Page 59 of People We Meet on Vacation

“Aspire to get out of bed.”

“You poooooor thing,” I moan. “Trapped in bed with a book—your personal hell!—while I rub menthol on your back and hand deliver you your ideal breakfastandlunch.”

Alex makes the puppy face.

“Unfair!” I say. “You know I can’t use self-defense against you right now!”

“Okay,” he says. “I’ll stop until you’re comfortable causing me bodily harm again.”

“When did this start happening?” I ask.

“I don’t know,” he says. “I guess a couple months after Croatia?”

The word lands like a firework in the middle of my chest. I try to keep my face placid but have no idea how I’m faring. He, for his part, shows no sign of discomfort. “Do you know why?” I recover.

“I hunch a lot?” he says. “Especially when I’m reading or on my computer. A massage therapist told me my hip muscles were probably shortening, pulling on my back. I don’t know. My doctor just prescribed me muscle relaxants, then left before I could think of any questions.”

“And it happens a lot?” I say.

“Not a lot,” he says. “This is the fourth or fifth time. It happens less when I’m exercising regularly. I guess sitting on the plane and in the car and all that... and then the chair bed.”

“Makes sense.”

After a moment, he asks, “You okay?”

“I guess I just...” I trail off, unsure how much I want to say. “I feel like I missed a lot.”

His head tilts back against the pillows, and his eyes wander down my face. “Me too.”

A half-hearted laugh rises out of me. “No, you didn’t. My life’s exactly the same.”

“That’s not true,” he says. “You cut your hair.”

This time, the laugh is more genuine, and a contained smile curves over Alex’s lips. “Yeah, well,” I say, fighting a blush as I feel his gaze move over my bare shoulder, down the length of my arm to where my hand rests on the bed near his knee. “I didn’t get a house or buy my own dishwasher or anything. I doubt I’ll ever be able to.”

His eyebrow arches, and his eyes retrain on my face. “You don’t want to,” he says quietly.

“Yeah, you’re probably right,” I say, but honestly I’m unsure. That’s the problem. I haven’t wanted the things I used to want,the things I wanted when I made just about every big life decision I’ve made. I’m still paying off student loans for a degree I didn’t finish, and even if I saved myself another year-and-a-half’s worth of tuition, lately I find myself wondering ifthatwas the right choice.

I fled Linfield. I fled the University of Chicago, and if I’m being honest, I sort of fled Alex when everything happened. He fled me too, but I can’t place all the blame on him.

I was terrified. I ran. And I left it up to him to fix it.

“Remember when we went to San Francisco, and we kept saying ‘when in Rome’ whenever we wanted to buy something?” I ask.

“Maybe,” he says, sounding uncertain. I’m guessing my expression must be something along the lines ofcrushed, because he apologetically adds, “I don’t have a great memory.”

“Yeah,” I say. “That makes sense.”

He coughs. “Do you want to watch something, or are you going back out?”

“No,” I say, “let’s watch something. If I go back to the Palm Springs Art Museum, I think the FBI will be waiting for me.”

“Why, did you steal something priceless?” Alex asks.

“I won’t know until I have it appraised,” I joke. “Hopefully this Claude Moan-ay guy turns out to be a big deal.”

Alex laughs and shakes his head, and even that small gesture seems to cost him a shock of pain. “Shit,” he says. “You have to stop making me laugh.”

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