A Long Trip

It’s been a long time since Lily had last seen her hometown. These days, only the air moved there. The tiny town had lost its shine and replaced it with an eternal cover of dust. The streets were covered with mud and weeds sprang up in the cracks between the pavements. The driveway to her home was wrecked from the lack of maintenance and from an outsider’s look, the whole house seemed to sag with age. Inside was empty. The living room she remembered with ease would not be vibrant. The kitchen would not smell of her father’s pancakes. The hallways would not be framed with pictures of a perfect small-town family. Since her trip, which had lasted a good three years, everything had changed. But how was Lily to know? She hadn’t received a bit of news from anyone in this town. But that was not on her mind when she stepped off the train into the station. 

She expected a bustling head of people running and bumping to make their way onto the vehicle. Though the town was small, there were always plenty of people shoving themselves around to make it into the city for whatever bore of a job they held. But she was not greeted with crying children or anxious adults. Instead, she was greeted with silence. Complete and utter silence. The lights that were still on flickered uncertainly. They weren’t accustomed to lighting the way for someone. Usually, no one got off the train. Lily looked around in the silence. Yes, something was wrong. What had she missed? The click-clack of her petite heels were the only sound that filled the room, but then again, sometimes silence is the loudest sound. Feeling as though someone was watching her from an unknown place Lily picked up her pace rolling her suitcase unsteadily beside her.

Standing outside the door of the train station, she was bewildered to find no one on the streets save a small squirrel. The squirrel stood still, watching her, and occasionally shifting its view in that comical way animals sometimes do. She stared back. Both their black eyes were mesmerized for a moment. For a moment Lily thought she might bound after at the squirrel and scream, “WHERE IS MY BEAUTIFUL TOWN?” But she didn’t. For a few seconds longer, they just stared. And then Lily looked away. There were no cars in the street. The neighboring shops in the town square looked to be closed, and no one was inside. She approached the supermarket she was used to exploring as a treat. Despite no one being inside, she noticed the lights were on and the door was unlocked. Had there been an evacuation? How long ago? Why had no one told her? With a deep breath that seemed much too loud for the quiet little town she turned away from the store, and the squirrel that hat curiously followed her to the store, and started down the street towards what had been her home. 

Straight. Right. Straight. Straight. Straight. Right. Straight. Home. Her mom had made her memorize the path home when she was six. It was to a tune she couldn’t quite remember, but instead, she remembered what it felt like to be able to go wherever she wanted with her friends and always be able to find the way back home. Days were always in a summer haze then, her old friends Marzia and Anna both didn’t want to leave the town when they grew up, very unlike Lily who left the second she got the chance and tried not to come back. It wasn’t that she didn’t like the summer sun and days of endless laughter, but something about the town had always seemed a little too perfect for her liking. But that was almost twenty years ago. Now she rehearsed the path straight, right, straight, straight, straight, right, straight, home to find that she was lost. The streets that she had known so well had turned foreign and she didn’t know what to do. Each way she turned the houses just blankly stared at her. Daring her to stay. She wondered what had pushed everyone out because not a shutter in the windows fluttered. No one was left. It was just her. From the porch of one of the broken-down houses, a small squirrel watched her. Lily went with her gut and turned left. 

The eerie feeling only intensified as she walked leftward. Of course, she was alone in her hometown without a bird or insect in sight, except the squirrel. It cannot be excepted of her to stay calm. Eventually, she found herself back on track and decided to go again at the path she had carefully memorized. Straight, right, home. So she went on. 

She stared up at her childhood home with scarcely a tear in her eye. Something in her told her that she was meant to be crying because her whole family was missing along with everyone in the town including the livelihood of the town, but she couldn’t. Something else in her whispered that this was coming for a long time. She kept on marching on. Up the stairs, face to face with the front door. The squirrel now sat at the end of the driveway. Watching? Thinking? What was Lily to do? She could reach for her bag and let herself in. She had the keys. But that didn’t seem right because this didn’t feel like her home anymore. It felt like she was disturbing private property that wasn’t hers. She could knock on the door or ring the doorbell, but that didn’t feel quite right either since that was her childhood home, and she had never knocked or rung the bell before. So instead she rang the bell, knocked twice, and then let herself in. 

The house didn’t smell strange, but the air felt heavy. Her heart started to beat faster as she peered into the once familiar home. Stepping inside she took off her shoes as she was accustomed to doing, and then decided it was better to keep them on. She didn’t think she would be staying for long. The living room, which was an ironic name for such a sad room. Lonely and dark it sat there with chairs that looked as though they hadn’t been touched in years. The kitchen dishwasher was open and it was half full with some dishes in the sink. The garbage was missing. How long had everyone been gone? She wasn’t interested in the answer, it seemed the least of her worries. She looked into the bathroom, with everything in its place and though no one had used it in god knows how long, the water was still working. Hot and cold. She retraced her steps and walked upstairs where all the bedrooms were except her parents. She didn’t want to see what was left in their room. Then she heard something. A quick, loud, drop. Something was in her house.

The noise came from the stairs so as quietly as she possibly could she walked back. There was an acorn on the floor that had not been there before. At the top of the stairs was a squirrel. It was the same one that had followed her from the train station. And silently it beckoned her to follow it. It was almost pleading with her. Well, she gave in and followed that little squirrel up the stairs. She turned and faced the hallway with five doors ahead of her. Three of the doors are bedrooms, one is a linen closet, and one is a bathroom. There is also a spot where it seems a door is missing but the bathroom actually connected the two sisters’ room so there was no need for an outside door. The squirrel sat in front of the door that she had had her first kiss in. The room that had changed with every phase she went through. It had seen her on days where the world seemed miraculous, and on days when the world seemed to be ending. She put her hand on the knob. It was warm. She looked down at her little friend by her feet, and her little friend looked back. She opened the door and walked in. And thus everyone who had ever lived in the town had disappeared. And all that was left, was the squirrel.