The sky is shining pink through the treetops as we make our way up the steep dune. Olivia took a hit from her inhaler before we began climbing, and she’s taking slow, measured steps. She’s leading this time; in control. I follow behind, wondering how we’ll get the canoe back up the river in the dark. There’s no way I can make it without a light or Ellis to lead. We hike up the last hundred feet of the dune, Olivia charging ahead of me, traversing the trunks of fallen trees and ducking beneath sagging branches. She’s not talking to me—and I’m not talking to her—and it’s giving me too much time to think. About why she brought me here, at sunset, when clearly I’ve seen it a million times. This dune held no significance to me, it was simply the perfect platform on which to capture the scene below. A scene I never painted anyway. So why are we working so hard to get back here?

When we reach the top, Olivia steps to the side of the narrow, sandy path, and lets me pass her. “Turn around,” she says, just as I walk into the opening.

I do what she says, and stare back at her. Her face is red, but she looks better than the first time we climbed here. She lowers her backpack, strap by strap, and sets it at her feet. As she unzips it, she says, “Close your eyes.”

“Olivia—” I argue, but her voice is soft and pleading.

“Please, Aiden?”

I do what she asks, and close my eyes. The air is still hot, even though the sun is making its final descent, but the breeze on the dunes is cool against my heated face, and sends goose bumps across my arms.

Hands fall on my biceps, and turn me around, then they’re gone. A hand on my shoulders pushes me forward, one step, two steps, three, until I’m starting to get nervous that Olivia brought me up here just to push me off. Her hands are gone again, and I feel the sand shift next to me. Even though we’re not touching, I can tell she’s right there, her arm so close to mine that I want to move it just an inch to touch her.

“Okay.” She takes a deep breath that seems amplified with my eyes closed. “Open your eyes.”

I do what she says, letting the orange of the sky slide past my eyelids. The orange is almost rusty where the sun is slipping below the lake, and as my eyes sweep across the water, I wonder what exactly I’m supposed to be seeing. I look to Olivia next to me, and she pushes me forward another step with her hand on my lower back.