Page 26 of Canadian Boyfriend

“Good for you.” She tried to get Olivia to talk to me, but all I got were monosyllabic answers. Eventually I gave up, and we said goodbye.

But Aurora and I kept texting.

Aurora:Sorry that was a bust. You want me to turn off the TV, and we can try again?

Mike:God, no. You’ve got her onto something other than Fuller House. Little > Fuller when it comes to fictional houses.

Mike:How’d you get into Little House anyway? I remember watching it in rerun format when I was a kid, but aren’t you too young for it?

What I really wanted to know was how old she was, but I didn’t want to ask outright. I guessed thirty, tops.

Aurora:My mom was into it. She grew up near De Smet, South Dakota, where the real-life Ingalls family went after Walnut Grove. There’s a summer pageant there, and my mom played Laura one year. She used to profess to hate the show, but we always watched it in syndication. She harbored show-business dreams at one point.

Mike:What happened to them?

Aurora:She got pregnant accidentally with me.

Wow, OK.

Mike:So what did she do instead? For a job, I mean? Or what does she do? I don’t mean to talk about her in the past tense.

Aurora:You mean besides being a retired dance mom? She’s a real estate agent.

Aurora:You know what? Let’s talk about something else.

I smiled, stupidly pleased she wanted to keep talking to me. I wasn’t sure why. It wasn’t as if I were lacking social outlets. A bunch of the guys were going to dinner later. But texting with Aurora was… nice. I decided not to interrogate the feeling. Nice, these days, was novel.

Mike:So what’s Half Pint up to?

Aurora:This is an Albert episode. He’s addicted to morphine!

Mike:I remember this one! He barfs all over the road!

Aurora:Haha, yes! I probably should have run it by you first. I forgot how dark some of these episodes are. Now you’re going to have to have a big “don’t do drugs” convo.

Mike:It’s okay. Unfortunately, Olivia is used to dark.

Aurora:Yeah. I’m sorry.

Mike:It’s fine. Well, it’s not. But it’s life.

Aurora:By the way, I bought Olivia a set of the Little House books, thinking they might help with reading responses. I thought she and I could read them together. I have copies from when I was a kid.

Aurora was so great. Like, super, elementally great.

Mike:Excellent idea. Maybe I’ll read them, too.

After that, we kept in touch when I was on the road. But also sometimes when I wasn’t. Not-on-the-road texting started when Olivia and I were watching aLittle Houseepisode—Aurora had left the DVDs at our house—that was so bonkers I spontaneously texted.

Mike:We’re watching Little House, and it’s the one where Ma almost cuts off her leg.

Aurora:OMG, yes! She gets some kind of infection in a scrape on her leg and takes that bit from the Bible about cutting off thy limb if it offends thee too literally!

Mike:But Reverend Alden rescues her just in time.

Aurora:Yes! She was baking pies for the church fundraiser, and he came to pick them up. Saved by pie.

Mike:Well, if anything can save you, it’s pie. What’s your favorite kind?

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