By Tom Newrick

The drive from Hagerstown to Cumberland should not have taken longer than an hour, especially late at night.

It couldn’t have been much later than 11:00 p.m. when he finally left the office, late heading home once again. He promised her it would be different, but this was another promise he could not keep, no matter how much he wanted to. Time and again as his career progressed he brought her assurances that he would be home more, that he would be there for her more. He ached with a litany of longing, wanting to be with her but unable to reforge the long-ago shattered distinction between his work and his life, as much as he desperately wanted to. He often wondered if she doubted whether he wanted to at all.

As he stepped out into the cold and quiet of the night, he realized how tired he was. Had he ever been this tired? Sliding behind the wheel of the car, he gunned it to life and began the drive home.

It was a simple route, committed long ago to muscle memory. Time and again he would arrive at his destination, only ever either work or home, with no memory of the preceding drive. Follow the two-lane out of town, pick up I-70 heading east until it became I-68 winding its way past Green Ridge State Forest and into Cumberland. Cumberland was home, and that would make everything feel better.

How long had he been driving? Hours, already? On leaving Hagerstown the radio turned to static; it wasn’t until he switched it off that he noticed he hadn’t seen another car the entire drive. The darkness of the world outside his windshield was overwhelming: no moon, no streetlights, just him and his old sedan.

The wheel of night had unfurled above the world and the patchwork of stars revealed itself once again, an ink-black canvas bespeckled with the silent and peaceful incandescence of starlight.  Such a night held mystery, romance, and awe for many, but for him it was another long drive.

I-70 stretched to forever. How long had he been driving for? He was sure he’d seen the exit for Hancock at least three times already. He could have been driving for fifty miles or five hundred.  Had it been fifteen minutes or days on end?

The night brought back old memories. He remembered that unknowable fear from his childhood. Late at night, longing for sleep that would not come, and being the only one awake in the house. Was he now the only one awake in the world? The only one left? That same childlike fear stirred in him, that entropic loneliness. 

What felt like days later, his weary eyes happened upon the exit for Cumberland. Just a few miles left, surely his day would be over soon. He’d  been driving for so long a full beard emerged on his chin; his hair had become wild and unkempt. He would be unrecognizable to her.

As he finally pulled onto Camden Avenue, he looked at his watch. To his surprise, only an hour had passed. Looking in the mirror now he saw no beard, no wild hair; he was as he always had been.  

Even still, something had changed. He just didn’t know what it was. As he slowed, his eyes stopped upon another car parked in the space outside his house. It was a sedan like his. As he crawled closer to it he realized it was his.

He pulled in behind, switched off the car, and emerged once again into the cold air. A light was on inside the house, in the living room. Slowly approaching the window, he peered inside to see that he was already home. Sitting comfortably on the sofa, next to her. They were sharing a bottle of wine and laughing together, a picture of warmth and love.

A somber realization crept over him as he walked back to his car and climbed in. It was for the best. No more would he try to reforge anything; this was who he was now. May the other Him be a better man to her than he ever was.

The driver’s seat accepted him with the well-worn comfort of an old catcher’s mitt. Gunning the engine to life, he drove out of Camden Avenue and moved back towards I-68. The road stretched endlessly onward before him, a dark tunnel with no light at the end of it.

As he emerged onto the interstate, he tried the radio again. The static had given way to an old song. As the music gently warmed both the car and his soul, he realized that his life decisions had been made years before he even knew the path he was walking down. Maybe it was better this way.