Chapter 11: Fire Tower

The old fire tower stood on the highest rock above the lake, and it took ninety-one steps to reach the cabin at the top.

I counted them with his hand in mine.

He pushed the door open with his shoulder.

Inside was one square room of dusty glass, with a cot and a gray army blanket.

The whole dark valley lay below under a spill of stars.

"The rangers quit it in the nineties," Lennart said.

"I came up here when I was fifteen and cried about a girl."

"Which girl?"

"I can't remember her name."

"Good."

He spread two wool blankets on the floorboards while I stood at the window.

Below us the lake lay black and flat, and the lights of Larch Hollow were a handful of gold coins on its edge.

I took off my cardigan.

I took off everything else, one piece at a time, and hung it on the rail of the cot.

When I turned, he had stopped moving, with a blanket in each fist.

"I can't believe you're real," he said.

"Why?"

"Because there's a woman I've never met who I'd cross the county for.

"And then you walk up the ridge and take your clothes off like you invented it."

I crossed the room and unbuttoned his shirt.

"I have something to say," I said. "I keep things from you."

He caught my hand against his chest.

"Everyone does."

"It isn't because I don't..."

"Maja. You don't have to be good to be worth keeping."

I stopped breathing.

They were my own words, typed on a warm night last July.

I had not known he had memorized them.

"Someone said that to me," he said. "I think it's true for you, too."

My eyes burned, and I pulled his mouth down to mine so he wouldn't see.

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