Surprise!

       It had taken until October 20th, but at last, Shelby had scored an amazing coup: a date with Bryan Dillard. She liked that he was shy and understated, not a braggert, not a show-off, not the best-looking guy on campus or the smartest or the most athletic – just a regular guy. Decent, solid, no gimmicks.

        She’d been working since the last week in August, at Freshman Orientation, to get him to notice her, saying “hi” whenever they passed each other on campus, waving to him across the cafeteria and – finally – maneuvering to be coupled with him as lab partners in Bio.

        Recently, they’d begun going to the Student Union afterward for coffee. It’s where she learned that he was from the Midwest, heir-apparent to his family’s ten-thousand-acre corn farm and was beginning to feel more and more isolated and homesick on this suburban East Coast campus by the day.

        She loved the cornflower blue of his eyes, the rough-hewn look of his hands and the fact that his mode of transportation was a genuine farm truck. She knew a lot of the upperclassmen referred to him as “Alfalfa,” but he seemed oblivious. He was on a mission to understand the biotechnics behind improving corn production and was all about focus.

        So, on Monday afternoon, when he’d asked if he could take her out on Thursday, Sydney was so beside herself with excitement and giddiness that she neglected to ask where they’d be going. Truth be told, it didn’t even matter. She just wanted to be with him.

        She greeted him in the lobby of her dorm, wearing her cutest crop top with a cotton hoodie, yoga pants and sandals, perhaps not exactly the smartest of fashion choices on this frosty New England night, but heavier clothes wouldn’t have accentuated her body this well.

        She noticed his eyes register a slight hint of surprise, which was followed by him opening his mouth, as if in preparation to speak, but then quickly clamping his lips back together as he sweetly reached for her hand.

        His truck was so old-fashioned that it still sported a bench seat, so Shelby sat close to him. More than once, she noticed him side-eyeing her outfit, then clenching his jaw.

        He hadn’t offered any enlightenment about their destination, which Shelby took as a sign that she shouldn’t ask. Just let things play out, her Little Voice told her. Don’t force his hand. He’s shy. Just let him surprise you.

        Nearly an hour later, though, as the hubbub of campus life and the lights of their college town faded into the rearview mirror, houses became fewer and farther between. Sydney began to tremble.

        “You cold?” Bryan asked. “I was worried about that when I first saw your outfit.” He frowned. “I wanted to tell you to maybe change into jeans and boots and a coat, but I thought I’d sound too bossy.”

        Sydney gave him a smile of appreciation for being so noticing as she fought back thoughts of what friends of hers had  experienced almost exactly a year earlier.

        Bryan cranked the heat way up as they continued down the desolate country road.

        Before she could stop them, other facets of her friends’ catastrophe flooded Sydney’s mind: It was a camping trip that she, Sydney, was also supposed to have been on, but then wasn’t allowed to once her parents received word, earlier in the day, that her grades had slipped. Her five citified girlfriends had  chosen a random, remote farm, lost their bearings and then been unable to secure cell service. Temperatures had plummeted once the sun had gone down, no one had dressed appropriately, and four of the girls had died from hypothermia. The fifth told of wandering aimlessly for hours while hearing the howlings and skitterings of animals all around her.

        Sydney had listened intently to every terrifying word of her friend’s account and had internalized an amalgam of guilt-stoked phobias to call her own: cold, the dark, being somewhere unfamiliar and being surrounded by wild animals.

        “We’re here!” Bryan announced. “It doesn’t officially open until tomorrow night, so we’re kind of trespassing, but I’m so homesick, I don’t even care.”

        The sign illuminated by his truck’s headlights read:

       CAMP TERRIFYING:

               THE COUNTY’S FIRST UNLIT CORN MAZE!

        ARE YOU GOOD ENOUGH TO FIND YOUR WAY OUT?