2-6
421 Words
THE SEVEN OF THEM EAT breakfast together. Liam and Paul can hardly look at each other through the meal without laughing. They’re clearly having fun, so Alex lets them at it and doesn’t snark. It’s definitely a vast improvement over the period when Paul was jealous of Liam, which was followed by the oddly unrelated period when Liam was afraid of Paul.
They leave the dishes in the sink for later and pile into the minivan to drive to a trail. It takes fifteen minutes to coax a reluctant Vic into her car seat while Ali provides entirely unhelpful commentary, but Alex is still delighted the moment they get on the road. He loves living in Iceland, but he’s excited to vacation in it too. His filming schedule hasn’t left him much off-duty time to explore.
There’s so much to see, and all of it is fascinating. California has mountains, but not like this. They’re huge, covered in snow except for a few patches of brown and gray on their sides as they slope to the sea. With the drive along a winding road, the cold gray sea stretching behind them to the horizon, Alex feels like they’re on the edge of the world.
He parks alongside a few other cars at the trailhead. It takes almost as long to get everyone out as it did to get them all in. A small part of Alex wishes he was on his own, so that he could do a more rigorous hike. It’s impossible, though, not just with the children, but with Liam, Carly, and Paul. Even so, he’s thrilled to be with his strange family in this strange landscape.
No one expects him to talk. As they walk Paul and Ali keep up a chatter about how far Húsavik, the town Alex is based near, seems from everything with its one road, tiny cluster of buildings right on the water, and epic mountains. Paul has Claudia in a baby backpack, Liam has Vic, and Alex is keenly aware of Carly close on his heels and also, he suspects, wanting to be alone with this place. They’re both something like witches sometimes.
“So, if you didn’t have your doting husband and your adorable baby,” Carly asks quietly. “Would we ever get you back from Iceland?”
“Nope.” Alex doesn’t look at her, peering instead up the path ahead where their destination, Lake Botnsvatn, has just come into view. He takes off at a run, Carly leaping into her own sprint toward it a moment later.
As they dash ahead, he can hear Ali ask Paul why he and Carly are such jerks.
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- Writer
