Read Before I Go for Free Online Page B

go? Meet me out there?”
    He leans over to zip the suitcase and hefts it out of the room.
    As soon as I hear the back door creak open and slam shut, I hop off the bed and open the drawer where his shirts are smushed together like bulging Tootsie Rolls. One by one, I quickly pick them up and crease them in the exact center, then make a series of near-origami folds until each shirt is a perfectly rectangular cotton parcel. Satisfied, I close the drawer and grab my shoulder bag from the hook on the closet door. In the hallway I pause at the bathroom, then duck inside and pull back the shower curtain. I scan the tub, the vanity, and then open the medicine cabinet. And that’s where I spot it. Jack did remember his toothbrush and razor, but his contact solution stands like a lone soldier left on the battlefield. I tuck it into the side pocket of my sack and yell “Coming!” when Jack calls to me from the back door.

    “ARE YOU GOING to tell me where we’re going?” I ask from the passenger seat of the Ford Explorer Jack has been driving since he got his license thirteen years ago. The air coming out of the vents hasn’t warmed yet, so I tuck my cold hands under my thighs.
    “It’s a surprise,” he says.
    “Did you get a cabin in Ellijay?”
    He laughs. “OK. Maybe it’s not a surprise.”
    “You left the Web page up a few weeks ago.” And then, even though I promised myself I wouldn’t ask, that I would trust Jack to plan everything out, I say, “What are we doing for food?”
    He drums his thumb against the steering wheel to the beat of the song coming through the speakers. Something by the Lumineers.
    “Daaaaa-isy,” he says, drawing out the “a” like he does when he teases me. “It’s under control.”
    His BlackBerry sitting in the cup holder between us starts buzzing. He turns down the volume knob on the CD player in the dashboard.
    “This is Jack,” he says, holding the phone up to his ear.
    My shoulders immediately tense as I recognize the formality of Jack’s professional voice. Please don’t let this be an emergency , I silently plead. This is the first time I’ve had Jack all to myself for a weekend in months and I don’t want anything to ruin it.
    “Do you have her on her stomach? OK, clamp your hand on her muzzle . . . Now start rubbing her back. Is she sucking?”
    He exhales a breath. “Good. Now, if she sneezes, you’ll need to clear the formula out of her nose. It means she’s eating too fast . . . OK, call me if you need anything else.”
    He hangs up and runs his hand through his in-need-of-a-haircut mop.
    “Is everything OK?” I ask.
    “Yeah, that was Charlene. I literally just explained to her step-by-step how to feed Roxanne yesterday afternoon. I don’t understand how she’s made it this far in the program.”
    Jack belongs to the Wildlife Treatment Crew, a volunteer group for vet students at the university. When he was on call last weekend, someone brought in a baby raccoon after they had accidentally killed its mother with their car. Jack immediately dubbed it Roxanne and has been nursing it back to health at the vet hospital—feeding it every three hours, weighing it daily, and keeping it warm with heating pads. I had stopped in to bring him dinner one night and seeing him with the bottle, cradling the little creature, made my ovaries hurt.
    “Well, it was sweet of her to take over for you while we’re gone,” I say, aiming a vent, now full of hot air, so that it blows directly on me.
    “I just hope she doesn’t screw up.”
    After driving for a few hours, Jack turns the car into the cracked parking lot of a strip mall desperately in need of renovations. He pulls into a parking spot in front of a glass door with a sign that reads: Sky Blue Cabin Rentals . The parking brake screeches as he sets it with his foot, then he turns to me and nods his head in the direction of the Ingles next door. “Do you want to run in and stock up while I check in and get the