Nobody

Evening Discussions

In Memorium of all my shirts my sister stretched out and then stole

The night was cool, quiet nighttime insects buzzing and the rustling of small animals hurrying through the underbrush hoping to avoid the owls I could hear hooting now and then in the woods around us. The Coleman gas lantern in my hand gave off a steady white light as I followed the trail that was already marked every five paces by a solar powered little lamp.

The light was for Miss Lily-Rylee, not me.

She was a few paces behind me, the six pack of soda in her hand as I walked in front of us.

I could smell the water from the brook a good dozen paces before we could see the little clearing I'd found a month ago.

A month?

Had it been that long already? I knew it was August.

Huh.

Anyway...

I walked up and set the lantern on the flat rock I'd uncovered from the sand, stepping back and making a sweeping motion with my arm.

"Ta-dah!" I proclaimed, letting her see the whole thing.

"My God," Miss Lily-Rylee breathed, looking around her.

I'd talked to a Games & Wildlife worker, then gotten to work. What I'd done didn't show easily, and it looked pretty natural, but I had done quite a bit once I'd gotten permits.

I only dimly remembered it.

There was two logs half-buried in the sand that I'd taken a hatchet too and chopped into benches. A stump I'd bought in town and pulled out here before burying the bottom so it made a good table and looked natural. The wild undergrowth pruned back to make it look nice. There was a buried firepit that only the top three layers of rocks showed, making it look more rough than it actually was. I'd bought it at the store. There were rocks out into the water, making a place to set bottles and cans without worrying about the current sweeping it away.

Games & Wildlife had taken pictures of my work, signed the approval sheets, and left.

"It looks lovely out here," She breathed. She handed me the six pack of soda and I moved over next to the water, pulling them out and one by one sticking the bottoms into the sand to hold them still. The water was nice and cold and I knew the bottles would be a good crisp temperature in no time.

"Sit," I said, pointing at one of the logs.

"You did this?" She asked, sitting down. She looked around, then pointed at a large flat rock. "Is that to sit on so you can be in the water?"

"Yup," I told her, taking taking the two cans out of my pockets and sitting down next to her. "Here."

"Thank you," She cracked open the soda, still looking around.

"I'd stay out here all the time," she said softly.

"I haven't really come out here in a week or so," I told her honestly, looking around. "Looks nicer than I remember."

Miss Lily-Rylee shook her head, still looking around in wonder. "I never pictured you as the nature loving type. At least, not the woods like we have here."

I shrugged, taking a drink. "Spent a lot of time in Germany, I guess."

She smiled, her face shadowed in the lantern light. "Really?"

I nodded. "Yeah. Seven, maybe eight years. Post I was on was on a mountain, pretty place."

The memory of Alfenwehr made goosebumps rise up with her next words.