He was already a part of her past.

They were half-way into a two-week Central American road trip–her idea, its inspiration a 1960s Albert Finney-Audrey Hepburn movie about a couple driving through Europe, recalling their past to stop the collapse of their present.

WARMING HOUSE BY JEFF ESTERHOLM 34THPARALLEL MAGAZINE ISSUE 02

Showering was useless. He couldn’t dry off. He stood at the open hotel window and the heat and tropical decay, the street sounds—the traffic rumble and horns, the vendors at their colorful kiosks on the square, birds and dogs—all slid in on the damp air. A ceiling fan stirred the soup.

She was asleep, wound up in the white sheets. He didn’t know how she could do it. One bare shoulder had slipped the sheets and it glowed in the waves of her copper wire hair.

He sat in the chair by the window and poured a glass of bourbon from the bottle they had packed. It was like drinking the air. They were half-way into a two-week Central American road trip–her idea, its inspiration a 1960s Albert Finney-Audrey Hepb…