A festival story. The characters are imagined; the clothes are real.
At seven in the evening the dune stairs still held the whole afternoon, and the sand squeaked under my boots like snow. Below me, Lake Michigan lay flat and glittering all the way to the horizon, and the sun hung two hours above it, white as a stovetop coil.
The whiteboard in the medical tent said 96°F at 4 p.m. Under it, in Makena's loopy capitals: LORNA'S LAST NIGHT. KEEP IT BORING.
Sixteen summers on this beach. In September I'd start teaching paramedic students in Duluth, days only, a classroom with a window.
The radio clicked. "Seven on the schedule," Aurelio said, "four in the tent. The other three are running the cooling bus at the campground. Drink something, Lorna."
I drank something. Down at the beach stage, a piano riff rolled over a four-on-the-floor kick, and thirty thousand people answered it with their feet.
✦
The first one came in at 8:15 on two friends' shoulders, one bare foot held high.
Signe, twenty-four, in charcoal leggings with crimson wings feathered across the thighs. She'd taken the dune stairs two at a time and met the last one sideways.
I pressed the back edge of the bone on the outside of her ankle, then the inside, then the knob halfway down the outside of her foot. No flinch. "Four steps for me."
She took them, wincing, on her own.
"Looks like a sprain," I said, and wrapped it, ice on top, her heel up on a cooler. "If it won't hold you tomorrow, or it swells past the wrap, get an X-ray."
"Can I dance?"
"From that chair. Arms only."
She danced the next three songs from the chair, and at 9:31, when the sun touched the lake and the whole beach turned to face it, she raised both hands like she was catching it.
At 10:40 a girl sat folded on the edge of a cot, breathing fast and high, fingers curled into claws.
"My hands are buzzing," Junie said. "My phone's dead and I don't know anybody's number and I don't know where they—"
"Save the rest for the breath out." I sat beside her while Makena clipped a pulse oximeter to her finger. Ninety-nine. Good air, just too much of it, too fast. "In through your nose. Now out, like you're cooling soup. Longer." I pressed her palms flat on the cool steel of the supply table. "Five things you can see."
"Your shoelaces. That fan. The lake. A guy in a hat. You."
By the eighth long exhale her fingers opened. Makena plugged her phone into the charging strip, and at three percent it buzzed awake: pineapple flag by the lifeguard stand. NOT leaving without you.
Before Junie went, I wrote her friend's number on her forearm in black marker, big as the phone number on a moving truck.
✦
At 11:52 the radio went sharp. "Medical, cook down behind the food trucks. He's talking, but it isn't making sense."
The cart brought him in: Pascal, thirty-one, fourteen hours over a fryer in a pierogi truck. His skin was hot and flushed, and his eyes slid right past mine.
"Two potato-cheese," he told me kindly. "Sour cream on the side."
The core probe read 106.1.
"Tub," I said.
Makena already had the stock tank full and an ambulance called. We lowered him in to the chest on a towel sling under his arms, and I knelt behind him with his head in my hands, holding his chin above the water. Makena tore open the ice chest.
Two bags.
"Delivery truck's behind the shuttles on the county road," she said. "Forty minutes."
Cool first, transport second. A brain at 106 doesn't have forty minutes.
"Shaved-ice truck," I said. "Run."
She ran. Two bags went in and melted to nothing. I stirred the water with my free arm and hummed along with the bassline drifting over the sand, the way I always do, because humming keeps my hands slow.
"Two potato-cheese," Pascal said.
"Coming right up."
105.8. The water was going warm as a bath.
Then wheels on the boardwalk: Makena and the shaved-ice man hauling a garden wagon piled with clear blocks, the lemonade crew behind them with bags of cubes on their shoulders. The first block went in with a crack. The water bit my wrists.
104.9. 104.0. 103.1.
At 102.0, twelve minutes in, Pascal blinked at me like a man waking up on a train.
"Where's my truck?"
"Right where you left it."
We lifted him out into dry towels, and the ambulance doors swung shut on him at 12:31.
✦
The heat didn't break. At three, Aurelio radioed that the cooling bus was full, and two more came to us, flushed and dizzy, who just needed shade, fans and something salty to drink. Makena handled both before I'd finished my water.
At 3:10, a tall man folded himself through the tent flap and announced to a point six inches left of my head, "Minus eight."
Ike. Light gray snapback, a feathered wing across the crown in white linework, and a scraped shin from walking into a tent line.
"They flew off on the dune stairs when I jumped for the sunset," he said. "I've been nodding at strangers since nine-thirty."
I cleaned the shin with saline and dressed it. Then I took my penlight and walked him back to the stairs.
The trick is to lay the light flat on the sand and roll it slowly, so the beam skims low. Grass throws shadows. Glass throws light back.
On the fourth step from the bottom, something winked.
He put them on and looked at me, at the stage lights, at the lake, as if reading a letter he'd been waiting on all night.
"Huh," he said. "You're shorter than your voice."
✦
At 6:05 the wind swung around off the lake for the first time in four days, cool across the back of my neck, and every tent flap on the beach lifted at once. Behind the dunes the sky went peach. The lake took the color and held it.
A woman stood at the flap with a folded shirt in both hands. Late twenties, freckles, a wide straw hat.
"You won't remember me," she said.
I didn't. Sixteen summers is a lot of faces.
"Huron," she said. "Ontario. Michigan."
She stopped.
The tub. A nineteen-year-old with her teeth chattering in the ice water and her temperature coming down a tenth at a time, and me behind her, holding her head, asking her to name the Great Lakes. She'd gotten stuck on Michigan, over and over. We're staying right here, I'd told her, until you get to Erie.
"Erie," Brynn said. "Superior."
I sat down on the cooler.
"I got to Erie in the ambulance," she said. "I never got to tell you. I teach fourth grade now. Every September I teach HOMES, and I tell them about the woman who held my head above the ice. They always ask what you were doing." She smiled. "I tell them you were humming."
She held out the shirt. "You sent me home in your spare tee. Mine was soaked. I've owed you a dry one for nine years."
Rose pink, a hexagon of linked circles over the heart, a six-pointed star drawn in black line beneath it, small mint sparks scattered across the cotton.
✦
At seven, Makena took the radio. I unclipped the vest for the last time, pulled Brynn's shirt on over my sports top, and it smelled of new cotton and her beach bag.
"Keep it boring," I told Makena.
"No promises."
I walked down the dune stairs, past the fourth step, past Signe's empty chair, into the lake to my knees. The water was cold enough to make me laugh. On the beach stage the sunrise set rolled into its last record, a piano climbing over the kick, and the pink on my shirt matched the pink on the water.
Next July, I'd buy a ticket. I already knew which stairs to take one at a time.
The shirt she owed me
Our Angel Catcher design is built from wings, stars and a Flower of Life, which felt right for a story about the people who catch us. Brynn's gift is the Angel Catcher Light Red cotton T-shirt ($60): rose pink and coral, a magenta hexagon Flower of Life over the heart and a black-line six-pointed star below it, on breathable cotton for a beach in a heat wave. Signe dances from her chair in the Red Angel Catcher yoga leggings ($70), crimson wings feathered across a charcoal leg. Ike's cap is the Angel Catcher Light Gray snapback ($40), grey and white wings over a Flower of Life, a brim for the afternoon sun.
- Cotton tee: 100% cotton · listed fabric weight 190 g/m² · dye-sublimated, so the print becomes part of the fiber · XS–5XL.
- Leggings: microfiber, 75% recycled poly / 25% elastane · listed fabric weight 225 g/m² · 4-way stretch · raised waistband · XS–XL · kept clear of rough surfaces that can snag.
- Snapback: one size · the Angel Catcher art in grey and white across the crown · heathered grey brim.
More for the beach: cotton shirts · leggings · snapback hats
What do you wear to a festival on the Lake Michigan dunes?
For a festival on the Lake Michigan dunes, wear a breathable cotton tee, shorts or stretchy leggings, sandals for the beach plus closed shoes for the dune stairs, sunglasses and a cap. Summer days can climb into the 90s°F, then the lake breeze cools the shore after dark, so bring one light layer.
- Sand logic: dune sand gets hot underfoot by afternoon, and wooden stairs are steep. Shoes with grip beat bare feet once the sun drops.
- House music dress code: color and groove. A printed tee, a kimono at sunset, leggings you can dance in and a hat you'll keep on until the light goes.
- Heat-wave habits: refill water often, eat real meals, take shade between sets and know where the medical tent and cooling stations are before you need them.
- Freshwater, real waves: the lake can be cooler than the air and kick up strong currents. Swim near lifeguards and read the beach flags.
- Pack a backup: a spare pair of glasses, a small battery pack and your crew's number written on paper (or your arm).
For more summer festivals by trees and water, Electric Forest fills the lit woods of Rothbury, Michigan, in late June on humid nights of 55–65°F; Dirtybird Campout x Northern Nights brings tech house to a California river valley in mid-July, with 85–95°F days and nights in the 50s; and Lightning in a Bottle gathers at Buena Vista Lake near Bakersfield over Memorial Day weekend, with the same hot-day, cool-night swing.
Frequently asked questions
What happens at the medical tent at a music festival?
At most festivals the medical tent is staffed by EMTs, paramedics and nurses, often with a doctor on call. They treat heat illness, sprains, cuts, blisters and fast breathing, and they cool, rest and monitor you until you're ready. If you need a hospital, they arrange the ambulance. Asking early is always welcome.
Does Lake Michigan have rip currents?
Yes. Lake Michigan has rip currents, plus strong structural currents along piers and breakwalls, especially when wind and waves build. Swim near lifeguards and follow the beach flags. If a current pulls you out, float to keep your energy, then swim parallel to shore until you're free, and wave for help.
What should you do if you lose your glasses at a festival?
Retrace your steps first, then check the lost and found and the info booth. After dark, lay a flashlight flat on the ground and sweep the beam low, since lenses throw light back. Next time, pack a spare pair or prescription sunglasses, and wear a strap for dancing.
Written by Magus & Lylyth Fawn, the Los Angeles artists behind Magus Fawn. Magus makes VR and digital visionary art and produces Psy EDM. Lylyth makes fractal digital art and runs design and customer care. We've been selling wearable art since 2020 on Etsy (4.7★ from 144 reviews as of October 2026) and here at magusfawn.com. Come say hi on Instagram @magusfawn.
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