When breakfast had been cleared and he and Johanna were alone, he looked at her across the table. “Whatever happens, if I don’t come back, you need to finish our song,” he said.

“I know,” she said, pausing. “we will, but you will come home, so we’ll finish it then.”

“And tell Jubilee—tell her I kept my promise and will for as long as I can. Tell her that. Don’t tell her more than that. Don’t make it pretty for her.”

As the morning light spilled through the windows, he stood and gathered his bag, slipping the notebook securely into his coat and before leaving, he crossed to Johanna and placed his guitar in her hands. “Take care of it while I’m gone,” he said. “When I get back, we’ll finish our song.” He then paused at the door of the store and looked back into the room one last time, wanting to remember: the workshop area, the back room where the piano and lesson tools were, but most importantly for Caleb, the window sill where Jubilee liked to sit. It was a place that had become more than a music shop. It had become part of who he was.

Then he stepped out onto East Main Street to join his uncle.

The first light of morning had just climbed above the rooftops to the east. The street was beginning to stir. A boy he didn’t know swept the steps of a shop three doors down. Across the way, a cart was being unloaded. A dog crossed the street with quiet purpose, heading somewhere known only to itself. As he left, he didn’t look back at the store. He had decided, the night before, that he would not. He had said his goodbye to the room in his head while he tore out the pages of the notebook. He had said his goodbye to Johanna and his aunt at the table. He had said his goodbye to Jubilee three nights before. There was no one left to say goodbye to except the version of himself who had walked down East Main months ago with a bag and a guitar, but that version of him wasn’t walking now. That version had gone into the back room and the version walking now was the one the back room had made.