I’ll die before I go back there.
I’ll die if I go back there.
“You know, my mom was a singer, too,” I murmur when we’ve finished playing.
“That’s not surprising — you’ve got a lovely voice, honey.” Gran smiles softly. “Had to come from somewhere, I reckon.”
From you, Gran.
“She used to sing your songs to me when I was really little,” I tell her, trailing my fingertip lightly across the surface of they keys. “It’s one of my first memories.”
“How sweet, dear.”
“Do you think…” I trail off. “Do you think you’d sing one for me?”
“Oh, I don’t do my own songs anymore. It’s not the same. My voice isn’t what is used to be.”
“Your voice is perfect. And it… it would mean the world to me.”
She stares into my eyes, searching them. There’s no recognition there, just compassion for a stranger who’s begging for a favor.
“Name your tune, honey.” She smiles, her bright red lipstick flawless as always. “Just this once.”
And so we sit there together on our last day. I play my guitar as she sings, her voice thready and thin as it fills the air.
“Saw you in the crowd the other day…”
I try not to cry… but I can’t help the tears that slide out as she hits the chorus.
“Sure it’s sad but it isn’t complicated…
You’re my only memory that never faded…”
It’s more than a little heartbreaking that her greatest hit of all time is about never forgetting… when she can’t remember the past twenty years. Can’t remember me.
“You’re my only memory that never faded…”
A cruel twist of fate. Irony at its finest.
Like falling in love the night you say goodbye.
Like finding a home, only to have to leave it.
Tears slide freely down my cheeks as I walk out to the lobby, where Carly’s waiting to drive me back to The Nightingale for our shift.
Another farewell.
Another broken heart.
Another fresh start.
I don’t know how many more of these I can take. I’m not sure how much more I can bend before I shatter to pieces.
* * *
“You can’t just leave.”
“I don’t have a choice, Carly.”