The smoke from the smoldering ashes wafted in the gentle breeze of the cool spring day. The blue sky seemed too ironic to be believable. The brick chimney was the only part of the house still standing.
Eric stood in the middle of the charred remains of his boyhood home and shook his head in disgust. His parents were away on a vacation in Europe; they’d saved for years and he told them he would take care of the details so they could enjoy themselves. He finished drinking his water, and threw the plastic bottle into the last of the ashes. It turned in on itself in the heat. More figurative language, he thought.
Eric made his way to the chimney, stepping over the skeletons of his past. He noticed a charred door hinge in the proximity of his old bedroom. The bedroom was on the second floor, but none of that remained. His stomach churned as he remembered the day his dad unhinged his bedroom door; he was a sophomore in high school and Eric’s grades dropped. His dad told him that doors were a privilege and he could have it back when his grades improved. Eric wanted to thank his dad for this somewhat cruel act of love. Without those grades, Eric would never have gotten into the University of Michigan; his life would have taken a totally different route.
The heat from the ashes was making him sweat. He knew his dad would have loaned him a handkerchief, but thought of using a rag of someone else’s bodily fluids made him shiver. His dad was always blowing his nose because of his allergies and his refusal to take any medication. Taking off his sweatshirt, he wiped the sweat off of his brow with the grey sleeve. Too bad it wouldn’t remove the discomfort of this day.
When Eric made it to the chimney, he gently touched the bricks on the hearth. They were warm to the touch. Wading up his sweatshirt, he made a pad for his knees and reached into the chimney. The flue was always closed; his dad didn’t believe in having fires in the house. More irony, he thought. Opening the flue, he reached up and exhaled when the small pouch dropped into his hand. Eric unwrapped the dirty handkerchief and found the hockey puck and the note. He turned the hockey puck in his hand, feeling the weight and remembering the day it came flying through his bedroom window. Opening the crumpled note, he read it. Now, twenty-five years later, he could feel the bile rising in his throat, remembering the girl who wrote it: “Meet me at the swings at 11:00.”
It all came down to that day. The day he lost his door, he lost the girl, too. That fatal day, when his dad took off his door, he lost the only girl he had ever loved. He couldn’t escape to meet her, because his father’s bedroom door looked right into his own room. There was no way he could go.
He stood up, put the hockey puck in his pocket and walked back to the street. On his way, he threw the note in the ashes and never looked back.