Vale

We leave the city with the sunset. New Jersey turns peach-colored across the water, as the Empire State Building shrinks in the distance. My little city. It looks so frail from afar, and it doesn't add up with the towering force I know it to be up close. 

Palisades parkway lies dark at the other edge of the bridge, as night spreads a heavy blanket across the suburban land. Your phone loses reception, the air is thick with cricket song. The chill in the air seems appropriate; you forget it was ever summer. Their house smells like America. You know you'll sleep like you were home. 

We all grew up somewhere. Wherever we go after is just a symptom. 

You think I forget. 

I remember.