Page 89 of Canadian Boyfriend

“Yay!” she cheered. My mom took her hand off my shoulder. I wished she wouldn’t. Everything felt easier with it there.

“It’s just as well, because I changed our reservation to Spruce Woods, figuring we’d have a better shot at the northern lights at a more southern park. I got us a backcountry site, so we haveto hike in. It’s on a creek. It should be nice.” Liv wrinkled her nose. I turned to Aurora to explain. “Liv is bailing on camping.”

“Ihatebackcountry camping,” Liv said.

“I don’t know what backcountry camping is,” Aurora said, “or why you would want to go south to see the northern lights.”

“Backcountry camping means you don’t drive your car to your site. You have to hike or canoe in—hike in this case. Though this won’t be serious backcountry camping,” I assured her. “There are firepits and tables at the sites. We just gotta lug our stuff in.”

My mother was watching me closely, with an uncharacteristically serious expression.

I kept talking. “For the northern lights this time of year, you actually don’t want to go too far north. The farther north you get, the longer the days are—Land of the Midnight Sun territory. You need darkness for the northern lights. There are forecasts you can look at. There’s this thing called the Kp index that’s a measure of geomagnetic activity. So we’ll keep an eye on that, but…”

OK, I needed to get a grip. Aurora had only been awake a little while and had walked into a confusing conversation, and no one had asked her how she was feeling.

“How’s your head?” I pushed out a chair for her.

“How’syourhead?” She sat, and my mom snickered.

“My head… has been better.”

She smiled. “Mine is fine.”

“Fine enough for coffee?” my mom asked. “You hear about how sometimes caffeine helps migraines.”

The smile slid off her face. Maybe she wasn’t better. Maybe she was putting on a front. “I’d love coffee, thanks. I’ll help myself.”

“Good morning!” It was one of the day-care parents—they let themselves in the front door in the mornings.

“Hi, Amy!” my mom called. “Hi, Lucy! I’ll meet you in the basement!” She and Olivia headed down to meet them, leaving me alone with Aurora.

“I guess it’s just you and me camping.” I lifted my tea for a joking toast to cover how unsettled that made me feel. I told myself this was Aurora. I knew her. She was easy to be with.

So why did everything feel so different all of a sudden?

“Bye!” Olivia trilled the next morning. “Enjoy sleeping on the ground while I lounge on my waterbed!”

“Yeah, yeah.” I hugged her tight. “You be good, OK?”

“Am I not always good?”

I smacked an extraloud, exaggerated kiss on her cheek. “No, you are not.”

She dropped her attitude suddenly and wound her arms around my neck. “Be careful, OK? Maybe Ishouldcome.”

“Nah, you don’t want to come,” I said, but I let her keep hugging me—I letmyselfkeep huggingher. She was panicking at the idea that a bear might eat me, or I might drown, and she’d be left parentless. She’d had fears like that early on, in the initial weeks after the accident. She hadn’t wanted me to go anywhere without her. Dr. Mursal had said it was normal, and it had faded. I’d thought. “I’ll be careful. I promise.”

“I’ll keep my eye on him,” Aurora said, and Olivia surprised me—and Aurora, too, I think—by throwing her arms around her and giving her a long, hard hug.

“Want to stop for coffee?” I asked as we pulled out of the driveway.

“Yes, and now I know how to order mine.”

As we drove by my dad’s Tim Hortons a few minutes later, which I’d pointed out to Aurora on a previous outing, she said, “I thought we were getting coffee?”

“We are, but…”

“… we’re not going to this one because it’s your dad’s.”

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