Nine Days

The app told me I’d be riding to the airport with Theogene.

I briefly wondered how to pronounce Theogene, and if he went by Theo or Gene or something else entirely.

I looked out the door, half hearing the fraught conversation in the kitchen, half thinking Theogene was running late. He wasn’t, but my bags were there at my feet and I was ready to go.

“I love you,” my mom said, walking toward me, crying.

“I love you, too. I’ll be back soon.”

“When??” she asked, though I’d already told her several times since seven a.m.

“Nine days, mom.”

“When is that?”

“February ninth.”

Theogene pulled up in his little Nissan sedan, and my mom threw her arms around my neck. “I don’t want you to go,” she said, sobbing.

“I’ll be back soon.”

“When??”

My brother picked up my bags and waited by the door, while I eased away.

“Soon, mom. February ninth.”

“When is that?”

“Nine days,” I said quietly.

“I don’t know what to do or where to begin!”

“Mom, you don’t need to do anything, it’s all taken care of.”

“I feel like I should be doing something, but I don’t know what to do!”

“It’s okay, mom. See all these boxes? This is what we’ve been doing the past few days. You don’t need to do anything.”

My brother went out, and I caught the screen door just before it closed. Walking down the curving red sidewalk toward the car I glanced at the app again. “Theogene” it reminded me.

The trunk popped open and my brother hoisted my bags inside. He closed the lid and then pushed on it to be sure it was closed—and then I pushed on it to be sure it was closed. Because trunk lids always want you to think they’re closed when in fact they’re secretly still open.

We hugged, tight.

“I love you, man.”

“I love you, too.”

I reached for the door handle, but then my dad was there, looking for another hug.

“Love you.”

“Love you, too.”

Then, the door handle, and the back seat, and the inside door handle, and quiet.

I fastened the seatbelt and caught Theogene’s eye in the rearview mirror.

“Good morning, Theogene,” I said, hoping I got it right.

“Good morning, Michael,” he said, with an accent that suggested he had been born somewhere far from where we were.

Without further ceremony, we rolled away from the house my parents bought fifty years ago and will be selling soon.

It wasn’t until just now, hours later and over an ocean, that it hit me—I didn’t look back. Or wave. Or…

I’ll be back soon, mom. Nine days. 

See? It’s written down right here.