Page 62 of Grumpy Bear

“I’ve got a blanket over here.” I led him to a bench on the eastern edge of the field where the ground began to rise toward The Village.

“Did this bench grow here?”

“Well, I guess it must have, long before our time. It’s a fallen tree carved up with a chainsaw.”

“No way.”

“Cool, isn’t it? It was here when I arrived. I remember Wayne saying it was too big to move when they cleared the field out years ago.”

Luke set his guitar case behind it, and I offered him a camouflage-printed fleece throw.

“Is the camo supposed to keep people from stealing your blanket?”

“Genius, huh?” I draped it over his shoulders and sat down on the hard, smooth wood. He dropped to the ground in front of me, sitting crosslegged between my feet so my legs enveloped him from behind. “You good down there? It’s colder on the ground.”

He sighed. “It’s perfect.”

It was perfect. It was more than I’d ever allowed myself to imagine. I kissed the top of his head, inhaling the chamomile scent of his hair.

We took it all in together—night sky and fire, shirtless men swaying in a loose ring as the drummers returned to their trance-inducing rhythm. The rumble of voices punctuated every so often by obnoxious drunken shrieks of laughter. A skunky whiff of pot smoke.

I massaged his shoulders. “You’re quieter than usual. Everything good?”

He moaned and arched into my hands. “Mm. Better than good. Wiped out, but really content right now. I come down pretty hard once the adrenaline of performing subsides. And that’s without drinking all day in the sun. What’s your excuse?”

“I’m always this quiet.”

“No shit. What are you thinking about right now?”

That nobody’d ever written a song about me. That there was no better buzz on earth than being wrapped around him like this. Apparently, I was very capable of falling fast, but I wasn’t likely to get good at talking about it anytime soon. “I was trying to remember the last time I came to a bonfire.”

“Really? Why don’t you come?”

“It’s usually my first opportunity to be alone after being around so many people, running my ass off. It’s the break between the party and the aftermath. I usually go back to the cabin and crawl into bed.”

“Is that a suggestion?”

I growled. “You say the word.” I ran a hand down the front of his shirt. “No. It’s nice to experience it this time.”

“What’s different?”

He was playing with me. “You can’t guess?”

“Maybe.” He pressed his back against the bulge in my shorts and ran his hands up and down my calves. “But I want to hear you say it.”

“I’ll give you a hint.” I leaned down so my lips were against his ear. “It definitely has something to do with you being here.”

A large shadow broke from the group of revelers and wandered toward us. “Well, well, well.” Jim’s voice was unmistakable. “Don’t you two look cozy, all cuddled up over here.”

He handed us each a slip of paper and gave Luke a tiny stub of a pencil.

“What’s this?” Luke asked.

“Here comes the woo-woo,” I whispered loudly.

Jim ignored me. “This is a ritual we do at the start of every season. You write down something—whatever you want—a word, a sentence, a name—something you want to let go. Whatever you want to release from the past year. You throw it into the fire and send it back to the sky as ashes.”

“Ooo, I like that!” Luke said. Of course he did.