The sun began its slow descent. The trees formed shaded silhouettes against the setting sun. Lights in the upper level of the cabins, where the student bunks were located, flipped on. The fifteen girls gossiped and giggled together while I relished the peace with a novel.

It didn't last long.

A blood-curdling shriek echoed down the stairs and bounced off the wood floors and log walls.

Five other girls picked up the shriek. Then six. Then too many to count.

Heart thudding in my chest, I leaped off my twin bed, turned the corner, and ran up the stairs to their level.

"Get it out! Get it ooouuuuuuut!" one of them cried.

I was met halfway by a teen girl stampede.

"Run, Ms. Oyola!" one of them gasped. "Run away!"

Squeezing against the wall so they could rush past me, I hollered, "What in the nine hells is going on up there!"

Iris, the last to exit, hitched a wing toward the open door of the room with the bunks. She deadpanned, "Sarah found a Satanic cross by that fireplace and is trying to summon a demon."

"Uh huh." Finishing my ascent, I put my hands on my hips and stood in the doorway. Sarah sat on a top bunk and was hunched over something. "Sarah. Are you trying to summon a demon?"

"No, just communicate with them," she said with an innocent shrug.

I put out my hand. "Give me the cross, Sarah."

"Yeah!" Emani yelled up from the ground floor. "Give her the cross, Sarah!"

"But I want it," she whined.

Using the full force of my teacher glare, I said, "Now."

"Ugh. Fine." She leaped down from the bunk and, rolling her eyes in protest, handed me a bundle of sticks that had been bound with twine in the shape of a cross. "I just found it there. It's probably from the grave of those dead kids."

"That's not real!" I insisted, but suddenly the cross in my hand seemed much more menacing.

"Mr. Finsaid it's real." Emani crossed her arms across her chest.

"Let's go ask him!" another of the girls suggested.

An angry mob of females descended on the male cabin. Gently, so as not to provoke it, I set the cross in the grass outside the cabin and followed.

"Mr. Fin!" Emani pounded on their front door. "Open up!"

Our co-chaperone cracked open the door and smirked at us. The five boys in his cabin flanked him, standing akimbo.

The girls screamed at them in unrestrained rage. "Was that story a lie?" "Did you put that cross there?" "Why are you trying to scare us?"

Mr. Fin, in a gesture he had picked up from watching too much anime, pushed his glasses up, threw his head back, and laughed. Picking up on his cue, the boys jeered at the girls.

"I told you not to touch it, Sarah," Timothy added for good measure.

"OK, enough!" I declared. "Everybody, get dressed for the night hike. No more demons."

Once the students dispersed, I leaned in conspiratorially toward my fellow educator. "Nice touch with the cross, my friend."

His eyes widened. "Oyola, I didn't put that there."

My heartbeat resumed its allegro rhythm. "You're lying again."

"Nope." He gave me a lazy salute. "Enjoy your night hike."

***

"I can't do this, Mom."

Tanni clutched at my shoulder in desperation. I hung in the back, while Ms. Rebecca took the front of the train. We had divided the class in half for the two-hour, five-mile excursion in complete darkness.

"Talk to me," I encouraged. I bent my elbow so my hand could cover Tanni's, still clinging to my shoulder. "Nobody can hear us back here. Was it the cross and the story?"

"It's not that." Tanni's eyes, shrouded with the last winks of twilight, scanned the softening landscape. "It's dark. I'm cold. And—and I just can't."

Lightning bugs flashed out their love songs in the brittle grasses, and a cold breeze bit at any part of our skin we had been foolish enough to leave exposed. My hand, for warmth and security, did not leave Tanni's. Keeping my voice low, I said, "Tanni, you came out as gender fluid to the entire class last week."

Tanni let out a sharp exhale. "Yeah. So."

"That was the bravest thing I've ever seen, kiddo." Tanni wiped a tear from their cheek. "And how did that turn out?"

They graced me with a slight smirk. "Pretty OK, I guess."

"Umm, the entire class just rolled with it, remember?" I gave the hand a reassuring squeeze. "You got this. Because we got you."

"If you say so, Mom."

"I do."

Ahead, Ms. Rebecca had stopped the group. "Let's pause for a moment to learn about the crepuscular creatures that call Shaw Nature Reserve home."

Our collective breath formed short-lived clouds in front of our mouths as we formed a huddle around Ms. Rebecca, who revealed to us the secrets of the creatures who eke out their existences in that sacred space between day and night. Then, we continued. Tanni stayed close to me as we leaped across muddy creeks, dodged fallen branches, scaled hills, and listened to night sounds in perfect, uninterrupted silence.

At last, the hike reached its highest point. We could see for miles, standing at the peak of the prairie region's rolling hills. Along the way, we had lost the feeling in our lips, our hands, and our legs. We didn't care, especially not after looking up.

"It's beautiful," Kat gasped.

"It doesn't look real," Sarah added.

An explosion of stars above us, their light brighter and more penetrating than anything visible in the city limits. We spun around them as they fell all around us, the night sky opening its arms to us in a magnanimous embrace.

Ms. Rebecca pointed out various constellations, and the kids listened with eager ears. I glanced around for Tanni. They had wandered away from the group. Again, I caught them wipe tears from their eyes.

I approached. "You still doing OK, kid?"

"I've just—" They turned to me, smiling and crying. "—I've just never seen so many stars before."

Too overwrought to speak, I simply nodded.