When We Were Young

Like It Was Before

My heart was in my throat. I had never been so nervous in my life. I was sweating, and shaking, and sick to my stomach. The front door closed and I turned around. Rachel had left me alone. I guess she was confident that Skylar would be happy to see me. But I was having my reservations.

The apartment hadn't changed too much. New couches and the bookcase was gone. There was a new one in its place with fewer pictures and I couldn't resist going to see them.

It was crazy to think that I was in the same apartment with her. That I was in the apartment I shared with her. I took off my coat and walked over to the pictures. There were a few that were the same: ones of her and her mother, and Zeb and his family. And there were new pictures of her with her nieces, I guess they were in their twenties now, at one of their college graduations. Next to it was a picture of Sky with Rachel on her wedding day. They looked beautiful, and happy. Then a few pictures of Sky and a dog. He was a black and white shaggy thing. She was beaming in every picture. In the last picture, he had white around his nose and she was holding him on her lap. He looked old and I could see it in her eyes, the tears and sadness that she was holding back.

And I suspected that was probably the last picture of her with him.

I moved to the next shelf and had to catch my breath. I shuddered and felt the wall around me start to crumble. After all these years, after no calls, no emails, like she had vanished into thin air and became like someone I had imagined or dreamed, that she really didn't love me as much as I loved her and me leaving was what she really wanted—there on the shelf were four pictures of me with Skylar.

I stumbled into the sofa and rested against the arm. Everything I had told myself over and over that I was better off, even if I didn't believe it. Every time I met another girl and immediately compared her to Skylar, and then hated myself for it, was not in jest. When Cait found a picture of Skylar and I explained to her that she was very special to me, and someone I loved very much, and how it broke my heart to tell my daughter about Sky because Cait should have been my daughter with Skylar.

Skylar was going through the same thing. She didn't stop loving me.

The first picture was the same one I kept in my wallet from our first date at the hockey game. Fuck, we were so absolutely happy in that moment. The second was our trip to Italy. We were on the beach and she was resting backwards against my chest, and the sun was setting behind us. We were glowing, shivering I remember, but the orange sky created a surreal backdrop. My father had taken that picture and my heart shook at remembering. The third was when I had graduated and we were here celebrating. We weren't even looking at the camera and I think that Rachel had taken it. But we were looking at each other like nobody else was in the room. Her hand was resting against my cheek, and I had my arms tightly around her waist.

And the fourth was at my going away party before I left her. She had been crying. Her eyes were glistening in the picture, but I held her close to me with her head resting against my chest and my cheek against her forehead. To this day, I remember exactly what I was thinking.

I will never love another woman like I love Skylar. At that point, I still had hope she would be coming with me, or at least join me a few months after I left. But now, I see in this picture that she knew she would never see me again.

And now I know why.

After taking a few moments to gather myself and not appear so disheveled, I headed down the hallway to our bedroom. Rachel told me that Sky thought she was running to pick up some things from the store and wasn't expecting anyone else.

My hand hovered over the door and finally rested my palm flat against it. It was quiet inside, perhaps she was sleeping and I would wake her. She'd think she was having a dream.