The gentle peace of the previous day felt like a distant country. The remnants of the party: the giant card propped against the wall, the faint, sweet smell of cake... were a warm memory, but the reality of the present was the low hum of tyres on the M1 and the grey, featureless sky of the British motorway network.
Emma was driving, her expression a mixture of pride and sadness I knew all too well. It was the look she got whenever one of us had to leave.
We had spent the last year navigating the two hundred miles between London and Manchester, a constant, low-level ache of distance that had become the background music to our relationship. This time, it was different. I wasn't just going to work. I was going back to school.
"You're quiet," she said, her eyes flicking from the road to my face and back again.
"Just thinking," I said, looking out at the blur of green and grey. "It feels strange."
"What does?"
