Page 75 of The Forbidden Summer
Van curls into me again, his head tucked beneath my chin, arms around my waist like he’s staking a claim.
“We’ll need a journal,” he says suddenly, voice muffled against my chest. “To keep track of every place we go. What we see. Who we meet.”
“And what we eat,” I add. “You know I won’t remember a single landmark, but I’ll know exactly where we had the best pie.”
Van snorts, the sound warm against my skin. “You’re such an old man.”
“You’re the one who wants to visit the biggest ball of yarn,” I tease, running a hand down his warm, bare back.
He hums contentedly. “It’s not about the yarn.”
“I know,” I whisper.
It’s about freedom. About making new memories to balance the ones that hurt. It’s about choosing each other over and over, no matter where the road bends.
He lifts his head, eyes soft and wide open. “Let’s start now.”
“Now?”
“Yeah.” He kisses me, his soft tongue tangling with mine for the briefest moment before he pulls away, leaving me hungry formore. “Even if we don’t leave for weeks. Let’s live like we already chose this life.”
A slow smile spreads across my face. “We did.”
Van stands, pulls me up with him, and together we step outside, barefoot on the porch, the lake winking in the distance. The world is wide open.
He laces his fingers through mine.
The first chapter begins.
Van
Three Months Later
Turns out, Père snores like a dying lawnmower when we park near the ocean. Something about all that salt air and his sinuses.
I learned this at 2:13 a.m., somewhere outside Corpus Christi, while clutching a pillow over my head and reconsidering my life choices. Not really—I wouldn’t trade this for anything—but IdidGoogle "RV-compatible noise-canceling headgear"before sunrise.
By morning, he’s making coffee shirtless, humming off-key to some classic rock song, and just like that, I forgive him. Again. Like I always do.
The road stretches out ahead of us, the windows wide open, the day young. And despite the snoring and his criminally bad singing, I can’t stop smiling.
We’re out here, chasing sunshine. Together. Writing our own story with our own happy ending.
By noon, we’re deep into west Texas, where the roads are straight, the sky is endless, and the cows outnumber people ten to one. Père insists we stop at a place calledBuckaroo Bill’s World Famous Rattlesnake Emporium, which—spoiler alert—does not have air conditioning, butdoeshave a live snake pit and a snack bar that sells deep-fried pickles and something labeled “mystery meat on a stick.”
Naturally, he tries the mystery meat.
Naturally, he regrets it.
“I think I’m dying,” he groans two hours later, sprawled on the tiny RV couch, one hand on his stomach, the other dramatically flung across his forehead like a Victorian widow.
“You’re not dying,” I say, steering us toward a rest stop. “You ate a questionable skewer labeled‘Bill’s Surprise’.That’s not death. That’s math.”
He mutters something about my lack of bedside manner and how luck favors the young, then suddenly bolts for the bathroom. I offer a quiet prayer for the RV’s plumbing.
Later, as we sit outside under a blazing sunset, he sips ginger ale with a grimace and says, “Youwillmention this in the journal, won’t you?”
“Oh, I plan to illustrate it.”
