Page 43 of Bourbon & Bonfires

Halfway through season three ofOrange is the New Black,Addison hits a wall. Her sadness bubbles to the surface, and I hold her as she cries and falls asleep. I send a text to Taylor to check on things, and he gives me an update on the funeral arrangements for next week. I promise to keep in touch to ensure Addison has all the information.

When Mason walks in from school he finds his mother still asleep on the couch, her head resting in my lap. For the first time, I see a young boy looking at me. The sadness his eyes hold, looking at his mom, breaks my heart.

“Hey kid, how was school?” I whisper as I slowly rise from the couch and motion for him to go into the kitchen.

“Fine. How’s my mom?”

“She’s okay. Exhausted. We’ve hardly left that couch since breakfast.” Not a total lie. “I think she’ll be better when she wakes up. We talked about Henry, their childhood. Did you know him?”

“I met him a few times. Are we working tonight?” Mason begins pulling ingredients for sandwiches from the refrigerator while we talk. I remember this age, starving all the time. My mom used to complain constantly how all we did was eat after school. She worried it’d ruin our appetites, but it never did.

“Not tonight, man. I think we should be here for your mom. It’s been a long twenty-four hours. How about we make dinner, so she doesn’t have to worry?”

“Make dinner? Do you know how to cook?”

“I made you tacos once, remember? And, I can grill a mean steak. What do you say? I’ll show you how to master the grill.”

“Master? Whatever.” Mason rolls his eyes dramatically and I wish I had something in my hand to throw at him. “I’m taking my snack and going to my room. Let me know when you want to teach me, oh wise griller.”

I laugh and stop suddenly when I realize I may be a master griller, but I don’t have anything to grill. “You just realized we don’t actually have the steaks, didn’t you?”

“Yep. Guess I’m heading to the store. I’m going to swing by my house and change while I’m out. I’ll be back in an hour. You okay here with your mom?”

“Pretty sure I can handle hanging out at my house with my mom, Landon.”

“Right. Sorry. Oh hey, I was wondering where the Sinclair’s stand on camping.”

“Camping?” Mason asks, eyes wide.

“Yeah, you know: tents, fresh air, fishing. Camping.”

“We’ve never been. I mean, I went with my friend Jordy and his dad, but I don’t think my mom has ever slept in a tent.”

“Good to know.”

Mason stares at me for a few minutes before shaking his head and walking out of the kitchen. As I’m walking out of the house, I check on Addison, still asleep on the couch. I have to hurry if I’m going to get to the store, my house, and back before she wakes up. But first, I have a call to make.

When I returned from the store I wasn’t surprised to find Mason sitting on the couch playing Xbox and Addison throwing her sheets in the washer. I couldn’t help but tease her about the reason for the sudden urge to wash bed sheets. I may have used the worddirtya few times. She blushed. I laughed. She smacked me no less than four times. I’ll admit it—the last one stung a little.

Like we’d been together for years instead of weeks, we easily fell into the motions of preparing dinner, and when the three of us sat together at the table, I realized none of this felt out of place. Being here with Addison and Mason in their home, sitting down for dinner, teasing Mason about his inept gaming abilities, accepting the praise for my superior grilling skills, and settling in for some television before crawling into bed together. All of it was how it should be. How I want it to be.

Yet, as I lie on my back, staring at the ceiling, Addison curled up into my side, her legs tangled with mine, I worry it’s all too much too soon for her. She’s cautious and a little skittish. I saw her watching Mason and me together tonight. She was quiet and observant, her expressions jumping from happiness to ... worry. A nervousness fell from her in waves, and I wasn’t sure if I should address it or let her work through the feelings at her own pace.

When I gave her my option of staying again or going home, she asked me to stay. As we settled into bed, she thanked me again for being here for her and Mason. For stepping up and caring about them and letting her wallow in her sadness. For an hour I lay, holding her in my arms and not talking, only listening. Finally, as she began dozing off, she admitted this loss triggered all the memories of losing her parents and the loss of her marriage. While not sad her marriage ended, she still felt a sadness for the loss of what it represented.

Those words were the last she spoke before falling asleep, and the same words keep me awake. In only a few words the happiness I feel being with Addison all day cracks as I wonder if she’s really over her ex-husband.

Ayear ago, if you’d told me I was going to pick up my life and move to a small town, I would have said you were crazy. Now, if you add to that scenario that I’d be dating a younger man and falling madly in love with him, I would have laughed you right out of the room. But this, this thing we’re about to do? Yeah, telling me this would happen would have had me calling for a psych evaluation. There’s no way in hell I thought in a million years I’d be ...camping.

No rational woman goes camping on purpose. In tents.Tents. Why would I choose to sleep on the ground in a tent when I have a perfectly good bed at home? It makes next to no sense. If it wasn’t for the fact that the men in my life didn’t ask me to go camping, they only promised me a relaxing day and night away, I wouldn’t be here.

I’m a liar.

I still would have come. I just would’ve required a lot more convincing. And promises. Promises of massages, pedicures, and at least six new books. Real life priorities. Not this camping business.

“Are you done pouting?”

“I am not pouting,” I insist. I am pouting a little. I don’t mean to. It’s just that, for the last four years, it’s been Mason and me. We’ve been a team, and I was used to being the decision maker. This morning I woke up to an excited Mason and Landon talking about plans for fishing, fire, and ghost stories. I was caught up in the moment and before I asked where this was happening, I had agreed to go with them.

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