Evermore, Nevermore Forget Me Not

Home Again

*the house that built me: Miranda Lambert-2009*

Setting: outside the old Cooper house in Galveston 2018...

Mary parks the car in front of the old familiar family home; Mary gets the wheelchair from the trunk of the car while Missy gets out and helps to get her sister out of the car. Missy practically carries Bailey over to the back where their mother is waiting for them and puts her down in the chair before going to get her kids...

"I don't wanna go up there in this dumb chair," Bailey whines looking up towards her mother

"I know baby," Mary sighs, "but ya gotta be in the wheelchair till yer muscles strength back up."

"Can I," Carl comes running up to her as soon as Missy unbuckles him and lets him out of the car, "Can I-um-Can I ride?"

"Y'all wanna ride in yer auntie Bay's lap?" She asks him with a smile

"Yea," he says as he nods his head

"Ok, climb on up inta auntie Bay's lap," she encourages him

Carl happily climbs up into Bailey's lap, while Missy grabs her daughter from the back and Mary closes the trunk of the car; Mary wheels Bailey up to the front door, Carl in her lap and Missy following behind them carrying Matilda's carrier. Mary knocks at the door and they wait patiently as Carl looks all around the porch front where he sits in Bailey's lap, all smiles and bright eyes...

"Mommy," He calls looking over to Missy

"Yes baby?" She asks him

"Dis yer house?" He asks her

"That's right baby," Missy tells him, "this is where mommy and Auntie Bay grew up in fur a while."

"Yes?" Come a woman answering the door, "c-can I help y'all?"

"Hi," Mary starts with a smile, "I'm Mary Cooper, these are my daughters: Melissa and Bailey," she introduces, "the little boy is Melissa's son Carl, and little baby is her daughter Matilda."

"How can I help y'all?" The woman repeats, "if yer sellin something, I ain't buyin."

"Well we ain't sellin nothin," Missy tells her, "we use ta live 'ere Ma'am."

"Oh?" The woman asks

"Excuse Ma'am," Bailey buts in, "But I've spent the last twenty nine years in a coma-"

"Yer that Bailey Cooper?" The woman asks, "I heard bout y'all on the news-longest coma ta wake from."

"Yea," Bailey says quietly

"Come on in," the woman says welcomingly, "What can I do fur y'all?"

"I was hopin ta look round my childhood home," Bailey tells her, "since the last I was awake it was nineteen eighty nine and was still our house-" she explains to him, "I-I was just hopin fur some closures is all..."

"Of course," the woman tells them as she closes the door behind them all

"Thank ya kindly Ma'am," Mary tells her with a smile

"Thank ya," Missy adds in

"Thank ya so much fur this Ma'am," Bailey chimes in, "and god bless ya."

Mary slowly pushes Bailey through the house so she can take in every little detail to memory and as she quietly talks to Carl: tell him about her memories in each room they entered and describing in great detail how the room looked way back when in her memories...and Carl quietly listens as he looks around, completely interested. Missy silently follows behind, tuning her sister out as she loses herself in her own memories of the place, along with the voices of their childhood ringing in her ears. Mary quietly listens to the smile on her daughter's voice as she, herself remembers all the good times in the house, until they reach the stairs leading upwards...