No Perfect Hero(54)
But once we're geared up with proper boots, safety ropes, water bottles, a few other necessities and out on the trails, I’m surprised to find myself enjoying the walk.
The trails around here start off gentle on open terrain lined with tall waving grass and bits of scrub, then blend into thicker and thicker trees. Before you know it, you're up in the foothills toward the mountains and the nature preserves.
Everything looks so pristine and untouched. You can imagine yourself thousands of years in the past, before logging and farming reshaped the land and cut down so much of the old growth.
Out here, beneath the shadows of moss-faded trees, the rocky slopes cragged and ancient, it’s downright primeval.
Breathtaking, too.
We climb higher toward a clear summer sky, looking down over the splendor of the huge cliff beyond the town and the valley sprawling on for ages beyond.
The tension broke somewhere along our hike.
Tara’s enjoying herself the most, chasing pale spring-green butterflies around, picking up different kinds of leaves and flowers and bringing them back to identify. She's damn near running circles around us with more energy than one little girl should ever have.
Hay's quieter, save for when she laughs at Tara’s antics, but it’s a sort of rapt, reverent sound.
I can see the appreciation in every look as she takes in our surroundings with the eye of an artist. I can’t help but wonder what she’ll create from this trip. What that lovely passion and talent and ingenuity will bleed from the emotion the grand, awe-inspiring landscapes evoke.
Now and then she catches my eye. And smiles.
Damn! Here I thought the scenery was the prettiest thing up here.
It's a whole lot harder to keep walking with a hard-on as heavy as these trees.
It’s not even her trying to be sexy. More like a small, strange smile, thoughtful, but there.
Like we're sharing some secret between us, acknowledging it in stolen glances that catch me off guard and make my heart thud harder in my chest.
When we reach the top of the trail and stop, breathing in the warm, woodsy scent around us and the crisp mountain air tinged with just the faintest far-off whiff of snow, we're there.
The zone.
We’re speechless as we look out over the vista. Staring at this great, sprawling, beautiful thing that somehow makes us small, but not insignificant.
We’re part of it. Part of this awesome natural wonder, part of the feeling of immensity that settles over us. And we’re quiet for a long time, quiet together.
That’s something I haven’t had in a long time.
Together with anyone, part of something, belonging somewhere.
I’m not sure whose hand reaches for whose first.
Maybe we just brush in our daze, and somehow it sends an electric signal through us.
But then everything shifts. We're holding hands, our fingers twined real tight, and her touch is a spark going through me. Tara finds us and leans against us both.
Today we're not Hay and her fucked up ex. Or Tara and her worries over heading home. Or me and my soul crushing memories.
We're three happy people, dammit.
And we stay like that – happy – as calm settles over us like the world at large is trying to send a message. Then I see Hay's smile, and there's no doubt whatsoever.
Life goes on, and one day I’ll wake up and find out it’s gone on without me.
Unless I manage to tear myself from this sick obsession to savor the present.
Savor times like this and grasp them tight when they come, because they may well be few and far between.
Same goes for a fine, gorgeous young woman with her soft hand in mine.
*
I don’t get to savor for long.
That client’s still up my ass. If I want to keep a job and my reputation, I can’t let my contracts lapse for the sake of my own personal projects.
I tend to work with district attorneys and bail bondsmen. Once they realize they can’t rely on a bounty hunter, they stop calling for new hits.
So I set out for Boise, keeping that quiet day on the trails wrapped around me like a shield of armor. Thinking of Hay makes the miles on the road go by like nothing.
I circle back to that moment when the sun started dipping low and mellow in the afternoon, the color of the light changing to this burnished, bronze, tinting everything around us.
There’d been murmurs about needing to head back if she was going to survive her shift. We’d looked at each other, and for a moment I’d wanted it again. So fucking bad.
I wanted to kiss her.
Kiss her for real, a conscious choice rather than diving in on fury and impulse and adrenaline.
Kiss her the way she deserves to be kissed.
Show her I’m not an utter asshole, just maybe ninety percent.
I wanted to clear the air between us, cut away some of the nettles and barbs bound around us, and maybe lay the foundation for something that isn’t quite so combative.
A friendship, at least.
A storm, certainly. One where I'd sweep my lips across hers like I owned her, cherished her, ready to call her mine.
Sure, she was driving me nuts with desire, and she’s the most goddamn sexy woman I’ve seen in years. But it’s not that wrong to want to be friends with her if we’re going to keep bouncing off each other like pinballs.
It’d make both our last few days in Heart’s Edge a lot calmer, at least. And less stressful, not just for us, but for Tara.