She just shook her head and continued walking to the house. They stepped over the screen door and Michelle tried the doorknob. It turned easily. Sean put a hand over hers. “You sure you want to do this?”
“We came all this way. And I doubt I’ll ever come back.”
He removed his hand and they walked in. The place was empty and filthy.
Sean had grabbed a flashlight from the SUV and now swung it around, revealing ragged blankets, food wrappers, empty beer bottles, and more than a dozen used condoms.
“Not exactly one for the memory books,” she murmured, taking all of this in.
“Walks down memory lane usually aren’t. It’s hardly ever as good as you remember.”
She eyed the stairs.
He followed her gaze. “Which bedroom was yours?”
“Second on the right.”
“Want to head up?”
“Maybe later.”
They walked around the main floor, taking in more trash and rot, and Sean noticed that Michelle didn’t really register on anything. She pushed open the back door and stepped outside. More trash, the carcass of the truck in the side yard, and a leaning one-bay garage with its overhead door gone, revealing a mound of junk inside.
It was all pathetic and depressing and Sean could barely stand being here. He didn’t quite know how Michelle was able to keep from running away screaming.
“So what are we doing here?” he asked.
She sat down on the back porch. He stood beside her.
“Did you ever go back to the place where you grew up?”
“Once,” he said.
“And?”
“No grand revelations. Other than everything being a lot smaller than I remember, which makes perfect sense because I’m a lot bigger now. So I just saw the house and kept on driving.”
“I’d like to do that. See the house and keep on driving.”
“Let’s go then.” He reached in his pocket, pulled out the keys to the SUV, and flipped them to her. “You can do the honors.”
They walked back through the house; she paused at the stairs.
“Michelle, you don’t have to beat yourself up about this.”
She started up the stairs.
“You sure about this?” he said.
“No,” she said, but kept on going.
They reached the wide landing and stopped. There were four doors, two on each side.
“So the second one there was yours?” He pointed to the right.
She nodded.
Sean moved to open the door but she stopped him.