North of Now

On the second day of her vacation, the girl stopped struggling with the rock hard clay she was chiseling at and leaned against the sweaty shovel. She was beginning to miss the job she hated. She paused her laboring, adjusted her pony tail, and pondered what her co harts were doing without her.
"Anywhere in the world."
"What?"
"Anywhere in the world you want to go."
The girl hurriedly stood up straight and took her foot off the shovel. She had not wanted him to catch her daydreaming when there was so much ahead for her to do.
"Next year I will send you anywhere you want to go on your vacation."
"Why next year?", she asked wishing she was anywhere on the face of the earth but standing along side the half finished chicken coup.
"Just figure out where you want to go and we will book it now, this year, before your vacation is over, so you are set for next summer."
"Let's just get this never ending building project of your done first. I have all winter to search on the Internet and plan for next."
"No- do it now. You can use up all my frequent flier miles and you and the boys can go where ever your heart desires."
"I can do that later", she argued.
"They might not be available for you later", he persisted.
The girl lay down her tool and walked into the house to shower of the dust and the tears before reaching for the computer he had bought her last Christmas. She stared at the blank search engine screen and tried to come up with a destination. She used to dream of the exotic travels she would make. Her mind when back to how happy she had been last year, north of the Arctic circle. He was not with her then, but they could talk every night. She tried picturing a bright, tropical adventure, but a trip to the center of the earth's magma core could not warm her now. So she Googled her own house to see if any sign of him could be seen from space now. Or ever.
Later that night he asked her again where she wanted to go.
"Alaska.", was her answer.
"Alaska? You never wanted to go to Alaska when I used to talked about going there."
"Alaska is different now."