Page 85 of Past Tents

A second later, he pulled me against him. With the sunlight and all, I didn’t see him coming, but I wasn’t about to send him away. “Oh. Hi,” I said, wrapping my arms around his waist.

“Hi.” He nuzzled my neck and kissed me there. Then he moved along my jaw and over to my mouth. His preferred destination. And mine.

But we risked never making it onto the lake if we didn’t stay focused, and realizing this, he tore himself away. But his eyes never left me as he walked backward to the boat.

Meantime, I busied myself checking our cooler to make sure it had wine chilling over ice and the charcuterie platter I’d pulled together yesterday when Clay proposed the idea of taking a late-summer boat ride on the lake.

Now, tucking a container of fried chicken in next to the various meats and cheeses, I had to admit our basket was photo-worthy. Even the green checkered tablecloth that lined the accompanying picnic basket felt perfect amid the pine trees. The basket contained plates and utensils, along with a loaf of Donner Bakery’s finest French bread and enough dried fruit, brownies, and cookies to keep Clay and me well-fed for a week, just in case our boat sprung a leak or something and we ended up stranded.

Finally, Clay finished wiping down the interior of the rowboat and set up the oars on either side. When he beckoned me over, I noticed orange life jackets splayed out over the bench seats in the silver metal boat. “Oh, I’m good. I know how to swim,” I said.

“Safety first,” he said, giving me a stern teacher scowl that I didn’t buy for a minute.

“Don’t you think you’re going a little overboard?”

“Haha.”

“No. Seriously. Do you really want me to wear a life jacket?”

His serious expression told me he did. Well, fine. I’d kiss that look right off his face. I walked over to the boat, where Clay held up the orange flotation device. Slinging it over my head, he used the webbed straps to tug me closer to him. His lips found mine as he tightened the straps.

“You think you can distract me from what you’re doing that easily, sailor?” I mumbled when he broke the dizzying kiss.

“I think I want you to come back from our little outing alive, that’s what I think.”

“But a rowboat barely moves. I don’t see myself falling out of a stationary boat and getting swallowed by Jaws.”

But there was no dissuading Captain Clay. He tightened the straps a bit more and I sucked in a breath. “Too. Tight. Can’t. Breathe...,” I gasped.

He loosened them only slightly before tossing his own life vest over his head. Somehow, he managed to make a traffic-cone-orange flotation device look sexy as hell on his tall, muscular frame. Catching me ogling him, he gave me the crooked, smiling-despite-himself grin that I loved.

“Okay, ready to take this baby for a spin?” He pointed at the silver boat bobbing in the water, still tied to a post with a long rope. The simplest of boats, it had three faded wooden benches inside the metal shell and two oars resting on top of those. Clay rolled up his pants and kicked off his tennis shoes, before tossing them into the boat. I was about to do the same, reaching downto untie my shoes, when Clay scooped me up with a strong hand beneath my legs. “Allow me,” he said.

I wrapped my arms around his neck as he waded into the water beside the boat and deposited me over the side on one of the bench seats. The boat tipped to the side, so I scooted toward the middle of the bench to right it. Instantly, I realized that this boat could, in fact, dump me into the lake without much trouble, so I straightened out my life vest and turned to watch Clay behind the boat.

He swept the rope over the top of the post and rolled it up as he walked back to the boat. With one hand on the side of the boat and a skilled hop, he hefted himself inside the shell and settled himself on the bench facing me. Then he handed me one of the oars.

“Ready?”

I was too busy marveling at how he did everything with such easy grace. If I hadn’t fallen for him already, I’d have yet a new reason.

“I feel like I should be wearing a frilly dress, and holding a parasol,” I said in a coquettish Southern accent. “Like we’re a scene in a Monet painting.” Except that we weren’t. Not in casual clothes and orange life vests.

Clay chuckled and started rowing, his back facing the lake. His body moved with easy grace, those well-defined arms working the oars. No wonder I couldn’t concentrate on my own rowing. I gave it my best effort, but I was barely moving the boat compared to Clay’s strong strokes. “If I’m about to hit the Loch Ness monster or something, you’ll let me know, okay?”

I looked over his shoulder and confirmed, “Nessie must still be sleeping.”

His smirk let me know he expected me to have a similar fear of water creatures as I’d once had of bears. But he didn’t know everything about me, especially some of the lengths I’d gone to in order to feel self-sufficient.

Over the past several months with Clay, I’d come to realize that being truly self-sufficient meant knowing what I needed in order to be happy. And he was sitting in front of me, rowing backward, knowing he could trust me to guide him in the right direction. The feeling was mutual.

The lake was calm and still in the late morning. A couple other boats bobbed in the distance, but out here, surrounded by water, we were alone. Soft ripples in the water lapped at the sides of the boat and rocked it gently beneath us.

Once we’d rowed far enough from shore to reach the sunny part of the lake, Clay pulled in the oars and handed me a fishing pole. I examined the fishing pole while he opened the container of bait. It was a Quest spin rod, which made sense for fishing off a boat for medium-sized fish, the type stocked in Bandit Lake each summer. We’d catch mainly striped bass or trout, and I’d had experience with both. The fishing course I’d taken a couple years back required me to learn a list of over three hundred species of fish that could be found in Tennessee. This little outing on the lake was going to be a snap.

“It takes a bit of getting used to. The bait smells awful, but it’s part of the fun.” Clay winked and it was all I could do not to yank his face into my hands and kiss the smirk from it, but I waited patiently for the rest of his explanation.

I held the hook steady as Clay opened a container of tiny crawfish. The sight of them made me squirm, even if I knew they made the best bait. Bravely, I reached for one and skewered it on the hook, making sure it was good and stuck so it wouldn’t drop off when it hit the water.

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