Free Love in Maine by Connie Falconeri

it
     again! Just pick a side already!”
    This did not bode well. If she was this bossy in a boat, Hank could only imagine how
     bossy she’d be in bed.
    “Why don’t I just sit here in the back and let you paddle for a while, Post?”
    “Good idea,” she said on a huff and began pulling them along at a steady clip toward
     the far end of the lake.
    Hank sat with the paddle resting across his thighs and stared at her back and her
     hips. He was momentarily tempted to set down his paddle and do something about the
     aching pull that was starting to gather in his lap. Maybe letting her take charge
     wasn’t such a bad idea. In the boat or in the bed, he thought, then smiled because
     he felt like a Dr. Seuss character.
    “Are you laughing at me?” she asked, without looking over her shoulder.
    “I didn’t make a sound.”
    “I know. But I can sort of feel you smiling back there.”
    “I’m happy. What else do you want me to do?”
    She held up the dripping paddle and they coasted quietly through the water. Maddie
     turned her head slowly so she could look at him over her right shoulder. “You’re happy?”
    “You don’t have to sound so surprised, you know?”
    “Okay. I’ll try not to sound surprised. I know we only met a week ago, but you didn’t
     strike me as the happy type.” She had turned back and resumed paddling. “More grudgingly accepting than
     happy, I’d say.”
    “How miserable. Is that how I seem?” It was easier talking to her straining back,
     probably because he didn’t have to see her curved lips. She shrugged, and he liked
     the way the movement pulled her T-shirt up so he could see the skin at the small of
     her back.
    “How should I know? It’s not like you set your emotions out on a platter.”
    He laughed a little. “Now that’s probably true.”
    She smiled over her shoulder and winked. “I’m not a total airhead.”
    He didn’t think he had actually called her an airhead out loud, but he felt guilty
     for thinking it just the same.
    “Should I start paddling back to camp?”
    “Probably. I’ll need to go catch dinner.”
    “Oh, how primitive. I love it. Did you bring a bow and arrow? Are you a trapper?”
     She kept paddling, and he had the wonderful vision of being a trapper, in another
     time, with his little Sacagawea guiding him through the wilderness.
    “Nothing so heroic. Just a fishing rod.”
    “Oh. Well, I suppose a girl has to make allowances.” She kept pulling the canoe with
     strong, confident strokes.
    “You’re good with the paddle.”
    “Thanks.”
    The silence of their voices let the sounds of the lake blossom around them: the gentle
     slap of the water against the edge of the canoe, the little brushes of noise near
     the shore, the occasional loon crying out for his mate. It was beautiful in that spiritually
     calming way that Maddie only found in these rare moments of pure, deep silence. “Thanks,”
     she repeated, in a reverent whisper this time.
    “You’re welcome,” Hank said with a gentle nod to the sloping hills in the distance.
     He was glad he’d brought her here.

CHAPTER 6
    The lake was so remote and so full of fish, they caught four in ten minutes. They didn’t really catch them, Hank did, and he held them up by their gills and taunted
     her. “You know how to clean these?”
    She put her hands on her hips. “As a matter of fact I do.” She took the fish from
     him and made a bed of leaves. She set them down carefully on the makeshift tray and
     took out her Swiss Army knife. Hank stared, probably waiting for her to screw it up,
     she thought skeptically. “Part of no-girls-on-trip training. Worms. Fish. Squirrels.
     Pheasants. You name it, I had to gut it.”
    “That might be the sexiest thing I’ve ever heard.”
    Maddie looked up and blew that strand out of her eyes again. “Ew. Why would that ever
     in a million years be sexy?”
    Hank rinsed his hands in the lake, then walked over to their packs and started to