so I could watch it more closely, but that would mean telling Angela the truth. She wasn’t ready for my truth. However, I couldn’t sit in the crevice all day, waiting for something to appear. Angela was at the cabin, and she would be gone and out of my life soon. I wanted to spend every minute I could with her. I wanted to make sure no one crept up on her, to be sure she was safe.
After double checking and triple checking the equipment, I finally powered it down and headed into the forest. I found a nest with eggs that seemed okay to eat when I shook it and took them back to the cabin so it looked like I had a reason to be out.
“Viktor,” Angela said, smiling when I walked in. “Where were you?”
I held up the eggs. “Breakfast.”
“What kind of eggs are those?” she asked warily.
“Edible eggs.” I’d bought eggs on my grocery run, but that was months ago, and eggs went fast.
My kitchen was a shitty hole in the ground. I hadn’t minded it before, but I’d never had company that cooked in it before. Angela deserved somewhere nicer, but she sat next to me and helped, seeming unconcerned with the basic kitchen.
While we cooked, she rattled on about her life in Grizzly Falls, about how she wouldn’t miss her job at all and was excited about her new job. She missed her mother, I could tell, and felt guilty that I hadn’t taken her to town to call. Every now and then, she touched my arm or my back or my hand. I loved it. I loved the easiness between us, the fact that we’d developed a connection. I hadn’t felt connected to another person in decades. Angela was special, and I had to let her go. The thought made my chest hurt.
When we finally sat down with bacon, wild eggs, and some crackers, Angela leaned back, chewing. Her face was pensive.
“What?” I asked when she’d been looking at me for a while.
“Don’t you want a different life than this?”
I glanced at her, an eyebrow lifted, a smirk on my face.
“I guess not,” she said, frowning. “Otherwise you would live it, huh?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “When I came out here, I was sure it was the right thing for me. And it was at the time. When you’re alone in these woods, you find yourself. There’s no one around to tell you who you should be, and no one you have to please.”
“It’s a different sort of life, I imagine,” Angela said thoughtfully.
I nodded, shoveling eggs into my mouth.
“I think it sounds great.”
“Yeah?” I asked, surprised. “I thought you were all about the city life you’re headed for.”
Angela shrugged her shoulders. She didn’t say anything, but I was starting to get the idea that moving away from Grizzly Falls, living in a big city, wasn’t something she really wanted. She was doing it for her mother, she’d said. And for herself. But I wondered that if she could really chose what she wanted, without thinking about what everyone else needed, she might stay.
“Where would you be if you could be anywhere in the world right now?” Angela asked. She took a bite of egg and chewed, looking at me.
“Right here,” I said, without even thinking about it.
Angela laughed around her food, lifting her hand to her mouth. “You can’t do that. You didn’t even think about it.”
“What’s there to think about?” I asked. “You’re here.”
Her cheeks turned scarlet, and she looked down. “Don’t do that.”
“Don’t do what?” She just shook her head and wouldn’t look at me, so I turned the question on her. “Where would you go?” I asked, tearing a piece of bacon in two with my fingers and popping one piece into my mouth. “Anywhere in the world, right now?”
Angela thought about it, turning her head to the window. “Would it be too cliché if I told you I would be right here, too?”
I grinned at her. “Very.”
“I guess you do have to worry about what other people think out here after all.” Her eyes were laughing at me, and a smile tugged at the corners of her mouth.
“Why don’t you stay?” I asked, changing the conversation with a serious question. “You don’t have to leave.”
Angela snorted. “That’s a nice idea. And carry on working for that asshole and a dead-end job? Watch my mom live with all her regrets?” She shook her head. “I don’t know, Viktor. I