40
C aleb decides not to return for school in the fall and officially drops out with zero regrets, though it does result in a nasty argument with his parents over the phone. But even his parents can’t dampen our spirits. We make the Dolomites our home base from which to launch our travels around Europe. We both manage to get jobs. Caleb serves at a little restaurant in town that specializes in Tyrolean dumplings, and I find work at a farm.
One day when Caleb and I are out for a bike ride, a huge hound wearing a bowtie starts chasing us. It follows us up a hill, where we meet Martine and Dax, hobby farmers who take in and rehabilitate abused or neglected animals with the aim of putting them up for adoption. I spend the entire day there, in heaven with the animals. And by the time I leave, they offer me a part-time job.
I help with whatever they need, refilling water bowls, washing blankets, playing with the dogs, and assisting with clerical work.
Martine tells me I have a special way with the dogs, and it occurs to me that maybe this is what I want to do. Maybe this is my path. Work with dogs. Maybe become a trainer, own a kennel, and open up a rescue eventually. It’s not that I hadn’t considered it, but it never seemed like a viable path. More like a pipe dream. Until now. Caleb thinks it’s an excellent idea, although we don’t discuss that it’s not a career conducive to traveling for long periods of time. That seems like a problem for future us.
For the next six months, we use our days off to travel around Switzerland, Germany, and Austria. We challenge ourselves to the most extreme hikes. Winter arrives early in the north, so Caleb wants to hit as many trails as possible before the snow comes.
I develop killer calves and muscle tone in places I didn’t even realize I could. It’s only when we’re hiking the Tofana di Mezzo with some hostel friends (our fourth hike in two weeks) that my body decides it’s done. I take a misstep on a loose rock, and a sharp twinge of pain shoots through my knee. I shift awkwardly before I can utter a sound, and my legs give way.
“Shit. Are you okay?” Caleb asks, clutching my arm to help me up.
“No, I can’t stand,” I manage through a wince. The pain is intense, like a lightning bolt radiating up my leg.
Caleb carries me on his back to the hostel. But by the time we get ice on my knee, it’s already massively swollen. The next day, I’m still unable to put weight on it, which sucks since we’d planned another big hike. To be honest, after all our adventuring, I could use a little quiet time. I suggest we watch a movie at the hostel. Hovering over my iPad in our crappy, creaky hostel bed with my leg propped up isn’t exactly an ideal night in. But it feels like a luxury after being on the go for so long.
We select a heist film, one where they drive flashy cars all over Europe that Caleb seemed intrigued by. Only twenty minutes in and he’s bored. He’s tapping his knee, fidgeting. Usually, he’s in a good mood. But he seems down and irritated.
I can’t help but imagine watching this with Teller. We would have already dissected how unrealistic the car stunts are, or bickered about who would drive (me, obviously) and who would shoot (also me) in the event of a high-speed chase.
“Sorry,” Caleb says when I ask what’s wrong. “I haven’t watched TV in ages. My attention span is shot.”
“Usually people try to detox from screen time, not nature,” I tease.
He doesn’t smile. “It just really sucks your knee isn’t going to be better for the hike tomorrow,” he says, pouting like a child being told they can’t go outside for recess.
“I know. I really wanted to go on that hike.” It’s a lie. Even if I could, I don’t really want to go. I’m burned out and just need to sit still for a bit. But now doesn’t feel like the time to admit that.
Caleb is quiet for a few minutes, trying to watch the movie. But he finally gets so antsy, he has to stand. “Wanna go play some Frisbee or something?”
“I can’t run with my knee,” I remind him.
“Shit. True. How about just a walk around?”
“There are stairs and cobblestone literally everywhere,” I point out, frustrated by his inability to comprehend my handicap. I know he doesn’t intend it, but he’s making me feel bad for being injured. Like I’m putting him out, holding him back from life or something.
He lets out a sigh and turns a wistful gaze toward the window. “Can we at least go sit by the lake or something?”
It’s December, so the weather is frigid. The last thing I feel like doing is bundling up in my snow gear.
It makes me think back to Cinque Terre. Sure, we did some relaxing on the beach, but it was always after an exhausting day. And it was never long before Caleb ran into the water, desperate to move. At first, Caleb’s “always on the go” persona was exhilarating. But lately, it’s exhausting.
“You could still go, you know,” I finally say. “On the hike tomorrow.”
He perks up and leans forward, shifting his weight on his elbow. “And leave you?”
“I’m fine,” I assure stiffly. “Bianca wants to have a FaceTime date anyway. And I could probably use the rest.” Now, I know it’s unfair of me, but I kind of expect him to protest. Not because I want him to stay, but because it just doesn’t feel like the right thing to do. Leave your injured kind-of-girlfriend behind to go hiking.
But he doesn’t. “You really wouldn’t mind?”
I shift my gaze to my lap. “Nope,” I say, because I don’t have a choice.
While he’s hiking, I spend the afternoon in bed, resting and commiserating with Bianca about my injury. She’s finally healed and back on her feet, but she knows how it feels to be sidelined. After we’re done comparing wounds, she gushes about how I’m living the dream and how jealous she is that I’m not coming back to school.
“Where’s Caleb?” she asks, sipping a cup of hot chocolate in front of her parents’ fireplace. I count four fluffy-looking stockings hanging behind her.
“On a hike.”
“Oh. And he just went without you?”
“Yeah. But I told him to. I don’t need him here with me at all times,” I say quickly, realizing what my real beef is. I’m not actually annoyed that he went on the hike. He’s allowed to do things without me. What irks me is his shift in attitude since I injured myself. He’s less patient, seemingly annoyed and inconvenienced by me.
“I’d have killed Chris if he left me here to rot all by my lonesome.” Turns out, he’s not her flavor of the week. They’ve been serious since I left for Italy. To his credit, he’s been wonderful. He brought her food and helped with errands while her foot was healing over the summer. And they’ve been loyal to each other ever since.
“Do you think it’s selfish of him?” I dare to ask. I gnaw on the inside of my mouth, ridden with guilt for speaking about Caleb like that.
She tilts her head. “Kind of. But we can’t all be perfect, can we? I mean, he’s great in every other way. At least he’s straight up and honest with you about his feelings, unlike someone else.”
She’s referring to Teller, of course. When I told her about how Teller confessed he was secretly in love with me this whole time, she upgraded her one-way ticket on the Caleb train. Bianca likes a straight shooter.
“Speaking of, I meant to text you this earlier, but I thought you’d rather hear it over the phone. I saw Teller. He is way taller and hotter in person. I think he has one of those faces that look better in motion—”
She stops when my mouth falls open. I haven’t allowed myself to think about him for more than a few fleeting moments in months. It’s also a defense mechanism, because him no longer being in my life is too painful to think about. Admittedly, avoiding that reality has been easier than expected, probably because I’m across the world, distracted. I know being back at home will be another story. And I plan on putting that off as long as possible. “My Teller?”
“Is there another Teller?” Bianca asks.
“Technically, the doctor he’s named after,” I point out, not that Bianca knows that whole story. “But that’s beside the point. Where did you see him?”
“At his mom’s coffee shop. He’s home for Christmas break, I guess. Super random, huh?”
Not entirely random. It makes sense he’d take a few shifts if he were home for Christmas. But last year, he spent Christmas with Sophie. Does that mean they bro ...? No. I’m overthinking it. They’re probably doing Christmas at Teller’s this year. Not that I should care.
Apparently, Bianca’s a mind reader, because she says, “Actually, I haven’t seen Sophie post anything about Teller in a while. Maybe they broke up.” That’s news to me. I unfollowed Sophie months ago to avoid the temptation to snoop. Bianca did not get that memo, apparently.
“Did he recognize you?” I ask. Technically, they’ve never met, aside from a FaceTime chat last fall.
“Yup. Well, only after I asked if he was the Teller. He asked how you were doing and I told him you were thriving, never been better.”
I cringe. Bianca can be a bit heavy-handed. “How did he seem?”
“Normal? I don’t really have a baseline, though. He seemed happy to know you were doing well.” She pauses for a beat to study my reaction. “Please don’t be sad about it. I knew I shouldn’t have brought it up.”
“No, no!” I argue. “I’m not sad. I’m perfectly fine,” I say, forcing a smile with all my might.
“Don’t smile like that. You look like the Crypt Keeper.”
I right my face. “Sorry.”
“Anyway, like I said, I know you and Teller have history. It’s hard to ignore that. But here’s the deal—you two had the opportunity to get together for four years. You were both single when you first met. But nothing happened. That’s not by accident. Timing never worked out, and there’s a reason for that.”
I blow the air out of my cheeks, mentally exhausted all over again. “I know.”
“And! Let’s not forget, he hid his feelings from you for years and dated some other chick at the same time. That’s some serious coward behavior. You don’t need that in your life.”
“I don’t need that in my life,” I repeat, mostly to appease her.
There’s a knot in my gut when we hang up. A knot that I’d uncoiled when he left. And now it’s back. It lingers the next day, and the day after that, as Caleb goes out and adventures while I hang back and rest my knee. Every day he returns eager to tell me about the people he met, the sights he saw, the food he ate, how he can’t wait until I’m healed and ready to go again.
Thrilled as I am for him, I have two realizations: 1) That I don’t care if I ever go on another hike again. Don’t get me wrong, the odd hike is fun, but I don’t see this becoming my identity like Caleb’s or some of the hard-core people we’ve met with ice picks and spikes on their boots. 2) That I feel a little resentful about being left alone for days on end. Because now that Teller is back on my mind, I’m desperate to busy myself again.
After about a week, Caleb can tell I’m testy, so he suggests we go out for dinner, a luxury since he’s not big on spending money at restaurants. The place boasts a gorgeous panoramic view of the sky, a blend of vibrant oranges and deep purples over the mountaintops.
Just as Caleb helps me into my chair, someone shouts, “Caleb!” from behind. I assume it’s someone from the hostel, but when I turn around, I realize it’s Ernest and Posie, the older couple from Venice. Two tables away from us.
“Oh my goodness! And Lola,” Posie says, jumping up to greet us. I don’t bother to remind her my name is just Lo.
They invite us to sit with them near the huge stone fireplace, and we fill each other in on the last many months of travel. After Venice, they also went to Tuscany for a few weeks before heading home. But now they’re back for a little winter excursion to try snowboarding (of all things) before Christmas.
“I knew there was something between you two,” Posie says when Caleb excuses himself to the bathroom. “You really seem to like each other.” She’s not wrong. I can picture my life with him, or some version of it. We’d always be on some wild adventure, exploring parts of the world we’ve only ever dreamed of visiting. Working odd jobs to make sure we had enough money to cover our expenses. We wouldn’t have much, but I would be happy.
“Thank you. And you and Ernest are adorable.”
She smiles at Ernest, who’s examining the cocktail menu over his wire-framed glasses. “We’ve had a lot of adventures together, I’ll tell you.”
“What are your favorites? You guys must have traveled a lot.”
She nods. “We’ve been to some absolutely magnificent places. But my favorite memories with him are at home, in our squat little flat.”
“At home?” It strikes me as odd, considering how much they’ve prioritized travel in their lives.
“It’s easy to have fun with someone on all these elaborate adventures. But the real challenge is finding someone to enjoy the mundane. Someone who makes you look forward to the blurry gray of everyday life. That takes someone special. That’s what’s real.”
I think about Caleb and these past few months. All these grand escapades, moments straight from the movies—all he has to do is hold his hand out and we’ll be off into the glittery night on some beautiful adventure. When I’m not injured, that is. And yet, my best memories are with Teller when everything was entirely ordinary, or at their worst. Laughing our asses off in the creaky, broken beds at the Shady Pines Inn. Starved and eating deli pizza on the side of the road in Florence. Watching movie marathons and cleaning toilets at The Cinema. It feels like ages ago.
“What do you want to do tomorrow?” Caleb asks as he piggybacks me back to the hostel. He’s in a particularly good mood after dinner. Social Caleb loved seeing Posie and Ernest, who he’s invited to our place later tonight to play cards.
I inhale, bracing myself. “I think I need to go home.” It comes out before I’ve fully registered it.
I think I need space.
It’s scary, the prospect of leaving. Of not knowing what that means for Caleb and me. But I can’t ignore that, for the first time, going home feels more right than staying.
“Home? For the holidays?” Originally, I’d been intent on going home to spend the holidays with Dad. But given the flight costs and our jobs, we decided we wouldn’t go home for Christmas. Instead, we’d head home for the summer. Dad had planned a Caribbean cruise with Scheana, anyway, so it made more sense to stay.
I nod toward my knee. “My knee makes it pretty difficult to do anything. And if I’m going to be stuck in a room, I’d rather not be paying for it. I may as well be home for Christmas, at least.”
“Isn’t your dad going on some cruise?”
“Yeah. But he’s not leaving until Christmas Eve. And my aunts will be home. I’ll spend it with them.”
“Understandable. I wouldn’t want to be in Italy with a knee injury either.” He doesn’t argue or try to convince me to stay. In fact, I think it’s a relief. I can see it in his face.
Our gazes hold for a beat, and I think we’re both finding some clarity. It’s not just about my knee. My injury represents something a lot bigger. We both know it. I’ve always wanted epic love. But I’m starting to think I’ve had it all wrong. Maybe epic love isn’t dashing off to faraway places and passionately kissing amid postcard-worthy views. How could it be, when you’re living a life that isn’t your own? I think about what Posie said, how it’s easy to be in love on vacation. You’re pretending, in a way.
But what about when you’re at home, on any given Tuesday? When you’re in matching sweats, rock-paper-scissoring who unloads the dishwasher for the fifth time that week. When you’re both so exhausted that you barely have the energy to throw chicken nuggets in the oven, but you make each other smile anyway.
Maybe epic love is when there’s no one else in the world you’d rather have a million mundane Tuesdays with.