The couple in their caravan

picture source: Life

Waking up is always an adventure
when you live in a caravan.

The Couple just loved that feeling of
getting away from it all; living on
the road  and having everything you
could ever need within three feet of
your bed.

They weren’t an old Couple, in case
you are wondering. They still had a
long road ahead of them. However,
they weren’t young either. The
innocent dreams of youth were
a long way behind them and their
children had now long gone.

Perhaps it was because they were no longer around,
we will never really know, they
simply thought to themselves one day, ‘Why not? What have we got to lose?’

No sooner had they made the decision, they were all packed up and ready to go and,
for them at least, it felt the right thing to do.

That was a little over three years ago now. 

Three years and the routines of each new day are still the same. He wakes up first,
makes the tea and reaches across to his wife who still lies sleeping in her bed. He
gently kisses her on the cheek and wishes her good morning, hoping each day that
today is better than the last.

Then breakfast, washing up and organizing everything back into its proper place. In
a space this small, even for only two people, you simply cannot afford to be messy.

Anyway, life is messy enough.

Sometimes they stay in their caravan all day. Other times they jump in the car with
a flask of hot tea at the ready, drive to their local beach and watch the sea roll
in or children playing in the sand.

They don’t talk much to one another, except about practicalities.

After all, what is there to say?

Occasionally, they both think back to their previous life, before the caravan. It
now seems a lifetime away, if not two. But they never speak about it; never once
question their chosen life on the road; never once think about going back.

They couldn’t.

And it isn’t because they are too far from home. Not at all! You see, the caravan
has never been roadworthy, at least not as far as anyone could remember. It still
sits, as it always has, at the end of the driveway next to the home the Couple
decided to leave all those months ago. 

The neighbors, of course, have noticed; but are too polite to address the subject
directly. 

They prefer to talk behind their backs and under their breath. Anyway, what do you
say to a couple who have to shut the door so firmly on a chapter of their lives?

The house itself, if you were ever to pass by and peer through the windows, is quite
simply beautiful. Everything has its proper place and is kept clean by the husband’s
weekly cleaning routine – every Monday morning without fail. It really is a labor of
love.

A more adequate, comfortable family home could hardly be imagined. It literally was
the talk of the town, and the envy of it too.

But that was before the accident. A dark, December night, just before Christmas. A
drunk driver, they said. Two children, aged 7 and 9, gone in an instant.

They simply had to leave.

And as the Couple closed the beautiful, red-painted door of their notoriously happy
home, I guess they knew that they would never move back.

The caravan just seemed safer.

*A short fictional tale, inspired by the many caravans that sit on driveways outside

of British homes.