loading the woodstove

i’m remembering the winter night, over ten years ago, when he visited for the first time in years, emerging from the trees in the dark early evening on a snowmobile, pulling it in front of my parents’ house and i thought, ‘my hero,’ and i thought, ‘who travels by snowmobile?’ and i thought, ‘how did he do it?’ and i thought, ‘god, i spent years trying to lose this asshole,’ and i thought ‘he still looks great,’ and i thought ‘he still smells like how he smells, and smiles like how he smiles, and talks like how he talks.’

so much came flooding back, but the night was calm and understated, built around nothing more than simple reconnecting, talking about what had happened in the years since high school when we’d gone our separate ways—very separate ways indeed—while, i don’t know, eating pizza and watching television. when my family went to sleep and we remained in the basement, tv on, woodstove roaring, he shrugged when i asked and so it was decided that he would stay the night. i kept loading wood into the furnace, and maybe we were drinking. i don’t remember how it started, but it ended with sobs and convulsions, penetration and the release of so many years’ worth of anger and love and pain and lies and whatever emotion we feel when we miss someone and can’t tell them.

that emotion.

and then silence. and then separate ways again. 

i think of that night whenever i’m home and it’s winter and i’m loading the woodstove.