Finding Abbey Road by Kevin Emerson

up.
    â€œHe misses you,” I add.
    â€œYeah,” she says like it can’t be helped.
    â€œYou were just hooking up with him,” Caleb says. “It wasn’t more, was it?”
    Val shrugs. She draws a tiny Icelandair logo on one of the airplane tails. “I didn’t really consider it becoming anything more,” she says. “He’s a sweetie, but . . . I’d just let him down.” A shadow passes over her face. “Well,” she adds quickly, “you know, after I got him off.”
    We giggle again, and I’m so tired that it feels like soda bubbles behind my forehead, but I also notice that Val stops laughing far earlier than Caleb and me.
    4:09 p.m.
    â€œWhat are you doing?” I ask Caleb as I wake, halfwaythrough our second flight.
    He’s been typing on his phone since we took off.
    â€œYou didn’t turn on the Wi-Fi, did you?”
    â€œNope.” He passes me the phone. The notepad is open and there are words. It takes travel brain a minute to realize they’re arranged in lines. Lyrics.
    â€œHow do they go?” I ask him.
    He leans into my ear, his breath warm, and sings in a whisper:
    I see the future and all I see is you
    I’ve been making plans since you took my hand
    But when you ask me, I keep it to myself
    It’s not the future, until you see it too
    Let the miles come, it doesn’t matter
    Let the time zones change, it doesn’t mean a thing
    If you’re where you want to be, I want to be there too
    If you’re where you want to be then . . . I’ll be with you.
    I mash my lips against his. “You are way too sweet,” I say.
    Caleb nuzzles his face against my neck. “I mean it. I feel like, if we can make it through this, we can make it through anything.”
    I hold him and wish these plane seats were more private. As we kiss again, I can practically feel Val rolling her eyes from three rows back, not that she can even really see us.
    I sink back to sleep on Caleb’s shoulder, trying to picture our future together, but my own future is still too foggy.
    6:25 p.m.
    It is dark by the time we land, so at first, London is just another airport anywhere.
    We leave the plane and head directly for the gift shop across from the gate. We separate, stumbling around, and reconvene at the register. I put down trail mix and an energy drink. Val has a long package of plain-looking round cookies.
    â€œWhat are those?” I ask.
    â€œBiscuits,” she says. “It’s what you’re supposed to do. Also these.” She has a package of potato chips that are steak and onion flavored.
    â€œGross,” I say.
    â€œI know, right?” She grins big, but it’s interrupted by a yawn.
    Caleb arrives with a city map and three wristwatches. “Check these out,” he says. They are cheap tourist trinkets, gold-colored watches on black faux leather bands, with the Union Jack on the face. “This way, we can leave our phones off the whole time,” he says.
    â€œI like the sound of that,” I say.
    Val unfolds the map and runs her fingers over the diagonal lines of the city. “This primitive technology is amazing.”
    â€œThat will be nineteen pounds thirty,” says the cashier, and I can tell we’re all trying not to giggle at the awesomeness of her accent.
    But then it hits me what she’s saying. “Oh,” I say, “we only have . . . Do you take American dollars?”
    The woman just gazes at us. “There’s an exchange booth that way.”
    â€œCan we leave this stuff here?” Caleb asks.
    The cashier just sighs and sweeps it all into a bag that she stashes beside her.
    â€œHow much cash do we have left?” Val asks as we walk through the terminal.
    I carefully remove the envelope from my bag and thumb through. “Six hundred and some change,” I say. Moments later, I hand it over to an expressionless young man in a suit vest, and