I drove out of the rental car lot and into the city, taking I-25 toward Wyoming. It was cooling down. August was one of those months where it was not too hot and not too cold, with the summer receding and winter announcing itself and everything hanging in the balance.

The road was smooth, the air was clear, and I arrived at my mom’s place right on time. She came out, her arms wide, a smile on her face.

“I knew you would get a death trap,” she said after hugging me, her eyes taking in the car.

I laughed. “You’re always teasing me about my cars.”

She shrugged. “You’re the only boy I have. I need to keep you close.”

I hugged her again. “It’s good to be home,” I said.

I looked at the house I’d grown up in. It was exactly the same, from the two rocking chairs on the porch to the mud splatters along the bottom of the walls that happened every time it rained.

We walked into the house, and I put my bags in my old room before I joined my mom in the kitchen.

“Tell me what I’ve missed,” my mom said. She started on spaghetti bolognaise, my all time favorite if it was my mother’s. “When are you going to bring a girl home?”

“When I find one, Mom,” I said. “But dating isn’t my priority.”

My mom sighed. “Yeah, you always say that. But I don’t believe that you don’t have a string of girls following you around. You’re handsome, just like your dad. And you’re not going to be young forever, you know?”

I groaned. We had this conversation every time I visited.

“Mom, I’m only twenty-five, and I’m at the peak of my career. I can’t play ball forever. Once I retire, I can start thinking about a family.”

“But I want grandchildren,” my mom said.

We laughed together. I couldn’t even think of something like that now. My football career had an expiration date; love didn’t. Seeing that I hadn’t found it yet, anyway.

Not since Carly.

The thought of her brought a pang of longing and guilt that I shoved away. I was here to enjoy myself, not to visit ghosts from the past. I hadn’t seen her since that day, and odds were that she’d moved on long ago. She was the kind of woman any guy would be happy to have, so I was sure she’d found someone else by now.

“I know this is important to you,” my mom said, pulling me back to the present. “But you know I’m not going to stop nagging.”

“I know, Mom,” I said.

I knew she meant well and just wanted me to be happy. What she didn’t understand was that playing ball made me happy. Nothing since Carly had made me so happy so I didn’t see the need to chase tail or date women when I could never get my mind off the one I lost my virginity to and had hoped to do a lot more than that with.

I had always figured that when the time was right, I would be able to put Carly in my rearview mirror and move on. It just so far turned out that time took a lot longer to be right than I had anticipated.

We spoke about a bunch of things on our drive. Mom told me about her life here, gossiping about her friends and the people she saw every day, telling me about a world I wasn’t a part of anymore. I settled into that comfort that comes with being back at home, listening to the sound of my mom’s voice, the sound that had lulled me to sleep when I was a kid.

We ate dinner together, and I helped her clean up. When we were done, the sun was sinking below the horizon.

“Let’s sit outside,” my mom said, and we made coffee and sat in the rockers on the porch. The sky was colored in streaks of orange and purple, the last frantic attempt of a drowning sun to survive. It was beautiful, and I took a deep breath, enjoying the smell of the fall breeze that hung in the air.

The neighbor’s front door banged open, and a man stomped out that wasn’t Jeremy Brandt, the man who had lived next door all my life. This man had a full head of gray hair and an uptight attitude, despite his age. And he looked achingly familiar.

“Who’s that?” I asked.

My mom was silent. I glanced at her. She looked at her hands, picking at a nail. I watched the old man as he walked to the garden shed. His walk and his stance and his attitude nagged at my subconscious. A moment later, it hit me.

“Is that Mr. Donovan?” I asked, looking at my mom.

She looked at me, her lips pursed together, and nodded.

“He lives next door now?” I asked.

As she nodded again, I shook my head. Fuckin’ A, man. The coincidence was ridiculous. That Carly’s tyrannical dad would end up right next door to my mom’s house seemed like a cruel joke.

Yet there he was, taunting me with his very presence, just like he had haunted my past for so long.