Whence He Came

by Payne, Jodi;

  Whence He Came

  By Jodi Payne

  Published by JMS Books LLC

  Visit jms-books.com for more information.

  Copyright 2017 Jodi Payne

  ISBN 9781634863704

  Cover Design: Written Ink Designs | written-ink.com

  Image(s) used under a Standard Royalty-Free License.

  All rights reserved.

  WARNING: This book is not transferable. It is for your own personal use. If it is sold, shared, or given away, it is an infringement of the copyright of this work and violators will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

  No portion of this book may be transmitted or reproduced in any form, or by any means, without permission in writing from the publisher, with the exception of brief excerpts used for the purposes of review.

  This book is for ADULT AUDIENCES ONLY. It may contain sexually explicit scenes and graphic language which might be considered offensive by some readers. Please store your files where they cannot be accessed by minors.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are solely the product of the author’s imagination and/or are used fictitiously, though reference may be made to actual historical events or existing locations. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Published in the United States of America.

  * * * *

  Whence He Came

  By Jodi Payne

  Elliot Cohen stepped off the four o’clock train from the city and onto a solid concrete platform. Seven years ago he’d have stepped directly into the miserably cold, January rain, but in his absence the town had constructed a covered platform where there used to be nothing more than a four foot high, wobbly wooden deck and a set of narrow aluminum steps.

  Back then, he would also have been the only one disembarking at this hole in the wall station, but today he was one of perhaps thirty people. A small suburban town could really grow up in seven years.

  He hefted his suitcase and made his way through the small station to a set of sliding glass doors, where he was just as surprised to discover escalators leading down to the parking lot. The whole arrangement had him shaking his head in amazement. When he was a kid there used to be a never-ending set of concrete steps where these escalators now resided and whenever he and his buddies went anywhere by train, they used to jog up the steps singing the theme to Rocky.

  When he’d left home there had been only two taxis in the whole town, one driven by Mr. Papadopoulos, and the other by Mr. Papadopoulos’ brother-in-law, Mr. Vasileiadi. If you wanted a ride you had to call and leave a message with Mrs. Papadopoulos and she would make sure one of the brothers came by to pick you up. Between the new station and the taxi stand with its line of four waiting cabs Elliot was starting to wonder if he’d gotten off at the right stop.

  Unless the town had also invented teleportation while he’d been gone, Elliot remembered it was a twenty-minute walk to Main Street. Walking that distance in the pouring rain sounded less than appealing, so he headed for the taxi stand. He could have called his mother to pick him up, but he still wanted this to be a surprise visit.

  “Where to?” The driver asked, taking Elliot’s suitcase and putting it in the trunk for him.

  “Twenty Sawyer Lane.”

  “That’s out behind the high school, right?”

  Well at least that hadn’t changed. “You got it.”

  “Hop in.”

  They left the train station and headed toward downtown and Elliot found himself compelled to ask, “Do you know George Papadopoulos?”

  “Who?”

  He ought to have known better. “Never mind.”

  Elliot was home, but it was nothing like how he’d left it.

  * * * *

  Elliot was relieved to find that, despite the shiny new train station, his neighborhood was remarkably unchanged. His parents’ house, a white, 1930s, two story bungalow on a tree-lined residential street, looked exactly as it had the day he’d left, right down to the cracked and angled flagstone walkway leading up to the front steps and iron bench on the front porch. The greenery was a little fuller, the trees were definitely taller, but the house was still the same one he’d grown up in.

  The longer Elliot sat in the cab, however, staring out the rain-streaked windows, the more he was having second thoughts about going in just yet. There were a lot of things on his agenda and he knew his mother wouldn’t be happy if he just stopped in and went right back out again. He wanted to walk past the high school and to go see what downtown looked like now. He wanted to see how many people he still knew and find out what his reception would be like. He wanted to go for a drive around town and stop by old haunts, and maybe have a cigarette out behind the YMCA for old times’ sake.

  In the end he decided he should go inside now and say hello before one of his mother’s friends saw him and it got back to her that he was in town. She’d never forgive him if she didn’t see him first.

  He paid the cab driver and watched as the cab pulled away, thankful that the rain had let up a bit. It was still gray and the damp was very much a factor, but it didn’t seem quite as cold. Elliot looked again at the front of the house and decided it was time to stop procrastinating. He knew his parents would be happy to see him, it was just the idea of facing questions and having to provide answers that was haunting him.

  He climbed the lopsided front steps and rang the doorbell.

  “Elliot?” His mother looked stunned and pleased as she opened the front door. “Oh my God, Elliot!” Her hands flapped excitedly. “Come in! You look great! Joel!” she called upstairs, “Elliot is home, get down here.” Elliot’s mother smiled at him and did an admirable job of getting in his way the entire time he was entering the house. So much so that he gave up and left his suitcase by the door. “Joel Melvin Cohen, get your rear downstairs!” she shouted again.

  “It’s okay, Ima.”

  “It’s not okay. When your baby comes home for a visit you come down and give him a hug.” She proceeded to do just that, clutching him to her bosom like a long lost child.

  Elliot’s father made his way down the stairs slowly. He was wearing an oxford and khakis, both of which had seen better days. He had a cane in one hand, and looked more tired and a lot older than Elliot had expected. But his father’s arthritis had always made him kind of frail, so the fact he was moving at all at his age impressed the hell out of Elliot. As a kid he remembered his Abba coping with medication and working through the pain, but at seventy-one Elliot imagined it was better to take it easy.

  “Hey, Abba,” he said, and went to meet his father at the bottom of the stairs.

  “Well, hello, son,” his father replied with a genuine smile, though he had several stairs still to go.

  “Why didn’t you tell us you were coming?” Elliot’s mother asked him, shouting from the kitchen where she was, no doubt, preparing food for him. “You missed the High Holidays because of that job of yours, we’d never guessed you’d be coming home for Passover. You are staying for Passover, aren’t you?”

  He hadn’t come home for Passover exactly, it was more a coincidence of timing. But it was only an extra week and if it made his mother happy to believe that he had, he wasn’t going to disillusion her.

  “Sure, Ima.”

  His father finally made it to the landing and held his arms out for Elliot, who moved into them and gave his Abba a much more affectionate hug than he’d intended. His father returned the hug gently, patting Elliot on the back and then pulled away. He met Elliot’s eyes curiously, raised an eyebrow in question, but said nothing to him, and Elliot decided to pretend for now he hadn’t seen it. Eventually, they would talk.

  “You look good, son,” his father
told him. “Maybe a little tired, but good.”

  “Yeah. Traveling will take it out of you, you know?”

  “Ah. Yes.” Apparently his father caught on to Elliot’s hint about not wanting to talk yet and dropped it, continuing on into the living room. “Come with me, Elliot, your mother will bring you something to eat shortly, I expect.”

  Elliot laughed and followed.

  They had a lively chat while Elliot ate the enormous hot pastrami sandwich his mother produced for him. He swallowed down every last bite while his father told him about all the construction that had gone on at the high school down the street a couple of years ago. A new gym, an indoor pool, a computer center, a new football field, and the building had been given a facelift, too. He told Elliot he wouldn’t recognize the place and by the sound of it, Elliot figured he was right.

  When he was done eating, he took his plate into the kitchen and then grabbed his raincoat. “Hey, Ima,” he called as he headed for the front door. “I’m going for a walk. Don’t wait dinner on me.”

  “I most certainly will,” his mother replied indignantly. “Dinner is at seven as always. It’s your first night home, Elliot, the least you can do is have dinner with your family.”

  Elliot glanced at his father, who gave him a shrug and his vintage, ‘I’m not arguing with her about this one’ look.

  And with that, Elliot felt seventeen again.

  * * * *

  Abba was right, Elliot didn’t recognize the high school at all. If it weren’t for the fact it was standing where his old high school stood, he would have stared at it for a while wondering what the hell it was. The front looked more like a municipal building than a school, with tall columns and several gigantic glass windows looking in on the lobby. He noted the security desk right at the entrance and shook his head. Times really had changed.

  The buildings downtown looked more or less exactly as they had when he left. There was more traffic, though, and the names of some of the stores had changed. He made his way slowly from one end to the other, peering into windows. He passed some kind of upscale boutique he didn’t recognize and on the corner was a Starbucks where a little mom and pop bakery used to be.

  Man, they used to make the best doughnuts.

  Elliot sighed, feeling old, until he noticed the little greasy-spoon diner he and his buddies used to hang out at after school was still on the opposite corner. With a spring in his step, he hurried across the street and pulled open the front door.

  In an instant he was transported back in time. Eyes closed, he breathed the warm air in deeply. The scent of french fries and cheeseburgers assaulted his senses and he smiled. He opened his eyes and looked down the row of booths along the right hand wall. Most of them were empty but he could almost see his friends there; teenage boys squeezed five and six to a booth, drinking cold Cokes and milkshakes and splitting a huge plate of onion rings.

  “Hey! Close the door, will you? It’s rain…ing. Whoa. Elliot?” The feminine voice interrupted his thoughts and he glanced over at the counter. Behind it a tall woman with dark hair and bright blue eyes was smiling and staring at him. “Is that you, Cohen?”

  Elliot squinted at the woman, searching his memory. He smiled back, finally. “Jesus. Jenny.”

  “Elliot!” Jenny’s grin grew wider and she started to make her way around the counter. “Daddy!” she shouted as she hurried by the pass-through window to the kitchen. “Daddy, Elliot Cohen’s here!” She didn’t stop to wait for an answer, she just flew right into Elliot’s arms, hugging him around the neck. “Elliot,” she said again and kissed him right on the mouth.

  Elliot was so overwhelmed by the reception it was all he could do to keep his feet under him. “Hi, Jenny.”

  “Well, well, well. If it isn’t the Elliot Cohen.” Robert Davis, Jenny’s old man, had a booming voice and it rang out loudly through the little diner.

  “Hi, Mr. Davis,” Elliot said, waving back at him with Jenny still hanging on him.

  “Don’t you ‘Mr. Davis’ me, Elliot. You’ve hit the big time now. It’s Bob.”

  Elliot blinked and stammered, but couldn’t quite find the right words. He hadn’t realized how hard his return was going to be, and Mr. Davis—there was no way he was going to be able to call Jenny’s dad ‘Bob’—had just hammered the point right home for him.

  Jenny laughed, though, saving him from having to reply. “You’re embarrassing him, Daddy. Nobody wants to be famous all the time. He’s just the same old Elliot here. Right, Elliot?”

  “Thanks, Jenny.” That’s exactly what he wanted.

  Mr. Davis snorted. “Well, welcome home, ‘same old Elliot’. Glad to see you haven’t forgotten the little people,” he said, and disappeared back into the kitchen.

  “Hungry?”

  “My mother stuffed me with pastrami. How about some coffee?”

  “You got it.” Jenny nodded. “Come on.”

  He sat on one of the bar stools at the counter and watched Jenny pull a mug from the stack next to the coffee pots. She had always been a pretty girl. Elliot remembered her being shy and sweet, well dressed and friendly. She had been a cheerleader and played the flute in the high school orchestra, and she had always worked weekends for her dad at the diner. Her father had raised her by himself because her mother passed away when she was young. The fact Jenny’s mother had died was never a secret, but to this day Elliot had no idea know how or why, or exactly how old Jenny had been when it happened, despite how close they’d always been. It just wasn’t a question he’d ever wanted to ask.

  Jenny set a cup of coffee in front of Elliot and leaned across the counter. “So. You see Tony, yet?”

  At his age, after everything he’d seen and done in the ‘big city’, after all the men he’d fucked and been fucked by, he’d have bet real money that he was too jaded ever to blush again. And yet, Elliot felt the heat rise in his cheeks as Jenny said Tony’s name, as if she were privy to his private fantasies. A picture of Tony, smiling impishly and looking flushed, flashed through his mind and that only made the moment worse.

  He tried to sound casual as he answered, despite the display. “He’s still in town?”

  “Oh, yeah. He’s still in town.” Jenny’s tone made Elliot look up from his coffee. She was grinning at him in a knowing way.

  “What?”

  Jenny pushed away from the counter. “You’ll see.”

  Elliot couldn’t imagine what she was up to. “Is he married?”

  “No,” Jenny laughed. “Oh, no.”

  “He’s single?”

  “At the moment.”

  “Is he still living up on Whitehall?”

  “Oh, no.” Jenny was slicing something that was half-hidden by the register and he couldn’t see. “No, he’s got his own place now, a house over on Mulberry.”

  “Mulberry? Is that still a nice part of town?”

  “Yep. He’s got a big old Victorian. It’s nice. He’s doing well.”

  “What does he do?”

  “He bought the hardware store from Mr. Barrett.”

  Wow, Elliot mused, Tony owned the hardware store. He had just walked right by there not fifteen minutes ago. “God, Mr. Barrett must be older than dirt now.” Mr. Barrett had seemed old seven years ago.

  “Ninety-three!” Jenny nodded, sounded awed. “Can you believe that? He still walks down to the store to check on Tony every day.” She turned around and held a plate out in front of Elliot at about nose-height. It had an obscenely large piece of pie on it.

  “Oh my God.” Elliot’s eyes went wide.

  “Lemon meringue. Your favorite,” Jenny sang, setting the plate down in front of him.

  “Get a fork. You’re sharing.”

  Jenny grinned like the girl he used to know and did just that.

  The pie was another little piece of his past, and as they ate it Elliot made yummy noises and felt at home for the first time in years. Some of the buildings might have been renovated but it seemed like the people hadn�
�t been; Jenny belonged in the diner, Tony had always talked about buying a pretty, old house, and Ima and Abba were still just the same. He still felt a little removed, as if he was looking in from the outside, but the longer he talked with Jenny and the more of the disgustingly sweet meringue he ate, the more relaxed he began to feel.

  Jenny was leaning on her elbow on the counter, her face close to his. She looked up at him, and asked, “So how long are you visiting for?”

  “Don’t know yet,” Elliot told her. “Probably not long.”

  “Well, I know Amy and Rich will want to see you.”

  “They’re still together?” Amy and Rich. Jock and homecoming queen.

  “Uh huh.” Jenny nodded meaningfully. “And they have three kids.”

  “What? Rich has kids?” He laughed. “Who allowed that?”

  Jenny shrugged and they both laughed.

  “So…” Elliot shifted on his stool. “I guess I need to find Tony, huh?”

  “Hardware store closes at six-thirty,” Jenny said with a nod. Her tone was teasing. She scooped up the empty plate and plucked the fork from his fingers.

  Elliot blinked. “Did we finish that already?”

  “We did. Go see Tony. Then come talk to me tomorrow.”

  Elliot pushed away from the counter, his curiosity winning out over his desire to stay there and schmooze with Jenny. “You’re killing me.”

  Jenny winked at him. “I know.”

  * * * *

  It was still raining as Elliot left the diner, and he ducked his head to keep it out of his face. But even staring at the sidewalk Elliot knew where he was going, and his feet carried him easily to the hardware store. It was still in the same place it had always been, still painted a dark green on the outside and the windows were still full of things for sale; seasonal items to prepare for spring like hoes, grass spreaders, seeds and birdfeeders on one side of the door, and power tools on the other. Elliot stepped under the awning, shook off his raincoat, and ran his fingers through his hair before stepping through the front door.

  There were a few customers there but no one he recognized. He passed them one by one as he made his way through the shop, looking for Tony. The store was as crowded as ever but brighter now, and the floors had been redone, as well as the main counter where the registers were located, now in the center of the store instead of all the way in the back.