Running. Away.

"Hello again."

I roll my eyes, "What are you doing here?"

"This isn't my fault you know. You called me here."

"I did not."

If he had eyebrows, he would have raised them right then as he blinked at me. Instead he puffed his feathers at the neck, "You have to be joking."

"I didn't do it on purpose. I didn't know this was going to happen."

"So what are you going to do about it?"

"Same thing I always do."

He cracks his neck as if he's about to beat me into a pulp, but he doesn't. "It's a fine day for running. "

"...Yes... lovely."

"You have your mother's feet."

I suddenly see where this is going, "And her weak knees, that aren't much good for running."

"You've never been one to avoid the impact."

"No, I just avoid other things."

"You have your great-grandmother's nose, and you're as tall as she was, aren't you?"

"One inch taller."

"Do you ever feel like, maybe--just maybe--you're more like them than you think?"

"I know I am."

"Want to go for a walk?"

I look suspiciously at him.

"You walk, I mean. I'll just come along and commentate."

Suddenly, I'm crossing a different street: its four lanes are reminiscent of a time when they made it wide enough to turn around a wagon and full team of horses in one easy u-turn. I know it only too well. Very few people know that this street is named after my family--we've lived on this road for seven generations.

I cross the broad street to smaller one. "Remember when you came home from a walk and your mother was standing out in the yard, your pink Easter dress all finished?"

"Yes, I remember, and the four o'clocks climbing up the white clap-board siding to poke their heads in through the windows."

"Do you remember your room with the plush pink carpet tucked away in the basement?"

I nod fondly, "The window faced east."

"Your window still faces east."

"Always."

Now the road is a shepherd's hook on which someone stepped, it's much more narrow--two lanes instead of four--we walk up the drive to the front porch to sit in the rocking chairs.

"Remember watching thunder and lightning storms from this porch?"

"I like watching the trees battle the wind, electrified by the lightning, drooping from the heavy rain."

"Remember the time you and Little slept outside in a tent in the summer?"

"Mmmhmm."

"And racing across the yard to get the mail?"

"He was faster, with his spindly legs, he always got there first; but I'm stronger, so I just pushed him out of the way."

Now we are walking across a parking lot, rows and rows of yellow lines interrupted by superfluous speed dips. I purse my lips.

"Now this might sting a little."

"Yeah, yeah, let's get it over with."

We go to the little parking lot first, next to a small, sacred building.

"Remember..."

"Yes, yes, yes. How could I ever forget?"

"Remember sitting here in the spring, totally lazy, studying bio and history?"

"Yep."

"Remember that rainy day when you made fun of the other team's cheerleaders in their rain ponchos?"

"We lost that game."

The roads are much more narrow now, barely two lanes, and certainly not a safe two lanes.

"You could leave here now and it would only be a dream, like you'd never been here. You'd go back to other roads. Except you can't keep from running."

"..."

"Where will you go this time?"

"Somewhere where it's always overcast. Where the sky isn't blue, but gray. Somewhere where I can wear long sleeves all the time and hide behind them."

"You don't think your reasoning is a little flawed? That maybe 2400 miles is enough?"

"Or too much."

"Now we're getting somewhere."

"Remember that house on the river? Or the one on the coast?"

"Now you're just going backwards."

"By going forwards?"

"Why do I feel like we've had this conversation before?"

"Because we have."

"Isn't this where you say 'You worry about the future too much'?"

"Not this time. This time, you don't trust enough."