Carol was at Maria's house right before sunrise, banging on the front door until she finally heard movement inside the house.

"Alright, alright, I'm awake," Maria muttered as she opened the front door with a cup of coffee clutched in one hand.

Maria wasn't usually a morning person, but Carol had talked her into an early start to the trip. The sooner they headed out, the further they'd get by evening. And Carol was really hoping they'd make it all the way to Colorado by the evening. She had seen pictures of a really fun little bed and breakfast place just outside of Denver and it was the perfect place to stay the night.

"Where's your bags? I'll start loading the car while you get dressed."

"Bottom of the stairs, next to the cooler."

"Great." Carol slung one of Maria's bags over her arm and bent down for the cooler.

"Hey." Maria put a hand on Carol's shoulder. "Don't use up all that energy before we get going."

"I won't." Carol flashed her a bright smile. "I'll let you do the rest of it."

Maria just shook her head and disappeared back upstairs to finish getting dressed.

Of course, Maria was probably right. Carol had always been the starry-eyed dreamer and Maria was the one keeping her grounded. It had been that way since their college days.

A door opened downstairs and Maria's daughter peered around the corner. "Carol? Are you leaving already?"

"Hey there, Monica. Didn't meant to wake you."

"I was awake already. I wanted to get up in time to say goodbye."

"That's sweet." Carol pulled the little girl into a hug. "Your mom and I are really going to miss you. I wish we could take you with us."

"You don't want me on your anniversary trip," Monica scoffed. "You want to go out drinking and all that grown-up stuff."

"Something like that."

There was definitely going to be plenty of drinking involved, but she was more looking forward to exploring the country with her girlfriend. They were going to relive their glory days from college, when they spent almost every weekend in the bars, laughing and singing karaoke together. And they were finally going to visit all the weird little places they had always wanted to go see.

Carol smiled down at Monica."Maybe we'll make another trip later this year, as a family."

Carol and Maria were only celebrating their sixth anniversary, but they had been friends for more than ten years now and Monica was practically her daughter too.

"Sounds good to me," Maria said as she made her way down to the bottom of the stairs.

"Alright, let's go!" Carol said cheerfully. She kissed the top of Monica's head. "We'll call you every day and send you lots of post cards. And we'll be back before you know it."

After going over a few last-minute instructions for her daughter's stay with a neighbor, Maria followed Carol out the door and started grabbing all the bags Carol had left along the curb.

Carol unlocked her trunk and chucked in the first bag.

"Uh-uh," Maria said. "You're not driving."

"Why not?"

"First of all, my Camaro could run circles around your beat-up old Mustang. And secondly, you're not getting us lost again."

"It was a shortcut," Carol protested. "We made up so much time."

"We also damn near got killed on that winding-ass middle of nowhere road you found."

Carol shrugged indifferently. "Worth it."

"Nope." Maria tossed the bag in her own backseat. "I want to make it back to my baby girl alive."

"Fine. But you're buying us breakfast then."

"Fine by me."

Carol hopped into the passenger's seat and propped her feet up on the dashboard.

As Maria pulled out of the driveway, the first rays of sunrise were just starting to illuminate the neighborhood. She reached for her girlfriend's hand and leaned back in the seat.

The road ahead looked bright and Carol couldn't wait to see where they ended up.