Work Text:
Another afternoon, another twelve hours to spend in the house alone. When you had taken the teaching job at the local high school three years ago, getting off at three had been a bonus. Now that there was no one to spend that extra time with, it was nothing but a burden. As you took a long sip of your favorite drink and stared out at the orange forest beyond your yard, you could feel the sneaking suspicion that it was getting to be time to move on.
You’d miss your students, obviously, and the steady paycheck; the feeling of the small town and the way the winter air smelled. But you needed something other than what this place had to offer–like a smaller house, maybe. As beautiful as New England in the fall might have been, it seemed silly to stick around this massive place when all you needed was a bedroom and bathroom for yourself. The children’s bedrooms upstairs were going to remain empty, and you felt even lonelier sleeping in the master bedroom on your own.
Sighing, you picked up your grading pen and looked down at the stack of essays sitting on the desk. You needed to pass them back at the beginning of next week if you wanted to give your students a chance at revising them before the grading period wrapped up. Boy, weren’t you sick of reading them, though–weren’t you sick of everything.
Just as your tired eyes found the title on the next sheet, the phone in the hallway blared. You frowned and and squinted at the tiny black letters on the paper, trying to concentrate through the noise. No one called you, not unless they were telemarketers or students from your old alma mater wanting money. They always called back again; there was no need for you to get up to answer.
A few short minutes later, the answering machine gave its immediate and unexplained beep.
A moment of silence followed before: click. Whoever it was hung up. The tension in your shoulders gradually worked away in the quiet that followed; you made several marks on the paper.
The phone rang again.
You started, and your red pen hit the table with a clatter. Your heart beat violently in your chest as you waited, perched tensely on your chair, for another ring.
It came.
Cautiously, you got to your feet. Maybe it was the principal. Maybe it was a student’s mother. But for whatever reason, the fact that whoever it was seemed both highly intent on hearing from you and not at all desirous of leaving message made you nervous. Your breath shook as you stood, padded into the hall, and picked up the portable phone there.
“Hello?” you said.
“Hi,” said a man on the other end. “Is this the [L Name] residence?”
“I’ve never heard it referred to as such,” you said, leaning against the wall and trying to get your nerves under control. Technically, the answer was yes, and the house was under your name, but it belonged to someone with an entirely different surname. You certainly hadn’t paid for it.
The man cleared his throat. “Uh, okay. But, um, is there a [Name] there, by any chance?”
“Who wants to know?”
“May I speak to her, please?”
“Look,” you said angrily, “I don’t–”
“It’s Bruce.”
The phone slipped from your hand and hit the wood floor. “Shoot,” you whispered as you bent down to pick it up.
“[Name]?”
“Y-Yeah,” you said, as you returned the phone to your ear. “Bruce? Is that really you?”
“Yeah,” he said slowly. “Yeah, it’s me.”
“Are you–Are you okay? What’s happened? I haven’t–It’s been years. I thought–I thought you were dead.”
“Yeah, I know. I’ve–I’ve been around. You know,” in your mind’s eye, you could see Bruce tugging his hand through his hair, “getting shot at, running from the military, that sort of thing.”
“Where are you?”
Bruce didn’t answer. You could tell that he hadn’t hung up, though, because you could hear him breathing every so often.
“Bruce?”
“Well–” He began, then stopped, then took a huge breath. “It’s kind of rude to show up at someone’s house uninvited, but I didn’t really think about that. That is to say, I sort of–well, it’s not my house, but I forgot and–”
Bruce continued to ramble on, but you hardly listened. You pelted for the front door, bare feet smashing against the wooden floor as you did. Your trembling hands needed several attempts to unlatch the lock, but when they managed, you threw the door open.
The man standing outside looked up as the door banged against the inside wall.
Your eyes met, You dropped the phone again. The arm holding Bruce’s cell phone slowly dropped as well. He blinked, then said:
“I am so sorry.”
And what could you do in answer but throw yourself into his arms and cry?