Amy & Roger's Epic Detour

Inside, it was cozy but very decorated. Everything seemed to match, and since it was a guesthouse, there were no personalized touches anywhere. But it was a real house, with a functioning kitchen, one bedroom downstairs, and two upstairs. Lucien showed us where the snacks were and how to use the air-conditioning unit, while I mostly just looked around, trying to take it all in.

“So I think that’s it. Just give me a call if you have any questions,” he said, writing down his cell number on the pristine whiteboard on the fridge. “And I guess I’ll see y’all tomorrow morning. If you want to come by the main house, breakfast is normally around nine.”

“This is great, man,” Roger said, looking as shell-shocked as I felt. “Thanks.”

“Sure,” he said, and was heading for the door when I spotted a thin silver laptop sitting on the kitchen table.

“Lucien,” I said. “Is that yours, or …?”

He turned back to look at it, and shook his head. “It’s the house’s,” he said. “But feel free to use it.” He made a vague gesture upward. “We’ve got Wi-Fi.”

“I’ll drive you back to the house,” said Roger, grabbing the keys.

“It’s okay,” Lucien said. “I’ll just grab one of the Jeeps, if that’s cool. See you tomorrow.” He lifted one hand in a wave and shut the door behind him.

In the silence that followed, I looked around, still a little stunned, then turned to Roger. “Remind me again how we got here?”

“I don’t know,” he said with a yawn. “I think you invited him to dinner.” He headed up the stairs, and I followed.

I grabbed my suitcase from where it had been left on the landing and gestured to the room closest to me. “I’ll take this one?”

“Sounds good,” Roger said, yawning again. He slung his duffel bag over his shoulder and headed for the bedroom a little ways down the hall. “I’m spent. ’Night, Hillary.”

I smiled at that. “’Night, Edmund.” I watched him disappear into his room and then headed for my own. Roger might have been exhausted—driving all day probably had something to do with it—but I was feeling strangely restless. I changed into gray sweat-pants with COLORADO COLLEGE printed in blue on one leg, and a navy tank top, marveling at how even Bronwyn’s loungewear was nicer than anything of mine. I headed downstairs, figuring that maybe I would go online, or watch the flat-screen, or make some popcorn. But when I saw the moonlight flooding in through the windows, I knew the only place I wanted to be was outside.

I stepped barefoot out into the still warm night and sat on the porch steps. I leaned back on my hands and looked up. The only light was coming from inside the house. There were no streetlights or city lights visible, and as a result, the stars just took over the sky. There was a riot of them, incredibly clear and seemingly closer than usual. The moon was almost full and seemed twice as big as normal. It provided so much light that the path back to the main house was still visible.

As I stared at the stars, I realized that there were always this many of them. It was only when the other lights were removed that I could see what had been there all along.

I don’t know how long I sat there, staring up at the sky, but it must have been a while, because I began to feel my neck developing a crick. As I stretched and stood up, I noticed a pair of headlights rounding the curve in the road, heading toward the guesthouse. As the car got closer, I saw it was an open Jeep painted white, with Lucien in the driver’s seat. He was steering with one hand, the other arm thrown over the back of the bench seat next to him. The Jeep drove past the guesthouse, then screeched to a stop and reversed until the car was in front of me.

“Hey,” he said, his expression surprised. Then he smiled at me. “Want to go for a ride?”

I looked at him, and the car idling. My first instinct was to say no. It was late, we were going to have to get up early, I wasn’t wearing a bra, and I didn’t have any shoes on. But I hesitated for only a second before heading down the stairs. Maybe this was a chance to find out where my sense of adventure was. “Sure,” I said. I pulled open the passenger door and climbed in. “Let’s go.”

I said, blue moon of Kentucky, keep on shining.

—Elvis Presley

We bounced along the road in silence. The Jeep was certainly bumpier than a car, and I held tightly to the roll bar above my head. There was something great, though, about being in an open-air vehicle and seeing all those stars above us as we moved along underneath them.

“Couldn’t sleep?” I asked after a moment.

“Nah,” he said. He rested the hand that wasn’t on the wheel on the roll bar. He seemed to drive exclusively with one hand, but was totally in control of the car. Which wasn’t surprising, since he’d told us at dinner that he’d learned to drive on the property when he was ten. “I don’t know. There’s just something about being in an empty house….”

“I know,” I said automatically. He looked over at me, eyebrows raised in surprise. I thought about backing down, muttering some half-baked explanation and pretending I hadn’t said anything. But I had said something. I took a breath. “I, um, was alone in my house for all of May. So I know what it’s like.”

“For a month?” Lucien asked, and I nodded. “Where was your family?”

The question should have been expected. But it hit me hard, as I had been wondering pretty much the same thing for the past three months. “Well,” I said, looking out at the grounds and not at him, “my brother was …” I hadn’t told anyone that Charlie was in rehab, sticking to my mother’s story. My mother had never even said the word aloud to me, always just calling it “the facility.” “He went to North Carolina,” I said, hoping Lucien wouldn’t ask why and forcing myself to keep going. Like the sharks that died when they stopped swimming, I knew I wouldn’t be able to keep talking if I stopped to hear what I was saying. “And my mother had to go to Connecticut to get our new house set up. And my father … my father died.” I pressed my lips together hard after saying that, feeling my chin trembling after just saying the word.

“I am so sorry,” Lucien said. And like before, he seemed to really mean what he said.

“Thank you,” I said, meaning that, too. “I’m just trying to …”