Page 81 of Happiness for Beginners

“When it’s right, it’s right,” Uno said.

“When it’s fate, it’s fate,” Dosie agreed.

I took a deep breath, held up my hands in astopgesture, and said, “Okay.” I couldn’t stop them planning the wedding, but I didn’t have to stay and listen. I stood up and faked a stretch. “Have fun party planning. I’m going to take a walk.”

“You don’t want to brainstorm?” Dosie said.

“Maybe I’ll work on a sample wildflower bouquet.”

“Awesome,” Uno said, and I nodded like I agreed.

Heading out into the meadow,my meadow,I took a second to steady myself. This was nonsense. Literally nonsense. Five minutes of tranquility? That was all I got? A glimpse of heaven just to watch it turn into love-at-first-sight wedding hell? The irony was not lost on me that being here was robbing me of the tranquility I’d specifically come here to find. And the only two people I could have talked to about how miserable I was were the exact two people who were making me miserable.

I pretended to pick flowers for a long while, and then made my way to the stream bank to follow it back up toward camp. I thought I might ask to borrow Windy’s book on happiness. But when I got there, I spotted the two of them, J-Dog and Heartbreaker, sitting knees-to-knees by the campsite, eyes closed in meditation as Windy taught Jake all about the Native American art of Buddhism. For their upcoming nuptials.

Knees-to-knees. That was howIhad sat with Jake!

Oh, God. I was genuinely losing my mind.

Then, I noticed Beckett was nearby, and I was alarmingly happy to see him. “Hey, Boss,” I said, turning his way. “Give me something to do.”

He looked up. “Anything?”

I nodded. “Anything.”

So he let me inventory and reorganize the first-aid kit, sort and consolidate the food packs, darn a ripped tarp, and help him work a splinter out of his right thumb.

“I like your work ethic today, Holdup,” Beckett said then. “This is Certificate-worthy behavior.”

I hate to admit those words were motivating, but they were. “What’s next?” I asked.

Beckett sucked on his thumb. “Go collect dandelions for a salad for tonight,” he said, gesturing back toward the meadow. Then he glanced the other direction. “I’d send you that way for blackberries, but I don’t want to interrupt the lovebirds.”

Three Good Things. What were three good things about today? Actually, even as grumpy as I now was, I could name plenty more than three. Easily. I’d woken under our blue tarp to the sound of the creek running by. I’d made a terrific batch of morning coffee, if I did say so myself. I’d had a whole morning of freedom. I’d rested. I’d sunned myself on a hot rock with all the abandon of a gecko. I’d felt a hundred breezes. I’d stood in a field of wildflowers. I’d seen a cloud in the shape of a heart. I’d helped Beckett get that splinter out. And I’d literally had a glimpse of heaven—and felt a closeness to the person I missed most in the world that I hadn’t experienced in years.

A pretty remarkable day, all in all. Even if, at the moment, I happened to be ever so slightly miserable.

As I made my way around the field, picking dandelions for real now instead of wildflowers for pretend, I tried to construct a plan to be less miserable. At the beginning of this trip, I’d wanted to learn how to be so tough that I was untouchable, but instead I’d gone the other way: I’d become all-emotions-all-the-time. Well, maybe that wasn’t entirely a bad thing, since at least I wasn’t numb anymore. And shifting my heartbreak from Mike to Jake seemed like an improvement—surely a not-even-boyfriend I’d made out with on one night would be easier to get over than a bona fide husband I’d been married to for six years. You’d think so, anyway. “Be brave,” Hugh had said. And Windy had said, “Havingdoesn’t make you happy:appreciatingdoes.” Maybe not having what I wanted would force me to appreciate what I did have. It was possible, at least. All I could do was try. Even just trying, I decided, could be an act of bravery in itself.

So, salad picked, I went back to our tarp for a refreshing nap, and by the time I woke up, it was late afternoon and dinner prep had already started. All the tent groups had pooled their cookstoves together for the party. Windy was pouring fruit punch powder into everybody’s water bottles and calling it mojitos. Somebody had collected blackberries and added them to the dandelions. Vegas had amazed everyone by making a very palatable salad dressing out of Dijon spice and powdered milk. The three fish had been cleaned and seasoned with dried oregano and garlic pepper, and Cookie was grilling them with all the attention of a master chef.

I rubbed my eyes, fixed my ponytail, brushed my teeth, and headed down to join them.

I would find a way to enjoy this party; I had earned the right to enjoy it. I would not let anybody’s marriage proposal to anybody depress the hell out of me. There was a lot more to life than who was or was not marrying whom.Getting what you want doesn’t make you happy.I hadn’t understood Windy when she’d said it at first, but now it made sense.

I worked out a strategy. I would focus on the food first, and savor the hell out of each bite. I’d sit next to Beckett, who I was actually growing fond of. I would participate wholeheartedly in whatever goofy rituals he wanted us to do. I would immerse myself in the moment, fully, without holding anything back. If we sang, I’d sing. If we danced, I’d dance. I’d saturate my brain with such an overabundance of gratitude for every little joy around me that I wouldn’t have any room for envy, or loneliness, or sorrow. And if J-Dog did, after all, propose marriage to Heartbreaker two weeks after meeting her—and two weeks and one day after messing around with me—I’d be too insulated by happiness to even care.

***

The fish smelled mouthwatering as it cooked, and it tasted even better. I let my tongue caress every mouthful, savoring the smoky juice. When Jake came over with his dinner and sat next to me, I popped up and moved over next to Beckett. Jake frowned a little as if to say,That was weird,but then Windy came to take my place, and all was forgotten. As we ate, we toasted the fishermen in the group and gave thanks for the fish. I also gave silent thanks for the existence of butter in the world, and the fact that it was so well suited to long camping trips.

We all ate together in a big circle around the burners, which served as a campfire. We sang bawdy songs. Vegas turned out to be a drummer in a college band back in Memphis, and he got all the minions playing Run-DMC rhythms with rocks and sticks. Once that was going, the kids started to dance. They were drunk on plain Kool-Aid somehow, or maybe drunk on exhaustion, or drunk on the good life. I steered my eyes away from the sight of Jake and Windy sitting two by two. Caboose turned out to be quite a singer, and she busted out with a song called the “Cupid Shuffle,” which every single person there could sing along to. (And which I had never even heard before.) Apparently, it had its own line dance, and the kids all popped up to do it.

That’s when Beckett pulled me up to join, and when I protested that I didn’t know the dance, Beckett said, “Shut the hell up, Holdup. It’s easy.”

He wasn’t wrong, it turned out. That dance was so easy that a group of goofballs could do it with no music, twenty miles from civilization, under the stars—me, Uno, Dosie, Cookie, and Beckett, dancing in the grass like we’d been friends forever. The fact that I was participating at all was surprising, but it was even more surprising that my plan worked. I had so much fun I forgot to be unhappy. I even forgot to be careful not to look over at Jake and Windy.

That’s when I accidentally did. Just as Caboose and the drummers took a break and the dancing broke apart, before I’d found a new distraction, I forgot to resist the gravitational force of glancing at the two of them—and I discovered quite by accident that they were gone.

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