The Road Trip by Beth O'Leary (grave mercy .txt) 📕

before. When my ex tried to bring up the love thing I would usually find a reason to slip away: an empty drink, a friend across the room, a passing spider. And before him, there was nobody serious. I wonder whether Dylan’s ever said it before.

‘I sense some thoughts are occurring,’ Dylan says, nuzzling into my neck. ‘Are you about to head off to the Intermarché?’

I laugh at that, though I hadn’t realised he noticed me slipping off when things felt too intense.

‘No supermarket necessary,’ I say. ‘I guess it’s just . . . I mean, you’re going travelling now, so . . . What does this even mean?’

I kiss him then, because I can hear the need in my voice. I don’t like it. I don’t want to think about how much I’ll miss him.

‘It means we’ll talk all the time on the phone, and on Skype. I’ll send you poems on postcards. I’ll come find you the moment I’m back in England,’ Dylan says. He smooths back my hair. ‘But . . . I could stay here for the rest of the summer instead? Should I stay?’ He pulls back slightly.

I could say yes. Miss out on your summer plans, don’t go to Thailand and Vietnam, stay here with me. I could tell him what to do. He’d do it – if there’s one thing I’ve seen this week, it’s that Dylan is easily led.

For a moment the temptation tugs at me. It would be such a small thing to do it. Like a foot slipping, the brush of a hand.

‘No,’ I say, pressing my lips to his. ‘You go. Don’t let me mess up your plans. This summer’s about figuring out what you want, right? So go figure. And then come find me when you’re done.’

Dylan

For the rest of the summer, we travel, Marcus and I. My shoulders become accustomed to the stinging ache of the backpack’s weight; I lose count of the number of wonders I try to comprehend, beaches so white they look like snow, jungles so lush the path you took yesterday has to be recut with a machete the next day. Boat rides and cramped trains and the yells of marketplaces, bartering and sweating and drinking and wondering what the hell I’m doing with my life and always, always missing Addie.

I should be having the summer of my life, but wherever we are, I’m lost. With Addie, for those beautiful, sun-soaked weeks in Provence, I felt myself take shape – falling in love with Addie took the whole of me, and for once I felt completely happy with where and who I was.

I thought I’d leave France and take that with me, but I left it there with her. Some days, once again, to my disgust, I struggle to even get out of bed; I’m as formless and fretful as ever, always one line away from a finished poem, always a step behind Marcus. Always disappointing my father.

He rings me when I’m at Phnom Penh airport. Addie will be going home to Chichester in three days; Marcus has gone off somewhere in search of bottled water, and I’m staring at the departures board. We’re due to leave for Preah Sihanouk for our last week before heading home, but . . . perhaps I could just leave now. Be waiting for Addie at the airport when she returns, see the joy on her face when she catches sight of me in the waiting crowd and sets off at a run to throw herself into my arms.

‘You better be coming home,’ Dad says, when I pick up.

It’s late August. According to our original plan, we should have been home weeks ago – but what was the point of going back to the UK while Addie was still in France?

‘Nice to hear from you, Dad,’ I say. The tone is less sharp than I’d intended – I cop out at the last minute and end up sounding quite pleasant.

‘Enough nonsense. This trip to Europe has escalated ridiculously.’

I scowl. ‘I only stayed a few extra weeks.’

‘You’ve missed all the deadlines for graduate schemes. What are you doing, Dylan? When are you going to grow up?’

I lift my gaze to the ceiling. The criss-crossed strip lights leave a garish tartan pattern on the inside of my eyelids. There’s no need for me to say anything – Dad will say what he wants to say, irrespective of my responses, or lack thereof.

‘You’re planning on living at home, I presume. As much as you’re planning anything. Your mother says it’s no use buying you a flat in London yet, and I’m inclined to agree with her. You haven’t earned it, frankly.’

Mum wants me to decide for myself if London is where I want to be. In some ways, her quiet faith that I’ll figure my life out is almost worse than my father’s absolute conviction that I won’t.

‘We’ll talk it all through properly once you’re back, but I’m sure I’ll be able to find you something in the business – though you’ll have to commute to London, which won’t be easy.’

I feel the life eking out of me as the call goes on. I’m a toy version of a man, flopped in my seat, waiting for someone to lift my strings and jerk me into life.

Marcus ambles back to me with two water bottles; his hair is longer than ever, dry and sun-streaked, and his clothes badly need washing. He grins at me and throws me a bottle from too far away – I can’t catch it with the phone to my ear, and it hits me in the stomach.

I do know, on some level, that this problem of mine is not real. I have a whole world of opportunities in front of me. I can do anything I want, more so than almost any other being on this planet, probably.

But the dread doesn’t seem to know it. The dread just knows that the future is enormous, and awful,