One Question

Chapter Six - And They're Off!

The air was already pleasantly warm by the time Naomi pulled up in front of Phi's house, which, considering it was 9 in the morning, was not a good sign to the temperature of the rest of the day. With school now over and the nice weather, Naomi would have ordinarily been running around in a dress with her friends, eating food, and maybe driving to the nicer park a city over. But it wasn't an ordinary day, so she was dressed plainly.

She knew that, at that moment, Hana and Lorelai were on the way to Disneyland for Grad Night. Disneyland was only a few hours away, so the bus had left at 6am, and they were set to arrive right about then. Naomi couldn't tell whether or not she felt sad to miss it. She'd been to Disneyland with Andrew a couple years back, and while she enjoyed it, she knew the only reason the lines were bearable was because she could talk to Andrew without getting bored. Maybe a year ago she would have jumped at the opportunity; now, all she wanted was to be was exactly where she was, standing outside Phi's house with her car full of clothing, a tent, and a cooler of food.

Soon the door opened and Phi came out, a huge duffle bag slung over her shoulder. She limped forward until Naomi ran up and took the bag from her, carrying it easily into the trunk.

"Softball," Phi said to herself, knowingly.

"What's even in here?" Naomi asked, wedging the bag carefully into the back such that the trunk could close over it.

"Clothing, mosquito repellent, a sleeping bag, some sticks for marshmallows, a camp stove, a flashlight, hand sanitizer, dry shampoo, an extra blanket, and a few Kit Kats," Phi said, checking her fingers off her hand.

"Wow," Naomi said. "Now I'm surprised it all fit."

"I'm good at packing. My family likes to go camping."

"I should have asked you for help," Naomi said. "Now I feel underprepared."

"So long as you packed a cutting board, knives, a pot, plates, utensils, and another flashlight, you should be fine."

"Um..."

"Okay, give me a second, I'll run back in and grab what you don't have. What do we need?"

It was another half hour before they were ready to go out on the road because Phi had to dig through her family's camping supplies again, and then her parents came out and wanted to talk to the stranger taking their daughter on a road trip, and then Phi realized she was hungry and made herself some toast. By the time Naomi was driving, she was already feeling exhausted from socializing and glad that it was one of the shorter drives on the trip.

When her family did want to get out in nature, they often drove north, despite living near LA. The parks in SoCal were all deserts. Naomi had been to Joshua Tree once, but it was long enough ago that she didn't remember much of it. NorCal was more green, and the further north one went, the greener it got. She liked those forests, with the moss and tall trees and moist dirt, but she was curious to see the other side of it. She had heard deserts could be beautiful. She wanted to find out for herself.

The further along they drove, the more and more Naomi realized that the weather was probably going to be horrible that day. Her car had AC—weak AC, but an AC nonetheless—and she turned it on after the first hour. Like at Disneyland, however, she soon found that almost any discomfort was much more bearable with conversation.

"We're going to the Mojave, right?" Phi asked. "Do you know which part? Did you already make a reservation?"

"Um." Naomi took a moment to gather her thoughts. "Yes, we're going to the Mojave. Yes, I was hoping to get a spot at one of the developed campsites. No, I didn't make a reservation because it's first come first serve."

"Okay," Phi said. "I actually haven't been there before."

"Really? I thought you camped a lot?"

"I have," Phi said. "But we normally drove up more north. I've been to a few places in SoCal but not a lot of deserts."

"Our families are the same way, then," Naomi said. "We also drove up."

"It never made a ton of sense to me," Phi said. "At that point, we should just move up to Oregon or something."

The absurdity was not lost on either of them, and they shared a laugh.

"I guess, before we go camping, I have this question for you," Phi said.

"What?"

"What do you hope to get out of camping? What are your expectations?"

Naomi mulled over it as she tapped the steering wheel.

"I'm mostly curious. The few times I go hiking with my family, there's this different...feeling I get. Like all the things I care about are so small, really. That everything that matters is this forest and this air, and it doesn't really matter all that much how I do in school, or whether or not I lose games, and whether or not I can keep up with my friends, or even how I look. The world narrows to my family and the space around me and even Andrew, though he's not there. It's this feeling of peace I get nowhere else. But this is only on the scale of a day, or just a few hours. I come back home and it's all the same all over again. I want to see what it's like to sleep and wake up with that feeling. I wonder if it would do anything more lasting."

They sat in silence while Naomi watched the road and Phi sat back, finger tapping her lips in thought.

"I think I know the feeling you're talking about," Phi said. "It's a childish feeling, for me. And very...what is the word. Untethered?"

"Yeah. The peaceful sort of freedom."

Phi hummed.

"So is it?" Naomi asked.

"Is it what?"

"More lasting?"

Phi curled a piece of hair around her finger. "Maybe a little," she said. "But I think that being untethered is unsustainable in the world. So we only get moments of it. Nature is our exhale but we can never escape the inhale. Does that make sense?"

"In a strange way, I think so."

Naomi watched Phi in the mirror for a moment. She still had her hair around her finger and looked lost in thought.

"What are you thinking about?"

Phi met her eyes before Naomi looked back to the road. Phi smiled, the one that held a laugh.

"How I'd like to share this exhale with you."

"Oh no," Naomi said. "Don't phrase it that way."

"We've already shared the inhale," Phi said with a singsong voice.

Naomi laughed. "Stop. Stop stop. That's such a bad image."

"We're breathing the same air now," Phi said.

"You just made it worse."

By this point, they were both laughing, and Naomi had to be careful not to get distracted from her driving.

"You're so weird," Naomi said.

"Oh, I know," Phi said. "Can't believe you didn't figure that out sooner."