Page 48 of Date and Switch

Date and Switch Day 123

It’s been an interesting few weeks for Sera and me. The ship had to do a bit of a switcheroo with ports and destinations, and we find ourselves eating our way through Italy. I say we’re on vacation, live it up! That’s what an onboard tailor is for, am I right?

After Roma (see, I spoke that in Italian) we headed up the Amalfi coast and will be stopping in Paris before touring some of the more famous European cities. Speaking of speaking in Italian, a fun little fact for you. Sera speaks Italian fluently. Something about her classical training and it being a requirement.

Now that we’re back to docking in a port every night our updates on the blog and Instagram will more be more frequent. We don’t have any information yet on when we’ll be circling back to pick up the ports of call we skipped over, but hopefully we’ll be able to catch them all at the tail end of our trip.

I still never found out how we’re supposed to sign off of this thing.

Bryce & Sera, present location—in a carb coma, leaving Eat-a-ly and heading towards the city of love.

* * *

I thought telling Sera I loved her would bring a heavy dose of guilt or some kind of dark brooding feeling that seemed to happen whenever I felt myself getting too close to her. Eight days of food, wine, and lots of sex. Not a single regret over telling her what I’d felt waiting to be voiced for some time. She was sunshine epitomized. For so many of the darkest days I’d had since the end of my relationship with Sarah with an h, Seraphim was the lighthouse that guided me out of the darkness.

The last time I’d updated the blog, Raven went apeshit over how popular my post had been. Apparently our “fans” loved that I made a cameo so now Sera and I switched off on posting, both on the blog and for our Instagram page. While I would never admit it to a single soul, coming up with little quippy things to say about our travels had actually become quite enjoyable.

Our itinerary had the ship docked in Paris for two full days, and there were quite the list of things I wanted to experience with Sera. Thankfully, Esther worked her magic as usual, and managed to help make every suggestion on my list a reality. While I waited for Sera to finish up her shower, I checked in with office and replied to the few emails Esther had marked important. Penn’s iMessage still showed he was active, despite it being after one in the morning in Chicago.

* * *

Me: wtf are you doing up this late on a school night?

Me: Don’t tell me you’re actually…working?

Penn: Yeah, because you’re the only one in this family with responsibilities.

Penn: Being in a different time zone from nearly all of my properties is the shits. Once you get back, we really need to reconfigure territories. Especially if you plan to stay on the East coast.

Me: If we are going to expand into Europe everything will need to be reconfigured because I’ll need you helping me run things on the international level. We’ll need to bring some of the senior managers up to the executive level.

* * *

Penn: Sure. Makes sense. Where are you now? Still no word on why you got diverted out of Asia and the Indian ocean.

Penn: Never mind, the blog just hit. Paris. City of LOVE? Smooth brother. People are going fucking nuts over that picture of the two of you at the opera last week.

* * *

Me: Sera looked beautiful, didn’t she? I don’t think I’ve ever enjoyed the opera more. I think La Traviata might be my favorite. Hmm. No second favorite. Turandot still holds the number one spot.

* * *

Penn: I need to get something off my chest Rye.

* * *

Me: Oh, good! Is today air our grievances day? I’ve been holding on to some of these for a good ten years.

Me: You’re forty years old, it’s time to actually get a haircut that makes you look your age instead of a born-again Tony Hawk fan.

Me: Even Tony Hawk doesn’t look like Tony Hawk anymore.

Me: Anyone born after 1985 literally has no idea who you’re trying to look like.

* * *

Penn: Hey! This isn’t about me. And my wife loves my hair.

---