With my eyesight obscured, my other senses are heightened. I can smell the night. Sweetgrass and woodsmoke and theperfume of the wild roses along the fence. Somewhere across the valley the first of the illegal bottle rockets goes up, a distant crack, and I feel Walker's arms tighten around me slightly, like an instinct.
“Okay,” he says, close to my ear. “Open.”
He drops his hands.
I open my eyes.
His vintage truck is parked out back. The tailgate is down. The truck bed is full of blankets, an actual nest of them, quilts and pillows piled deep. There's a small cooler wedged in the corner, glass beer bottles poking out through the ice, and his Martin guitar propped carefully against the cab.
I stand there in the grass and just look at it for a moment.
Screw a white tablecloth and crystal champagne glasses.
This is the most romantic thing a country girl like me could ever dreamed of.
He promised me we’d sleep underneath the stars this summer.
Here it is.
“Walker,” I whisper.
He leans against the tailgate with his arms crossed, watching me take it in. “Couldn't let my princess lay down on a hard truck bed.” His gaze travels over me slowly, dropping from my face down and back up. “Not for the things I have planned tonight.”
The warm night air suddenly feels warmer. He looks pretty pleased with himself, and I have to say, he’s earned it. And there’s more to come?
“Such as?” I say.
“You’ll see.” He holds out his hand. “Get in the truck, darlin'.”
I take his hand and let him help me up.
He climbs in after me and suddenly the truck bed is its own small world.
Walker settles back against the cab and pulls me in front of him. My back against his chest, his legs on either side of mine. His arms come around me and he props his chin on my shoulder and we sit there for a moment just taking it in.The quilt nest, the cooler, the guitar, the Montana sky enormous overhead, the valley spread out below us.
I tip my head back against his shoulder. Above us the stars are coming out one by one, the way they do out in the country where there's nothing to compete with them. Whole constellations arriving at once, like they’ve been waiting for their time to shine.
“What are your plans for that guitar?” I prompt. “Another lesson?”
“Was gonna write you a song.”
“Really? Right here? Right now?”
I crawl to the guitar on my hands and knees and take it like it’s a precious thing before handing it to him.
“Go on, then,” I urge.
“I meant at some point tonight,” he grumbles. “I’d rather hold you in my arms than this guitar.”
I poke his thigh. “No more excuses. Get to work, cowboy.”
He sighs. Sits with his back against the cab, guitar across his knee, and I tuck myself under a quilt beside him.
“This is the part where I impress you by coming up with some masterpiece,” he admits sheepishly. “Except I’m rusty as hell.”
I smile at him. “Just gotta warm up to it, that’s all.”
He picks out a melody. Stops. Plays it again, slightly different. His brow furrows.
