“Dinner and a movie? Out here?” The look on her face was priceless, like I was out of my mind. I couldn’t help but laugh. She looked away when I did and wandered out in the meadow, the sun slowly setting and shinning on her hair, highlighting it with waves of warmth and light.
I grabbed the Dutch Oven and walked over to the small fire pit. I started to throw wood and light a fire as she walked over. Her face was filled with an apprehensive look, wary of whatever was going on. This girl was guarded, that was for sure.
“What are you doing?”
I looked up at her as I moved the wood around, getting the fire to light. “Making dinner.”
She lightly kicked the Dutch Oven, the hard cast iron not moving. “With that?”
“Yep.”
“What is it?”
I got up and brushed off my hands. “It’s a Dutch Oven. Once I get the fire going I’ll use it for dinner.”
She nodded but I could tell she was still unsure about it all. I went back to the truck and grabbed the cooler and the small bag I had brought. I set it by the fire pit and then went back and grabbed the camping chairs. The fire was going strong and I grabbed what I needed for the Dutch Oven.
“What are you making?” This girl was full of questions.
I tried to hide my smile. “I thought this was nothing new to you.”
She huffed and sat in the chair. I turned only to immediately hear a loud shriek. I quickly turned back around to find Jolene had fallen through the chair, the bottom of the canvas seat giving out on her.
“Are you okay?” I rushed over to her but when she glanced up at me with, her eyes narrowed, a pissed off look on her face I couldn’t help but burst out laughing. I tried to hold it back but I couldn’t.
“Are you seriously laughing at me right now?”
I tried to talk through my laughing but it was difficult. “I’m sorry but that look.”
She continued to sit there and stare me down as my laughter died down, not even a hint of smile on her face.
I finally had calmed down enough to see through the tears in my eyes. I swiped them away as she cleared her throat.
“Ty.”
“Yeah.”
“Can you help me?”
“Are you stuck?” I was totally egging her on. Someone had to.
She looked away. “Get me out of this damn chair.”
I went and took her hands, but before I pulled her up I said, “Hey. Look at me.”
She reluctantly moved her head toward mine, our eyes connecting.
“Good thing this is only a thing between friends, otherwise this would be really awkward,” I told her.
Our eyes held each other’s for only a few seconds before she busted out in laughter, finally finding humor in the situation. I pulled up her up and she slightly stumbled into me, our chests flush. Our hands were still meshed together held between us. I could instantly feel the heat between us and I felt her take in a deep breath. On the exhale she said, “Yeah, good thing this is a friend thing.”
Her words broke the spell we were in and I dropped her hands, taking a step back. We both stood there. I put my hands on my hips and licked my bottom lip. I watched Jolene’s eyes zoom in on my lips. It was undeniable there was something between us. Acting on it was a whole different situation.
I went back to the Dutch Oven, breaking whatever weird zone we were in, and put the ingredients in, setting it in the fire pit and covering it with hot coals. She took the offending chair and put it in the back of the truck. No words were spoken and I was starting to wonder if every time we got together it would be this hard, because it seemed that so far every time we met, something went wrong.
And now we only had one chair. I grabbed the cooler and sat on top. “You can use the other chair,” I told Jolene.
“You sure it’s not going to break?”
I smiled. “Hopefully not. Guess you’ll have to sit and see.”
She stared down the chair. “Hmm. Let me have the cooler, you sit in the chair.”
I laughed and got up offering her the cooler with a wide sweep of my hands, like a throne to sit in.
I quietly made dinner in the other cast iron pan I had brought and then pulled out the fresh bread from the Dutch Oven, making two plates, then handing one to Jolene.
Her eyes grew wide as she stared down at the plate and she looked up at me. “Did you make fresh bread from that pot thing.”
“Yes, I did. And the pot thing is called a Dutch Oven.”
“Wow.” She sounded mildly impressed. “No one has ever made me bread on the spot on a date. This is almost like Hunger Games. Are you a baker? Are you going to throw me left over bread?”
I winked at her. “Only if you kiss me in a cave.”
Jolene laughed and every time she did it was an intoxicating sound, warm and a little rough, lacking a bit of femininity but in such a wonderful way. I couldn’t help but wonder what kind of sounds she would make writhing underneath me. I had a small taste of it the night at the bar, but I knew it wasn’t the real Jolene, only the one she allowed people to see.
We finished dinner and I put everything away as I grabbed the white sheet.
“This must be the movie?” Jolene pointed to the sheet in my hand.
“You catch on quick.” I tied the sheet between two trees and moved my truck so the bed of it faced the sheet. I had “borrowed” the projector from the office and connected it to my laptop, popping in the DVD. I grabbed the blankets out of the truck and threw it in the back. We settled in, with a good two feet between us, each covering ourselves with separate blankets when the famous castle came onto the screen and the music that almost every person knew came on.
Jolene looked to me but I just shrugged and tried to hide the smile on my face. The ship came into view as the movie started but my focus was on Jolene. A wide smile filled her face. With the last of the sun setting, it literally stole my breath.
“Really?” She didn’t look at me, her eyes glued to the screen but she tried as hard as she could to hold back the smile and laughter as the screen filled with the large sailing ship and the men singing in the background.
“Pocahontas?”
“Yeah,” I answered. I couldn’t help my smile, knowing I finally surprised her.
She smiled and settled into the truck bed, watching the movie. We silently watched the movie as the sun finally disappeared behind the mountains, bathing the meadow into a deep purple. About thirty minutes into the movie, Jolene turned towards me. “I think it is safe to say that no guy has ever watched a Disney movie with me on a date.”
Disney movie for the win, and why hello there man pride, I’ve missed you.
“Yeah?” I simply said, trying not to look too smug.
“Yep. Why a Disney movie?”
“I found it fitting for the setting. I’ve watched my fair share of Disney movies,” I said without thinking.
Jolene gave me a confused look and I quickly said, “I have a lot of nieces and nephews. I watch a lot of kid movies.” I didn’t know how much I wanted to tell her about my family and my past. That all seemed too much for a first friend outing.
She turned on her side and wrapped the blanket closer to her. It was starting to get pretty cold. “Do you have brothers and sisters?”
An innocent question but for me it was again looking into a small volcano, one you didn’t want to get to close too since it was about to erupt.
“I’m one of seven kids.”
“Whoa. Seven kids? Holy crap that’s a lot.”
I nodded because it was true. I came from a large family.
“I’m the second youngest and I have three brothers and three sisters. Do you have any siblings?”
“No, only me.” Her answer was short, clipped even. Maybe family wasn’t the easiest thing to talk about.
“How old are you?” I asked her.
“Twenty-five.”
I smiled. “I’m twenty-four.”
“You’re younger than me?”
“When’s your birthday?”
“January 18th”
“Then yep I am younger by about eight months.”
She made a noise of agreement but I couldn’t tell if it was a good or bad thing.
We fell into a comfortable silence as the rest of the movie played and as soon as it ended we got our stuff up, piling it in the back of the truck. It was a quiet ride home, music playing softly in the background.
I pulled up to her cabin and we both spoke at the same time.
“Does anyone ever-”
“You know we don’t-”
We both stopped.
“I was going to ask you if anyone ever calls you Jo?”
Jolene looked at me and smiled. “Close friends do.”
“Oh,” was my reply.
“You can call me Jo.”
I smiled. It was really a simple and stupid thing but for some reason I thought I had crossed a huge hurdle right with this girl.
“What were you going to ask?”
Her eyes looked away from mine. “We don’t have to do this, yeah know.”
I shifted on the bench seat, trying to face Jolene. “Do what?” I asked timidly.
She stayed sitting forward. She was wringing her hands and her eyes focused on the cabin, not looking at me. “This dating thing. Is it weird? I think it’s weird?”
And then I felt like I was starting all over again, taking ten steps back.
Jo shook her head. “I mean, shit, that came out wrong. We can hang out and we don’t need to classify it as a date. I just . . . when I date I have this goal in my head-” And then she abruptly stopped.
I hesitated a second but asked, “No, keep going. What’s this goal?” I turned more fully towards her in the truck, with one arm leaning on the steering wheel. I didn’t want to give her a chance to avoid me or try to look away.
She sighed, obviously uncomfortable with where this conversation was heading. She still couldn’t look at me. “No one knows me, Ty,” she whispered. “When I’m dating, it’s about the short-term fun and really nothing more. It’s how I work and it’s been pretty good so far. I don’t want to mess with that. I’m happy with how things are.”
I didn’t know if I quite believed her, if she was truly happy.
“We don’t have to label it. At all. Okay?”
Jo nodded, accepting what I offered. “Do you run every morning?” She asked me, changing subjects.
“I try.”
“Do you always run on this trail?” She pointed to the general direction of the trail that connected to her cabin.
“It’s one of my favorites. I try to hit it at least once a week, if not more.”
I wanted to reach over and take her hand or brush the piece of hair that keep slipping from behind her ear. I know we had said there was no label, this was not dating, but I felt this pull to her and I had to restrain myself.
“What are you thinking?” was the question I allowed myself.
“Do you always run alone?”
“Mostly. Yeah.”
She fidgeted in her seat.
“Why?” I asked her. “Want to join me?” Because her joining me first thing in the morning to run the trails would be the second best thing to waking up next to her. God, this friend/non-label thing was going to be hard.
“Okay, don’t laugh, but when I was living in Boise I was kind of addicted to work out classes. Zumba, Hip-Hop, Body Combat, any of those. I would go to three or four classes each week and now that I’m here for the summer I don’t really know what to do.”
“Come running with me.”
“I could, but I really know nothing about running, let alone trail running.”
I smiled. “It’s pretty simply. Put one foot in front of the other.”
She smiled back at me. “That’s it, huh?”
I nodded. “I’ll be here, six in the morning. Be ready”
Jo laughed as she said, “I guess I’ll be running with you in the morning. All right then. Well . . .” I could tell she didn’t know what to say as she paused. I bet her dates probably ended differently than this one. Oh that’s right, it wasn’t a date. “Thank you for tonight,” she finally said.
Jo slipped out of my truck as quietly as she slipped in. I watched her get into her cabin and pulled out of the driveway, already wishing it was morning.
CHAPTER FIVE
Jolene
“The wilderness pushed me beyond what I thought was capable.”- From the diary of Maggie Brown, June 1891
It was freezing in my room. Though, I didn’t know if I would call the little alcove that held the full bed in this small cabin a “room.” I had forgotten to turn on the little heater the night before, my thoughts elsewhere. It was five-thirty in the morning and I was supposed to be ready to run in thirty minutes. I bundled the covers and blankets closer, trying to find warmth. No one warned me for the extreme range of temperatures you experienced in a single day here.
No one warned me about a lot of things.
Like Ty.
How in all reality, it was wrong. He was all wrong. He was younger than me, only a few inches taller than me, and he had a beard. He was everything I avoided. But I couldn’t help but wonder why it felt right. And that was why I was pulling back; something I never did. I could still have fun, but I had to set clear boundaries. I never really had friends that were guys that I didn’t sleep with. I guess Reece was a friend but only because he was dating my best friend. Otherwise, I enjoyed my time spent with guys playing in and out of the bedroom.
Ty was different.
I rubbed my hands over my face, trying to clear away my restless sleep filled with Ty’s rugged handsome face. One I never thought would fill my thoughts. I succumbed and dragged myself out of the bed, the cold coating my skin and giving me the chills. I threw on sweats, shirt and tennis shoes. I was lucky if I was coherent enough to grab matching socks.
I yanked open the cabin door. The morning was breathtaking and unexpected. The great thing about being out here in central Idaho was at any point of the day, the scene in front of you was different. The light reflected differently and it made the same landscape vibrant and diverse. This morning the air was clear and crisp, untouched by human influence. Birds were chirping in the background and a small ground squirrel was eating grass off my front porch. It was like my own fairytale land.
As I looked out, I heard Ty before I saw him. The crunch of the fallen twigs from the tree-covered path alerted me of him.
He walked out of the little trail connecting our homes and just like I was taken back by my landscape only minutes ago, the same thing happened as Ty came into view. He looked like he belonged in this magical land. I was the stranger, the invader into this pristine scene and for once in my life I wasn’t too sure about it all.