I grab my bag out of the back, realizing how good it feels to be carrying my own suitcase, walking toward a house that hasn’t already been swept for threats, all by myself. No security team. No assistants. Just me.
If only it weren’tthishouse I was walking into.
I stop along the sidewalk near the stairs, grabbing the key out of the fake rock that has been there since I was in middle school. My dad’s lawyer confirmed the hidden key was still there when my team reached out aboutsomeoneneeding to see the house.
Unlocking the front door, I push inside. It’s…the same.
As if it’s a children’s game in some magazine, my eyes scan the scene in front of me, picking out the differences. A new recliner and couch in the living room. A slightly different version of our old refrigerator. A bigger TV that hangs on the wall rather than sitting on the floor. But, mostly, it’s the same. Sure, it’s aged. It’s outdated now, but it’s the same expansive view out the back windows of the sand bluffs. The same light wood cabinets in the kitchen. The sameGod Bless This Messsign hanging where my mom put it almost thirty years ago.
The fractured memories flood back. The smell of lavender mixed with the sharp tang of hospital-strength cleansers. The sound of her coughing at night, muffled through the wall. The pain that radiated through my four-year-old body when I heard she wasn’t coming home. My dad shutting down. The fights. The arguments. The silent resentment that lingered in the house like a thick fog. Escaping to the Harpers’ house. Dad telling me the one thing I could do to make it all worthwhile was to take over the farm. More fights between us.
The house holds it all like a matching set of baggage.
I slip my phone out of my pocket and dial Andre back. “I need you to book me a flight home tomorrow,” I say after he answers. “This was a bad idea.”
“What happened?” Andre asks. “You were ready to stay two weeks five minutes ago.”
“And then I walked inside and remembered how much I hate this house.”
“I’ll get you a room at a hotel.”
“No. This was a bad idea. I closed the door on this part of my life when I was eighteen. My roots aren’t here; my demons are.”
There is a pause, and I hope it means Andre is coordinating with pilots to return the plane to Denver.
“I think you should stay,” Andre says instead of confirming my flight out of here.
“No.”
“Hear me out, you were in a house for two minutes and are so pissed off you’re changing your plans. That doesn’t say closure to me; it screams unresolved issues. Don’t be the guy who can’t face his past.”
There’s a long pause where neither of us says anything.
Andre sighs. “I’m not booking the plane for you to come home. Embrace the pain. Write about it. Channel it into a song for the Lupus Foundation.”
He mumbles something to someone else. Probably Annie.
“Annie’s not going to book a flight for you either. So you’re stuck there. For at least two weeks.”
“You two do know I can book my flights, right?” I ask defiantly.
“Maybe,” Andre responds. “But it’s been over ten years since you have. And I don’t think you will.”
I grunt. He might be right.
“Stay there, Jaxon. Deal with your shit. Then you can sell the house and the farm and never look back if that’s what you want. But you need to do something if walking into your childhood home is that triggering to you. Maybe call Dr. Newsom? At the very least,channel it into a song.”
“I’m firing you as soon as I get home.”
“Fine. I’m bored off my ass anyway. If you don’t start writing music or performing again, I’m going to have to leave for my sanity. I don’t do well with monotony, and I can only work out with you so many times a day.”
“One week,” I say, going back to our previous conversation. I can’t stay here for two weeks.
“Two months,” he counters.
“Ten days.”
“Fine.”
