Arthur slept through most of the flight to Europe.
I did not.
Every few hours, he woke, looked at me, and said some version of the same thing.
“You should sleep.”
Then he immediately fell asleep again.
By the third time, I considered throwing a pillow at him.
Instead, I watched the map on the seat-back screen as our tiny digital airplane moved toward Europe.
I had been to France once.
Not with Robert.
Before him.
That fact bothered me because I had almost forgotten.
I was twenty-eight then, traveling with my college friend June Parker.
June.
I sat upright.
Arthur opened one eye.
“What?”
“I know who June is.”
He blinked.
“Should I be worried?”
“No.”
“Excellent.”
He closed his eyes.
I nudged him.
“Wake up.”
He sighed.
“I was afraid you'd say that.”
“June Parker. We went to France together before I married Robert.”
Arthur straightened.
“The name on the map.”
“Yes.”
“Why would Robert mark it?”
“I don't know.”
But this mystery felt different.
It belonged to my life.
June and I had met while working our first office jobs. We were opposites in almost every obvious way. I made lists. June lost lists. I arrived early. June considered punctuality an unnecessary social convention.
She had convinced me to travel with her after months of saving.
We spent twelve days in France.
I remembered cheap rooms.
Train stations.
Bread eaten on benches.
June flirting shamelessly with a waiter.
A storm near the coast.
Then something else surfaced.
A promise.
I turned toward the dark airplane window.
“Oh, Robert.”
Arthur waited.
“What?”
“I told him about June.”
“When?”
“Years ago.”
I closed my eyes, searching through the memory.
Robert and I had been sitting in the backyard. The children were grown. We had been talking about travel.
I told him that June and I once promised we would return to the same coastal village when we were old.
Not middle-aged.
Old.
We had laughed about meeting there at seventy.
Arthur watched me.
“How old are you?”
“Don't be irritating.”
“Sixty-nine.”
“I know.”
“So Robert remembered.”
Apparently he had.
The realization hurt in a different way.
The mark on the map wasn't another hidden chapter of Robert's life.
It was mine.
He had marked a promise I had forgotten.
We landed in Paris the following morning.
Arthur complained about his back.
I complained about his complaining.
We took a train south.
The farther we traveled, the more memories returned.
Not clear memories.
Fragments.
June standing on a platform wearing a ridiculous straw hat.
The smell of salt.
A tiny café.
A blue door.
A photograph taken beside a stone wall.
I had not spoken to June in more than thirty years.
Life had separated us gradually.
Marriage.
Children.
Moves.
Christmas cards became less frequent.
Telephone calls stopped.
Eventually, she became someone I remembered rather than someone I knew.
“What if she's dead?” I asked.
Arthur looked out the train window.
“Then you'll remember her here.”
“What if she's alive?”
“Then perhaps you'll find her.”
“You make things sound very simple.”
“They usually are before people complicate them.”
I smiled.
We arrived at the coastal village late in the afternoon.
It had changed.
Of course it had.
The little station was newer.
The road was busier.
Several buildings I remembered were gone.
But the sea was the same.
I stood on the promenade and breathed.
Arthur remained a few steps behind.
“You remember?”
“Some of it.”
We found a small hotel.
After checking in, I searched online for June Parker.
There were hundreds.
I added her hometown.
Then her old occupation.
Nothing certain.
I tried social media.
More names.
More faces.
None I recognized.
Arthur sat across the room reading.
“Any luck?”
“No.”
“Tomorrow.”
I closed the laptop.
“Tomorrow.”
That word no longer felt like an excuse.
Sometimes tomorrow was simply the next day.
The following morning, we walked through the village.
I searched for the café June and I had loved.
It was gone.
In its place stood a bakery.
I went inside anyway.
An elderly woman worked behind the counter.
I showed her an old photograph I had found in my email archives after hours of searching.
Two young women stood outside the café.
June and me.
The woman studied it.
“That building was here,” she said.
“Yes.”
“My parents owned it.”
My heart jumped.
“Do you remember this woman?”
She looked closer.
“No.”
Then she pointed at June.
“Maybe.”
I waited.
“There was an American woman who returned several times.”
“When?”
“Years apart.”
“What was her name?”
The woman frowned.
“June?”
My heart began pounding.
“Yes.”
“She used to send postcards.”
“To whom?”
“My mother.”
“Do you know where she is?”
The woman shook her head.
“Not now.”
My disappointment must have shown.
She disappeared into the back.
Several minutes later, she returned carrying an old metal box.
Inside were postcards.
Dozens.
She sorted through them.
Then she found one.
The handwriting was June's.
I knew it immediately.
The postcard had been sent nine years earlier.
On the back, June had written that she planned to return for her seventieth birthday.
I stared at the date.
Arthur leaned over my shoulder.
“When?”
I calculated.
Then looked at him.
“This year.”
The bakery owner smiled.
“Maybe she remembers the promise too.”
I laughed.
Then cried.
The owner pretended not to notice.
We asked whether June had left contact information.
No.
But one postcard mentioned a town in Oregon.
That was enough.
I called Karen.
She answered on the second ring.
“Everything okay?”
“Yes. I need you to find someone.”
“Who?”
“June Parker.”
“Who is June Parker?”
“My friend.”
“You have a friend named June?”
“I had a life before you were born.”
Karen laughed.
“Apparently.”
I gave her the details.
Two hours later, she called back.
“I think I found her.”
My heart jumped.
“Where?”
“Oregon.”
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
“Are you sure?”
“Pretty sure.”
Karen gave me a telephone number.
I stared at it for several minutes before dialing.
Arthur waited on the balcony.
The telephone rang.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
Then a woman answered.
“Hello?”
Thirty years disappeared.
“June?”
Silence.
“Yes?”
“This is Abigail.”
Another silence.
Then:
“Abby?”
Nobody had called me that in decades.
I covered my mouth.
“Yes.”
June laughed.
Then she began crying.
So did I.
“You old fool,” she said.
“I was about to say the same thing.”
“Where are you?”
“France.”
Silence.
Then she shouted so loudly I moved the phone away.
“You went without me?”
I laughed through tears.
“I didn't know whether you were alive.”
“Neither did I.”
“That seems rude.”
“You stopped writing.”
“You stopped first.”
“We're too old for this argument.”
“We were too old thirty years ago.”
Arthur looked in from the balcony.
I nodded.
It was her.
June and I talked for nearly an hour.
She had married twice.
Divorced once.
Been widowed once.
She had two daughters.
Four grandchildren.
Arthritis in one knee.
An unreasonable hatred of decaffeinated coffee.
Some things had changed.
Some had not.
Then I asked the question.
“Do you remember what we promised?”
June became quiet.
“Yes.”
“Seventy.”
“Yes.”
“You're seventy next spring.”
“So are you.”
“Not until later.”
“You always were annoyingly younger.”
I smiled.
“Come here.”
Silence.
“What?”
“Come to France.”
“Abby—”
“Come.”
“I can't just fly to France.”
“Why not?”
There was a long pause.
I recognized it.
That pause had ruled most of my life.
Bills.
Family.
Schedules.
Reasons.
“June.”
“Yes?”
“If not now, when?”
She exhaled.
“I hate you.”
“I know.”
“I'll look at flights.”
“That's not an answer.”
“Still bossy.”
“Still late.”
She laughed.
Then said, “Give me three days.”
We ended the call.
Arthur came inside.
“Well?”
“She might come.”
He smiled.
“Good.”
I looked toward the sea.
“Robert remembered.”
“The promise?”
“Yes.”
“I forgot it completely.”
Arthur sat beside me.
“He didn't.”
That evening, I called Eric.
“Where did you find the map?”
“In one of Dad's old storage boxes.”
“Was there anything else?”
“Mostly papers.”
“What kind?”
“Receipts. Notes. Travel brochures.”
I straightened.
“Travel brochures?”
“Yeah.”
“From where?”
“I don't know. A bunch of places.”
“Don't throw them away.”
“I wasn't planning to.”
“Photograph them.”
“All of them?”
“Yes.”
He sighed.
“How many mysteries did Dad leave?”
“Apparently enough to ruin your weekend.”
He laughed.
The photographs arrived gradually over the next hour.
Rome.
Kyoto.
Buenos Aires.
Melbourne.
A small town in Switzerland.
A train route through Canada.
Some brochures were decades old.
Robert had kept them all.
Then Eric sent one final image.
It wasn't a brochure.
It was a handwritten list.
At the top, Robert had written:
Places Abigail talked herself out of seeing.
I stared at it.
Arthur read over my shoulder.
“That's quite a list.”
“He kept track.”
“Yes.”
I scrolled.
Beside several destinations, Robert had written short notes.
Too expensive.
Kids needed us.
Maybe next year.
After retirement.
When things calm down.
Each excuse was painfully familiar.
Some had been mine.
Some his.
Most belonged to both of us.
At the bottom was one sentence.
Stop waiting.
I put the phone down.
Arthur didn't say anything.
“He knew.”
“Yes.”
“He knew we were wasting time.”
“Yes.”
“And we still did it.”
Arthur leaned back.
“Knowing something isn't the same as changing it.”
I looked at him.
“Is that what happened with Anne?”
He nodded.
“We planned things too.”
“Did you do them?”
“Some.”
“Not enough?”
“Never enough.”
We sat quietly.
Then Arthur said, “That's why I said yes when you asked me to France.”
“I didn't ask.”
He smiled.
“You strongly implied.”
“I remember you inviting yourself.”
“History is written by survivors.”
I laughed.
Three days later, June called.
“I bought the ticket.”
I stood so quickly my chair scraped across the hotel floor.
“You're coming?”
“I land Thursday.”
I covered my mouth.
Arthur smiled from across the room.
June continued.
“If this is terrible, I'm blaming you.”
“Fair.”
“And I'm not sharing a room.”
“I didn't ask.”
“You snore.”
“You don't know that.”
“You did at twenty-eight.”
“I have improved.”
“People don't improve at sleeping.”
I laughed.
After we hung up, I went outside.
The sea stretched beneath a pale evening sky.
Robert had brought me here without ever setting foot beside me.
Not by controlling where I went.
By remembering the things I once wanted.
That distinction mattered.
Two days later, another message arrived from Eric.
Found something else.
Attached was a photograph of a sealed envelope.
My name was written across it.
Below my name, Robert had written:
Only after Australia.
I called Eric immediately.
“Open it.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
He hesitated.
“Mom, Dad sealed it.”
“And addressed it to me.”
“Exactly.”
“So open it.”
“That feels illegal.”
“You used to steal money from my purse.”
“I was twelve.”
“Consider this repayment.”
He laughed.
I heard paper tearing.
Then silence.
“Eric?”
Nothing.
“Eric?”
His voice changed.
“Mom.”
My stomach tightened.
“What?”
“This isn't a letter.”
“What is it?”
“It's a document.”
“What kind?”
He paused.
Then said, “Dad bought something.”
“What?”
Eric read the page again.
“A piece of land.”
“Where?”
Another silence.
“Australia.”
I sat down.
Arthur saw my face and came closer.
“When?”
I asked.
Eric told me the date.
Twenty-five years earlier.
The secret trip.
My heart began pounding.
“Whose name is on the deed?”
Eric didn't answer immediately.
“Eric.”
“Yours.”
“What?”
“Not mine.”
His voice softened.
“Yours, Mom.”
I couldn't speak.
Arthur watched me.
Eric continued.
“Dad bought it in your name.”
I looked toward the French coast, thousands of miles from Melbourne.
“What land?”
Eric unfolded another page.
When he answered, I already knew.
“The property beside the lake.”
Click here to continue reading: PART 9: The Land Robert Bought in My Name Had Been Waiting for Me Beside the Lake, but Its Real Purpose Was Still Hidden
I Had Spent Sixty-Nine Years Believing My Life Could Wait, Until One Morning I Realized Everyone Else Had Already Claimed My Time
Part 8 of 12
