Forty Days and Nights: Love Stories. 8. Homecoming

They walked in the rain and he held her hand and she held the the umbrella and had blankets draped over her arm and he carried the big lunch and everyone's hands were full. Rain dripped off the trees and poured softly into the grass and over the flowers and formed tiny rivers that ran along the low places on both sides of the path. I wonder if this path is an island, she said, a long skinny island. He thought about that and smiled. Our very own island, just for the two of us. Hmm, she said, somehow, I don't know, I'd have expected our very own island, if we ever got one, would have enough room for us to lie down full length. He laughed out loud. It does, he assured her, head to head.

No one else had come out for a picnic.

As far as they could tell no one else had come out on this dripping wet day for any reason whatever. The big parking lot had been empty, completely empty. They had never seen that in all the times they had come here in all the sorts of weather they had braved together. The woods were absolutely silent aside from the sounds of rain and water. He noticed, when he thought about it, that he couldn't even hear the traffic anymore, and she remarked that she hadn't heard a bird all day. He smiled down at her. Just us, he said, no one else in the whole world. The rain fell straight down, there was not a breath of wind.

They were headed to a place they had found, a pavilion they thought must have been built by the CCC the same time the roads and paths were improved and the picnic tables and fire rings built. The pavilion was almost like a tiny cabin, with a great fireplace made of river stones forming a back wall and half walls, pony walls, on the other three sides. Close at hand, in some bushes, was a cobbled pillar with a faucet sticking out of it, so they never had to carry in water. They had been so delighted when they found the pavilion on a late summer afternoon when the golden air had filled with blowing cotton from the trees and when everyone else seemed to be having a party at the far end of the world. They had explored and talked and eaten the snacks they carried in their pockets and even played house, a bit, laughing at themselves, piling firewood, breaking back encroaching branches and then using those branches to sweep the piles of leaves drifted inside the walls. They ended up, that day, sitting wrapped in each other on one of the benches that ran along both sides of the pavilion, whispering plans to come again with lots of food and with blankets, to build a fire, some time, next time, any time they could ever remember to bring matches. She wondered if it would be alright for them to sleep there and he had gotten a sudden image of holding her and watching her sleeping in front of a fire they had made. He had had to duck his head and take a long breath. Yes, he had said out loud, yes, he thought it would be fine for them to camp there, he couldn't see why not. Yes, that was a wonderful idea.

They had tried, a couple of times, to bring friends to see the place, but sometimes it was hard, impossible, to find. They seemed to get there most easily when they were talking of other things and one of them would say, isn't the pavilion right over here? and then it would be. They spent happy times there but they had never built a fire, nor done more sleeping than an occasional doze taken on one of the benches, having to hold each other tightly, even in their sleep, in order not to fall off. They had taken days and evenings in the pavilion as they happened upon them, always happy there and sad, too, wishing for matches and blankets they had not thought to bring, had been unaccountably unable to remember when they set out. One morning though, just three days ago, he had awakened from a tumbled and pleasant dream into a slowly mounting sense of purpose and excitement. He rolled over to reach for her, nuzzle her awake and tell her his plans, to see her already awake and smiling at the ceiling. Let's take stuff and go sleep in the pavilion, she had said, let's really do it. Yes! he said, so pleased and excited, getting up on one elbow to talk about this, yes! And, he said, I'm going to build a fire.

So they had really done it, headed out on the day they had chosen and determined to see it through. They had awakened feeling like it was Christmas morning and hurried through necessary tasks, not wanting to even acknowledge the buckets and sheets of rain as they gathered the things they always wished for when they were in the pavilion and loaded them into the car, working quickly and quietly and closely, side by side. A pack for each of them, sleeping pads and blankets, plenty of food, matches, of course, and at the last minute, the umbrella. They hadn't looked at each other when she grabbed that, it was as if they hadn't wanted to admit the rain flooding their driveway and rushing down the street. Now they were walking steadily through the rain, nearly there, not a sound in all the world except their breathing and the mud sound of their shoes.

It was even better than they had thought, than they had hoped. It felt like home, felt just exactly like coming home. He thought, later, that he hadn't remembered stacking the kindling with the other wood the last time they had visited, but he was glad he had, otherwise he'd have had all sorts of trouble making the fire. She hadn't remembered the door, either, could not remember ever before shutting a door behind her, but there it was, open against the wall, and she had closed it gratefully against any little animal that might come scurrying in the night. He lay in front of the fire and thought drowsily that the pack of food seemed just as full, just exactly as full as it had before they ate dinner, and she thought as she leaned against him that she had never felt so comfortable, so cozy, so peaceful as now. Really, there was nothing more they needed, no place else to go, nothing that needed doing. In the morning, he thought, he'd set in those storm windows he suddenly remembered were around the back, out of sight under the bushes. They'd be needing them in place before it got any colder. He'd gather more firewood, too, make a great stack. She planned how to store their things, the clothing they had brought, the food that would last them a long, long time. Out in the dark, the rain washed their footprints completely away, and by the fire he watched her as she drifted into sleep, thinking, it's just you and me, just you and me and no one else in the whole world. He fell asleep holding her, and the fire burned all night.