Soft as Glass

Jamie stirred and yawned.

She kissed his shoulder. "Good afternoon, gorgeous."

He squinted at her and yawned again, covering his mouth this time.

"I brought you blue stuff. Drink up. It's good for you." She pressed the plastic bottle into his hand.

He accepted the bottle, but didn't do anything with it. "You're not always the boss."

"You haven't had any fluids in 16 hours, so if you don't drink up, I'm going to sing the peanut song in a cartoon duck voice."

Jamie propped himself up on one elbow gingerly and cracked the bottle open. "Meany." He granted her a weary smile. "Is it okay with you if we don't go bike riding today and make up the miles tomorrow? I feel like I've been run over by a flock of ostriches. But in a good way."

"Sure. For that matter, if you want to sit here all week, that would be okay with me."

"We'd run out of food and water."

"I think there is a gas station I could get to and back in a few hours. I'd fetch some. We might have to subsist on candy bars, though."

"Tempting. I like candy." He took a gulp of blue liquid.

"You're the one who had a rough night. It's entirely up to you."

He finished his electrolyte drink in silence, alternately looking at Lene and closing his eyes. "I'm glad we didn't chicken out last night. I needed that. What about you?"

"Since you're glad of it, yes. I may burn through a lot of double A batteries thinking about it."

"Nice. Will you do it again if I ask you to?"

"I'm not sure I have it in me to say no."

"Well then, I might ask sometime. Like, what are you doing a year from next Thursday? I might be crazy enough to want it again by then."

Lene felt a dangerous twinge of hope. She let herself imagine going out to the docks to meet him, and stepping into a big warm sea salt flavored hug. "I don't think I have anything on my calendar yet."

"Well then, maybe you can save the date for me, for one thing or another." Jamie re-capped the plastic bottle and lay down on his back with a fleeting grimace.

"If you fly halfway around the world to come see me, I'll save lots of dates for you. I'll find all the fun things to do and the neat things to see, and triage the local delicacies for you so you don't get surprised by snake kidneys with watercress and pureed yak brains."

"Not if. When." He sounded so certain that it was infectious. "And thank you in advance for not surprising me with snake kidneys. Do snakes even have kidneys?"

"Sorry. When. And I assume so." In spite of all her efforts to temper her expectations with realism and avoid setting herself up for disappointment, she believed him.

Overhead in the clear blue sky, a circling hawk screamed Keeee keeee keee.