You Can't Go Home Again

Small towns never change. Sunnyvale certainly had not.

That’s not a fair assessment, thought Lily, pulling into her designated parking spot. The grocery store was now a full-fledged supermarket, complete with an in-store pharmacy, and the coffee shop-slash-bookshop that replaced Minkert’s Dry Goods and Variety store was a definite improvement. She could even get a pizza delivered, if she wanted.

Even the highway had been widened in spots, to prevent miles-long backups during planting and harvesting seasons.

Sunnyvale was a farming community, although it had originally been a railway town, plotted to provide a stop for the trains as they made their way between Indianapolis and Chicago. Most of the populace lived on farms, with their extended family spread out in small houses in town. Rental property was thin, although there were a handful of churches in town, along with a couple of restaurants, a nice library, and a bar. 

Lily had lucked out when she called the realtor to find an apartment. The unit in the 1905 Mallon Building was the same apartment her favorite librarian had rented back in the day. Originally the railway’s offices, it was the front corner, the original beveled glass door and transoms; even the steel bars covering the glass did not ruin the feel.

When the old owners had originally turned the building into apartments back in the early 1980’s, Miss Adams had been the first occupant. She lived there until her death six months earlier, and the owners had waited to rent it out, almost as though they knew Lily would want to live there.

It was called something different when she was in high school, she could not remember what. The new owners had painted the exterior a pleasing shade of gray, did their research, and decided to rename it. She did not need two bedrooms, and it was temporary, but it gave her time to settle in and decide where to buy, once she settled in to her new job.

It wasn’t perfect, but for now, she was happy there. It was exactly as she remembered it, complete with creaky wood floors and the bathroom door that stuck on the floor after a shower. She could walk to any of the downtown businesses, quite a change from Las Vegas. The only downside was the constant reminder of her youth.

When Lily was in high school, a large retirement home had been built, and since then, while she was living in Las Vegas, a small hospital had been built and started actively recruiting. Her mom lived in the retirement home now, only one of the reasons she had taken the call from the recruiter two months earlier.

Landing the job was easy. Packing up her home in Vegas: not so much. It was the home she had shared with her husband until his death. It was the home where her daughter was raised, until she grew up and moved away to her own life.

She still wore her wedding ring, even though Jack had been dead for more years than they had been married. It held people at bay, left her to mourn in her own way, leaving her to her ghosts of her husband and the happiness they had shared for those few years of marital bliss.

There was the old adage: you can’t go home again. What did that mean? She never really understood it. Returning home would reopen those wounds, she knew, but wasn’t it time? She had lived so long with her memories of Jack, didn’t she need to move on to other memories?

Memories of times best forgotten, people she had not thought of since walking out of her high school on that Sunday afternoon, tossing her cap and gown in the trash without a look over her shoulder. She had never returned, flying her mother to Vegas instead of coming back to Sunnyvale. The idea of returning made her stomach fluttery.

He was still there.

She knew, because he was the first person she had looked up on Facebook before saying yes to the job offer. She had stalked him for several days before sending the friend request, which had been accepted almost immediately.

“He’s waiting for you,” her assistant told her, as Lily dropped off her purse. Thanking her, Lily slipped into her office and studied the man waiting for her. She shrugged into her white jacket and circled him.

“Hello, Coop.”

Cooper Henry. Star quarterback in the fall, power forward when the season changed to basketball, pitching in the spring, he had gone to a local college on a basketball scholarship, returning home to take over the family farm immediately after graduation.

They had met on their first day of kindergarten and Lily was immediately smitten. It took Coop a few more days to fall for Lily, but they were inseparable after that, at least until day she received the letter from UNLV, offering her a full scholarship. Coop wanted her to turn it down, to stay home, marry him, and spend the rest of her life on the farm. Lily wanted more and she had pursued her dreams.

“I heard you lost your wife a few years ago. I’m sorry about that.” She truly was. She understood loss. At least Jack had not lingered, taken by cancer, as Coop’s wife had suffered.

“My Jack's been gone for 25 years now. It never gets any easier, does it?”

Meeting Jack had changed Lily’s life. The break up with Coop had been tough, but Lily hoped that, if she returned to Sunnyvale after graduation, they would pick things up again, but fate had other ideas. Jack had pursued her relentlessly, insisting that she take her MCAT, helping her apply for medical school, cheering her on, all while studying law between his deployments.

While she examined a spot on Coop’s shoulder, she rambled on about life in Las Vegas, trying to explain to him why she had stayed, even after Jack’s death in a training accident.

“Your children are all grown up now, aren’t they? I ran into your son at the coffee shop the other day. Hard to miss him,” she laughed, patting his arm before making a note on his chart.

“My daughter got married last year. They’re expecting their first child in the spring. She loves living in Tokyo. Her husband works for the city.”

She poked and prodded at his stomach before returning to the chart to add a few notes.

When Coop’s son had introduced himself at the coffee shop on Saturday morning, Lily had not been surprised. He was a carbon copy of his father, broad-shouldered, stormy blue eyes, the strong jaw. He had a miniature version of himself on his hip, a charming toddler who giggled when Lily said hello.

“Your grandson is adorable, by the way.”

Flipping up the papers, she turned back, sighing quietly as she stared at Coop’s features. “You never could grow a decent beard,” she mumbled, swiping her fingers over his jaw.

She had only been back in town for three weeks, but there were reminders of their years together everywhere she looked. The elementary school was gone, of course, but the library, where they’d had their first kiss, was still there, right across the street from her apartment. The creaky floors of the coffee shop reminded her of the hours they had spent pouring over the long lost items buried deep in the dusty shelves of the dry goods shop.

Every time she walked down the street to the post office, she remembered walking hand-in-hand with Coop, heading into the fall festival, or going to the theater for a matinee.

“The whole town is one big memory,” sighed Lily. “And you. I knew we would see one another, Coop, Sunnyvale just isn’t that big. People are walking around on egg shells. I hate that. I know I’ve been gone for a long time, but no one here knew Jack.

“You would have liked him, I think.” She smiled, thinking about her husband. “He was taller than you, but the same build. He was funny, smart. He had a deathly fear of chickens.”

Laughing, she lifted Coop’s hand to check his fingernails. “I thought about coming back a couple years ago, when Mom decided to move into the assisted living facility. She didn’t want to move to Vegas. She told me to come home, that you were lonely with Carol. I – I just wasn’t ready. She just didn’t understand.

“I didn’t realize how much I missed Jack until Katie got married, you know? It was like losing him all over again. I was hoping we could have a second chance. I wish I had come home sooner now.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t come back sooner, Coop,” whispered Lily, smoothing back his hair, always unruly if he let it get too long. There was silver at his temples now, and in his beard, but that was really the only hint at his 55 years. That, and the purplish-gray pallor of his skin.

The door to the morgue swung open and Lily’s assistant pushed through. “Are you going to cut him open?”

Lily shook her head. “No, I was just saying hello to an old friend. We dated in high school, you know?”

“Cause of death?”

“Sudden cardiac death. His son has asked that I not cut him open unless it’s absolutely necessary, and I see no reason to.”

“Is he ready then? I’ll call the funeral home.”

“Sure. Look, do you have this covered? I think I need to go check on my mom. She’s been bugging me lately about never stopping in to see her. I think it’s time to mend some fences.”

Smiling down at Coop’s immobile features, Lily impulsively brushed her hand over his cheek once last time.

“Goodbye, old friend. It was nice seeing you again. I wish it had been under better circumstances.”