In previous episodes, I spoke with my 19 year old mind of formative moments in my life. That week with Edith, was starting to make me realize that not only was Edith at a pivotal moment in her life, but I began really seeing the changed in my mind.

Was it the pills starting to shape my mind? Was it the journaling making me more conscious of what was happening? Or maybe was it simply that I had new friends and I was opening up.

I can't tell you. Not even today. All I know, is that the wait for the Halloween event at the resort make me realize that this, was a major pivotal moment in my life.

The talks with Lucy which broadened my mind were all more or less improvised. The Pinball machine moment was semi-spontaneous. The hug between Mindy's parents was just serendipity: I was open to seeing moments of intimacy, and they offered me one.

But this weekend, that was an event in the making. That was where core memories would be formed, where friendships would be solidified and where I would live stories I would tell my kids next to my jealous husband who wasn't there. Or maybe it's where I met him?

Spoilers, I didn't. In fact, I can't even tell you when I will meet my spouse for the simple reason that I just

got out of a relationship with someone I had high hopes of marrying, and I don't currently have a prospect in mind.

But when I got home, I immediately realized the first obstacle to my epic weekend: I now had a half-sister to consider. Edith was just a friend when those plans were made, and while I still don't fully grasp, at my venerable age of 21, how this relationship escalated that quickly, I can say that I was happy it did.

But would Edith even want to camp in a trailer, on top of a lowered kitchen table? In a naturist resort? Well, as it turned out, she did! She would stay dressed the whole weekend, but this would be a good distraction for her.

She helped us pack, asking a ton of questions about, notably, why we packed clothing to go to a naturist resort.

"It might get very cold in the evening, precious", said my mother.

"Precious?", replied Edith, confused.

"Edith, I call my daughter Kiddo. I call Mindy, sweetie. So, I am calling you precious. Unless you don't like it at all"

"But why?"

"Edith, you have a ton of qualities, and I find that none of them come from your background. My daughter is polite because we taught her to be. She is patient because we are patient. But you, Edith, you are who you are, a fundamentally good person, without anyone really showing you to be one. And that, to me, is precious."

"But you barely know me"

"Precious, I am good judge of character, and I listen."

That made Edith cry some more, and my mother too. She was dressed, by the way, all four of us were, since we were travelling from the house to the trailer in the driveway.

Edith proposed a few snacks we didn't think of, notably, my father thought that her suggestion of Pringles chips was outstanding, and we stopped at the grocery store for that, and some red licorice candy, and of course, more marshmallows.

When arriving at the resort, however, I was disappointed. I was told of scores of children running around, of parents doing body painting jobs, of a festive mood.

Well, there was almost no-one.

When we finally found Mindy, after parking at the spot assigned to us, I learned the truth. There was a storm front moving in, and Saturday was more or less a bust.

It was rather chilly, but still doable for outdoor nudity, but tomorrow? It could be freezing.

Body painting was out, most of the families decided to stay home, and well, Billy wasn't coming tonight because of a soccer game, the only evening of the weekend with possible nudity outside a home.

Mindy was pissed. Edith, was also not taking it well. We were in Mindy's house, and Mindy was nude, and I had undressed on arrival, but Clara was wearing a thick bathrobe.

She did express a lot of concern for Edith, and they spoke, one on one for a little while, and then with my mom too (who hadn't even undressed at all), but Mindy decided to try to salvage the evening by going to find Lucy and Clark. They hadn't met Edith yet, and she wanted to, like, warn them to be gentle. As if they needed to be warned.

Edith was fine talking to the mothers. She was also being fed cake by Clara.

We run around the resort, and couldn't find Lucy, until someone called to us.

"Looking for me?", says a woman in a mummy costume with long black hair.

"Lucy?", I said, confused.

"I am disguised. Clark got me the wig, and wanted me to be dressed as in the mummy. So, I got this, But now, he is pissed. He wanted me to be anck su namun. Well, he should have said so", she says.

"Who?", I ask.

"The priestess in the mummy movie? In one scene or two, he is nude except for exquisite tattoos. He wanted me to just paint those tattoos on my body, and then, he could be Imhotep, which he is, but the thing is, he wasn't clear!"

Now, that didn't clear anything up, but today? I can tell why he wanted her to get disguised as anck su namun. Many guys apparently have her in first place in their imagination as to what a perfect woman looks like.

"So, where is Clark?", asked Mindy.

"How should I know? He got mad, we fought, he ran off. Good riddance. None of you are in a costume?"

"No, I was hoping for body painting", says Mindy

"Ah. I could do body painting, if you recall I did some last year, Mindy"

"You did, and Lucy, don't take this the wrong way, you are a great person and superintelligent, but like, that was not your strong suit", says Mindy.

My thought was, is there something that Lucy can't do?

"Mindy, thank you. I think that my stupid boyfriend expected me to pull one of the most elaborate body painting in the movie industry, on my own."

"We have a friend over", I said

"Oh?"

"Edith", I said.

"Wait, Edith is here? Mindy told me so much about her. I have to meet her", says Lucy.

"She had a really rough week. "

"Failing an exam rough or boy trouble rough?"

"Her parents losing custody of her rough"

"Oh. Woah. Ok, where does she live then?"

"With my family for now"

"Good, What do you girls want me to do? I'll be there for you three"

See? Lucy is cool. She doesn't know Edith, but she has empathy without having met her.

We went to Mindy's house, where Edith was on the couch, on her own, with the bag of red licorice. She had bitten the two ends of her vine, and was blowing in it as if it were a straw.

"Edith, I want to present you Lucy. The coolest teenager in our resort", said Mindy.

"I wouldn't say that, but I am happy to have met you", says Lucy.

"Mummy?"

"Yeah, but my boyfriend failed to mention he wanted me to be anck su namun, and he only gave me this wig"

"It's a great wig, and an amazing costume idea for a naturist resort Halloween party"

"You know her?", I asked.

"The mummy is one of the greatest action movies ever made", said Edith. And I hadn't seen it.

"Girls, a cold front is moving in. There is a corn maze, and we have red vines", says Lucy.

"Red licorice", says Edith.

"Now, you heard her, I am the coolest teenager around, and there is nothing cool about licorice. These are red vines, and that's my final judgement"

"This is my bag of red licorice. If you want one, you will call them how I want them to be called"

Lucy looks at her. And laughs. "I do the same thing"

"What?"

"Bite both ends and use one as a straw. With sprite, it's astonishing"

Now, I don't know how to call this rule of cool, but Lucy, just defused the situation like that.

"I couldn't have Sprite at home"

"From what I heard, you got free from there. I have Sprite in our cabin. If you come run the corn maze with us, I'll give you one to try one of your red licorice as a straw"

Now, that is surely another rule of cool. She bargained not to get something for herself, but to get Edith in a better place. To help her. A girl she had never met and who isn't a naturist.

"Only if you remove that ridiculous costume", said Edith.

But again, Lucy didn't take it as an attack. She joked around it.

"If I didn't knew you better, Edith, I would say that you are just trying to get me naked", she says, joking around.

"But you don't know me"

"That's the joke. Edith, if it takes removing my fabulous but equally ridiculous costume to get you outside, well", and like that, Lucy just removed the wig and the costume, revealing that under it, she was only wearing shoes. Again, with no socks.

"Ok, let's go. But first", said Edith, standing up and distributing one red licorice to each of us. We all proceeded to just bite the two ends, and then, blow at each other's faces with the homemade straw, laughing.

But as we were going, Clara stopped us. "Aren't you forgetting something?"

You all look at each other. "What mom? The sun is almost down, no sunblock needed", says Mindy.

"Well, you will need flashlights, but that's not what I meant"

"But moooom", says Mindy.

"No, she is right, I am not 18 yet, and we are about to leave the resort", says Lucy.

"I can go with you girls", says my mom, who received three flashlights from Clara. I ended up with Edith with one, and Mindy had the luck to be with Lucy. My mom kept the third one.

As much as I wanted to go with Lucy, Edith needed me.

The four girls, and my mom, proceeded to the back of the resort. My mom and Edith stayed clothed, but the three of us were nude. It felt good to see Lucy and I liked that Edith and her got to meet, even if the meeting was a little awkward.

I might be paired with Edith, but Edith and Lucy spoke a little on the walk to the corn maze. Mostly about school, but also about how chilly it was.

Edith commented that Lucy had her nipples hard from the cold, and I was certain that she would get scolded, but Lucy only laughed.

Is that, too, a rule of cool? Simply deflecting attacks away? And why the hell is Edith that acid with Lucy?

By the time we make it to the back of the resort, with my mom leading away, Lucy and Mindy caught in a deep conversation, I decide to speak with Edith.

"Are you okay? You seem rather angry with Lucy"

"I hate that kind of girl"

"I know, I usually hate them too, but Lucy isn't like the other. She is even the captain of the math competition team or something. She is cool. And she cares for us"

"I don't know. I don't have much patience, sorry. I know she is your friend. I'll try to be nicer"

But I sensed she was feeling bad about it.

"Edith, no one is blaming you. Certainly, not Lucy. Just do your best, and at worse, I will smooth things out"

"Julie?"

"Edith?"

"Thank you for being you. I am not used to kindness"

"Hey, you are like my little sis"

She laughed. "I am two years older than you are"

"Maybe, but I have been a naturist longer, and I am taking care of you. Like a big sister"

She laughed again.

Well, guess what? Soon enough, we will stop joking about me being her big sister, but recently? It's Edith who brought it back, only now, 24 and 22 aren't that different, and I am now taller than she is.

My mom had trouble with the door, so Lucy had to help her. It had been years since the last time she operated it, while Lucy frequently cheats and leaves the resort with Clark.

Still, that allowed the five of us to get closer.

Edith, decided to speak up. "Lucy?"

"Yes, darling?", says Lucy, as if all of their previous talks were positive.

"I like you better nude than with that costume"

"Thanks, I like myself better nude, than wearing, well, anything", she says, positively.

"You really would have made a great anck su namun", said Edith.

"I know, I was pissed at myself for not thinking that's what Clark meant. Maybe tomorrow?", says Lucy.

"I like painting", says Edith.

"Oh, wicked. Let's get together then", says Lucy, smiling.

Edith looked at me, unsure, but I smiled at her and gave her a thumbs up.

The walk was more problematic than the first one, simply because it was darker, colder, and we didn't have three adults with us. Not that I didn't trust my mother, after all, look at how it ended with my dad. But if someone had found us, I would have preferred my father.

But of course, no one found us. Well, yes, but not one wearing clothing. We crossed a family with two kids, probably 6 and 8, a girl and a boy, which Lucy and Mindy knew, but whom I didn't know.

The father was carrying the little girl, who was visibly half asleep. She was the only one in the family dressed up. Perhaps she was cold?

It was chilly, I almost regretted going nude, but I didn't want to falter. I had been looking for this for a while and I hadn't considered that perhaps, the weather wouldn't allow it. Well, I was here, I was nude, I wasn't turning blue, I had to press on.

I haven't seen the maze yet, and Mindy hadn't explored the whole maze either, while Lucy and me stayed outside. This could be interesting. None of us knew the path inside.

"I love corn mazes. My aunt had a corn maze and I would help her make it", told me Edith, after a period of silence.

"Sweet, would you like to visit her?", I ask.

"I would love to", said Edith, with wet eyes.

"I can ask my parents"

"Oh, I would love to visit her, but I can't"

"Why?"

"She died. Last year."

"Oh, I am so sorry"

"I think my father became worse after his little sister died. Not that it's an excuse, but still. I miss her. She was nice."

"I am happy she was in your life.", I told her. I did... I really did. Because honestly? That little nugget of information, retrieved from the depth of Edith's pain, helped me see why Edith was a good person.

She had one good role model, until she didn't.

Well, hopefully, she would have three at home, and maybe two other friends, Mindy and Marge.

I recognized we were getting close from a little path on the side. I had wondered where it leads, and it's only the next year that I explored it. It leads nowhere... Well, nowhere interesting. Just more fields but more in the open, so you can't go explore there in the nude. In fact, the only reason I explored it was because I wasn't nude when I did: there was a strong chilly wind and even just normal clothes weren't enough. I had a jacket on, at a naturist campground!

My mom spot it first, she was up ahead and Lucy and Mindy were caught in a strong conversation in which emotions and laughter were thrown around. Meanwhile, Edith and I were having a quiet moment. Years later, I learned that Mindy was having the time of her life thanks to the talk, my Mother was having the time of her life not having to think about much, just relaxing, and Edith and I were on a high basking in the quieter understanding between us. It's only Lucy I don't know about, but she was always enigmatic to me.

My mother explained the rules: no one without a flashlight. Not crossing the walls, no running. She would stay on a rock, between the entry and the exit, with her flashlight off, not knowing it was the same one Lucy and Clark were sitting on the last time I was there. Every turn or so, she wants us to point the flashlight up, so she had an idea of where we are.

Mindy seemed to roll her eyes at the rules, but Lucy quickly acknowledged them, as did Edith and me.

My best friend wanted to go first, with Lucy, so we let her go, giving her a good minute of a head start.

"Thank you, mom for this", I fold her.

"My pleasure"

"Did you see the Mummy movie?"

"With Brendan Fraser?", asked My mom.

Edith replied. "I think so. From a few years back"

"Yeah, I liked it a lot. Your father and I went to the theater to see it, and it's sequel."

"Do you think we could watch it tomorrow, since it's cold"

"If it's on Netflix, otherwise, let's go to the video store. Edith, are you scared of action movies with mummies?"

"I already saw it"

"Ah, ok. We'll see what we can do. It's cold tomorrow, so not a bad idea to stay inside"

It's been long enough, so Edith and I bid farewell to my mother, and we decided to explore the corn maze.

Which was built for kids, with the navigational abilities of kids in mind. In short, we only saw 4 branching paths, and two of them lead to a quick dead end. Why would the fathers say it was better this year? I don't have a clue. The third one lead to a "deeper" dead-end, and it's how we crossed Mindy and Lucy: we were getting into it, they were returning from it.

"Should we continue, we know it's the wrong day?", asked Edith

I thought about Lucy, about those cheesy novels I read. About what it means to be cool. And I try to be with my answer. I'll let you be the judge.

"Is the maze about finding the exit, or about exploration?"

Edith liked my answer. "Exploration, let's go in it"

But once we hit the end, after 4 turns, we return and go on the path we hadn't explored yet.

There is another branch, we don't see Mindy or Lucy, but we ended up picking the exit, where we see the pair speaking with my mother.

"I think it's the worst so far", says Mindy.

"It sucked compared to the one my aunt used to make"

My mother explains. "It's not like they have a lot of surface area to work with"

But I give my theory. "I think they are making it more accessible for kids"

"Could be", said my mother.

"Is there a reason we can't have two? I mean, not all the corn is harvested, there are other corn fields, we could make this one for kids, and a bigger one for teenagers and adults", says Mindy

"I think the problem is cost. It takes time to make a maze", said my mother.

"We could all do it"

"But then, you would know the layout. If all the teenagers know the maze, no one would want to do it".

That sort of broke Mindy's mind. Maybe for her, corn mazes just grew like that?

"Shall we go back, it's getting chilly", I said, but the reality, is that I had my pill to take.

"I still had fun. Thank you, girls", said Edith.

"It was a pleasure to have you", says Lucy, adding more to how she wasn't holding a grudge.

Now, some spoilers, because Lucy will sort of disappear from my life for a while and only sporadically reappear, and often, in none interesting ways. The pinball exploits with Clark and her were behind me. The pep talks in private too. She was moving from the role of the wise teenager guide to the position of insecure young adult. It didn't go well, she fled to France, remember? And no, I don't know why. I don't know what caused her, or Clark, to just give up in America. But I was moving from the role of scared and angry pre-puberty tween to that of a more balanced teenager.

I was now a big sister, even if my little sister was older than me, and I was about to get a new best friend.

But the thing I wanted to spoil, is that Edith and Lucy never really became friends, but they were friendly. I think that in the wholesome - broken spectrum, the two girls were at opposite ends of the line and Lucy, despite how wise she was, was unable to see the sadness in Edith's heart.

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