Six hundred and ninety miles

Looked up the drive this morning while the coffee was going. Six hundred and ninety miles. Eleven hours if you do not stop, which you do, so call it thirteen with the dog. I have known that number for seven years and I have never once looked it up before this week. Said it out loud to Danny. Six hundred and ninety miles. He said yeah. Then after a minute he said we could go up for a week in the summer, and I said that is not what I meant, and he said I know. He did know. We left it there, because it was twenty past seven and I had a nine o'clock, but it is the first time either of us has let the sentence sit in the room without immediately making it smaller. The thing I did not say is that the number is only frightening because of what it means for the part of this I am not talking about. Thirteen hours is a holiday. Thirteen hours is not a Tuesday when something happens.