Road Rage

The blue Nissan Rogue squatted low in the driveway beneath a mountain of luggage..Jon stood with his hands on his hips and stared at it for a long moment. Three suitcases sat side by side in the cargo area. Two overstuffed duffel bags were wedged around them. A blue cooler occupied the remaining floor space, while a backpack packed with enough snacks to survive a small apocalypse rested on top.

Tucked into one corner was a camera bag they had both insisted was essential and would almost certainly never open. The back of the Nissan Rogue looked less like the vehicle of two adults taking a vacation and more like a family fleeing an approaching natural disaster. And somehow, despite all of that, Brandi was emerging from the front door carrying another tote.

"Absolutely not," Jon said.

Brandi laughed. "It's one bag."

He ran his hands through his hair. "You said that about the last three bags."

"It's a road trip. We're going to be gone three weeks." She smiled.

"We are not climbing Everest," he pointed out.

She rolled her eyes and squeezed past him. The tote disappeared into the cargo area with the rest of the luggage. The Rogue groaned slightly. Twenty years together, and she could still make him laugh when he was trying very hard not to. For a moment, he simply watched her.

Twenty years had a way of disappearing when nobody was paying attention. Twenty years of alarm clocks before sunrise. Twenty years of jobs they tolerated because somebody had to pay the mortgage. Twenty years of bills arriving with relentless punctuality. Twenty years of unexpected expenses appearing the moment they finally managed to save a little money.

Family emergencies became hospital visits. Hospital visits became bills. Appliances always seemed to fail at the worst possible moment. There were car repairs, roof repairs, water heaters that died without warning, and credit cards that carried one emergency until the next one arrived. Life never collapsed all at once.

Instead, it chipped away at their plans in small, reasonable pieces. Every problem seemed temporary. Every expense seemed necessary. Every delay seemed sensible. By itself, none of it felt significant. Together, it quietly consumed twenty years.

Somewhere along the way, they had started promising each other that they would take a real vacation someday. They would travel someday. They would finally take the honeymoon they never had someday. The promise had followed them through apartments, houses, promotions, setbacks, and entire decades. Someday had quietly become twenty years. Until now.

Brandi shut the rear hatch and brushed her hands together. "There."

Jon pointed at her. "That's everything?"

Brandi smiled sheepishly. "I have one more bag."

She laughed and headed back inside. Jon shook his head. The sound faded as he looked down the street. The neighborhood was quiet. The same neighborhood where they had spent most of their marriage. For twenty years, their world had gradually shrunk until it was just a handful of familiar places.

They drove the same streets past the same houses and spent their days following the same routines. The weeks blended together until entire years seemed to disappear without notice. There was comfort in that familiarity, but there was also a quiet kind of exhaustion.

Somewhere along the way, they had stopped looking beyond the horizon and started measuring their lives in work schedules, grocery lists, and weekends that ended before they truly began. Lately, it sometimes felt as though their entire lives had become routines.

The routine had become so familiar that neither of them really noticed it anymore. They woke up, went to work, came home, ate dinner, watched television, and went to bed. Then they did it again the next day. The rhythm was comfortable, predictable, and safe, but it was also relentless.

Weeks became months. Months became years. Before either of them realized what was happening, entire stretches of their lives had passed in a blur of ordinary days that were impossible to distinguish from one another.

They still loved each other. At least he believed they did. That wasn't the problem. The problem was that somewhere along the way, they had stopped living. The trip had been Brandi's idea.

They had given themselves three weeks and only one real rule, keep driving west until they reached the Pacific Ocean. After that, they would turn around and make the long journey home. There was no itinerary beyond that, no reservations, no checklists, no pressure to maximize every hour. For the first time in years, neither of them wanted a plan.

They simply wanted to go. More importantly, they wanted to leave everything else behind. There would be no schedules dictating every minute of their day, no obligations waiting for them when they woke up, no work emails demanding attention, no hospital shifts, and no deadlines hanging over their heads.

For three weeks, it would be just the two of them crossing the country together. The idea felt strangely romantic, not because it would return them to the way things used to be, but because it might help them rediscover the version of that past they had spent twenty years remembering.

The screen door opened again. Brandi emerged carrying a pillow. Jon stared. "You packed a pillow."

"I like my pillow," she confessed.

"We are staying in hotels," he pointed out.

She pointed at him. "Don't start."

Jon laughed despite himself. Brandi tossed the pillow into the back seat. For a moment they stood together beside the vehicle. The excitement was finally beginning to feel real. They were actually leaving, not next year, not next month, but today.

Brandi slipped her hand into his. "You nervous?"

Jon considered the question. "A little." The honest answer surprised him. "About us."

Brandi looked down. Neither spoke for several seconds. A breeze rustled through the trees. Somewhere a dog barked. Their marriage wasn't falling apart. But lately it felt like they were two people standing on opposite sides of a widening crack, pretending not to notice it.

Finally Brandi squeezed his hand. "We're going to be okay." She leaned against him. "You know what this really is?" "Our honeymoon." Brandi slipped her hand into his. "You realize we've never actually done this."

Jon smiled. "We've taken vacations."

"Not like this." She shook her head. "We got married on a Saturday and went back to work on Monday."

"We couldn't afford anything else, Jon admitted.

"We couldn't afford anything." She laughed. "We spent our wedding night worrying about rent."

"That sounds like us."

"It does."

Jon closed the rear hatch and stepped back to admire the SUV one last time. Three weeks of luggage, snacks, and good intentions were somehow packed into a vehicle that suddenly looked much smaller than it had an hour ago. For a moment they stood together in the driveway, looking at the blue Rogue waiting beside the curb.

Most couples took their honeymoon at the beginning. They had waited through twenty years of putting life first and themselves second. Twenty years of telling each other there would be time later. Twenty years of believing that once they got past the next obstacle, things would finally slow down.

Brandi squeezed his hand. "Think we're doing this backwards?"

Jon looked at her familiar face that had somehow become more beautiful with every year they spent together. "Ready?"

"Yeah," she said. "I am." Brandi opened the passenger door. "Your turn to drive."

Jon glanced at the open road beyond the neighborhood. Then he looked back at his wife. As they climbed into the Rogue and pulled away from the curb, both of them understood that this trip was more than a vacation. It was a last attempt to find each other again.