The door clicked softly to his room and he turned the lock before heading over, setting down his shower caddy and sitting down at his desk. His fingertips were wrinkled, and despite the boiling hot water, he didn’t feel better. Idly, he checked his phone, but it was slow tonight, and there was no one he wanted to call. No one he ever bothered to call this late. It wasn’t like before. Sophie wasn’t here.

Setting the phone beside, he ran his hand through wet, blonde hair. Towel about his waist, he sat there and listened. No music. No TV. No noise. The silence was disturbing when you spent your life since The Incident with noise. He felt nostalgic remembering the little TV given to him that would light up the room late at night, playing through white noise like digital rain – or on the bad nights, like the hum of insects.
Shivering, he opened his eyes, and let slender fingers pull the side drawer to his desk, revealing a mahogany. A tan square was set in the top center and written in thin, curling ink was the word “Memories.” He could feel Saliva rustle in his mind, either agitated or restless as he brought the book out and set it on the desk, fingers gliding over the leather cover and trailing down the side and spine. He pulled it open to plastic sleeved pages set on tan paper.

Plump, red-faced newborns slept and crawled on circus print fabric and chewed on bright keys. Not many, barely a page. His mother had the collection and he had no need of them. This page was shared with a few toddlers, shaking steps along his sister, already in kindergarten, baby fat long since lost with the first resentment to another child. The page turned and his memory finally started to kick in. A Easter excited over rabbits. A birthday with friends. Missing tooth. A local fair. Haystack ride in Halloween before the night chilled him more than the brisk air in the picture, reddening their cheeks, younger brother, Christopher, finally appearing.

The pages turned. Years skipped without care or courteously. Chris first bike. Baseball game with Uncle Greg. Cousins May and Issac skating with Chris and him, though not all very balanced as others. There were holiday pictures in messy timelines. Bikes, Action figures, basketball hoop, and Hotwheels tracks that never really worked as advertised. Thanksgiving dinners out of focus but too precious to throw away. Seasons moved between misshapen snowmen to visits to the lake to failed fishing trips. Despite difficulties, appointments and checkups, there was time for these things. His parents always made time despite how much he loved to stay in his room.

His world expanded. Freshman year, fresh friends, and gaining the weight of freedom and choices. Kassy, Thomas, Yalin, Bret, Jack, and Lars. People he hated, people he liked, and self-appointed wingmen. Darold, his roommate, great guy but snored, who had to wake up that morning when the police probably came to..

Melvin turned the page, pausing to brush his fingers past her. Mia. Who was it again? Quinten who she was with? Guy was a d**k anyways.
The pages turned and turned, college events to study sessions where the most that was accomplished was losing sleep and eating chips, holidays at home, restaurant trips late at night. The photo album opened to stuffed pages of printed out sheets, quickly selected while packing for a final trip and too big to slip into the pages. Drunk parties, fund raisers, hanging out on benches and sleeping in funny positions. All his friends he associated with and those he barely knew spilling from Facebook pages and piled into a folder. Page after page after pa-

Then white.

His hands stopped and he looked at the tan page staring back. Slowly turning to another page. Blank. This one too. And this. The past was 2 years down the road behind him, and there were no signs up ahead. An empty expanse of tan pages.

Melvin…don’t..

Head bowing, he pressed his brow to the pages, gripping the covers and pressing them from either side, but they didn’t suffocate the sound.

…It gets easier with time...

..there's more things to this than the past…

…Some people can't handle the change .

…. ain't no point or sense livin' in the past, but sometimes Ah gotta wonder how things are back home wit'out me.

You made the wrong choice, big ******** deal. We all did. And its too late to change it…

Don't go. Please. There's still another way. You don't have to do this!

He rose up, covering his mouth as tears welled down and dripped on the plastic covers, collecting in the crack of the album. He stared at the wall, the blank pages watching him, before he shook his head and wiped his eyes. Reaching over, he opened another drawer and pulled out some wiped, cleaning the pages till they were dry, and put the book back.

Melvin, could you just talk?

He went to the switch and flicked it.

Melvin, please.

“Good night.” He said, throwing the covers over his shoulder and made a point to close his eyes.

…good night.