Doing nothing turned out to be harder than it sounded.
For the first ten minutes, I kept waiting for Chenghai to pull out another bag, point toward something hidden along the shore, or tell me the boat was only the first part of whatever he had planned.
He didn't.
He sat beside me with one arm around my waist and ate pieces of fruit whenever I held them near his mouth. The boat drifted slowly across the lake while sunlight moved over the water.
That was it.
I looked inside the bag again.
Chenghai glanced down. "What are you looking for?"
"The rest."
"There isn't any."
"You packed food, towels, sunscreen, clean clothes, and a boat."
"The boat was already here."
"That doesn't make this less suspicious."
His hand moved slowly across my stomach. "You wanted another surprise?"
I thought about the swing, the mud track, the creek, and the porch.
My legs still remembered the porch.
"No," I admitted. "I just don't trust you anymore."
