Page 60 of Stuck With the Smokejumper

Ivy

“No, thinner than that.”

Beck holds up his piece of dough like it's supposed to prove something. “This is thin.”

“That's a pancake. Lefse is thinner than a pancake.”

He looks at me, then back at the dough with skepticism. “I’ve fought wild fires. Why is it so hard to flatten a potato?”

The kitchen looks like it lost a fight with a flour truck. There's a fine dusting across the counter, across the rolling pin, across Beck's forearms, across, if I had to guess from the way my shirt feels, me too. I decided that Beck missing the Silver Creek lefse was a wrong that needs correcting. Somewhere between deciding that and teaching him, I forgot how much of an undertaking making lefse is.

It's a normal Saturday otherwise. Reid left with Trevor an hour ago for some errand. Tessa has passed through twice already, once for coffee and once, inexplicably, for a spoon she never left with. Dani's doing laundry. Cassidy's reading on the porch. Nobody's paying much attention to what Beck and I are doing in here. A week ago this would have felt like something. Now, it's just Saturday.

It's been a good week. The kind where nothing dramatic happens and that turns out to be the whole point. Sunday dinner at the Grangers'. Working together during the day. Evenings at the crew house. Beck fixed the wobbly porch step without anyone asking him. Slow, steady progress on my thesis. After not having him around, I don't think I've stopped noticing how much I like just having him nearby, even if we’re not doing anything.

“My grandmother taught me this,” I tell him, taking his overly thick attempt and rolling it flatter myself. “I was maybe eight the first time. She'd stand me on a stool so I could reach the counter.”

“Was she patient?”

“No. Not even remotely. She'd take the rolling pin out of my hands about every ten seconds and say it still wasn't thin enough.” I smile, thinking about it. “There was flour everywhere in her kitchen too. I think it's just part of the process. She used to say if you weren't wearing some of it, you weren't really making lefse.”

“So this is authentic.”

“Very.

He tries again, more careful this time, and it's better, thin enough in most places I let him move on to the griddle without further critique. Beck's not bad at this, which surprises me a little. He's patient, the same steady focus he brings to everything, even when the dough clearly isn't cooperating with him.

“Would she have approved?” he asks, nodding at his second attempt, currently browning unevenly on the griddle.

I study it for a long moment. “She would've liked you.”

“Yeah?”

“She liked anyone who tried. She had less patience for people who gave up because something was hard.”

Something in his expression softens at that, quick, there and gone, and I go back to my own dough before either of us can make it into a bigger moment than it already is.

“Hold still,” Beck says a minute later, reaching toward my face. “You've got flour on your nose.”

I hold still, assuming this is going to go the way it went at Silver Bell, his thumb brushing something away, a kiss following it.

“Did you get it?” I ask.

“Not exactly.”

I narrow my eyes. “Did you just put flour on my nose on purpose?”

“Maybe.”

I retaliate, getting a generous handful onto his shoulder before he can dodge. A small, entirely justified flour battle follows, brief but thorough, until we're both standing here covered, laughing, close enough that the laughing starts to fade into something else. Beck's got flour in his eyebrows. I probably look worse. Neither of us seems bothered by it.

He kisses me. No hesitation, no uncertain first-time energy, just easy and warm, flour dusting both our faces. I think, not for the first time, I could do this every single day for the rest of my life and never get tired of it.

“Is that lefse?”

We break apart to find Nolan standing in the doorway, nose visibly working.

“Did you smell it from outside?” I ask.