A story about what you build when no one is watching, and who shows up when you’re done
The key was cold in my palm, its edges sharp and new in the way of things that have not yet been worn smooth by use. I stood on the sidewalk for a long moment before I walked up to the door, because I had been imagining this moment for ten years and I wanted to give it its full weight before it became simply a thing that had happened and moved on into the past. The house was exactly the blue I had hoped for, a soft robin’s egg that seemed to hold light rather than simply reflect it. The fence was white, the oak tree in the front yard was exactly as tall and broad as the one I had been drawing in notebooks since I was a child, and the porch swing moved slightly in the afternoon breeze as if it had been waiting.
