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***
Gravel crunches under my feet, disturbing the silence cloaking my surroundings. It feels wrong, as if I’m disturbing something I shouldn’t be. I try to step lighter, but all it manages to do is make my gait stiff. Gravel still crunches. A light breeze blows, gently shaking the leaves of the mature oak, sugar maple, and horse chestnut trees surrounding the space. I don’t know shit about trees, but I know that’s what they’re called. The sign I read while lingering outside the gate, trying to prolong the inevitable, told me so. I can hear birdsong in the distance, their cheer only adding to the peacefulness of this place. My thoughts are getting morbid, trying to compare this place to me. The quiet calm and peacefulness on the surface compared to the dead nothing inside. I veer off the path and wind my way through the rows of headstones, standing in orderly rows like silent sentinels. My steps slow as I find what I’m looking for. The headstone looks ordinary, nothing special, yet it has the power to bring me to my knees. I lock them. There’s no way I’ll ever be on my knees in front of her. Never again.
Sticking my hands in the pockets of my slacks, I run my eyes over the headstone, my eyes lingering on the inscription,
In Remembrance
Of
Nora Young
13.5.1967-18.9.2003
That’s all it says. No flowery words reminding the world that she was a daughter, wife, and mother. I wonder who paid for it, who buried her? I know for a fact that Dad didn’t. The once-white headstone is showing signs of neglect. I guess nobody paid for headstone cleaning—another thing I read on a sign outside advertising special services. Does anyone ever visit her last resting place? I cast my mind back, trying to remember if I ever saw her with friends, but some of the memories of my life back then are vague. Some of them I can’t block out no matter how hard I try. I swallow a few times, trying to work moisture back into my mouth. There are so many things spinning through my head, so many thoughts and feelings, but it’s useless. She’s been dead and buried for nineteen years, and any kind of answers or explanations died with her. But my need for answers didn’t die with her.
“Why?” My voice is a soft croak, and I ball my hands into fists when I recognize the weakness in it. I don’t ever want to be weak again. So I take a deep breath, push down the mash of nausea, anxiety, and helplessness churning in my gut and snarl out the words.
“Why? Why did you love me wrong?” I don’t know what I’m waiting for, but silence is all that greets me. What was I expecting? A voice from below—because it certainly wouldn’t be coming from above—to hand me answers on a silver platter? The ground parting, a scroll rising from it, wrapped up with a pretty little bow to hide the ugly answers inside?
“I hate you,” I whisper. “I hope that wherever you are, you can hear me. You can feel me and know that with everything I am, I hate you.” But even now, I know that’s not the whole truth. There’s this tiny part of me that still loves her, and that’s the part that sickens me, that I hate the most. It feels like an eternity passes while I stand in silence, gazing at her last resting place. This is the first and last time I’ll ever come here. I thought coming here would give me closure, but it hasn’t. What it’s given me is clarity and strength. Clarity to see the path I need to walk, and the strength to do so.
My mind is on autopilot while I drive aimlessly around. The earliest flight out I could get is at nine tonight, so I hadn’t bothered to book a hotel. I am itching to get out of this place, to put it behind me, but I still have a couple of hours to kill. Driving down Austin Street fills me with sadness. My favorite ice cream store, Lulu’s, is long gone, the once flashing ice cream cone replaced by the green Starbucks logo. Most of the trendy stores have been replaced by chain stores. I don’t know why I’m surprised or saddened. Fourteen years is a long time to expect things to stay the same, and it’s not like I’ll come here ever again.
Before I know it, I’m turning down a residential road. I slow the car down to a crawl, my heart rate increasing the closer I get. How the hell do I still know the way after all these years? Guess it doesn’t matter. This place is pulling me like a magnet. I switch the car off, my body rigid, staring forward. There’s no force on this earth that can make me get out, never mind opening the window. My neck is tight when I finally get the courage to turn my head, and a breath leaves my body. It’s still the same, and yet, it’s not.
A white picket fence has replaced the hedge that Mom trimmed a few times a year. The red brick steps leading up to the front door are still the same, but the front door is painted a cheery blue instead of the off-white it used to be. The hoop above the garage where Dad and I used to shoot hoops is gone. My eyes lift to the second floor, third window to the left, and the anguish that fills me is unfathomable. There are no words that can do justice to what I’m feeling. I realize I’m crying when a tear hits my clenched fist. Weak, Lucas, you’re weak. My thoughts are bitter, each one laced with poison, but where before, the poisonous words made me stronger and served as a justification for my actions, now I see it for what it is. An ugly shield I created to hide behind. Is that what I will read if I ever have the courage to open that letter stuffed away in my desk? More bitter, ugly words that never should see the light of day?
I’m jolted out of the trance I’m in when the front door opens and a woman steps out. For a moment I see another woman, and nausea hits me so hard and fast that I barely have time to get the door open before being sick all over the sidewalk. By the time my body has stopped heaving, the woman is gone, and the door is closed. As I sit there, my whole body shaking, I know I don’t know much, but I know I need help.
The next day finds me back in my office, that envelope clutched in my hand. It’s starting to show some wear from how many times I’ve held it in the past six months. The writing is blocky—no frills, just like Dad used to be. I flip it over, staring at the seam. All it would take is a quick flick of a letter opener, and whatever is inside would be revealed to me.
I just can’t do it. Instead, I stuff it back in the drawer and pick up my phone. I’ve done extensive research and found someone I’m hoping I might be comfortable with. With shaky fingers, I dial the number. Never in a million years did I think I’ll ever make this call, but to beat this darkness inside me, to rise above it, I have to let go, not let it consume me, and this is the only way.
They say the first step of a new journey is the hardest, and fuck if it’s true.
