Beau nods and shrugs on his backpack. It’s not a day pack. Nothing lightweight, compact, or form-fitting, but a regular school backpack. On the drive, he told me about some of his travel adventures. He’s hiked in some amazing places. I nod toward the backpack.
“Don’t tell me you took that to the Canary Islands.”
“Give me some credit.” His brown eyes dance. “I may not have hundreds of miles of the AT under my belt, but I’m not clueless.”
“Okay, professor, where’s your quality gear, then?” I tease, and I’m rewarded when his wide smile gets away from him. I watch as he tucks it back until it’s a muted grin.
“To tell you the truth, I don’t own my own gear,” he says, adjusting his shoulder straps.
I blink. “Wait, what?”
He still grins, but all of a sudden, I feel like he’s watching me. “I live in a tiny house. I don’t buy anything or keep anything that doesn’t have a place or daily purpose.”
“You mean tiny house as in a real tiny house?”
He gives a half nod. “It’s the real thing.”
“That. Is. So. Cool.”
Beau’s smile stretches wide again. Like he’s glad I approve. And why the heck wouldn’t I?
“Ready?” He gestures toward the trail.
“Yeah!” Even though it’s only been about a month since I was on a trail, the forest calls me like an ancestral home.
We set off, Mica leading the way, pulling the leash taut, knowing instinctively to follow the trail. As soon as we slip into the trees, Beau grabs my wrist, bringing me to a halt.
“Just stop for a sec.”
I glance down to where he’s touching me. Heat. He lets go, and I look back. His eyes hold mine for just a moment, and then he aims them at the tops of the trees.
“Just listen for a minute.”
We’re barely on the trail, maybe a quarter mile from the road we came in on, but it’s quiet. That natural quiet that only a forest can hold. Which is not quiet at all.
Because it’s alive.
The wind dances through the forest, rocking the treetops and smearing white clouds across a blue-tinted sky. The bird call is a map of sound, spreading out in all directions around us. Mockingbirds. Warblers. Ducks. I’m only an amateur birder, but it’s still early in the day, and the birdfolk have a lot to say.
The celebration of morning from all the winged life is one of the best things about waking up in the woods.
Feeling like I’ve come home, I take a deep breath and heave a sigh.
“Good, right?” Beau asks, grinning.
“So good.”
He nods, his eyes smiling. “Let’s go.”
We take off. The trail and leaf mold underfoot are damp with a recent rain, and the air is heavy with moisture, but the ground here isn’t muddy. And, yeah, it’s humid, but the breeze and the shade make the morning cool enough for comfort.
I see a mile marker ahead of us, 19 written out in reflective white.
“What’s up with that?” I ask.
“Oh. We’re starting at the end.”
I laugh. “Why?”
Beau hooks his thumbs under the straps of his pack and grins down at me. “Well, I’m guessing we’re not doing the whole twenty-mile loop, right?”
“Definitely not.”
On the AT, Sally and I kept to a schedule of averaging about twelve miles a day, and that was challenging because in order to average twelve, you have to account for at least one—maybe two—zero days, depending on how the weather treats you. So when the hiking is good and the weather is clear, you really need to cover fifteen miles. And fifteen miles in one day is serious hiking.
“And how far do you want to go?” he asks.
I shrug. “If we’re doing an out-and-back and you need to leave by three, I guess no more than about four or five miles in?” I suggest, watching him to gage his reaction.
Beau nods, unruffled by the prospect of a nine or ten-mile hike. “Good, then we’re going the right way.”
I like his certainty. “Why?”
“Because this way’s better.” His smile and that beard give him a sexy-as-the-devil look that has my breath coming short. “You trust me?”
I sniff. “I wouldn’t be in the woods alone with you if I didn’t.”
The words come out with a lot more subtext than I mean them to.
“I mean,” I stammer, “of course, I trust you.”
His look of amusement makes me go all hot in the face. Gah! Find something to talk about. Quick!
“So… tiny house, huh?” I say, smooth as a pile of rocks. “Where did you get it?” We settle into a comfortable pace. Not a stroll, but also not a rush.
“I built it.”
“You built it?”
“Yeah,” he says simply.
I scoff. “Well… details, please.”
He narrows his eyes at me as though I’m a strange but intriguing species. “What kind of details?”
“Um, the usual kind? How long did it take you? How did you learn how to do it? What made you decide to build a freakin’ tiny house?”
Beau’s laughter interrupts my litany of tiny house questions.
“Hmm. Well, it took almost two years, and it wouldn’t have taken so long if I’d really known what I was doing, but with something like that, you never really know until you’re neck deep in it—” he says, giving me a look that says, you know how that goes, when I have no clue.
I’ve never even attempted something as massive as building a dwelling. Pitching a tent is the closest I can claim to that.
“And I wanted to do it because I wanted my own place, and renting is ridiculous, but I also didn’t need a twelve-hundred square foot house or a mortgage that would take me thirty years to pay back. Basically, I wanted to own my home outright and not pay for more than I needed.”
I smile at his words and the self-reliance and determination behind them. He reminds me of a modern-day Thoreau—or what little I’ve read by him.
“And where is your tiny house? Do you live, like, in a neighborhood?”
He chuckles. “No, there’s actually ordinances in Lafayette against putting tiny houses in residential areas,” he says, his tone dropping. “And, no, I didn’t know that when I started building, which tells you just how little I actually grasped at that point.”
“Oh no,” I croon in sympathy.
“Yeah,” he says with a good natured shrug. “It all worked out. I found a place for it in the country.”
“In the country?” I immediately picture Broken Bow, though everything I’ve seen so far in this part of Louisiana is nothing like the lush foothills and island-dotted lake that make up the best of my hometown.
“Yeah, in St. Martinville.”
I grin. St. Martinville. “That sounds cute. Quaint.”
Beau bunches his lips together. “I don’t know about cute, but it’s quiet and it’s country. My house sits on some property that belongs to a friend of mine. Right between the Vermilion River and two hundred acres of crawfish farm.”
I shake my head. I don’t know what part to focus on first: two hundred acres or crawfish farm.
“Crawfish grow on a farm?”
Beau belly laughs. “Not one like Old McDonald’s.”
My cheeks turn pink. “Okay, so what kind?”
“They grow in rice paddy ponds.”
When he says it, I feel like an idiot. “Like a stocked fish pond.”
“Exactly.”
I try to picture it. “So, you live between crawfish ponds and a river. Is your tiny house on stilts?”
“Yeah.” He grins, but behind it is a little grimace. “You know what June 1st was?”
I frown. “The Monday before last?”
One side of his mouth climbs higher. “Yep, the Monday before last, and also the beginning of hurricane season.”
“How long does that last?” My guess is through summer.
“Now until the end of November.”
&n
bsp; My eyes bug. “Half the year?”
Beau nods. “That’s one of the reasons my house is on stilts. If the river rises much above flood stage during a storm, we get swamped.”
“We?” I zero in on that very unexpected pronoun. Who is this we? If Beau shared his tiny house with a girlfriend, he’d have mentioned that.
Right?
“It’s not just me between the ponds and the river. I have a neighbor with about thirty acres and cattle.”
“Thirty acres? You were serious when you said country,” I say. “Sounds like you’re pretty much all by yourself.”
He nods, pushing aside a low-hanging frond from our path. “It’s quiet.”
I step through the opening he’s provided. “The way you like it,” I venture.
“I’m not complaining.” His grin turns wry. “I’ve got nothing against society, but I prefer it in small doses.”
I smile, unable to help myself. “Thoreau said, ‘I had three chairs in my house; one for solitude, two for friendship, three for society.’”
He blinks like I’ve startled him. I’ll bet he never expected me to quote Thoreau, but it’s just the thing to read on a thru-hike.
Beau shakes his head, laughing. “I only have one chair in my house—but there’s a rocker on my tiny front porch. That makes a total of two,” he adds quickly. “So, according to Thoreau, enough for friendship.”
We latch eyes. Is that an invitation in his? For the second time today, I feel a glowing warmth at the thought of his friendship.
“What about you?” he asks, throwing me.
“Oh, I have no idea how many chairs I have.”
His laughter echoes through the forest. “No, I meant your house.” He points a thumb over his shoulder. “The house you’re renting in town. Is it anything like where you live in L.A.?”
“No-o-o,” I say, making the word three syllables. “I wish. I mean, I have a condo, and it’s nice—very modern, clean lines, natural light. I have a great view of a CitiBank.” I wrinkle my nose. “But it’s not very homey.”
He tilts his head to study me. “So why’d you pick it if you didn’t love it.”
I consider his question. When I first moved in, I did love it. I loved it like you love a lifeboat. Any port in a storm and all that.
“I wouldn’t say I didn’t love it. It was exactly what I needed when I moved in.” Truer words were never spoken. But I think about the house Ramon, Sally, Mica, and I share on Cherry Street. The creaky wood floors. The way the glass in the French doors makes prisms dance on the walls. The L-shaped kitchen counter that seems to wrap you in a hug.
I shrug. “It was what I needed,” I say again. “But maybe now I can focus more on what I want.”
We come to a massive fallen oak that sprawls across the trail. Its trunk, covered with shelf fungus, is so wide it reaches my thigh. I let Mica off the leash, and he leaps over the tree with almost no encouragement. Then, with graceful athleticism, Beau plants a hand on its bark and hurdles the thing. I’m glad I didn’t blink. The sight of his powerful legs launching his body into the air is one I plan to revisit. A few times.
From the other side, he offers me his hand to help me over the trunk. I don’t need it. I could scramble over by myself. Trees fall across trails all the time. Rangers can’t possibly keep up, especially in the spring when rains soften the earth and lightning and wind have their way.
I don’t need to take his hand. I just want to.
And when I do, he clasps mine with a squeeze that sends a current all the way to my middle. As if my hand recognizes his as a long-lost friend.
This is all I can focus on as I traverse the giant trunk. To my disappointment, when I hop down on the other side, he lets go.
“And what do you want?” he asks.
My eyes land on him with a will all their own. And then it hits me that he’s picking up the thread of our conversation.
“In a home, you mean?”
Beau nods, his gaze locked with mine.
And at least this is an easy question. Because all of my concentration is still wrapped up in the touch of his hand and the pull of attention in his eyes. My brain is pretty much good for nothing.
“Something like the house I’m renting now,” I say, and when I picture it, I’m able to come out of my Beau-trance. “You know. Arts & Crafts bungalow. Cozy front porch. Wood floors. Wood everything, really. Warm touches.”
He nods again and starts moving. “It’s nice.”
“Yeah.” I perk up. “You know what else I love about that place? The neighborhood. All those oak trees and crepe myrtles. There’s so much shade. There’s not a scrap of shade in L.A.”
He chuckles. “Didn’t think so.”
We hike for a while, talking easily the whole time. About the forest and the bird calls I don’t recognize. About Mica’s fascination with giant mounds that Beau identifies as armadillo dens. And then about the show and life in Los Angeles.
“So I’ve never been there,” Beau says, not looking particularly disappointed by this news, “But I’ve heard that having a car is essential.”
I give him my best no kidding look. “It’s nothing like New York or Boston or Chicago where you can walk to the market or a cafe or take public transportation downtown,” I attest. “You have to have a car.”
Beau’s gaze is soft, but he frowns just a little. “Then why…” He doesn’t finish, and his frown deepens as if he regrets even beginning.
“Why don’t I drive?” I don’t mind that he asked. Lots of people do.
“Yeah.”
I roll my eyes. “As clumsy as I am on my own two feet, it’s somehow worse behind the wheel of a car.”
He blinks. “You’re a clumsy driver?”
“I’m a terrible driver.”
Beau strains against a smile, shaking his head. “That doesn’t make any—”
“I’m as good of a driver as I am a dancer,” I interrupt.
“I don’t think you’re—”
“You know what I mean.”
I appreciate his attempt to dispute the obvious. It’s sweet. But it’s also pointless. I know I’m a bad dancer. And a bad driver.
“I’ve always been clumsy. It doesn’t matter if it’s on heels or wheels.”
Beau grins at my rhyme. I have to say, I’m rather proud of it. Anything to make him smile.
But then he frowns.
“What?” I ask, stepping over a rabbit hole.
“You’re not clumsy.”
I snort. “Oh, yes, I am.”
Beau gives me a pointed look. “We’ve been hiking for almost an hour and you haven’t tripped or stumbled once.” He gestures to the trail at our feet. “Chicot is nothing but roots and ruts, and you haven’t so much as stubbed your toe.”
I check out the path. He’s right. A network of tree roots and cypress knees make up the fabric of the trail. And he’s also right that I haven’t tripped. Not once.
“Yeah, but, how many times have you seen me trip before today?”
He angles his head left to right as though considering. “A few times.”
“Be honest.”
One side of his mouth quirks. “Okay. Several times.”
“Exactly. Several times, and we haven’t know each other all that long.”
“Okay, then, what’s different about today?” And now I can hear the teacher in his voice. He sounds like he already has the answer.
I hop over a muddy patch on the trail. “I don’t know. No one else is watching?”
“I’m watching.”
I bite my lips to keep from smiling like a loon. For some reason, I like the sound of that way too much.
“And does that mean you never trip or stumble when you’re alone?”
“That’s a big no.” Even if Mica’s the only one who witnesses, I trip in my slippers. I bump doorways. I stumble over area rugs. All the time.
“So scratch that hypothesis.” He sounds so smug.
I summon all the sna
rk. “Okay, professor, tell me what you think.”
“I’m not a professor,” he chuckles.
“Well, you’re a teacher, and you’re about to school me, so…”
Beau shrugs. “I could be wrong, but I think it has to do with hiking.”
I frown. “I’ve tripped and fallen on hikes before.”
“So have I,” he says. “It kind of comes with the territory, especially the more challenging the trail.”
“Well, then, what do you mean?”
“Ask yourself this. Do you trip or stumble on hikes as often as you do—” he sweeps his hand, gesturing at the wide world, “anywhere else?”
I stop cold.
Because the answer is no. I don’t. Yeah, I skid on loose rocks and step in holes when I’m hiking, but Beau is right. Everyone does. Sally does—no more or less than I do.
And it is less than when I’m anywhere else.
I stare at Beau, my mouth hanging open. “What the hell?!”
He’s grinning at me as if I’m his star pupil.
“But—But—what does that even mean?”
Now he’s beaming.
“It means,” he says, stepping closer and framing my shoulders in his hands, “Hiking is where you know how to be in your body.”
And it hits me. He’s absolutely right.
“I love hiking. I have loved it as long as I can remember,” I say, tingles of recognition running down my arms. “My dad used to take me.”
We didn’t have a lot of money, but walking in the woods is free. The memories wash over me, and I need to move. Keep moving. So we set off again. And it’s a good thing too. Mica’s far ahead of us on the trail.
“Here, boy,” I call. He jerks his head up from the clump of grass he’s sniffing and then bounds back toward us.
“Where did your dad take you?” Beau asks, his question both gentle and casual. It’s as if he knows that this butts up against painful territory, and he’s hinting we don’t have to go there if I don’t want to.
But, right now, I do. It feels safe.
“We lived just a few miles south of Beavers Bend State Park,” I explain. “Basically in the foothills of the Ouachita Mountains. I’ve been to Malibu. I’ve been to the Redwoods. I’ve hiked from Katadin to Hanover, New Hampshire. Beavers Bend is the most beautiful place I’ve ever seen.”
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