Page 22 of Lost With My Enemy

She looks at me sideways. The sunset turns her face warm, catching the hazel in her eyes, and my chest does the thing it's been doing for six days now. The tightening. The pull toward her that I keep telling myself is just proximity, just the forced closeness of a shared truck cab, just the natural result of spending all day every day with someone who challenges everything I say and somehow makes it feel like a gift.

My phone buzzes in my back pocket. The screen lights up with an email notification, and my heart rate spikes before I've consciously read it.

Subject: Assignment Opportunity — Patagonia Series

Hi Jaxon,

Following up on our conversation at the MEC launch last month. We'd like to formally offer you the lead photographer position for our six-part Patagonia expedition series. The project runs October through March, based out of El Chaltén with satellite shoots across Torres del Paine and Tierra del Fuego. Full kit provided. Flights, accommodation, and a per diem covered. Rate as discussed.

This would be our flagship content series for 2026. We need confirmation by September 5.

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Best, Liam Firth Content Director, Meridian Outdoor

Six months. Patagonia. October through March. Full expedition. The kind of assignment I would have said yes to without reading past the subject line three weeks ago.

Three weeks ago, I wasn't leaning against a truck in Saskatchewan watching a woman with a closed planner and wavy hair argue about my agricultural potential.

"Good news?" Elise asks, because my face is apparently doing something obvious.

"Assignment offer. Big one." My voice sounds strange, even to me. Too casual. "Patagonia. Six months. October start."

"Patagonia." She straightens off the tailgate. "That's incredible, Jaxon."

"Yeah." My thumb scrolls through the email again. Full kit. Per diem. Flagship series. "It's a dream gig."

"When do they need an answer?"

"September fifth."

"That's eleven days from now."

"Eleven, technically."

Her arms cross, and she turns back to the sunset, which has deepened into violet. The gold is gone. "You should take it."

"Yeah?"

"Of course. It's Patagonia. Six months of professional photography in one of the most stunning landscapes on earth. It's exactly what you do."

She's right. It is exactly what I do. Fly somewhere beautiful, shoot it, leave. The rotation that's kept me moving since Mom died. Iceland, Scotland, Portugal, New Zealand, Morocco. Name a country and I've got a portfolio folder for it. Name a continent and I can tell you where the best light falls in November.

The rotation that Kenzie says is a grief response dressed up in adventure.

"Would you turn it down?" I ask.

"Would I turn down a dream job? No."

"Even if it meant leaving something?"

Her jaw tightens. Barely visible, but I've spent eleven days mapping the microexpressions of Elise Boyd, and I know what that jaw means. She's choosing her next words carefully, running them through a filter, removing the parts that feel too honest.

"You wouldn't be leaving something," she says, measured. "You'd be going to something. That's how opportunities work. Your life is in Calgary. Mine is in Toronto. We were always going to different places."

The sentence is perfectly constructed. Logical. Air-tight. It's also the most painful thing she's said to me in eleven days, which is impressive given that she once told me my glove box was "a biohazard in a small enclosed space."

"Right," I say. "Different places."