If I Could Love You Again

The Return

Garrett came back to consciousness slowly.

He could hear the pitter-patter of raindrops on the roof of his apartment and the sound caused him to frown, his fog-filled mind realizing that something was off but not quite figuring out what.

His eyes flashed open when it hit him.  You can’t hear the rain from his apartment, because his was in the middle of the building, with many floors above him.

He jerked himself up to a sit and looked up, expecting to see a leak in his ceiling, the only plausible reason he would be hearing rain.

But above him wasn’t the ceiling of his apartment.

His wide eyes jerked down and around, finally taking in his environment.

He wasn’t in his apartment at all.

Yet he knew this place well.

He knew it so well that his fingers reached out of their own accord to touch and slide over the lid of the old toy chest he and Taylor had used every last bit of their strength to haul up their rope ladder… into the very treehouse he was sitting in.

Our treehouse.

Built when he turned twelve and received a real tool kit as a present from his grandmother.

They had been so proud of this treehouse.

And when it fell in a storm when Taylor was fourteen and he was fifteen, they had just built it again, stronger, sturdier, and added Taylor’s old toy chest then.

His fingers trembled when they slid over the crude initials they had scratched into the wood of the chest.

TH + GH

Fifteen-year-old Garrett had stared and stared at those initials sitting together on that chest, realizing how easily someone could possibly mistake them… for a lovers’ promise.

Just as he had done every single time he’d come up here alone after he’d forced himself to keep his distance from Taylor, Garrett now slowly, tears escaping down his cheeks, drew a heart with his finger around the initials and whispered the terrible words.  “I love you, Taylor Hitchens.”

“Garrett!”

Garrett jerked in shock and tore his hand away from the chest.

Then he blinked.  That had been his mother’s voice.

“Garrett!” his mother called again.  “I see your shoes; they’re going to get soaked!  Come in for supper if you’re home!  Your Nanna’s here, too.”

He heard the distinctly familiar sound of his mother closing the screen door to his childhood house as she went back inside.

In utter astonishment, he looked down the escape hatch where a rope ladder hang and saw shoes on the grass at the base of the ladder and the tree that the makeshift house was nestled into.

Holy s**t.

Then he recalled his mother’s words.  Nanna.

With the skill of someone who has done it a thousand times, he took the ladder down with lightning speed, grabbed his shoes, and sprinted socked feet across the wet grass and right to the back door that led into the kitchen.

He stopped with his hand on the door, having grabbed it on reflex, and stared wide-eyed into the kitchen, easy to see in the fading light.

At the table he could see his mother, younger sister Lily, and his Nanna all sitting down to eat, the scent of the food still lingering around him where his mother had opened the door earlier.

Nostalgia welled up inside him for a moment at the family scene, something he hadn’t seen since he’d left for the city right after graduation three years ago.

Three years ago.

Suddenly aware of something far more strange than waking up in his treehouse, which he would ask Nanna presently about, Garrett jerked open the door and strode inside, dropping his wet shoes on the shoe mat without thought as he stared without understanding at Lily.

Lily was three years younger than Garrett.  So, since Garrett was 21, Lily was 18, having just finished her last year of high school.

But the Lily sitting at the table not even bothering to glance his way as she ate her supper… this Lily was not 18.

In fact, he didn’t think she could be more than fourteen.

“Nanna!” He said, his voice strangled.  “Could I please have a word with you?!”

All three of his family members looked up in bewilderment at his tone.

“Garrett, she’s eating,” his mother said, frowning, “You can talk to Nanna after.”

But something in his expression must have meant something to Nanna because she was already rising and coming around the table.  “It’s all right, Julie, we’ll just be a moment.”

“Garrett…” his mother said again, showing him with her expression that she wasn’t impressed, and he couldn’t help but look apologetic, but didn’t stop moving with Nanna.  He took her upstairs to his room, his body moving on its own accord to its remembered safe space, and then closed the door behind them.

There was a moment when Garrett just looked around his room, shocked into silence by what he saw.

It was all familiar yet unfamiliar at the same time.  It was his room, but definitely not the way he had left it, even at 18.

“Nanna…” he began, then paused to cough to get rid of his high pitched squeak and tried again.  “Nanna, I think I—”

“What happened, Garrett?  Did you burn something?  Did you change something?  Did you unlock a door?”

Garrett turned to her in confusion.  “Did I what?”

She was looking at him with a mixture of eagerness and concern, but when he didn’t seem to follow her questions, she frowned.  “Did anything strange happen to you recently?”

“Nanna, you sent me back in time!”

Her mouth opened in a surprised O.  “Back in time?  Me?  Why did I do that?”

“I have no—”

Garrett stilled as a thought struck him.

“Taylor,” he breathed.  He sucked in ragged breath.  “Oh my god, Taylor!”

Without thought, Garrett raced to the front window to look out down the street, to the blue house with the brown roof that he’d looked out to for nearly every day of his life since he was eight years old.

“Taylor,” he whispered hoarsely.

In the next second, he spun for the door and would have been out of the house in a flash, running down that street… if it weren’t for the firm hands holding onto his shirt from behind.

“Garrett, you need to calm down,” his Nanna said from behind him.  “I don’t know what you’re about to do, but unless Taylor is about to fall off a cliff and you’re here to save him, there are a few things you need to consider first.”

Garrett looked back at her wildly and she let go of him in surprise.  “Is Taylor about to fall off a cliff?”

Garrett managed a shake of his head as he stared blindly at the door, his hands fisting at his sides while his heart thundered in his ears.  Her words had cut through his shock enough for him to realize that she was right.  Taylor was a teenager right now and running to his house screaming not to hurt himself would quite possibly have the opposite effect Garrett wanted.

The minimum it would do is send Garrett off somewhere he wouldn’t be able to help Taylor at all.

He moved slowly back to his room to sit on the bed and put his head in his hands, shuddering a breath out as he tried to keep himself from going mad.  He had to think before he went over there.  Taylor had committed suicide when he was 20, and clearly that wasn’t for years to come so, at least for the moment, Garrett had time.

Despite knowing all that, the need to see Taylor alive was so keen, his throat clogged, and his chest ached, a cold sweat covering his body in seconds.

Nanny was silent through all of this, but then she moved over to the landline, picked up the phone, and started dialing a number.

Garrett heard and looked up at her, confused.  “Who are you—”

She silenced him with a finger to her mouth, right before she spoke into the phone.  “Good evening, Mrs. Forbes, this is Anita Holmes, Garrett’s grandmother—”

Garrett shot to his feet at the sound of Taylor’s mother’s married name, but his grandmother shot him a look and pointed at him to return to the bed.

“—I hope I didn’t catch you at dinner?” She paused for a response.  “Oh, good, yes, I am doing well, too.  Could I possibly talk for a moment with your Taylor?” Another shorter pause.  “Thank you, yes, I’ll wait.”

Nanna covered the microphone of the phone with her hand and whispered to Garrett.  “You can listen, but don’t say anything, okay?  Now isn’t the time.  You have to get yourself under control first.  Okay?”

Garrett nodded vigorously, remaining silent.

She put her mouth back to the phone.  “Why hello, Taylor—”

Garrett shot up from the bed again and leaned in, not breathing.

“H-Hello, Nanna Anita, what’s up?”

Garrett sucked in a breath at Taylor’s voice and Nanna smacked him on the arm, her finger going to her lips again.  “Is everything all right with you, dear?”

There was silence for a moment on the other line.  Then, “Did … Garrett tell you?” came the hesitant question, squeezing Garrett’s heart.

Garrett and his grandmother exchanged looks and he shrugged.  Garrett had no idea what Taylor was referring to.  He mouthed to his grandmother, What day is this?

March 7—she began to mouth back but Taylor’s voice came on the line again.  “I guess he did then…” The sadness was clear in Taylor’s voice and suddenly Garrett knew exactly what Taylor was talking about, and he had to hold back a gasp at the realization.

March 7th, when he was seventeen years old.  The day that Garrett had told Taylor that they shouldn’t hug anymore.  The first day he started distancing from his best friend because he was too afraid to admit that he was in love with him.

Taylor had laughed at first, thinking Garrett was joking when Garrett had told him not to hug him anymore, not to put his arm around him, but when Garrett had looked down and away, Taylor had become solemn, and had replied quietly, “So… we’re not friends enough to hug anymore, is that it?”

Garrett, not knowing how to say how he truly felt, had just remained silent.  And then they’d gone their own way home.

Without hesitation, Garrett grabbed the phone from his grandmother’s hands.  “Taylor?” he said, trying to keep a calm to his voice but failing miserably.  His Nanna looked crossly at him and tried to take the phone away, but he shook his head at her, promising her with his eyes that he would be careful what he said.

There was silence on the other line for a few seconds before, in a quieter, more sullen tone than earlier, Taylor said, “What do you want?”

Garrett closed his eyes at the sound of his friend’s voice in his ear, the euphoria of it making his knees weak, regardless of its tone.  “Taylor… I’m sorry,” he said softly, just barely able to keep the cry out his voice as he finally said the words he’d wished so many times that he had said before, but never had the courage to say.  “I didn’t mean it at all.”

But now, things were different… he wasn’t a scared boy anymore running away from his feelings.

Garrett opened his eyes as the realization formed.

He was a man now.  A man who would do everything in his power to ensure that his childhood friend and the secret love of his life would never, ever come to a point where Taylor thought his life wasn’t worth living.

“So… then… why did you say it?” Taylor’s confused and unconvinced voice on the line brought him back to reality.

“Because I was being stuuupid and thought guys weren’t supposed to hug when they got older,” Garrett said, trying to affect the way he once spoke as a teen.  “I don’t even remember where I read that from.  I’m sorry for making things weird.”

He heard Taylor chuckle on the line and his heart squeezed.  “Yeah, you totally made it weird,” his friend said, relief clear in his voice, causing Garrett to close his eyes again as he became overcome with emotion.  How terribly stupid he had been to have done such a cruel thing to the person he’d once called best friend.

“Okay, so Garrett has to go now,” Nanna suddenly interrupted, startling Garrett out of his self-reflection.  “Goodnight, Taylor!”

“Oh, Goodnight, Nanna. Goodnight, Garrett.”

Garrett couldn’t control the shiver that went through him at Taylor’s soft use of his name, but he quickly hid it as his grandmother hung up the phone and then rounded on him.

“Didn’t I say not—”

“I’m sorry, Nanna, I remembered what happened today and I had to fix it.”

“Yes, so I heard,” Nanna said, raising an eyebrow.  “’Guys aren’t supposed to hug when they get older?’”

Garrett couldn’t help the blush that spread over his face.  “It was better than what I told him back then.”

“No, Garrett, not ‘back then,’” she said, frowning.  “Today.”

Garrett winced.  “Right.  s**t.  I mean, hell. Heck.  Fooey,” he fumbled under his Nanna’s gaze.

Nanna turned and left the room, saying over her shoulder, “We’re going to have to work on that.  But let’s eat and sleep on it—your spirit has gone through a lot today.  Come along now.”