I woke at midnight and couldn't get back to sleep. The house is too quiet now.
I fished his key ring out of the junk drawer. Three keys and a little brass tag that says 'FRONT DOOR.'
That house is gone. Sold two years ago, after he passed. I moved into this apartment above the dry cleaners.
These keys don't open anything in this world. But I still feel him in the grooves of the brass, worn smooth by forty years of his thumb.
Yesterday I found a seed packet in the bottom of a box. Zucchini, past its plant-by date by six years. He always planted on the last frost.
The neighbors down the street have a garden. I saw them this afternoon hauling in baskets of tomatoes. It's that time of year when the whole town smells like dirt and ripeness.
I held the keys in my palm until they warmed up. Then I put them back in the drawer and went to pour a glass of water.
Some things don't need to open anything. They just need to be held. I think that's what I learned tonight.