Page 28 of Stops Along the Way
Amelia walks back with a tall cup of coffee, pausing beside me. “Do you have the address?” she asks them.
The guys nod, so I say out loud, “Yeah, they’ve got it.”
“Do you want to take the lead?” Grady asks. “I’m good either way.”
“Sure,” Amelia says. “We can stop about two hours in at a rest stop to switch drivers?”
“Probably a lot healthier than the long stretches we usually do,” Declan tells Grady.
“Cool,” I say, following Amelia to our car. I peek back over the hood to call out, “Um, just text me if we get separated.” I duck back down into the car and must’ve missed Declan saying something else, because he sends a text.
Declan:Or if I get bored?
Iris:That’s fine too!
On most drives together, Amelia and I usually saveWickedfor later on, when we need an adrenaline boost, but she cues it up right from the start. I honestly couldn’t tell you the actual plot of this musical, but I know almost every word of the soundtrack by heart, and the ones I don’t know, I can vocalize some random sounds that fill in the gaps well enough.
Amelia sings in the car with a lot of confidence, the lyrics increasing her focus on the road during long driving stretches, though at some points in the song, when belting out big moments, she’ll reach her hand across to grab my shoulder theatrically.
I’m glad to be the car in front, where Declan doesn’t have an easy view of me singing my lungs out…the way I do of him each time I glance back in the side mirror. At first, he seemed to be slumped against the seat, asleep, but now he and Grady are laughing about something. When he looks forward, I tell myself to stop wondering if he’s looking at me, because when I look at the cars in front of us, I can never see the people in them clearly. At the same time, I avoid looking back in hisdirection as we reach the end of theWickedsoundtrack, particularly during “As Long as You’re Mine.”
When “For Good” wraps up and we’ve still got another half hour to go until our first rest stop, Amelia asks, “Should we put on a podcast?” She puts a hand to her throat. “My voice is all scratchy after that.”
“You can listen to whatever,” I say. “I’ll stream to my hearing aids for a bit.”
It gives me a headache to listen to spoken audio over the car stereo rather than music, because I need it to be clear and direct for me to actually understand everything that’s being said, which, when combined with the noise of the car and the road, is no easy feat. But through the Bluetooth on my hearing aids, it’s not as much of a problem.
Also, Amelia chose a celebrity talk podcast, whereas I’ve got a new episode of medical mysteries I’ve been dying to listen to, which my sister doesn’t enjoy because they’re too detailed and make her queasy.
Declan:Whatcha up to?
The corners of my lips curl up. I turn to look into their car, where I find him yawning again, leaning back against his seat and looking at his phone. Waiting for a response from me? I bite my lip, trying not to look too pleased at this basic message—not that he nor my sister can see my expression right now anyway.
Iris:Listening to a podcast. What about you?
Declan:It’s NPR time…
Iris:Ooh
Declan:He thinks he might be mentioned soon. Well, the professor he helped with a research project will be mentioned, which counts apparently
Iris:Aww I hope they mention him!
Declan doesn’t respond for a while, but when I look back through the mirror, I see Grady low-key fist pumping the air.
Iris:Congrats???
Declan::gasp: are you spying on us?
Iris:Your SUV shook with joy
Declan:He’s pretty proud of himself. Fair warning, he’s going to have a lot of energy when we stop
The exit ramp to the rest stop veers off the highway, bringing us to a grassy area with a small building that has bathrooms and vending machines, as well as a short walking path that loops around the building among tall trees. There are only a couple other cars here, but they’re all parked close together right by the front entrance, with only one bigger truck parked farther down in the rows of empty spaces.
Grady parks a few spaces to the left of our car and immediately leaps out to do a set of jumping jacks. Amelia and I turnto look, and Declan notices her driving glasses as he climbs out of the SUV.
I expect Amelia to do the same dismissal of this as she did on campus, but she holds them in her hands as she steps into the parking space, giving me a pointed expression, likeHappy now?and she holds them up toward the guys. “These are just my driving lenses.”
