It is considered common knowledge that returning to your childhood home is like taking a step back in time. Claire had looked forward to it when she got the call and packed her bags a week early. She looked forward to it now as she drove, windows cracked, watching the sea of pedestrians and traffic bleed into empty roads and towering trees. 

The gravel in the driveway crunched beneath her tires. Returning to the little white farmhouse on the hill tugged memories to the surface that overwhelmed her, so numerous and vivid that she hesitated to go inside just yet. The white picket fence, the garden full of carrot tops and lettuce leaves around the corner, and the faded quilt on the clothesline all could have escaped from a novel set fifty years ago. The house was timeless, both in a broad and personal sense.

Claire spent too much time attempting to untangle her hair, whipped about by the wind travelling through her car windows. It gave her a moment to breathe in the smells of sunshine, freshly turned soil, lemons, and laundry swaying in the breeze.

A war was already taking place inside of her, one fighting off the painful memories that inevitably came with the good.

The kitchen hadn’t changed much, but the dining room table was new. They sat around it now, having settled down to a game of cards after her mother had filled her in on the amazing deal they had found at an out-of-the-way antique store. Claire had felt a bit of a lurch when she saw it, sitting there looking foreign in the otherwise familiar room. Four matching chairs had been a part of the deal as well, and she couldn’t help but allow her eyes to flicker in the direction of the empty one now and then. 

“Have you talked to him at all?” her mother asked.

“No.”

“Claire.”

“Ace of spades,” she said, playing the card with such deliberation that there was nothing to do but continue the game.

It was almost a relief to escape the smothering affection of her parents, but not quite. Up in her old bedroom, she laid on her back, picking out shapes in the lumpy ceiling above. The walls around her were difficult to look at for too long, residue from tape that had held up posters and polaroids all that remained of her past self. Now the walls were bare, the shelves were dusty, and the floor freshly vacuumed. It had become nothing more than a guest room.

She couldn’t help herself. She reached for the top shelf in her old closet and felt around for the firefly jar. There it was, with the holes poked through the lid and a few pieces of dead grass in the bottom. Their firefly jar had captured much more than just bugs. She imagined that if she opened it, memories in the form of echoes and faint laughter would pour out. The lid stayed shut.

It was a rite of passage, she supposed, the realization that one had grown up and moved on from childish things, but as she held that jar in her hands, the euphoria of using it for the first time gripped her. He had poked the holes, and she had watched, entranced by the skillful movements of his hands. When they took it outside, they had taken turns holding the jar and catching bugs, holding them captive for observation before letting them all fly free at once when they finished watching.

The firefly jar was a part of the farmhouse, and the farmhouse was a part of her. These things made up who she had become, and that earned them no small token of gratitude. The problem was not rooted in the home itself, but in the fact that if she didn’t belong there, she belonged nowhere, and that made her afraid.

Admitting that she was afraid had never been one of Claire’s strengths. Nobody knew this better than he did. 

He had dared her to walk along the stone wall obscured by the trees when they were in fourth grade. The wall had been one of their discoveries a year before, stumbled upon during one of their adventures among the leaves. Her pride had spiked the moment the dare was proposed and she clambered up, wobbling as a gust of wind rattled the branches at her side.

Five steps. Five steps were as far as she got before she tumbled down, landing among the sticks and rocks, directly on her ankle. A shriek caught in her throat. 

He had crouched down at her side, spotting the tears forming in her eyes, though they both knew she would not let them fall. Perhaps he had felt a bolt of pain in his own ankle. Their synchronicity had frightened babysitters and teachers in the past, though their mother only rolled her eyes when they tried to fool her with it. 

He had promised to return with help, leaving her with a pat on the head and the silence that filled the woods when he was gone. 

She couldn’t have sat there for longer than ten minutes, but it felt to her like hours. The pain didn’t bother her so much as the ominous breeze toying with her mind and the branches overhead. 

A year ago, they would have laughed together at the memory. Now she tried to forget the tenderness in his face, the gentle touch he had left her with before going for help.

When Claire was certain that her parents were asleep, she climbed out of the window and onto the first branch of the oak tree, waiting for her every summer night she had spent in that room. She and her brother had climbed down countless times together when the call of their empty forest playground was irresistible.

Her feet met the earth, sending a wave of relaxation through her. The grass was soft beneath her sneakers as she walked and then ran in the direction of the woods. The map they had drawn and committed to memory hadn’t left her in the months away, and her internal compass led her in the direction of their clubhouse, built in the summer before sixth grade. As far as she knew, it still stood, waiting for the twins to return.

She hadn’t grown much since that summer, but she still had to stoop under the doorway. Right away she nearly tripped over his wooden sword that lay forgotten in the overgrown grass. At some point he had picked it up for the last time and neither of them had known it. The flag had fallen, torn by a branch that had grown too close, but the splintered walls had stood the test of time.

She wished she could tell him so.

It had happened right outside their clubhouse. As her present self stared at the very spot, she saw his hopeful gaze and her defensive one.

He can’t hurt me if I hurt him first.

“Claire, I got in.” His thumbs were hooked in his pockets and he drummed his free fingers on his thigh. 

She couldn’t bear it. She had lived her life in his shadow for too long. She had always been second to him. Second in terms of grades, humor, charm, athleticism. And now she was second choice for her dream school, the one she had pinned all of her hopes on, the one she had begged him to apply for so they could be together in their college years, just as they had always been. 

And then he got in. She did not.

She couldn’t take it.

Nothing stopped her from calling him. Nothing but her own selfish pride. 

Jealousies and grudges were not worth what they had cost her. She knew that. They both knew that. She had tried to justify herself by reasoning that he could have called her any time if he wanted to, but would she have answered? Would she have wanted to talk to him if the roles were reversed? Unlike his sister, he didn’t have a problem admitting when he was afraid. Was he afraid of her?

She wondered if he had talked about her to anyone. Perhaps his roommate, or maybe a date. He was always a great storyteller. He could tell of the time he had gotten stuck halfway in the second story window and she had tried to get him out by rubbing tub butter between his stomach and the windowsill. Or maybe he would tell of the time their small dog got into a fight with one of the chickens and they placed bets on who would win.

No, she decided her pride had never been as important as she had fooled herself into thinking it was.

Her walk back to the house was deeply peaceful, more peaceful than she had let anything be in months. As she climbed the oak back to her window, she remembered that it was the middle of the night. 

She dialed the number anyway. Somehow she knew he would be awake.