Jess is finally going! That New Zealand holiday is at its dawn, and all she can think of is landscapes, walks and adventures. But what she does not expect to find, is what is waiting around the corner - someone.
Someone who will turn her holiday up...
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The washed-up scraps of litter, left behind by that great wave of emotion that the thoughts of James had brought on, were taking precedence now...
Jess had waited and planned for this trip for so long, and it had been exactly as she had wanted.
But tainted. Tinted, blood-stained, by the hues of fallen expectations.
Happy, fun, exciting - sure, the trip had been those things. Yet even as it had barely begun, she had sat, as the car sped along toward their adventure - thinking of him.
And she had realised, beneath the joy of everything that had and was to happen, that she just might not see him again.
She had known that those days were the time for adventure - to not worry. But she had worried.
It had snuck slyly into her thoughts as she sipped Milo and lay in bed at night. Adventures had come and gone each day, delivering incredible sights and experiences, along with dread, and regret, at the uncertainty of what she would be going back to.
Each morning she had been begrudgingly awoken by her habit of rising early. She had lain in bed, mulling over the prospect of facing another day full of doubt. Doubt as to just how bad her predicament would be when they got back. The bed was safe. But she told herself she had to struggle to her feet. She had to get through those things she had been wanting to do for so long.
She had gone. She had even thought she was happy - happier than she had ever been. Maybe a small part of her was, but there were other parts. Parts that clamoured for attention, rising and falling around the bliss.
There were parts that spoke of lonely evenings in the neighbourhood, and more misunderstandings; things left unsaid that could put a gaping hole in the fabric of understanding they had so carefully woven. There was a malicious side of her that hissed that she might, unwittingly, end up hurting him the way he had, her.
On the adventure along the forest path, she had been free; free to journey back through her mind.
While the happy part of her, the part she tried to focus on, spoke of the peace and the hushed thrill of discovery that surrounded her, the rest spoke of her plan, and the likelihood that it would fail.
She thought of what she had done to her mother, and what her mother was doing to her.
Then, she was sighing a sigh of contentment and joy, by the lake. A sigh that was layered with breaths of so many other things. Of anxious worry, of sudden stabs of pain, and realisations she did not want to deal with.
Hugging her mother had felt so much more complicated than just a hug. She tried to tell herself she had imagined the stiffness in it.
Every thought of James had hauled a sackful of conflicting emotions along with it.
The amusement at his probable reaction to her giddy excitement, was doused by the thought that she might never see him grin at her again. The longing by the lake, to tell him of everything she had seen, was made suddenly solemn by the sudden conviction that she would never get to.
Somehow, though, that time - by the lake - it had, still, not been quite so bad. There had been more hope there somehow, lightening the turmoil and shining a spotlight on all the more felicitous feelings. Jess wished she could cling to the way the lake had made her feel. She wished she could erase all the other feelings that came after... the unwelcome ones, that had tainted her lovely trip in the time machine.
And her retelling of it all to Janine. Oh, it had been strange, feeling all the uplifting emotions come back to her, as she recounted it all, even though she knew, deep down, that it was not all that perfect. That it was not perfect anymore, and it was all her fault.
She had set out to have a perfect time on the perfect trip, and she had indeed set out - had forced herself to. But beneath the image she tried to float in her mind - the one of the perfection she had striven for - was all the turmoil and distress.
By the end of three days of suppression, she could not help but wonder if the worry was there for good reason.
