Hudson walks toward the pool, crouching to inspect something near the rocks. I watch him clear a small branch from the water flow, test a damp stone with his boot, and scan the surrounding slope where runoff has dragged gravel across the path.
He moves through the space like he knows it intimately. Like he belongs everywhere and nowhere.
“Do you miss this place when you leave?” I ask.
He pauses with one hand on a rock. “Yes.”
I wrap my arms around myself. “Then why leave?”
He straightens slowly. “Because I miss leaving when I stay.”
This is the truth of him. Not immaturity or some younger man refusing responsibility because freedom sounds sexier than commitment. It is deeper than that. Movement is how he breathes.
I understand that more than I should. Not because I have lived it, but because I haven’t. Because staying in one place, one marriage, one role, one quiet version of myself nearly erased me.
“Does that make sense?” he asks.
I look at him. “Yes.”
The single word seems to hit him harder than I expect. He takes one step toward me. Then another. The waterfall rushes beside us. Mist touches my skin. Somewhere overhead, thunder rolls so faintly I almost convince myself I imagined it. Hudson looks up. So do I. The darker clouds have moved closer.
“That was quick,” I say.
“Mountain weather.”
“Should we head back?”
He studies the sky, then the trail. “Soon.”
Hudson looks at the pool. “You want to get in first?”
I laugh. “That depends.”
“On?”
“Whether this is a trick question where you tell me the safest way into freezing mountain water is to surrender my dignity.”
“No trick.”
“No cliff?”
“No cliff.”
“No jumping?”
“Not unless you count stepping off that rock.”
I follow his gaze to a flat stone barely a foot above the pool.
“Daring,” I say.
His mouth curves. “You survived bigger.”
“Yes, and I’d like a plaque.”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
Another low rumble of thunder rolls beyond the ridge, and Hudson’s smile fades.
