“I didn’t know you knew how to drive,” Sandy teased, poking me in the side. I laid my hands importantly on the steering wheel.

“There’s a lot you don’t know about me, particularly that I’m skilled in crashing into garage doors.”

“Well, that is not a very good resume. Maybe you should let me drive instead.”

“You want to drive eight hours every day on your own?”

“Well, no…”

“It’s settled then.”

“What part of that screams settled?” Sandy retorted, laughing now.

“Well, it’ll be safer if I start our trip,” I said. “Especially since I am less experienced…”

“Less experienced? You’ve certainly got that right. Heck, I didn’t know you knew how to drive until two minutes ago!” he interrupted.

I shrugged, openly grinning now. “Again, there’s a lot you don’t know about me. Now admit that you’ve lost and you’re happy to let me drive and get in on the passenger side. Unless you’d rather ride in the backseat?” I lifted an eyebrow invitingly, but he waved his hand at me in mock surrender and walked around to the other side of the car.

Twenty minutes and some more bickering later, we were on the road, heading off on a new adventure.

“To New York!” I exclaimed as soon as we hit the open highway, just narrowly swerving to avoid a vehicle in the far right lane.

“To New York,” Sandy groaned with remarkably less enthusiasm, hands over his head as he watched my driving from the side of his vision.

Yet soon the traffic had cleared, and he must have felt safe enough to reemerge from his protective shell. “Who did you say taught you to drive again?” he asked, checking my blind spots several times.

“Oh, I taught myself,” I replied. “Be the best friend I know you to be and put some music on, won’t you?”

He groaned, but after a few more miles passed without incident, he reached over to fiddle with the radio.

A sappy song burst from the speakers, and I almost told Sandy to switch it over to our favorite classic rock tunes, before I recognized it.

“And at least I see the light! And it’s like a fog has lifted.”
We sang along in all our off-key glory, probably sending thousands of birds soaring away from us in screeching terror.

“And at last I see the light! And it's like the sky is newwwww!”
I broke off laughing at my attempt to hold that pitch, and Sandy joined in. Yet, somehow, we regained enough composure to finish the song together.

“All at once everything looks different…now that I see you.”
The song instantly shifted to commercials, and we grinned together, me mostly keeping my eyes on the road. “Why on earth was a Disney song on the radio?” I asked in wonder.

“Maybe someone like us requested it,” Sandy replied. “It feels like the perfect way to serenade us and new beginnings, after all.”

I nodded along, and he hesitated, as if about to say something else. I waited, but he just laughed and turned the radio back up.

The first four hours of the trip passed in relative simplicity as we passed from New Mexico into Texas. We talked of everything and nothing, each second passing away in a blur of light and youthful magic.

Finally, he gestured for me to pull over at a nearby gas station, and while he filled up on gas, I ran inside for snacks and sodas. With an armful of supplies, I ran back out, and I caught him staring at me weird.

“What?” I asked, feeling around to see if I had gotten that piece of donut on my chin.

“Nothing,” he said. “Just, what if this really could be the start of something new?”

“Yeah, we’ve got a decrepit yellow van that we are hightailing with across the country. If it’s not the start of something new, I’ll be sorely disappointed,” I replied, shaking my head as I slid into the passenger seat.

“This summer will certainly be interesting,” he laughed.

I agreed, yet to my surprise, when he sat back down and drummed his fingers on the steering wheel, he was once again humming the ending bars to the Tangled song.

“All at once everything is different, Now that I see you.”