If Sylvia Had Answered the Phone

after Dr. Hook’s “Sylvia’s Mother”

I thought her mother would answer.

That’s how long it had been.

So when Sylvia said my name

I held the phone tighter

than I meant to.

Rain tapped the glass

of the station booth.

Night leaned in close

to hear what we’d say.

“Hello?” she said again,

soft like she wasn’t sure

I was still there.

I said her name back

and felt something old

sit down beside me.

We talked about small things first.

Weather. Work.

How time keeps moving

whether you walk with it or not.

I told her I stayed in the same town.

She said she never stayed anywhere long.

A train moved somewhere far down the line.

Didn’t come.

Just shifted its weight

in the dark.

“I almost called,” I told her.

“I know,” she said.

“I almost answered.”

That hung between us

like a note

neither one of us

could finish.

I asked if she was happy.

Didn’t dress it up.

Just asked.

She took a breath.

Said, “I am what I chose.”

And I believed her

because not believing

would’ve hurt worse.

The loudspeaker cracked overhead.

Her train.

Always something

pulling her away.

She said she had to go.

I wanted to say wait.

Wanted to say come back.

Wanted to say I kept you

longer than I should’ve

inside my life.

But the years had already

said all that.

So I said her name once more.

Let it rest there

between us.

Then the line went quiet.

Just that flat sound

of distance

doing its work.

I stood in the booth awhile

holding the receiver

like it might warm again.

Rain kept falling.

Tracks ran both ways.

Nothing arrived for me.

I stepped out into the night

older than I’d been

five minutes before.

Some loves don’t leave you.

They just move farther off

until all you hear

is memory

walking down the tracks

calling your name

like it still belongs to you.

GBS

2023