by Sue Gibson
"Ethan, when did you become such a romantic?"
"Well, I don't know if I call it romantic ... eerie, maybe. You'll think I'm crazy, but that big old bird up there is spying on us. Again. It watched me make a fool of myself in the boat, the day we first met. And he's back now. Pulling guard duty, I guess" Lily craned her neck to see to the top of the Spruce.
Loon Lake's sentinel blue heron directed his long, pointy beak down toward the pair beneath his perch.
"Sam," Lily called out, "you can go back to the swamp. I'm fine." The big bird ruffled his feathers and lifted one foot from its perch. "Better than fine. In love!"
Sam's wings flapped against the night's dewy air. Bits of dried bark floated downward as he lifted from his perch and whooshed across Greensly Bay, leaving Lily happily wrapped in the arms of the man she loved.
