Twelve Days

Day two

It was one am and me and Alec were still driving. Or rather, Alec was driving. We left New York yesterday evening and were now driving for four hours already. We finally escaped traffic and still had quite some miles to go until we would reach the parking spot where we would park our camper in and sleep in it. "Should we switch?", I asked and Alec smiled thankfully:" Yeah, I am getting really exhausted of driving." "I think I can help with that.", I replied and switched to my party playlist. "This is my last hurrah!", Bebe Rexha sang through the entire camper and probably even blessed the cars next to us with her voice. Alec chuckled. I could see the situation was heavier on him than it was on me. "Hey, it's okay. This is our last hurrah and we should enjoy it.", I smiled and padded his shoulder. "We will.", Alec replied, his voice shaking. I watched a tear escape his eye. And this tear was too heavy for my heart to carry. It broke. I couldn't see Alec that sad. "Bro, listen. One day I will die. And one day so will you. But, this is different. We actually know when I will die. So we actually can live these days as if they were my last. Because they are. So let's not waste a single second crying, being sad, overthinking. Let's just live. With no regrets. Completely free." Alec looked up to me. "I love you, Jace.", he whispered. "I love you too.", I replied and wiped away this tear from his face. No more tears. No more fears. No more regrets. No more thinking. Living only. "Let's do this.", Alec said and smiled. "Let's fucking do it!", I screamed and turned up the radio. This was our last hurrah...

A couple of minutes later we arrived at a gas station and swapped sides so I made myself comfortable behind the drivers wheel. Only in this moment I again realized how insanely tall Alec was- I would have a hard time reaching the gas pedal if I wouldn't be able to adjust the seat. "Ready to go?", Alec asked and I nodded, smiling. I was. Even though we were on some random highway, it looked really beautiful outside. From times to times the sky was just pitch black, only the stars and the moon shedding light on the curvy road we were driving. It felt as if we were driving into a big black nothing. The sky was consuming us, but in the best was possible. The night was hugging us, engulfing us with its darkness and keeping us close, like a mother that wraps her child in a blanket to carry it home safely. But sometimes, we were driving past a city. "Welcome to Pennsylvania!", a big neon sign said. "Pennsylvania, baby!", I screamed and Alec laughed. Then he stood up and walked in the back of the camper. As he came back, he had a bottle of champagne and two glasses. "Dude, can I even drink that and drive?", I laughed. I knew I said I wanted to live my life but I really didn't want to spend my last few days in a cell because I got arrested for drunk driving. "Let's check.", Alec chuckled and fidgeted his phone out of his back pocket. "Hey Siri, how many glasses of Champagne can I drink and still drive my vehicle?", he said. "You are allowed to have almost two glasses, but the risks...", Siri started explaining but Alec cut her off by pressing the home button. "We don't care about the risks. Especially not now.", he laughed. I couldn't help but laugh as well. It was amazing to see how Alec was living up to this attitude as well. With a loud bang, Alec opened the bottle. "Where did the cork go?", I laughed. "I honestly don't know. But I also don't care. I brought these plastic ones.", Alec chuckled and started filling our glasses. "To our last hurrah.", he said and raised his glass. "Cheers!", I replied and poured down the champagne. When I looked out of the window, I saw nothing but neon lights, billboards and advertisements. I always enjoyed watching the city life at night, it felt as if it was pulsing in the rhythm of its citizens breaths. But, I always preferred nature. The casual calmness, the resistance of a mountain massively influencing the landscape but always and for ever being there, continuously, no matter what. "I think we almost arrived at our parking spot.", Alec said, checking the address on his phone. And he was right. I could already see the huge place. "Dude, it's two pm and we already are on our fist spot of our travel route.", Alec proclaimed, obviously proud of himself. "Yeah, we got really lucky that traffic didn't mess with us too much.", I admitted and gracefully maneuvred our camper onto a free spot. "Okay, can you prepare our bed, I will quickly pay for our spot.", Alec suggested and I nodded. I liked our camper a lot, mainly because there wasn't a single centimeter of it wasted. I removed the piece of wood that worked as our table and laid it on the ground. Then, I opened the boxes in which we kept some of our food and our blankets and stuff. And it smelled. Like champagne. I already thought I knew what happened when I pulled out the blanket- and I was right. It was soaked in Champagne. "Did you pee on our blanket?", Alec laughed as he approached. "No, actually that are your reusable corks out of plastic- now our blanket is soaked in champagne. Alec laughed out loud. "Do you think you can get drunk by sniffing Alcohol?", he asked. I burst out laughing:" I think we have no other choice but try it out tonight." Alec laughed and dropped himself on our bed right besides me. "This really is going great so far.", he laughed. I smiled:" It is." It was perfect.