I drive up the winding path in my beat-up Corvette. I park in the driveway and get out, looking up at the house that I used to live in. The flaking blue paint, the mismatched red trim of the roof. The attic window is still open, the torn curtains blowing out in the wind.

                               I take my sunglasses off and walk to the porch, my boots crunching the gravel. I step onto the creaking wood and wrap my fingers around the screen door handle, pushing the button. The latch gives way and my heart begins to pound.

                               In my mind flashes the image of the porch light, left on to welcome me home from work. It would mean he had come home from work early, and that he was waiting for me. The bulb is gone now, having been shattered by a local kid's BB gun in my absence. That was a little over a month ago.

                              I take the key from my pocket and unlock the door for the last time. I push it open and step into the living room. One of the last things here is the couch. So many Friday nights were spent here, just me and him. The man I cared about the most, James Hudson.

                             We'd come home from our jobs at the factory, scrub off the dirt, and have a late dinner before the TV set. The savory, warm smells drifting in from the kitchen are long gone, the crackle of oil sizzling in a pan forever silenced.

                              My eyes drift over to the bay window, which offers an exquisite view of the sapphire ocean. I kneel beside the wide sill and look out at the dusky blue clouds drifting on overhead, promising eventual sun.

                              The rain is falling quietly over the coast. I turn the window latch and open the pane of glass, lifting my face up to feel the warm droplets on my skin. I breathe in the damp air for a second and sigh.

                              We spent many long, summer nights just beyond the glass, curling up beside the last embers of a dwindling fire, my head on his chest. I can still smell the English Leather, and feel the cool silver of his necklace against my cheek. I thought we'd have forever.

                             I quickly pull myself away from the memory, forcing myself to remember why I'm here. I close the window and push myself up from the floor. Across the room, the telephone sits idle on the living room table.

                             The answering machine still blinks, filled with my own messages. I have to have called this number at least fifty times, just to hear his voice. The voice I'll otherwise never hear again.

                             I take a pen from my pocket and jam the cap underneath the plastic cover of the answering machine, opening it. I pop the tape out and stick it in my pocket along with the pen. I walk to the darkened stairs and go up.

                            Nothing lives here anymore. My love is gone now, and the time has finally come for me to move on from this house. I walk down the hall, passing by the upper main room where a hunter green pine stood in the window every December, adorned in twinkling white lights.

                            I take a moment to step inside and walk over to the French doors that lead to the balcony. I lost him on the rainiest night of the year. I remember begging him not to go. Just a week, he said. Just a week to say goodbye to a dear friend, then he'd come right back.

                            He called me at the airport, letting me know that he was on his way home and that he'd call again when he landed. It's the last message on the tape. The one I'll never erase. I waited up all night for his next call. Hours passed and not a word. The rain started to beat down on the roof, and that next call never came.

                            By midnight I did receive a call, from someone else. The weather's intensity was unforeseeable, said the man on the phone. No one could've predicted what happened.

                             When I hung up the phone, I leaned against the glass and watched the empty obsidian sky. I was alone now. And in the first moment of the solitude that was now here to stay, I let the tears fall.

                              The next day I went home to my parents, unable to face the memories that still live here. My dad came back by himself to move as much of our furniture as possible during the following days, but today he had to go back to work.

                              So I returned by myself, to take what was left of a love I used to know. I suppose I'll leave the couch. I walk to the bedroom and open the closet, taking the wrapped white dress and the pressed black suit from the rack.

                              I take one last look at the bedroom and walk out, going down the hall. When I reach the bottom of the stairs and head to the door, I open it and let myself out. The rain has stopped and the sun came out as predicted.

                              Locking the door and stepping off the porch, I stand back and look the place over. Tomorrow, someone will come for the yellow Cadillac parked in the driveway, and there'll be nothing left.

                              I open the door to my Corvette, stuffing the clothes I was carrying into the passenger seat and getting in. I put the car in drive and pull away from our house on the coast for the last time.