She lay there on her side, using her sweatshirt as a pillow, and stared, nearly mesmerized, at the fire. “I love all the colors that are in the flames and the way they move. It’s almost like they are dancing.” Ned nuzzled the top of her head. “So, what do you think about hiking and the great outdoors now?” “I think that if they put a Jacuzzi and a real bathroom up here, I’d never leave.” She didn’t know what Kay and Jill had been complaining about. She thought backpacking had a lot of romantic possibilities. Especially when your partner packed you Ring Dings and made you hot chocolate. There was also something very seductive about lying beneath the stars and hearing nothing but the fire crackle. “It would take away from the rustic ambiance.” “There’s outhouse rustic, and then there’s caveman primitive. I prefer to live in the current century on certain things, like bathrooms.” “Point taken.” Ned chuckled. “May I ask what happened with you, Kay, and Jill last Saturday?”
