“Thank you for rescuing us,” he grumbles. “And for being such an asshole about it.”
“Just glad you’re back,” the other man says. Gideon pulls away, glances over at me, and waves a polite hand in my direction.
“So, Andi, this is Silas,” he says. “Silas, this is, uh, Andrea Sullivan.”
“Delighted to make your acquaintance,” Silas says as we shake hands, and from the look on his face, he really is.
“You text a lot,” is the charming thing I manage to say after a full day of strenuous hiking.
“You chain yourself to trees,” Silas says, that grin still on his face, and I snort because he has a point.
“Not that often,” I tell him. “Only the once, actually. I probably won’t again.”
“Probably?” Silas asks. Gideon looks over at me with a thunderous frown.
“I like to keep my options open,” I say, and Gideon frowns harder, and Silas looks from my face to his and looks like he’s trying not to laugh, then jerks his head back at the Prius.
“C’mon,” he says. “I borrowed Kat’s car. Seemed like it would be more comfortable than my truck.”
Forty-five minutes later, we turn into the driveway of Lucia’s house. I spent the first five minutes of the drive making polite conversation with Silas, and then the next five minutes listening to the occasional murmur of their voices while watching the night slide past the car windows and trying not to think too hard about what was going to happen next, and then thirty-five minutes zoning out completely in a half-awake fog because holy shit, I’m tired.
“Thanks for the ride,” I say, as Silas turns the car off, politeness on autopilot.
“Of course,” he says as I unbuckle. “Happy to be of use.”
“I’ll walk you up,” Gideon says, and Silas gives him some kind of look as he opens his car door.
Gideon’s already gotten my pack from the back by the time I’m standing, and he’s looking up at the sky—cloudy and starry in alternating patches—and then we stand in Lucia’s driveway for a moment and look at each other. Suddenly, I’ve got no idea what to say because nothing that happened in that cabin seems real, right now, and I feel back to square one with this virtual stranger.
Then Gideon clears his throat and shifts the strap on his shoulder and looks at Lucia’s front door, and there he is, again, and he’s looking back at me and it’s impossible to see in the dark, but I think he might be blushing.
“So,” he starts. “I’ve never really done this before.”
I glance over at Silas’s car, then back at Gideon, unclear on what it is he’s never done.
“Dropped someone off?”
He huffs a laugh and puts one hand to his face, and I think he’s blushing harder. I want to frame him and hang him above my fireplace.
“I haven’t dated very much,” he says. “I’ve never actually had a girlfriend before.”
I do not say the first thing I think, which is: what?
I do say, “Oh.”
“And I know that most people figured all this out when they were teenagers and got over it then, but I just—I never was all that interested in it,” he goes on, in an awkward way that feels oddly familiar, and—holy shit, am I getting dumped? I’m not upset, not quite yet, but it’s close.
“So, you’re not… interested?” I ask, mind suddenly swirling.
“No! Fuck, no,” he says, wide-eyed, pushing a hand through his dark hair. “I’m saying I don’t… know what to do. Because I’ve never really done this. I’m pretty sure that usually taking someone to dinner comes before, you know. Other things.”
“Like eating me out while wearing a headlamp,” I say, and now he’s definitely blushing as hard as I’ve ever seen him blush.
“Right,” he manages, bravely. “That sort of thing. We got it all out of order.”
“And that’s bad?” The evening after a ten-mile hike, it turns out, is not my best time to have this sort of talk.
“Ah, Jesus,” he mutters, and rubs his face in his hands again. “It’s not bad, I’m just—I wanted to warn you. About me. That I might do everything wrong.”
He’s not doing great so far, but I don’t tell him that.
“I can’t tell if you’re trying to ask me out or trying to break things—”
“Ask you out,” he blurts, wide-eyed. “No, not—God no. I like this.”
Gideon clears his throat.
“Would you like to go to dinner sometime?” he asks, suddenly so formal I feel like I’m being asked to prom. “On a date,” he clarifies unnecessarily.
I’m tired, exhausted, confused, and wrung out by the up-and-down of the last minute and a half, and I wonder for a moment whether I should be warning him about me, that if he’s concerned about doing things in the wrong order then maybe I’m no good for him at all because I’m not sure I’ve ever done anything right, but this interaction has been complicated enough already.
“Yes,” I say. “I’d like that.”
He smiles. Gideon has a thousand micro-expressions, always hinting and gesturing at one emotion or another, but this is a smile, pure and pretty as sunlight on fresh snow.
“Good,” he says, and the front door opens and a rectangle of light falls across us.
“Andrea!” Lucia shouts, both arms up in a victory pose as she stands in the doorway. “Frank! She’s returned! In one piece!”
“How many pieces were we expecting?” Frank calls from somewhere inside the house.
Lucia comes out to where we’re standing and takes my face in her hands. Gideon’s off to the side, gone quiet again.
“If you ever pull something like that again I’ll kill you,” Lucia says, her earrings still wobbling. “I don’t care that you’re thirty-three—”
“Two.”
“—I’ll do it myself to save Rick and your father the heartache,” she finishes, which doesn’t make any sense, but it’s not my place to argue. “God. I’m so glad you’re okay.”
“Me too,” I say, hugging Lucia back and also acutely aware of Gideon, holding my huge frame pack, standing there blank-faced like he’s at attention. “You know Gideon, right?” I ask when Lucia finally pulls back.
“I believe we’ve met,” she says, her voice suddenly about ten degrees cooler. She holds out a hand. “Lucia Dawson. Thank you so much for keeping Andrea safe.”
“Happy to help, ma’am,” Gideon says in the same voice he uses to talk to Forest Service Dispatch.
“Can I invite you in? We’re just about to have dinner and we’d be delighted if you would join us,” Lucia goes on. She doesn’t really mean for him to accept and everyone here knows it, but we’ve all been raised with the same intricacies of manners and politeness, so I let Southern Hospitality Theater play out.
“I’m afraid my ride is waiting on me and I’ve really got to get home as well,” Gideon says. “Appreciate the offer, though.”
“Maybe some other time.”