely not enjoying this "camping" thing. I laughed and agreed, rezipping the tent. I climbed back into my sleeping bag, shimmied closer to her, and asked if she wanted to hear a story. She nodded and said, "Uh-huh," so I told her the story of the boy who could control other people's emotions, creating new, random plot points and talking slowly. Eventually her labored breaths became less frequent and I assumed she had fallen asleep. The night before a ski race, when I couldn't sleep, Lexi would be peacefully enjoying slumber, which was aggravating. But then I came up with a solution: I would match my breaths to Lexi's and eventually fall asleep. Staring at the ceiling of our tent, Becca half-snoring next to me, I knew I wasn't going to fall asleep. I tried matching my breaths to Becca's, but a sick Becca's breathing was too erratic and quick and so my plan was quickly foiled. I glared at the ceiling and the bugs bashing into the sides of our tent. Realizing I was cold, I slipped further into my sleeping bag, curling up as far down as was possible.

I must have fallen asleep, because Becca shaking me and saying my name definitely woke me up.
"Sammi, I can't sleep." She was shivering and she looked even more pale than she had all afternoon.
It was 4:13 in the morning and the initial anger that boiled in me cooled when Becca coughed and wiped her nose.
"Okay. Here. Give me your sleeping bag." She clambered out of her sleeping bag. I unzipped it fully and put in on the floor of our tent. Then I unzipped my sleeping bag all the way. Becca grabbed her pillow and curled up on her sleeping bag. I laid down next to her and threw my sleeping bag-turned-blanket over us. I assumed the role of big spoon without bitterness and Becca said, "Thank you, Sammi."

***

Becca sent me a message: "Fuck life and heat," going on to tell off the entire human race. Then I called her. I let her complain about everything for a good ten minutes. She paused to take a breath and then reported that she needed to pee. I laughed and said, "Me too." We both laughed and then I proposed a pee break. "I'm-I'm not gonna hang up, then when we come back we say hello."
"Okay."
Together we said, "3, 2, 1, BREAK!!"

We both came back shouting "HELLO?" into the phone.

Dear Lexi, I have to report that Becca has taken this song as her own. I have had no control over this.