Sierra Nevada (XXX)

10

Feet First

We walked back to camp hand in hand in sweet silence. The scenery was beautiful. I spent most of my time looking around in awe and amazement. Avi spent most of his time watching me.

I restarted the fire and put the grate over it.

"Are you hungry?"

"Always." Came the reply from right behind me. "You wanna play?" He was holding a guitar in each hand.

"Sure." I took my guitar from his hand and sat down on my rock and tuned my guitar. He sat on his and quietly tuned his a half a step higher.

"I would like to teach you something. Would that be alright?" I nodded. He did it again. "Okay. Trade me. Mine is tuned wrong for your part." We switched guitars and he started to show me the chords and the finger picking pattern. He set the tempo, thank goodness it was slow. He could play so much faster and far more accurately than I could. The advantage of years worth of playing experience. Then he handed me back my guitar and took his. "Got it?" I played for him with only a few mistakes. "Yeah you got it." Until then I had never experienced that smile from him personally. I had seen it, when he was watching other musicians and giving them praise. He smiled softly and tapped his foot to the rhythm I was laying down for him. I kept playing and looped it around again. He picked up his guitar and waited to join in until I hit the top of the loop.

The sound that we produced was amazing and extremely beautiful. I listened to the sound of our guitars softly signing to the wind. I relaxed into the rhythm and we played on.

"There something missing on the down beat every third measure, but I am not sure what that is." I listened as we played around again.

"Can I try something?"

"Please?" I got the feeling he was coaching me. The next time the down beat dropped on the third measure I plucked two string and shifted down to a minor 4th in the key we were playing in then shifted back up to the note I had played just before the shift. I caught the admiration in his eyes and played on. I did it again on the sixth and every subsequent measure. He nodded and started humming then drew the song to a close. I loved it. He beamed.

"Welcome to the pros."

"What?" He smiled.

"I needed that little lick there to pull it all together. It's perfect. Thank YOU!" He bowed over his guitar. "Credit where credit is due. You have a good grasp on music. You feel it I came up here to write, to clear my head. Well I wrote and though my head is actually a lot cloudier, I can still see clearly. You are so gracious, and kind and very right. We will never know if we don't at least see where this may go. So, let's see." He had stowed his guitar while he was talking so, I stowed mine and leaned it against the rock. He grabbed my hand and placed a hand on my hip.

"Do you dance?"

"Yes, A little."

"Let's dance until the sun sets. Then let's eat, talk a little. There's some things I want to know and some things I want to share before we go any further than dancing." His eyes held mine and he smiled a beautiful smile. I smiled back at him and stepped into his arms. We began to sway to the sound of the wind through the grass. It was subtle and soft, and sweetly soothing. I felt a little bold so I put my arms around his neck and rested my head on his shoulder. He put his hands on the small of my back and pulled me closer. We missed the sunset. I could have fallen asleep wrapped so softly in those arms. I was relaxed and comfortable by the time we fed the fire and then ourselves in silence.

"You don't talk much do you?"

"Not really. Do you?"

"Some times. We talk enough you might find it hard to shut me up."