The lack of search engines, and online maps, and the ability to call for help made it clear that, at the moment, the only things I could count on were the strong lines of Tuck’s body moving smoothly in front of me, leading the way.

Tuck looked back at me, and I realized suddenly that I was humming, snippets of song lyrics weaving through my brain, arranging and rearranging and then forming tunes. I went quiet.

“I’ve gotta take a leak,” Charlie said. I halted too and he stepped off the road and walked toward the woods. Tuck, just a few feet ahead, looked back and then came to a stop as well, opening his backpack and removing a bottle of water and taking a long swallow. I walked the short distance to him, honestly surprised he’d stopped. Over the past few days, he’d kept walking each time we’d needed a bathroom break and we’d had to hurry to catch up. We’d been walking for what had to be close to three hours now, and perhaps even Tuck needed a break once in a while. “You used to hum like that during those harvest mornings,” Tuck said, his gaze focused on his hand screwing the cap back on.

For a second, I was confused, but then his words brought forth a memory, the picture blooming so suddenly and so vividly that I swore the scent of orange blossoms infused the winter air. The workers at our grove had risen at the crack of dawn to avoid the heat of the day, and so had we, running outside in shorts and bare feet, with bedhead and sleep grains still stuck in our eyelashes. The oranges were so fragrant. If I closed my eyes, I could feel one in my palm, heavy with ripeness, and hear the small snap as it broke from the branch. It’d felt like a gift, the way the tree had so easily let go of its fruit with only the smallest twist of my wrist. A blessing. “I did?” I asked. I’d hummed as I’d picked? I didn’t remember that.

Tuck nodded and then took another swig from his bottle.