Has to Be Love Read Online Free PDF Page A

July, I think, but lakes are always open.”
    â€œThe canyon here is deep,” he says. “I guess I should have expected the glacier thing.”
    â€œWe can hike that too, if you want.” What am I saying? Did I just offer to take my teacher out?
    â€œThe glacier?” he asks.
    â€œThe glacier isn’t nearly as cool as it sounds. It’s about a four-mile hike from the road, and most of where you can hike on the glacier is covered in dirt. We can hike up to where the snow and ice are clean, so I guess it’s a little cool, but the crevasses get dangerous fast. There’s a zip-line place up the highway too. It’s pretty fun unless you’re afraid of heights.”
    â€œSo. Wild. Hiking on a glacier. And a definite yes to zip-lining.” His smile widens and his eyes are on me for another moment before he looks around the inside of the barn. Rhodes’s eyes follow the same trail that everyone’s do. Over the horse stalls and tack room. Then his gaze travels up to the loft, which is half open to below. He looks a lot more like a student than a teacher in this moment.
    â€œThis is cool,” he says. “I’m sorry. My thoughts are all over the place. I love being somewhere new.”
    I can’t imagine loving to travel the way he does, but maybe with a fixed face, traveling won’t feel so out of reach.
    I shove the measuring can into the large bin of oats and dump a canful into each of the feed buckets. Keeping busy around someone my body’s reacting to is probably smart. “Dad built it with Mom when I was a baby. Just after building the house.”
    â€œYou’ve lived here a long time.”
    â€œMy whole life.”
    â€œYou’re going to college, right?” He leans against Snoopy’s stall, and my horse immediately shoves his nose in Rhodes’s hand. He grabs Snoopy’s upper lip and tugs, playing my horse’s favorite game.
    â€œWhy do you ask?” I grab a few flakes of hay and start tossing them over the tops of the stalls, wondering where Rhodes was when he got acquainted with horses.
    â€œEverybody should get out of their comfort zone once in a while. And if you want to be a writer, like my aunt said, I don’t think you’ll get the teaching you need up here.”
    I want to be a writer.
    But that want feels fragile—like if I talk about writing as a career too much or hope for it too much, that future will shatter before I have a chance for it to begin.
    â€œI might go up to UAF for my freshman year,” I say as I toss the last load of hay over the partition and lean against the stall next to Rhodes. University of Alaska is a massive compromise, but it’s one I’m willing to make to stay close to home—at least until my scars are fixed. After that, the world might seem less like a cliff I’ve been asked to climb with no gear. That’s when I’ll maybe leave for New York, but not before. I’m still not sure how to manage the idea of leaving Elias behind for Columbia. I shove the thought away.
    Rhodes’s brow furrows. “You might want to think about somewhere else. See the world a little. I fully believe in current opportunity.”
    â€œWhat does that mean?” I ask.
    â€œIt means that life is too short to wait for things to come to you.” He gives me a purposefully crooked smile, like he thinks he’s cute or something. “Sometimes you have to reach out and try for what you want. Sometimes you don’t know what you want until it’s right in front of you. I had no idea I wanted to go to Alaska until my aunt suggested it, and now here I am, experiencing Alaska.”
    I’m self-aware enough to know I hide in my bubble, but that’s as temporary as my scars.
    I trace the welts coming off my upper lip as I lean against Snoopy’s stall.
    Rhodes’s eyes are on me. Something in me should be squirming under his gaze because we