“Camryn,” I say, stopping her nervous rambling. “I’ve never had a better birthday gift.” I close the empty space between us and kiss her lips softly.
Camryn
22
Somewhere on Interstate 75—May
We’ve been on the road for months. By March, we had already grown so used to it that living in and out of hotels had become second nature. A new room every week, a new city, a new beach, a new everything. But no matter how new it all is, each time we go in it’s as if we’re stepping through the front door of a house where we’ve lived for years. I never would’ve imagined calling a hotel room “home,” or that life on the road would be as easy to adjust to as it has been for us. Sometimes it’s been hard, but everything is an experience and I wouldn’t change any of it.
But I wonder if the long winter got to me. I wonder, because I’ve caught myself daydreaming about being in a house somewhere, living the home life with Andrew.
Yeah, I’m pretty sure it was just the winter.
It’s two o’clock in the morning, and we’re broke down somewhere in southwest Florida on a long stretch of desolate highway. And it’s pouring down rain. Buckets of rain. We called for a tow truck an hour ago, but for some reason it still hasn’t showed.
“Is there an umbrella in the car anywhere?” I ask over the rain pounding loudly on the roof. “Maybe I can hold it over you while you fix the car!”
“It’s pitch-black out there, Camryn,” he says, his voice raised as high as mine. “Even with a flashlight I doubt I could do it. I’d have to figure out what’s even wrong with it, first.”
I slump down further into the front seat and prop my feet on the dash, my knees bent toward me. “At least it’s not cold,” I say.
“We’ll manage out here tonight,” he says. “Wouldn’t be the first time we slept in the car. Maybe the tow truck will show up before daylight, and if not, I’ll fix it when I can see.”
We sit together in silence for a moment, listening to rain beat on the car, the thunder rumbling like a wave through the clouds. Eventually, we get so tired that we crawl into the backseat, curl up on it together, and try to get some sleep. After a short while, when it’s obvious we’re both uncomfortable and there’s not enough room for us to sleep like this, Andrew crawls over into the front. But we still can’t fall asleep. I feel him shifting for a while and then he asks, “Where do you see yourself in the next ten years?”
“I’m not sure,” I say, staring up at the roof of the car. “But I do know that I want to be doing whatever it is with you.”
“Me too,” he says from the front, laying the same way that I am now, on his back looking upward.
“Have you thought about anything specific?” I ask, quietly wondering where he’s going with this. I switch my left arm for my right, tucking it underneath the back of my head.
“Yeah,” he says. “I want to settle down somewhere warm and peaceful. Sometimes I picture you on the beach, barefoot in the sand with the breeze blowing through your hair. I’m sitting under a tree not too far away, playing around with my guitar—”
“The one I bought you?”
“Of course.”
I smile and continue to listen, picturing the scene in my mind.
“And you’re holding her hand.”
“Whose hand?”
Andrew falls silent for a moment. “Our little girl,” he says distantly as if his mind is a little further away than mine is.
I swallow and feel a knot grow in my throat. “I like that visual,” I say. “So, you want to settle down?”
“Eventually,” he says. “But only when it feels right. Not a day before.”
A gust of wind hits the side of the car, and a loud clap of thunder shakes the ground.
“Andrew?” I ask.
“Yeah?”
“Number three, to add to our list of promises. If we make it to old age and our bones hurt and we can’t sleep in the same bed anymore, promise me we’ll never sleep in separate rooms.”
“It’s a promise,” he answers with a smile in his voice.
“Good night,” I say.
“Good night.”
And when I fall asleep minutes later, I dream about that warm beach and Andrew watching me walk along the sand with a little hand clasped in mine.
* * *
The tow truck never came. We wake up the next morning stiff and in pain, regardless of each of us having a seat to ourselves.
“I’m going to kick the shit out of that tow truck guy if I ever see him,” Andrew growls underneath the hood.
He’s busy twisting a wrench around… I’m not even going to pretend that I know what that thing is. He’s fixing the car. That’s all I know. And he’s in a seriously foul mood. I just hang around to help him with whatever he needs, and I don’t play the dumb-blonde card by asking him what this doohickey is or what that thingamajig does. Truth is, I really don’t care. And besides, it’d just aggravate him more if he had to explain it.
But the sun is out. And it’s hot! I feel like I’ve died and gone to heaven!
I splash around in the puddles from last night’s rain, soaking my flip-flops. I don’t know what’s gotten into me other than simply the weather, but I raise my arms high in the air above me and look up at the sky, twirling around and around in the middle of the road.
“Will you get over here and help me?” Andrew grumbles.
I skip over to him and pinch his sides playfully because I’m in such a great mood, and I just can’t help it. But then bang, Andrew’s reaction to it causes his head to dart up and hit the underside of the hood. I wince and my hand flies over my mouth.
“Shit, baby! I’m sorry!” I reach out to a pissed-off Andrew, green eyes swirling, but then he shuts them as his cheeks fill up with air and wheeze out slowly.
I grab his head, rub it, and then kiss him on the nose. I still can’t stop smiling, but I’m not laughing at him, just trying to work the puppy-dog eyes.
“You’re forgiven,” he says and points underneath the hood. “I need you to hold this piece still right here for a second.” I go around to that side, peer underneath the hood, and stick my hand into the area, feeling for his fingers to guide me.
“Yeah, right there,” he says. “Now just hold it.”
“For how long?”
“Until I say,” he says, and I see the grin sneak up at the corner of his mouth. “If you let go, the oil pan will fall out and we’ll be stuck here for a long time.”
“Well, hurry up then,” I say, already feeling a crick in my neck beginning to form.
He walks around to the trunk and gets a bottle of water. Slowly he twists off the lid. Takes a sip. Looks around at the fields. Takes another sip.
“Andrew, are you screwing with me?” I peek around the raised hood the best I can to see him.
He just smiles. And takes another sip.
Dammit, he is screwing with me! I think…
“Don’t let go. I mean it.”
“Bullshit,” I say and start to move my fingers, but decide not to. “Are you telling me the truth? Seriously?”
“Yeah, sure I am. The oil pan will fall right out and it’ll probably splash all over you too. Hard to get that shit off your skin.”
“My back is starting to hurt,” I say.
He takes his sweet time, and just when I’m about to let go, he moves around behind me and grabs me by the waist, pulling me away from the hood. One hand comes up and he smears black gook all over my cheek. I shriek at him and push him away.
“Gah! Shit, Andrew! What if I can’t get this stuff off?” I’m seriously pissed, but a small part of me can’t resist that smile of his.
“It’ll come off fine,” he says, leaning back underneath the hood. “Now just get in the car and turn the key when I tell you to.”
I snarl at him once before doing what he asked, and in no time the Chevelle is running again and we’re in our way to St. Petersburg, just an hour away.
Today fe
els a lot like summer, and we can’t get enough of it. After we get to our hotel room and take a much-needed shower, we head to the nearest department store to buy him a pair of swimming trunks and me a bikini, intent on heading to the ocean for a swim.
He insists on the tiny black bikini with little silver stars, but he isn’t the one who’ll have to keep pulling that butt floss from between my cheeks every five seconds. So I settle for the cute red one with a tab bit more coverage.
“Probably better you picked that one, anyway,” he says, as we hop inside the car in the parking lot of the store.
“Why’s that?” I ask, grinning, as I kick off my flip-flops.
“Because I might end up busting a few jaws.” He puts the car into reverse and we back out.
“Just for looking?” I ask with a hint of disbelief and laughter.
His head falls to the side to look at me. “Nah, I guess not. I kind of get off on it when other guys look at you.”
“Ewww!” I scrunch up my nose.
“Not like that!” he says. “Geez!” He shakes his head as if to say UNbelievable, and we pull out of the parking lot and onto the street, which is busy with tourist traffic. “It just makes me feel good, y’know, having you on my arm. Does wonders for a guy’s ego.”
“Oh, so I’m just an arm trophy to you?” I cross my arms and smirk over at him.
“Yeah, babe, that’s all I keep you around for. I thought you knew that already.”
“Well, I guess then it’s no secret that I keep you around for the same reason.”
“Oh, really?” he asks, glancing over before staring at the road in front of him.
“Yep,” I say and lean my head back on the seat. “I just keep you around to make bitches jealous. But at night, I’m dreaming about the love of my life.”
“Who might that be?”
I purse my lips and look all around me, then back at him playfully. “Well, I won’t tell you his name because I don’t want you to go after him and see you get your ass kicked. But I can tell you that he’s got medium-brown hair, gorgeous green eyes, and a few tattoos. Oh, and he’s a musician.”
“Really? Well, he sounds awesome, so why use me as your arm trophy then?”
I shrug, because I can’t really think of a good line.
“Come on, you can tell me,” he says. “It’s not like he and I talk.”
“Sorry,” I say, glancing over, “but I don’t talk about him behind his back.”
“Fair enough,” he says with a smile. “You know what?”
“What?”
Andrew grins mischievously, and I don’t like it one bit.
“I remember a couple of things on our first road trip that you never got around to doing.”
Uh-oh…
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I lie.
He drops his right hand from the steering wheel and rests it on his leg. That daring look in his eyes is gaining momentum, and I try not to make my growing nervousness so obvious.
“Yeah, I think you owe me a bare ass in the window, and I still need to bear witness to your bug meal. What will it be? Grasshopper? Cricket? Earthworm? Or, maybe a granddaddy long leg. I wonder if they have granddaddy long legs in Florida…”
My skin is crawling. “Give it up, Andrew,” I say, shaking my head. I prop my foot on the door and twirl my braid between my fingers, trying to mask my worry. “I’m not doing it. And besides, that was the first road trip and you can’t just carry stuff over like that. Should’ve made me do it when you had the chance.”
He’s still grinning like the devious shithead he is.
“No,” I say again, flatly.
I glance over. “No!” I say one last time, and it leaves him laughing.
“All right,” he says, putting his right hand back on the steering wheel. “It was worth a try, though. Can’t blame me for tryin’.”
“I guess not.”
Andrew
We spend the entire day swimming and laying out on the beach. We watch the sun set over the horizon and eventually the stars, as they come alive in the darkness. Just an hour after nightfall we’re met by a group of people our age. They’ve been on the beach not far from us for a while, hanging out.
“From around here?” the tall guy with a full-sleeved tattoo down his right arm asks.
One of the couples sits down in the sand near us. Camryn, sitting between my legs, leans away from my chest attentively.
“No, we’re from Galveston,” I answer.
“And Raleigh,” Camryn adds.
“We’re in from Indiana,” the black-haired girl sitting down says. She points at the others she came with who are still standing. “They live here, though.”
One of the other guys wraps his girlfriend up in his arms. “I’m Tate, this is Jen,” he indicates his girlfriend, then points to the others standing nearby. “Johanna. Grace. And that’s my brother, Caleb.”
The three of them nod and smile down at us.
“I’m Bray,” the black-haired girl sitting by Camryn says. “And this is my fiancé, Elias.”
Camryn sits up fully and dusts the sand away from her hands by brushing them together. “Cool to meet you,” she says. “I’m Camryn and this is my fiancé, Andrew.”
Elias reaches out to shake my hand.
Tate, the guy with the tattoo says, “We’re heading to a private spot on a beach about thirty minutes from here. It’s a great party spot. Pretty secluded. You’re both welcome to join us.”
Camryn twists her body a little at the waist to see me behind her. We talk to each other with our eyes for a moment. At first, I wasn’t really up to it, but she seems to want to go. I stand up, helping her up with me.
I turn to Tate. “Sure. We can follow you out.”
“Kick ass,” Tate says.
Camryn and I grab our beach towels and the bag we brought packed with beef jerky, bottled water, and sunscreen, and we follow Tate and his friends off the beach and to the parking lot.
And now we’re back in the car being spontaneous again. I’m not so sure about this shit, maybe because it’s been so long since I’ve partied with anyone other than Camryn, but they seem harmless enough.
The so-called thirty-minute drive ends up being more like forty-five.
“I have no idea where the hell we are anymore.”
We’ve been on a dark highway and off the main freeway for the past twenty minutes at least, their Jeep Sahara coasting over the road in front of us at seventy-five miles an hour. I’ve got no problem keeping up, but I don’t usually speed like this in unfamiliar territory at night where I can’t spot the cops hiding on the side of road out ahead. If I get a ticket it’ll be my own damn fault, but I might still bust that Tate guy’s head for it just on principle.
“At least we have a full tank of gas,” she says. Then she laughs and hangs her foot out the window and says, “Maybe they’re leading us to a creepy cabin in the woods somewhere and plan to kill us.”
“Hey, that thought did cross my mind,” I laugh back at her.
“Well, I trust you to keep me safe,” she jokes. “Don’t let any of them cut me up into little pieces or force me to watch Honey Boo Boo.”
“You got it,” I say. “Which brings to mind number four on our list of promises: if I’m ever lost or missing, promise you’ll never stop looking for me until it’s been exactly three hundred sixty-five days. On day three sixty-six, accept that if I was alive I would’ve already found my way back to you, and that I’m long dead. I want you to go on with your life.”
She lifts away from the seat, bringing her foot back inside the car. “I don’t like that. Some people go missing and are found years later, alive and well.”
“Yeah, but that won’t be me,” I say. “Trust me, if it’s been a year, I’m dead.”
“OK, fine,” she says, slipping out of her seat belt and scooting over next to me. She lays her head on my shoulder. “Only if you agree to do the same for me. One year. Not a day more.”<
br />
“I promise,” I say, though I’m lying through my teeth. I would look for her until the day I died.
Camryn
23
It’s OK to lie about some things. This “promise” just happens to be one of them. There’s no way I could stop looking for him after one year. Truthfully, I’d never stop looking for him. This pact full of promises that we swore to keep is important to both of us, but I guess when it comes to some things, I’ll just have to openly agree and deal with things however I want if it ever comes to that.
Besides, I get the feeling he’s lying, too.
Andrew doesn’t know it, but that black-haired girl, Bray, I saw a couple of hours earlier in the restrooms not far from the beach. She ended up using my stall after me. We didn’t actually talk to one another, just passed each other with a friendly smile and that was it. I’m guessing that’s what motivated her to have her friends invite us to party with them.
I think it’ll be fun. Andrew and I spend one hundred percent of our time alone with each other, and I think it’ll be good for both of us to step out for a while and associate with others more. And he didn’t have any objections, so I’m guessing he probably thinks it couldn’t hurt, either.
The drive to this “private” spot feels more like an hour.
Their Jeep turns left onto a partially paved road and the farther we follow, the bumpier the drive. Their headlights bounce through the darkness in front of us until finally the tree-enveloped road opens up into a wide area of rocks and sand. Andrew pulls up beside them and shuts off the engine.
“Well, it’s definitely secluded,” I say as I get out of the car.
Andrew comes up next to me, gazing out at the deserted beach. He takes my hand. “We can turn back now, there’s still time,” he taunts me. “Once they get us away from the car, it might be the last time we ever see each other.” He squeezes my hand and pulls me closer to him playfully.
“I think we’ll manage,” I say just as the last of them pile out of the Jeep and meet us at the back of the vehicles.