Going Home
Kurt Savage lay awake listening to the raised voices in the apartment on the floor above him competing with the noise of the traffic in the street below. He missed the peace and quiet of his former Marblehead home, but then he missed a lot of things. He had spent twenty years building up his business, and what did he have to show for it? A crummy, crowded, overpriced one-bedroom apartment in South Boston.
The blaring roar of a police siren temporarily blocked out the arguing couple, but not for long. Sometimes they went at it for hours.
"That marriage won't last much longer," he prophesied. "Poor guy doesn't realize what's in store for him."
Kurt had not always been so cynical, but his wife had robbed him of his optimism, along with his home and nearly everything else he owned. After being taken to the cleaners during the divorce, was it any wonder that he was bitter?
Sometime after midnight the feuding couple must have kissed and made up, or perhaps they simply put their argument on hold, intending to resume the next round the following day. The traffic in the street below dwindled to a few passing cars, and Kurt finally dozed off.
The street he approached in his dream was one he knew well. It was a road he had travelled when he first got his driver's license. The sign on the corner identified it as PUTNAM AVENUE, but his word for it was home.
In the dream Kurt turned at the corner and walked along the sidewalk past houses that looked the same as they had when he was a ten-year-old boy, or at least as he remembered them. The brick ranch on the corner was where Billy Glover, his childhood best friend (who had recently been killed in a car bombing in Afghanistan) used to live. Next to Billy's house was the one owned by Carol Haas's parents. Kurt smiled at the memory of his first kiss in the basement of that house. On the other side of the Haases lived the Ruggerios. Mr. Ruggerio owned a bakery on Essex Street, and his wife worked part time at the town library.
Kurt knew who lived in every house on Putnam Avenue. There was Miss Hughes, his kindergarten teacher; Mr. Chamberlain, the coach of his Little League team; the Kennedys, who adopted a Vietnamese child before anyone had ever heard of Madonna or Angelina Jolie; and old Mrs. Lowell, whose husband had died the day before their fiftieth wedding anniversary.
At the end of the cul-de-sac, standing perpendicular to all the other houses on the street, was a white, two-story colonial with black shutters. It was the house where Kurt had grown up. For twenty-two years he had lived under that roof until, after graduating from college, he moved to Boston and started his own architectural firm.
Kurt stood in front of Mr. Ruggerio's house remembering the miniature cannoli, Napoleons and cream puffs the baker handed out every Halloween. He suddenly realized how much the people on the street had colored his early days and helped make him the man he was. He thought of Miss Hughes who was always available to help him with his homework, even when he was in high school. The Kennedys, who loved all children even though they could never have one of their own, paid him well to mow their lawn in the summer, rake leaves in the autumn and shovel snow in the winter. And Coach Chamberlain spent many hours teaching Kurt, Billy and hundreds of other young boys over the years the finer points of baseball.
As Kurt reached the end of the street, the front door of the two-story colonial at the end of the cul-de-sac opened slightly and a familiar voice called out, "Kurt, it's time to come home."
"Mom," he said, his eyes misting with tears.
He headed toward his old home, wanting to recapture whatever shards of memories were left of his childhood. As he neared the driveway, however, a stranger emerged from the garage: a beautiful, dark-haired woman.
"Hello, there," she called to him.
"You'll have to excuse me," he told her. "My mother wants me."
The annoying buzz of the alarm clock brought Kurt back to the crummy, crowded one-bedroom apartment in South Boston, a trip of fewer than sixty miles but one of more than thirty years.
* * *
After a large cup of coffee and a breakfast sandwich from McDonald's value menu—no Starbucks in his reduced circumstances—Kurt drove his nine-year-old Subaru to work. The Outback would not impress his clients as the late model Mercedes once had, but the Subaru was not too bad. At least it got him around in the New England winters.
As he drove to his office, he avoided Beacon Street. He did not want to drive past his ex-wife's house, the one she purchased after selling their Marblehead home. That chapter of his life was definitely over and he had no desire to revisit those memories.
"Good morning, Mr. Savage," his secretary cheerfully greeted him when he entered his office.
"Good morning, Dolores."
The architect went to his drafting table, picked up a pencil and began sketching ideas for a proposed shopping center to be built in Braintree. He stopped drawing several moments later when he realized he had drawn a two-story colonial house.
* * *
Sleep came easier to Kurt that night, no doubt because the couple on the floor above him were unusually quiet.
"Either they went to bed early, hoping to make up for the sleep they lost last night," he theorized, "or else one of them murdered the other."
Just minutes after closing his eyes, the divorced architect fell into a sound sleep. Again, he found himself on Putnam Avenue, standing on the corner, in front of the brick ranch that belonged to the Glover family. A child wearing a Boston Red Sox hat came along riding a Schwinn bicycle.
"Hey, Kurt!" the boy called. "I just got some new baseball cards. Wanna see if there are any you need?"
He recognized the voice, and when the kid looked up from under his baseball cap, Kurt knew the face. He was not surprised to see Billy Glover again, not even as a young child. This was a dream world, after all, and not bound by the laws of time and space that governed reality.
Billy didn't bother using the kickstand to keep his bike upright, preferring to lay it down on his father's freshly mowed lawn.
"Look what I found up in the attic," Billy cried excitedly, shuffling through the stack of Topps trading cards. "Here's Carl Yastrzemski, Carlton Fisk, Rod Carew, George Brett and Steve Garvey"
"What's that one?" Kurt asked when his friend placed a card on the bottom of the pile without announcing what player it was.
"Bobby Murcer. If you want it, you can have it. I hate the Yankees."
A blue '78 Mustang went by, and the driver honked the horn.
"Hi, Mr. Chamberlain," Billy shouted to his baseball coach.
"Don't you boys forget we have a game on Saturday."
"No, sir," Billy replied. "We'll kick Gloucester's butt!"
Moments later an overweight, balding man walked his beagle on the opposite side of the street.
"Hello, Mr. Ruggerio."
Billy seemed to be on good terms with everyone on Putnam Avenue.
"Hello, boys," the baker replied. "You stop at my shop after the game on Saturday, and I'll give you each a brownie: the kind you like, with sprinkles, not walnuts."
"Gee, thanks, Mr. Ruggerio!"
Had things really been so idyllic when Kurt was growing up, or were his memories tinted by watching reruns of family sitcoms such as Leave It to Beaver?
"I gotta get going," Billy announced as he picked up his bike. "I've gotta help my dad clean out the garage or else I won't be able to play in the game Saturday."
Kurt continued walking along Putnam Avenue, waving to neighbors who had long since gone to their graves.
"Kurt!" his mother's voice shouted from the front door of the two-story colonial at the end of the cul-de-sac. "It's time to come home."
As the dreamer neared the end of the road, the strange, beautiful, dark-haired woman appeared from around the back of his house.
"Hi there," she greeted him with a dazzling smile and twinkling eyes.
"I don't get it!" Kurt exclaimed. "Everyone and everything here is from my childhood except you. Why is that?"
"I'm sorry. I don't quite understand what you're asking me."
"I've been dreaming this same dream night after night for weeks now, seeing people as they were when I was ten years old. I never knew you then, so why are you ...?"
"Kurt!" his mother's voice called more insistently. "It's time to come home."
He gave the same answer he had throughout his childhood: "In a minute, Ma."
"This isn't a dream," the dark-haired woman argued. "I live in this house."
"Impossible. This was my parents' house. They lived here until my mother died of breast cancer. Then my father sold it and went to live with his brother in Pennsylvania."
"I bought this house in ...."
The jarring ringtone of his cell phone brought Kurt back to the present with a jolt.
"Hello," he mumbled into his phone.
"Mr. Savage, I've been trying to reach you all morning," Dolores cried. "The meeting with the people from the First New England Bank was scheduled for 7:30. Did you forget?"
Kurt's eyes went to the clock on his night table. It was 8:45.
"Shit! Did Humphrey cover for me?"
"No, he's in New York at a marketing seminar. Don't you remember? He told you about it three weeks ago."
Kurt closed his eyes, not wanting to face the inevitable.
"Mr. Hubble was furious when you didn't show up or call. He said he's taking his business to Katz and Doubleday."
Kurt could not really blame the man. Hubble had a business to run, and since his divorce, Kurt had not been very dependable.
"What are we going to do?" Dolores asked. "We're operating in the red now. With First New England gone, we have only a handful of projects left, and none of them is for a decent amount."
"Humphrey and I will just have to increase our efforts to bring in new business."
"Sure," Dolores said without conviction, fully intending to update her resume as soon as she hung up the phone.
Kurt got up out of bed, showered and dressed. As he drank a hot cup of Dunkin' Donuts coffee in his car, he realized there was little point in his going to the office since his calendar was empty for the rest of the day.
"Hell, there's little point in getting out of bed anymore," he told himself fatalistically.
Then he made a U-turn at the traffic light and headed back to his apartment.
* * *
The time that he should have spent knocking on doors or writing ads to attract potential clients Kurt wasted by watching a Law & Order marathon. He had come to the sad conclusion that life just was not worth the effort. Why bother working when all he got out of it was a crummy apartment, a rusted Subaru and meals from McDonald's dollar menu?
Why bother living at all? he asked himself.
Having decided to end his life, Kurt had only to choose the method.
That decision can wait until tomorrow, he thought as he lay back on the couch, fully clothed, and fell asleep.
"Hey, Kurt!"
Billy Glover was dressed in his baseball uniform, his cap tilted toward the side.
"It's almost time for the game. We're gonna kick Gloucester's butt today, aren't we?"
Carol Haas, who'd had a crush on Kurt since the third grade, joined them.
"You can't lose. Kurt is the best pitcher your team has got."
Kurt's heart ached for Carol, the first girl he had ever kissed. She became a flight attendant for United Airlines and later married one of her passengers and moved to New Jersey. It was ironic that she survived years of flying only to die in a car crash on the Garden State Parkway.
In a matter of minutes, the cast of his recurring dream assembled on Putnam Avenue. Mr. Ruggerio, who was sitting on his stoop, reminded the boys of the brownies with sprinkles (not walnuts) that awaited them after the game. Miss Hughes, the dedicated kindergarten teacher, was calling her cat, the only family the poor woman had. The Kennedys were in the back yard, pushing their Vietnamese child on the swing, and Mrs. Lowell, the widow, was pruning her rose bushes.
Coach Chamberlain ran out of the house, shouting to the boys, "Don't be late. The game starts promptly at two o'clock."
Suddenly, at the end of the cul-de-sac, the door to the white, two-story colonial with black shutters opened a crack. Everyone on Putnam Avenue stopped and became as still as the mannequins at J.J. Newbury's.
Billy Glover was the first to move. His hand reached up to his head and straightened his baseball cap.
"I think it's time for you to go home now," he announced somberly, apparently forgetting all about the big game with Gloucester.
Carol batted her long, dark eyelashes at her childhood crush.
"Yes, it's time to go home, Kurt."
Mr. Ruggerio repeated the sentiment as did Miss Hughes, the Kennedys and Mrs. Lowell.
Even Coach Chamberlain yelled from inside his Mustang, "It's time to go home, son."
Kurt felt someone tap him on the shoulder. He turned to see his mother standing behind him.
"Mom!"
He almost didn't recognize his own parent. She was so young, attractive and healthy. The thick red hair that had succumbed to the chemotherapy fell down around her shoulders, and her green eyes were not yet dulled by pain.
"It's time to come home, and don't give me that 'in a minute' nonsense. It's time to come home NOW."
At the end of the street, the front door of the white, two-story colonial opened wider. If his mother was on the street with him, then who ...?
No alarm clock or cell phone ringtone woke him this time. His eyes simply opened, and he sat up on the couch, fully rested. The dreams had been a message, he realized. It was time for him to go home, figuratively speaking. Somehow, he would end his miserable existence and join Billy, Carol, Coach Chamberlain, Miss Hughes, the Kennedys and his mother on the great Putnam Avenue in the sky. But first, he had an overwhelming desire to return home, literally, and see the white, two-story colonial with black shutters at the end of the cul-de-sac one last time.
Without even bothering to shower, shave or change his clothes, Kurt left his crummy little apartment in South Boston and headed toward the town of his birth.
* * *
He parked at the gas station/convenience store located on the corner of Putnam Avenue, on the lot where Billy Glover's brick ranch had once stood. Carol's house was still there, but the yellow shingles had been replaced with blue vinyl siding. Someone had built an addition onto the former Chamberlain house, nearly doubling its size. Where the Kennedys' house had burned to the ground, killing the couple and their Vietnamese child, a modified saltbox now stood. Only one house still looked the same: the white, two-story colonial at the end of the cul-de-sac. The only noticeable difference was that the shutters were now red instead of black.
As Kurt stood in the street looking at the house, the front door opened, and he was shocked to see the strange, dark-haired woman who had invaded his dreams emerge from the building. She stared at him for several moments and then a look of recognition brightened her face.
"I know you," she claimed. "Your name is Kurt, and you used to live here, didn't you?"
He nodded, speechless.
"I found an old photo album that must have belonged to your family on the top shelf of the bedroom closet. I recognize you from your prom and graduation pictures. Why don't you come inside, and I'll get the album for you?"
"It was nice of you to keep it," Kurt said as he followed the woman inside.
"I was going to get rid of it, but I had the strangest feeling you would show up one day."
The woman disappeared for several moments and then returned with the photo album. As she handed it to him, Kurt noticed there was no wedding ring on her finger.
"Would you like come in and have a cup of coffee?" she asked. "I just took a batch of brownies out of the oven."
"I don't want to impose," he protested weakly.
"Don't be silly. I could use the company. I just moved into the house two months ago and haven't had the opportunity to meet too many people."
Kurt was surprised when the dark-haired woman opened the Tupperware container.
"Sprinkles, not walnuts," he said, enjoying the rich chocolaty aroma of the brownies.
"It's my uncle's recipe," she told him. "He used to own a bakery on Essex Street before he died.
"Mr. Ruggerio? He and his wife lived on this street."
"That's right. My aunt has since retired and moved to Florida."
"I used to love your uncle's brownies. Mmmm! I haven't had anything this good since ...."
A smile lit up the architect's face.
"... since the day my Little League team kicked Gloucester's butt."
The dark-haired woman's eyes met his, and neither one looked away.
Home, he thought with a sense of belonging.
Kurt Savage looked out the window at Putnam Avenue and said a silent prayer of thanks, for he had been given a second chance at life when the past called him home and offered him the promise of happiness in the future.
I don't use walnuts or sprinkles when I make brownies for Salem, but I do use Godiva chocolate to make the icing.
