Page 22 of Love at First Flight

That’s cute! Do crows actually understand the significance of a heart? My mind is blown.

No... at least, I don’t think so. She just likes finding things that seem unusual to her. Yesterday, she brought me this.

The next image was a single metal dangle earring, dirty and bent.

To raise money for the wildlife rehabilitation, you can loan her out to find lost items at Smith Rock, like a crow search and rescue, but instead of people, she’s looking for earbuds or lost wedding rings.

See! I knew it was a good idea to ask you for help. You’re already coming up with good ideas. I was just going to throw this away.

Noooo, you can’t do that! She probably went to a lot of parks and dirt paths to find the perfect gift for you. What does a crow get for a park ranger that has everything? Sorry, but you have no choice but to pierce one of your ears and wear it.

I get one gift from a crow, and now I have to be a pirate?!

Yup. Pretty sure that’s crow law. You can thank the founding fathers for that one. I believe it was Benjamin Franklin who fought to get it included in the Constitution.

He reacted to her text with a laughing emoji and she liked it because she was laughing in her truck as well. Her whole mood completely turned around.

This might be why, after a couple of text conversations during the week, she agreed to meet at his place after work to brainstorm about the wildlife center. They kidded themselves into thinking they’d be less likely to get sidetracked if they were meeting for a specific reason. Or maybe she was the only one kidding herself because she wanted to hang out, to feel like she could be a different version of herself with Dex. She needed some space where she didn’t have to be anyone’s rock.

“Hey,” she said as she exited her truck, a small swarm of butterflies buzzing through her stomach.

He sat in one of the red plastic Adirondack chairs on the porch, drinking a bottle of some kind of kombucha drink. Besides warm tanned skin, he didn’t look as if he’d spent the day under the hot sun at the park. He looked refreshed, wearing a simple dark green T-shirt and jeans, no uniform in sight. It was still odd to imagine Dex had a full wardrobe in his closet other than hangers upon hangers of park ranger uniforms—almost the same as a kid discovering their elementary school teacher also went to grocery stores and didn’t live at the school.

Harper, perched on one of the porch railings, cawed twice in greeting. Dex lifted his head from his phone, a smile slipping into place. Selah was a touch nervous about if she should hug him in greeting or what. Her family were big huggers. She was relieved when the decision was made for her because he didn’t get up from his seat, only did a small, playful salute and said, “Captain.”

“Captain was my father. Selah is fine.”

“Selah, then.”

“Ranger Dex.” She took a seat in the other Adirondack chair, sliding her sunglasses to the top of her head. Dex offered a chilled extra bottle of kombucha. “Thanks,” she said, twisting the lid off and taking a healthy sip. It had the sweetness of marionberries, mixed with the zing of ginger, the flavor fizzling on her tongue.

While Dex did have neighbors, there was a healthy distance between them. Real space, with plenty of old-growth trees, and it smelled warm and earthy. If she couldn’t be in the sky, this was a fine spot at ground level. She leaned back, her nerves leaving her and a sense of relaxation and calm taking their place.

“You ever meet Smokey the Bear?” she asked, taking another sip from her bottle.

“Have you ever met the Red Baron?”

She almost choked on her drink because his quick follow-up question was unexpected. “Excuse me? Is that a dig at my age?”

He shook his head, laughing. “No, but Smokey the Bear died sometime in the seventies. How old do you think I am? Or how old do you think Smokey the Bear is?”

She studied him, feeling brave enough to take a guess. “Thirty?”

Dex was in the middle of taking a sip and held up two fingers.

“Aw, thirty-two then.”

He turned a scrutinizing eye in her direction. She returned this with a coy look, raising an eyebrow. She wasn’t sensitive about her age. It was just a number and, whatever, she didn’t care. It was more that Selah enjoyed seeing guys squirm at having to choose a number. It was her turn to see how courageous he was.

“Twenty-two?”

She flicked her bottle cap at him. “Shut up. You don’t honestly think I’m twenty-two.”

Harper responded with her own squawk.

“Yes, exactly! I agree with Harper. You’re nothing but a big caw-ward,” she said to Dex.

“Ha! I didn’t know you did dad puns. Okay, then. Thirty-two?”

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