The Journeys of John and Julia: Genesis (Book 1) ~Complete~

Line 36 / Part 2

Julia strained to open her eyes. "John? What the sock?" She looked around, clearly disoriented. "Where am I?"

John, though thankful that his friend seemed unharmed, at the prospect of Julia's reaction to his presence once her memory rebooted, felt some anxiety creeping in. "I'd estimate we're about three miles from your grandma's house and one mile east of the lake. How in the world did you get here?"

"Beats me. Last thing I know is, I was riding the prairie - in this cab, with this guy, Victor." She slowly steadied herself in an attempt to sit up.

"You must have had a dream," John ventured, "But that still doesn't explain how you got here in the first place. Unless you're one of those guys with night terrors. My mom did some research on them for one of the books she was writing; far-out stuff, I can tell you that!" Realizing that maybe now wasn't quite the time to talk about his mother's research, never mind how interesting it was, he slowed down. "You know I was on my way to hook up with you. I wanted to apologize for my behavior yesterday. That was insensitive. Sorry, okay?"

"Yesterday?" Julia, perplexed. The concept of a past other than to be with Victor was still a bit too much for her to handle.

"You know maybe you wanna try and get up? We could go to the tree house. It's much more comfortable there than lying around here." Secretly he was a little worried that Julia might have hurt her head when she went down, and from the tree house at least he could call for help. "You know you're lucky that those ants over there didn't eat you alive," pointing at an anthill about ten yards to the side.

Julia was up faster than she could even think Yuk. "Whoa, that's gross," slapping her torso while jumping up and down to rid herself of any bugs that might hide in the folds of her clothes, "let's go!"

She started to move and John caught her at the seam of her jacket. "Hey, Julia! That's the wrong direction, come this way."

Quickly they arrived at the spot where the abandoned bicycle lay on the ground. "You know what, I can offer you shotgun on the handle bar if you like. We'd be at the lake so much faster."

Julia silently nodded agreement and mounted the bike.

In the protection of the tree house Julia collapsed onto the mattress by the bay window overlooking the water. The sun was still low in the morning sky, painting different shades of green topped with sparkles of silvery glitter on the surface of the lake.

"I could make us some tea if you want?" John, proudly pointing to the newest luxury in his lofty shelter, "My dad gave me this ultra-light camping stove! They had one extra and now I can cook some chow! Isn't it cool?"

Julia still preoccupied and not ready to share his excitement said without turning her head, "Na, thanks. Just some water would be nice. I had this big breakfast in this corny restaurant and I'm really thirsty. Trucker's delight. Hmm, not the truck stop, the breakfast."

John didn't know what to say and quietly poured his friend a glass of water. Here we go again he thought, for all that shattering my brains I could have never ever imagined our re-union to be that! I'm taking a solemn vow right here right now to completely disengage from all free-floating anxiety about the way things might turn out. What a waste of time.

Disgusted at himself for being such a pathetic he sighed and sat down on the mattress next to Julia. "So, you wanna talk about it?"