I swirl the glass of white wine and watch tiny bits of cork travel in circles on the surface. It requires too much effort to dig out those fragmented pieces. It’s the lie I tell myself, even if my damaged heart welcomes the unorthodox companionship.
A person shouldn’t feel such anxiety when visiting her childhood home. I suppose I’m not like most thirty-eight-year-old women. I am alone. Raised by a single mother and born out of wedlock, I know nothing about my father. Fierce resistance met any inquiry into his whereabouts.
The physical bruises disappeared with time. It’s the deeper emotional scars that remain a mainstay in my life. Doctors insist the cause of my mother’s death was a heart attack. I suspect excessive alcohol consumption played a significant role in her demise. The liquor cabinet disguised as a side table was like Pandora’s box. Whenever I heard the latch close on that cupboard door, it triggered an impulsive response. I prepared for what would soon follow. Sometimes it was courtesy of a leather belt. If I was unlucky, it came from the backside of a right hand that should have stroked my cheek, not slapped it.
I’m sorry for your loss, Claire. Time will heal you. That’s the recurring message I heard from neighbors and guests after the funeral service. I wasn’t the least bit sorry, nor was time healing a single thing. I put on a plausible facade, but resentment overpowered my pretense of grieving. Ignoring the coldhearted thoughts seething inside me was impossible, but I need not pretend any longer.
It’s now only me, a glass of wine, and a houseful of belongings to empty. If only I could dispose of these painful and repressed memories with the same ease.
2
Why is it so hot in here? I suspect stress plays a role, alongside effects from the alcohol I shouldn’t be drinking. I’m hypocritical for partaking in libations at this moment, but I have no one here to chastise me.
As I stare at the ceiling, silence surrounds me. I push aside the despondent memories of voiceless pleas from years ago. Instead, I focus on a problem that’s fixable: a lack of airflow coming from the vent above me.
The overhead attic door in the hallway is easier to reach as a grown woman. My bedroom chair isn’t necessary. I am at ease climbing the stairs. Out of habit I conceal the creaks with each footstep. This was my shelter, a hiding place my mother never discovered because I used it with such discreet care. My destination today is the fuse box, to resolve one problem and hide from many others.
The red flashlight rests in the same spot. Turning it on, I watch a familiar stream of amber light spill from it. After I allow the dust particles floating before me to settle, my emotions do the same. I navigate the maze of boxes and furniture pieces with surprising ease. Swinging open the metal door, I trace my finger along the column of switches, each flipped to the left, save for one. Kicking the offending switch back in line with the others, I hear the air handler come to life outside.
There is so much awaiting me downstairs, packing up the remnants of a life I’d rather forget. But a growing curiosity beckons me. I’m sure it’s no longer there, but I still need to check. I round the pile of cardboard boxes stacked three high, once an indestructible fortress to my younger self. I scoff at the naïveté of youth. Now they’re nothing more than tattered containers. They hold useless relics from a mother who never loved me.
I catch sight of what I hoped to find. All the negativity inside me melts away, replaced by a warm smile I can’t suppress. I run my hand over the shoebox that used to hold my favorite Converse shoes. Opening the lid, I see familiar slips of different colored paper. On autopilot, I walk to the only window and place a sequence of Post-it notes in the frame, for old time’s sake. It was a secret language, spoken in hues, not words. Each pattern held a unique message. Only one other individual understood that code, the boy in the house across the yard.
OVER TIME, DILLON HAD become my best friend. Our relationship was born out of necessity and convenience. I needed someone to lean on when consumed by feelings of fear and rejection. He was the closest person willing to meet my needs. In return, he benefited from my ability to understand classic literature.
Dillon had three older sisters, so he possessed a natural comfort around girls. As for me? I escaped to one of two places when I had the opportunity—my attic or the library. There were always plenty of books in both locations. As a voracious reader, I consumed the titles on our school’s assigned reading list before anyone else. So ours was a symbiotic relationship. We both had something valuable to offer the other and were both eager to share it.
Near the end of each summer, we’d find ourselves seated in the back corner of Peppi’s with a pepperoni pizza between us. We discussed the merits of Steinbeck, Austen, Twain, and Fitzgerald. In the beginning, it was a chore for Dillon to complete the assignments. By senior year, though, he was a much stronger student, and our time together had developed into something more. I remember it with such clarity. And poignancy.
“Come over here. Look at this.” I slid over and motioned for him to sit beside me in the booth.
Pushing our greasy pizza plates to the side, he sidled up next to me as I creased the book’s spine. I began reciting Robert Frost’s poem: “‘Two roads diverged in a yellow wood . . .’”
After each line, I glanced up at him, deepening emotion etched into his facial features. Something was different. We had started communicating through unspoken words nestled between each breath. We were writing a story together, filled with excitement, uncertainty, joy, and travel. On roads forsaken by others in my life.
“‘I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference.’” I finished the poem, swallowed the lump in my throat, and prepared to share my interpretation of the work.
“You can see . . .” I began my sentence, not wanting to look up and meet his gaze. An unknown fear and anxiety consumed me. When my eyes finally found Dillon’s, it took only a moment for his to lock with mine. He connected with something elemental in the depths of my soul. It was more intimate than any physical connection. I welcomed and feared it in the same breath. Each new inhalation became shallower than the one before it. Dillon leaned in, closing the space between us with deliberate intentions. We were so absorbed in each other’s thoughts. Our eyelids closed and lips joined with impulsive certainty. An electricity coursed through me, more intense than any kiss in my young life.
That euphoric feeling made my ensuing choice unimaginable.
I pushed him away. The heartbroken look on his face crippled me. I didn’t know why I’d done it or what to do next. My feeble attempt to analyze Frost’s poetic form replaced the awkward silence between us.
We never returned to that pizza shop. That dreamlike-turned-distressing moment became a blemish in our relationship. The color-encoded messages subsided. We remained best friends through times of sadness and joy. But there had been an invisible thread delicately intertwined between our souls, and I had severed that connection after pulling away from our first, and only, kiss.
I WONDER WHERE HE IS now. My brief stroll down memory lane creates a longing desire for a fresh start. I pick up the shoebox full of childhood memories. It contains only pieces of paper, but it feels heavier, as if it holds more weight than it did a few moments ago.
With it nestled under my arm, I retreat down the attic stairs and sink into the cushion on the living room couch. I grab hold of my wineglass, gazing into the half-empty goblet. A strand of wavy brunette hair drifts into my peripheral vision. Tucking it behind my ear, I refocus on what still rests in that amber liquid. Those small bits of cork remain, but they’re now motionless, as if inviting their retrieval. It might not be so difficult to remove those fragments. While I ponder the possibility, my thoughts wander elsewhere.
I HAVEN’T APPROACHED this doorstep in over two decades. Sensing the countless impressions from my knuckles, I knock on the wooden door. The sound triggers pleasant memories.
As it swings open, I offer a tentative greeting. “Hi, Mrs. Darby. You might not remember me . . .” I notice moisture in the corner of her eye before she embraces me in a comforting hug.
“Claire.” She speaks in an endearing tone, pushing me to arm’s length. “You look beautiful, love. You haven’t changed a bit. I still see that young girl in your eyes.”
“You too.” I smile. It might be a small white lie. Mrs. Darby is showing her age, but it’s the only proper thing to say. She helped me through such a difficult stretch of childhood.
“Come in, please. I have a kettle for tea on the stove.” Her familiar kitchen hasn’t changed in twenty years. I fondly recall her serving warm cookies and milk for Dillon and me at the same table. “I’m so sorry I didn’t make it to your mother’s funeral. What she did, how she treated you . . .”
“Don’t worry. It’s okay.”
“I never understood how someone could . . . well, you know. It was wrong.”
“Please, think nothing of it. I understand.” I rest my hand atop the one belonging to my true mother and look deep into her eyes. Scared to hear the answer, I still need to ask the question. “Mrs. Darby, can you tell me where Dillon is these days?”
Selfishly, I fear she will tell me about a happy marriage, a gorgeous wife, three kids, and a house in the suburbs with a white picket fence. And a dog. I can’t forget the canine part of my forlorn dream. It was the fairy-tale ending I missed out on due to my lack of courage.
Tears flow unfiltered from Mrs. Darby’s eyes. “Oh, Claire.”
“Mrs. Darby? What is it? Are you okay?” A hollow and foreboding desperation washes over me.
“My baby Dillon. He died in a car accident. Three years ago. He was only thirty-five. Too young.” She fights through the sobs between each fragmented sentence. The grieving mom is answering my question, but she speaks as much to herself as she does to me.
