One Last Look Around The House Before We Go

The last of the movers maneuvers the hand truck with the last of the boxes through the front door. I close the door behind him. Through the living room window, I watch as the movers finish loading their truck and drive off. For the first time in a long while, the house is quiet, almost unnaturally so.

The house is vacant, changed, the richness and depth of its ambient sounds replaced by cold and sterile echoes. Even light falls differently: there's a uniformity to it, a flatness that is unrelieved.

I walk from room to room, pausing in doorways, remembering. While the residents of this house are gone, their stories remain. And then I remember that the stories don't belong to the house but are instead part of me.

Outside, the sun is setting and I have other places to be. Returning to the front door, I open it. Before I step through for the last time, I take one final look back at the house I lived in for many years but there is no longer anything here for me.

I lock the door behind me and go.