The Edge of Always

“I’ll promise, if you will,” I say.

“As always,” she says.

“Number eight,” I go on, “don’t bury me where it’s cold.”

“Fully agreed. Me either!”

She wipes more sweat from her face and I lift away from the hood, reaching out my hand to her. “Let’s sit inside, out of the sun.”

She takes my hand and I help her down.

Two hours later, the tow truck still hasn’t showed up and it’s starting to get dark. Looks like we’ll get to watch the sunset together over the barren Texas landscape.

“I knew it,” Camryn says. “What the hell is it with the tow trucks?”

And just when she says that, a set of blinding headlights comes down the highway toward us. Overly relieved, we get out to meet him and the first thing I notice is the same thing Camryn notices. The guy could be Billy Frank’s doppelganger. She and I glance at each other, but we don’t comment out loud.

“You need a tow or a tire?” he asks, thumbing the straps of his denim overalls.

“Just the tire,” I say as I follow him around to the back of his truck.

“Well, I don’ have much time to stay here while ya change it,” he says and then spits chewing tobacco on the road. “You two’ll be all right?”

“Yeah, we’ll be fine,” I say. “But wait one second.” I hold up my finger and lean into the car to turn the key. When the engine starts without a problem, I shut it off and walk back over to him. “Just wanted to make sure it started.”

I pay the doppelganger and watch his truck’s brake lights fade into the darkening horizon as he drives away. When I walk back to the car where I left the tire, I’m shocked as hell to see Camryn already lifting the car up with the jack.

“Hell yeah, that’s my girl!”

She smiles up at me, but keeps on working at it, that blonde braid draped over one shoulder.

“It’s not so difficult,” she says, now rolling the new tire over after managing to get the lug nuts off the old one by herself. I think I’m getting a hard-on. No, wait, I’ve definitely got a hard-on.

“No, it really isn’t,” I finally reply, my smile getting bigger.

Several minutes later, she’s letting the car back down and tossing the jack into the trunk. I lift the old tire for her and throw it back there, too.

We get inside and just sit here.

It’s so quiet. Enormous streaks of pinkish-purple and blue cirrus clouds are cluttered together in the sky, stretching far over the horizon. As the heat of the day wears off, the mild breeze of approaching nightfall funnels through the opened car windows. The sunset is beautiful. Honestly, I’ve never paid much attention to one before. Maybe it’s the company.

And I’m not sure what’s happening right now between us, but whatever it is, we’re so synced with each other that we both share it. I look at her. She looks at me.

“Are you ready to go back?” I ask.

“Yeah.” She pauses, looking toward the windshield, lost in thought. Then she turns back to me, more sure now than she was just seconds ago. “Yeah, I think I’m ready to go home.” She smiles.

And for the first time since I left Galveston on my own that day, or when Camryn boarded that bus in Raleigh that night, we finally feel… fulfilled.

32

I guess we really did come full circle. But I have to say, now that we’re finally back in Galveston after seven months, it feels different this time. I’m not worried about being here, or afraid that mine and Andrew’s time together is going to end. I’m not waiting for a medical tragedy to rear its ugly head at any given moment. It feels good to be here. And as we pull into the parking area of his apartment complex, I feel a sense of satisfaction. I can even picture myself living here. But then again, I can also picture myself living in Raleigh, too. I guess what this means is that maybe we are ready to settle down. Just for a little while. Never forever, like I told Andrew before, but long enough that we can recuperate from being on the road.

Andrew agrees. “Yeah,” he says grabbing our bags from the backseat. “Y’know what?” He drops the bags back in the same place and looks over the top of the roof at me.

“What?” I ask curiously.

His eyes are smiling. “You’re right about not wanting to be on the road so long that we get tired of it, or staying fixed in one place for too long for the same reason.” He pauses and stretches his arms over the roof of the car. “Maybe if we only travel in the spring or summer, leave the fall and winter for living at home and doing the family thing during the holidays—my mom was pretty upset that we didn’t spend Christmas or Thanksgiving with her.”

I nod. “That’s a good idea. And since it sucks traveling when it’s cold, that makes total sense.”

We just stare at each other over the roof of the car for a long moment until I interrupt all of the gear- churning inside our heads and say, “Well, get the bags. We can talk about it inside. You need to check on Georgia.”

“Ah, Georgia’s fine,” he says, leaning over inside the backseat again. “My mom’s been watering her.”

I grab the guitars and my purse. When we enter Andrew’s apartment, it smells exactly like it did the first time I ever came here: vacant. And just like Andrew said, Georgia is alive and well.

I practically fall onto the couch, exhausted, hanging my legs over the arm at the knees.

“But the next place we go,” Andrew says as he passes the back of the couch, “will be far away from here.” I hear his keys hit the top of the counter in the kitchen.

I rise up and call out, “How far?”

“Europe, South America,” he says with a big grin as he reenters the living room. “You said you’d like to see Italy and Brazil and all of those places. I say we pick one and go there next.”

A shot of energy zips through my body. I stand up and look at him, so excited right now about the prospect that I can hardly contain it. “Seriously?”

He nods with a giant, close-lipped smile. “Hell, staying true to tradition, we could even write down all of the places we want to see on little strips of paper, drop them in a hat and pick one at random.”

I squeal. I actually squeal! My hands come up vertically against my chest. “That’s perfect, Andrew!”

He sits down on the couch now, propping both feet up on the coffee table, his knees bent. I can’t sit down. I stay right where I’m at and just stare down at his smiling face.

“Of course, we’ve got to keep the money flowing,” he says. “We’ve still got plenty in the bank, but traveling out of the country will definitely drain it quicker.”

“I can’t wait to get a job,” I say, and that comment stimulates my memory. “Andrew, you told me before to be completely honest with you about where I’d rather live.”

That gets his attention. “Where do you want to live?”

I contemplate it for a moment and answer, “For now, I think Raleigh, but only because I’d like to be where Natalie and my mom are, and because I know I can easily get a job where Natalie works. Her boss really seemed to like me and told me to fill out an application and—”

Andrew stops me. “You don’t have to explain your reasons.” He reaches out for me and I sit on his lap, facing him. I didn’t realize I was babbling nervously. I just don’t want him to feel obligated.

He smiles at me and locks his fingers together behind my waist. “My question,” he says, “is what exactly do you mean by ‘for now’?”

“Well… that’s the hard part,” I say.

He tilts his head slightly to one side, looking at me curiously, his dimples barely visible in his cheeks.

Eventually, I just come out with it, “I don’t think we should spend all of the money on a house because I