Chapter 25
CHAPTER
TWENTY-FIVE
CLAY
A light bluegrass soundtrack snuck through the speakers I’d installed in my living room and the music followed us onto the deck that overlooked my yard.
I’d made an effort to come up with an activity for us this afternoon, so it wouldn’t seem like all I wanted to do was kiss Ally and carry her to my bed. But when she showed up in a plaid flannel shirt, painted-on jeans, and hiking boots, all bets were off.
“C’mere,” I said, leading her into the house. “We need to get you out of those clothes.”
She looked down. “What do you mean? I thought this was the perfect outfit for a hike.”
“It is. But I won’t be able to think straight watching your tight little ass in those jeans if I don’t have you first.”
I didn’t bother taking her upstairs to my bedroom, not when I had a perfectly good couch right here. “Ah, okay. Understood. Have your way with me, greyhound.”
I loved how easy things were with her. We functioned like a singular being, and it both delighted and scared the shit out of me. The better things felt, the harder I fell for her. The harder I fell, the more I worried about what would happen if things ended.
I knew it was the wrong thing to be thinking about, but the worry never left the back of my mind.
Well, that’s not entirely true. She did have the ability to make me forget everything, if only for a few hours. And those were the best hours of my day.
As my eyes roamed the milky skin of her naked body splayed on the couch beneath me, I stayed in the present. “You are so goddamn gorgeous, I’m about to lose my mind,” I growled.
And then I slid inside her. Heaven found. Mind lost.
After I’d ravished her body, I reluctantly let Ally get dressed, but only because of how much I enjoyed seeing her in those jeans. Then I guided her outside to a trail behind my house, where I’d promised her a fun date.
“I’m not feeling the fun yet,” she panted as we crested a hill.
“No?” I laughed, stopping so we could catch our breaths and enjoy the view. Bandit Lake lay below us and to our right was a lush green meadow. Our destination.
“It is pretty though.”
“That it is,” I said, enjoying my view of her. When she turned and caught me staring, she blushed. I loved that I could make her do that simply by telling her the truth.
The sun was high overhead, so I guided us to a shady spot in the meadow, where a winding trail cut through the greenery and led to a mossy flat area.
“Okay, here’s where we take your survival skills up a notch,” I said, kicking over a rotting log and revealing a colony of half the varieties of bugs that lived in the state of Tennessee.
Ally took a step back but observed the bugs, which crawled every which way, now that I’d moved their shelter. I rolled the log back with my foot, but a few escapees roamed on the moss around it.
“Um, what do you have in mind?” she asked, raising an eyebrow skeptically.
“I know how much you want to be self-sufficient, and I figured you might like to have some wilderness survival skills to go along with the first aid.”
I didn’t know what I was expecting. A laugh? An eye-roll? But the look on Ally’s face was pure gratitude. “You want to help me be more self-sufficient?” She brought a hand to her chest and cocked her head. Her eyes may have even been moist, but I couldn’t really tell behind the sunglasses.
“I—”
She wrapped her arms so tightly around me I almost lost my breath. Then again, I felt breathless around her most of the time anyway.
Moving the log again, I set the bugs free and watched them splay out across the ground. I searched for the one I wanted and saw it on the desiccated log. “Here, this is a good one.” Picking it up, I held the small brown insect out for Ally to inspect. Still standing a few feet away, Ally leaned slightly toward it but mostly observed it from afar.
“Why is that a good one?” she asked.
“Bark beetle. They’re plentiful around here, and they have a lot of protein. So if you ever run out of food, these are a good option. What you want to do is bite the heads off and spit them out, then eat the crunchy body.”
“I absolutely do not want to do that.”
I handed her the bark beetle, which she accepted in her palm, observing it. I watched her watch the bug. Then I saw her make a decision. Closing her eyes, she brought the beetle to her mouth and hesitated, screwing up her face in disgust.
“Wait!” Her eyes popped open when I took the beetle out of her hand. “I didn’t bring you here to eat bugs.”
The look on her face was priceless. Part relieved, part murderous. “I almost ate that bug.”
“I wouldn’t have let you.”
“You can’t stop me. Here, hand it over.” Was she serious? She nodded at me and held out her hand. I put the beetle back in her palm and watched her steel herself. “This is really safe to eat?” she asked.
“A hundred percent.”
“Okay...” She brought the beetle to her lips, and I prepared myself to fall hopelessly in love with this woman who had been scared of the wilderness a few weeks ago and was now willing to eat a bug.
Ally opened her mouth, but instead of taking a bite, she placed the beetle back on its log and smiled. “Maybe next time.”
Looking for a place to sit, she inspected the ground for evidence of bugs, critters, and rogue leaves.
“Hang on.” I grabbed her hand to prevent her from lowering herself to the ground. Then I took out a blanket from my backpack and spread it out. “Here. Much better.”
“Oh. So much better,” she agreed.
Settling down next to her, I unzipped the inner pocket of my pack, where I’d stashed a bottle of wine, plastic glasses, and the makings of a charcuterie board.
“I’m absolutely taking your wilderness survival training seriously,” I assured her, “and I plan to give you a full lesson while we sit here. But no eating bark beetles when wine and cheese is an option. Bugs are purely for an emergency situation.”
We unpacked the food and poured the wine, and then I gave Ally a lesson on wilderness survival, using a pad of paper to jot down notes for her and draw makeshift representations of some bugs that make good protein sources in a pinch.
“And whatever you do,” I cautioned, “no eating mushrooms on or off the trail. That’s where you get into trouble.”
“I think I knew that one.”
We spent most of the day in the meadow talking about hikes we could take and short backpacking trips that would test her wilderness skills. I respected her desire to take care of herself, but the more time I spent with Ally, the more I wanted to take care of her.
“You know, being self-sufficient doesn’t mean you have to go at it alone.”
I was lying on my back with Ally’s head resting on my stomach. She tilted her face to the side to look at me. “What do you mean?”
“Just that you can be strong and vulnerable at the same time.”
She swallowed and blinked up at me. I watched her process this information. Finally, she nodded. “That’s a good way of putting it. I guess I was taught that being vulnerable would lead to heartbreak.”
“It won’t with me,” I said, intending to live up to that promise.
She smiled. “Gonna hold you to that, greyhound.” She gave me a poke in the ribs, which left me no option but to tickle her until she cried uncle. Which led to me wrapping her in my arms and pulling her onto my lap.
“This is good. I like this,” she said.
“I like it too.” I loved it. And I fucking loved her. Which was why I briefly allowed myself to think about telling her everything about how despondent I felt sometimes and how messed up I felt on medication. Here I was, waxing poetic about Ally allowing herself to be vulnerable, but I needed to do the same. I could trust her—this I knew with certainty. Maybe I had to trust myself, trust that I would be enough for her, exactly like this. Exactly as I am.
Then, maybe . . . maybe it could work?
I was so lost in thought that I didn’t realize Ally was asking about my other weekend plans until she waved a hand in front of my face. “Earth to greyhound?”
“I have a family dinner on Sunday,” I replied, half distracted by the idea of seeing my parents, who required a whole different set of survival skills to be around. “Actually, would you like to come with me? It’ll make the dinner much more pleasant, though you might be done with me afterward.”
“I very much doubt that.”
“Yeah, maybe they’ll behave. There’s always a chance.”
It was crazy to invite her to a family dinner. My parents were half the reason I’d never felt comfortable with my depression diagnosis or the meds that kept me functional. Nothing good could come from her seeing the whole family dynamic in action.
And yet, a part of me wanted her to know that side of me. A large part. I’d never believed Alexandra Dalbotten and I had a future together, but every day I spent with her was making me want to believe.
“Will you come to dinner?” I asked.
She agreed readily, and for the first time, I found myself starting to believe.