Page 66 of Grace on the Rocks

TheAmericanscontinued to stare at each other.

“A campfire sounds perfect,”Gracefinally said.

“Grand,”Bryansaid, a little too loudly for a man trying to play it cool.

“Grand,”Gracereplied.

“Grand,”Wesagreed.

* * *

Grief was a cunning devil,sneaking up to slap you sideways when you least expected it.Themost mundane tasks could knock you down flat if you weren’t careful.Layinga fire in his grandad’s old sand pit brought another wave of memories flooding back, and allBryancould do was kneel there and breathe through it, holding onto the kindling for dear life and hopingGracedidn’t notice before he escaped the undertow.

He should’ve been here.Shouldhave come home sooner.Allthose nights pouring out plans overFaceTime, but he could have toldGrandadMacin person while sharing a dram around the fire.Hecould have made sure the old man was warm, breathed in his tobacco scent, and basked in the musical tones of laughter that a phone could never quite reproduce.

“I still can’t get over how light it is this late,”Gracesaid, crashing into his melancholy, throwing a life preserver of distraction around his chest.

Bryan cleared his throat and added some biochar to make the wood smoke. “Aye.Reckonit must be unsettling if you’re not accustomed.Haveyou had trouble sleeping?”

“No more than usual.Youwere right, the curtains are good.”

He nodded, dragging a pair of chairs from the patio to the pit.

“Should we roast marshmallows?” she asked as he reached for a box of matches.

Bryan shook his head. “Iought to have warned you.I’mtesting an eco-friendly alternative to peat.It’llbe a touch smoky.”

Grace shrugged, so he lit the fire.

It smoked all right, almost immediately, and the smell was godawful.Liketen thousand dirty athletic socks and old wet dog and food-turned-science-experiment in the back of the fridge.

“Is that how it’s supposed to?—”

“No.”

He dumped a bucket of sand over the whole thing, extinguishing the flame, but the rancid smoke still hung heavy in the air.

“Come on,” he grumbled, grabbing the hand not being used to cover her face and practically dragging her back to the porch.

“The chairs?”

“Leave them,” he coughed.

Fortunately, the porch was downwind tonight, and the smoke didn’t quite reach it.Hecollapsed onto the loveseat, pulling her down beside him, coughing and rubbing his burning eyes.Whiskywithout smoke was like sweets without sugar.Ifhe couldn’t find a sustainable biochar that didn’t smell like absolute arse, he’d be done before he got started.

“What was that?”

“An effective experiment demonstratingI’venot yet found a replacement for peat.”

She giggled, and it was like all the sharp, tiny bubbles in her sparkling water were forcing their way to the surface.

“Funny, is it?”Hadhe stammered without realizing?Mixedup his words?Hetried to play them back in his head, but her laugh was too distracting.Hecouldn’t recall precisely what he’d said.

“I love how you spin it.Nota corpse flower–scented mistake, just testing a hypothesis to rule out a potential solution.”

Flames licked up the back of his neck.Sheprobably didn’t mean anything by it, but calling itspinmade him think of his father.

“That’s how experiments work. ’CourseI’drather it didn’t reek,” he said archly. “Hopefullythe next won’t.”

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