barn. There will be music, of course, maybe something French. I scroll through my library and by some miracle I find a band called Cœur de Pirate, which is typical Saz. She’s always adding music to my phone that she wants me to hear. I press play and lose myself in the day and the melody. I close my eyes for a few seconds and just walk, feeling the sun on my face.
When a horn blasts behind me, I nearly fall off the road. A dusty black truck rolls up, engine idling. Jeremiah Crew sits behind the wheel, one arm resting on the open window. I take off my headphones.
He says, “Here’s the thing. I don’t want you getting too crazy about me, because I’m only here for the next few weeks.”
“I’ll do my best.”
“I’m serious. Four weeks. Twenty-eight days. More than enough time.”
I say, “I’m only here for thirty-five days, and three of those are already gone. I’ll be fine.”
“So I don’t have to worry about you falling in love with me and getting your heart crushed?”
“I’m pretty sure I’m good.”
“I need you to be, like, one hundred and fifty percent sure. I mean…” He smiles, dimples and all, the whole nine yards. He points to himself like, See what you’re up against?
“I’d say I’m at least two hundred and fifty percent sure I’m not going to fall in love with you.”
“In that case, get in.”
* * *
—
We drive past Rosecroft, past the remaining outbuildings. Miah stops the truck in a grassy patch on the edge of the trees. He gathers a few things—bug spray, a flashlight, a pretty serious-looking camera with a faded brown strap, which he slings over one shoulder. He gets out, door slamming, so I get out, door slamming. Then he’s standing in front of me and this is the closest we’ve been since last night, but instead of kissing me, he aims the bug spray at my legs and arms and starts spraying.
“Seriously, Captain. They do have nature where you’re from, don’t they?”
“Not like this.”
He sprays until the can gives out. Then he tosses it into the truck and says, “Let’s go see more.”
I follow him deep into the woods. Sensible Claude, the one raised by two sensible parents, is going: You don’t even know this boy. Don’t go into the woods with him. This is the exact way horror movies start. A girl alone in the woods with a stranger. Never to be seen again.
But the Claude who sat on the beach last night with Jeremiah Crew, who spilled her soul and twelve gallons of tears, keeps walking.
I expect him to bring up the talking, the making out, but he doesn’t. Instead we wade through undergrowth and brush and I try not to think about ticks and snakes and all the other things that live here.
I swat at tree limbs and spiderwebs and horseflies. I step over poison ivy and duck under vines. Like a kid on a car ride, I want to ask, How much farther? But I don’t. He’s not talking, so I don’t either.
We’re a good ten minutes into our hike when we suddenly emerge from the woods. I blink like a mole under the glare of sun and sky. There are horses grazing, and beyond them, Rosecroft. Just down the road from the ruins, I can see the truck.
“Did we get lost?”
“No.”
“Then what was that?” I point to the woods. To the truck. To the woods again. “We went in a circle.”
“I said let’s go see more nature.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?”
And then his hands are on my waist, on my hips, his fingers widespread and strong, so warm against my shirt that the warmth reaches into my skin. He pulls me to him and says, “I’m going to kiss you right now because I’ve been thinking about kissing you all morning. I’m telling you this because it’s going to be a fucking incredible kiss, so I want you to brace yourself. I know you promised me you wouldn’t fall in love, but I completely understand if that changes after this. I will now await your blessing.”
Before I can tell him exactly how full of himself he is, I say, “I’m not worried.”
“Is that a yes?”
“That’s a yes. But nothing’s going to change.”
“We’ll see.”
And then he kisses me. His lips are soft but firm, and I fall into them. There, underneath the sun, my brain goes light, my skin goes light, I go light. I am