“So don’t write the same kind of stuff.”
“But that’s what I know how to write, and…”
“And what?” I asked gently, feeling as if we were on the precipice of something.
“I don’t know if I can write without Scott.”
“Ah. I don’t have a pat comeback for that.”
“Yeah, I’ve never done it.”
I had a feeling hedidknow how to write without Scott, or at least that he could discover a way to, and I hated the idea of that jerk making Teddy feel less than, but what did I know about any of it? “Literally never?”
“Well, usually one or the other of us would start a song, but we’d always finish it together.”
Well, maybe I did have a pat comeback. “You know what? You don’t need that asshole.”
“Whoa!” he said—but laughingly.
“I said what I said.” Of course, he didn’t knowwhyI’d said it—which probably explained the bewildered look I somehowknew he was giving me. It was now officially too dark to see, but I’d gotten to the point where I could sense his bewilderment. Maybe because I was so often the cause of it.
“I guess not only do you not call the tabloids, you don’t read them,” he said. “I’m the one who threw a fit when he tried to dump me. So, logically, I think I do need him.”
“Screw logic. This is sounding more and more like a divorce, and you know how it works: when your friend gets divorced, you’re automatically on their side. So it’s Team Teddy here.”
“It is, huh?” He was trying to be wry, but he sounded chuffed. “You know what? I think ‘screw logic’ is the right approach in general. For writing songs, I mean. I think I’m way too up in my own head. I need to, like… rely on muscle memory or something. I know how to write songs—you were right about that. It’s just…”
“It’s terrifying, right? Like you said. I guess we both need to figure out whether being terrified is sufficient reason not to do something.”
“Yeah, I guess we do.”
I woke up with a start sometime later with my head on Teddy’s shoulder and his arm around me. I’d fallen asleep. “Oh, shit,” I mumbled. “Sorry.”
“No problem.”
I made an involuntary squeak of dismay when I pulled away. It was cold and he was… cozy.
“Yeah,” he said, as if he could read my thoughts—read my squeak. “How is it so fucking freezing here? It’s not this cold in our cabins at night.”
“I don’t know, maybe something sciencey to do with thetrees? Or just the simple fact of shelter. Anyway, it’s probably not as cold as we think it is. We’re not going to die of exposure.” I paused. “I’m saying that to myself as much as to you.”
“I didn’t want to wake you, but now that you’re up, I think we should get out that blanket.”
“Yes.” I completed the unwelcome task of disentangling myself from him and hopped around to try to get my blood flowing while he dug in the first aid kit.
“OK, come back,” he said.
My eyes had adjusted to the dark. He was settling himself back against the tree trunk with the blanket wrapped around his back and shoulders like a cape. He was holding up one side of it, making a space for me next to him. I went willingly but winced audibly as I tried to arrange myself into anything remotely resembling a comfortable position.
“Sorry, I have a crick in my hip. It’s an old injury that acts up when I’m cold. And when I sit too long.” The solution was to extend my leg, so I did that as well as I could while keeping my upper body cozied up to the heat sources that were the blanket and Teddy.
“Maybe we should put it over us actually like a blanket,” he suggested.
“Let’s try.”
Several minutes of awkward logistical wrangling followed. We’d get one end of the blanket tucked under one of us, but then the other end wouldn’t quite reach over and around the other person, and it would end up flapping in the breeze.
“Argh!” I said.
