by Megan Rivers
“Excellent. Great to meet you. Kevin Langston. This is my daughter Meadow, and this is Christie Kelly, your daughter’s newest roommate.” I loved how both Kevin and Meadow beamed in my direction. I held out my hand and shook hands with both Sophia and Jeff.
“Is Christie your daughter, then?” Jeff said, uncertain if the question needed to be asked, but I could understand his confusion by the difference in our last names.
He looked at Meadow and smiled. “Practically,” he replied.
Meadow linked her arm with mine. “Come on, let’s go explore.”
After walking around the campus and finding where my classrooms were, we ended up eating dinner at a restaurant nearby. Though it was within walking distance, we drove because it was so cold. With full bellies, we got in the car and ended up parking adjacent to a park. “Let’s get some fresh air,” Kevin said, as he turned off the ignition and unbuckled his seat belt.
I followed Meadow out of the car. Kevin sat at a bench a few feet away and Meadow ran towards the snow encrusted swings. “Can I talk to you, Christie?” Kevin asked, motioning for me to sit next to him.
I sat down in the space beside him. Meadow was nearly thirty yards away but I watched as she started kicking her legs on the swing, taking her higher and faster on every kick.
“You know I’m proud of you, right?” Kevin asked. He was slouched over, his elbows resting on his knees.
“Thank-you, Kevin,” I smiled. It felt great to hear it.
“I want you to know that if you ever need anything while you’re at school, you let me know. I want you to have fun in college too.” He looked at me, nudged me with his elbow, and jokingly said, “But not too much fun, young lady.”
I smiled. “Okay.”
His tone changed now, to a deeper, more serious one. “I tried what I could to get you to come to Chicago for summer break, but your dad is 'thinking about it.' But after you turn eighteen, you’re welcome to stay with us whenever you want to. We miss having you in the house. Meadow’s beginning to teach me NSYNC dance moves… and I don’t dance.”
I laughed. “Seriously, Kevin, thank you for everything you’ve done for me. I really, really appreciate it. I wish I could show you how much I appreciate it.”
Kevin waved his hand. “It’s nothing.” Several moments of silence passed between us. “Christie, there are two things I want you to know before Meadow and I leave for Chicago. They are two things I’ve been waiting to tell you and I need to tell you before time gets the best of us.”
I didn’t say anything, but listened. He put his hands together so that the gloved fingertips on one hand touched the fingertips of his other hand. He stared at the shoveled walk when he spoke. “Before… Well, before your mother died, we talked about you. We talked about you a great deal. She was worried about you so much when you were in Australia. She was a complete wreck when she couldn’t get you on the phone and hated waking up on Sunday mornings without seeing you hovered over a bowl of cereal in the kitchen. She loved you so much.” He looked over at me, his eyes burrowing into mine, “I hope you truly know that. We would watch TV and she would say, ‘I wish Christie was here to see that,’ and we wouldn’t get to watch the rest of the program because she would tell me a story about you that led to another story that led to another story.”
I smiled. Telling stories and not being able to get through a whole television program with her were two things that Mom was excellent at. “When Meadow and I got word that you were coming home we were extremely nervous. The way your mother talked about you, it was like inviting the Shah of Iran into our house. Meadow, of course, was more lax about it than I was, but I still caught her cleaning out from under her bed and doing a few loads of laundry so that we could once again see the floor of her bedroom.
“And then we met you. You were a huge entity in this tiny Christie body when you walked through the door. Meadow automatically took a liking to you and she is unbelievably picky when it comes to choosing friends. In such a short time you grew to become my daughter and Meadow’s sister—you truly were this remarkable person that completed our little family.
“After your mother and I became engaged, I asked her permission to adopt you.”
“Wait. What? Adopt me?” I asked. The news shocked me, but filled me with warmth.
Kevin nodded. “She was going to adopt Meadow as well. We were going to ask permission from the both of you on New Year’s Day and then, well…” He closed his eyes and rubbed his forehead. “Forgive me, Christie, but I was selfish enough to actually hope that your aunt didn’t want you. I told anyone that would listen that I would adopt you, right there, on the spot, no questions asked. But your aunt wanted the money and your dad refused my help and guidance ever since.”
“That’s not selfish Kevin.” I entwined my arm with his. “That’s, well, that’s the nicest thing anybody has done for me, ever.” I paused for a moment and leaned my head on his shoulder. “I knew you loved my mother, Kevin, but I had no idea how much. I know it was hard, but thank you, thank you so much, for telling me all this. It, it really, really means a lot.”
With the memory of my mother, a tear fell down my cheek. It left a hot trail down my cold, pale face. Kevin put his arm around me and gave me a hug. “You’re a great kid, know that.” He leaned back, keeping his arm around me. I welcomed his warmth and looked at Meadow who was now sitting on the swing and twisting the chains so that she spun in circles when she let go. I hoped she knew how blessed she was to have a father like Kevin.
After a few moments, I asked, “Kevin?”
“Yeah?”
“What was the second thing you wanted to tell me?”
“Come with me.” he said. We stood up and he lead me into the car. He started the car and put the heat on, so we could begin to regain feeling in our limbs. In the passenger seat, I looked at him, fully attentive.
“Your mother told me a great deal of stories, as I’m sure she has told you. She used to tell me that her grandfather would pull her aside and say, ‘Listen, I’m old. I’ve got a lesson to teach you so remember it and you can preach it when you’re as old as me.’ She said that her grandfather’s greatest lesson was that ‘In life, people can steal your car, they can steal your house and they can steal your money, but they can’t steal your education. So learn as much as you can because the three most important things in life are family, love and education.’
“Your mother would have loved to be with you today, to see you off to college and see you furthering your education. Your mother was always asking questions, researching new topics and reading about things that she didn’t know about. She went to get her Master’s after college and her Ph.D. after that. She really wanted to see you go to college and know more than you could ever know. She wanted you to see the world, which is why she was so keen to have you live with your father, and, whether you know it or not, you’ve learned something from that too.”
Kevin paused and sighed. A small smile played on his lips as he continued, “The first time your mom asked Meadow, ‘What did you learn today?’ and Meadow said, ‘Nothing.’ Your mother taught her, in great detail and length, about how different America would be if the south had won the Civil War.”
I smiled at this because I knew better than to say “nothing” when Mom asked that question. I always had something stored away in memory to tell her. She once spent two hours teaching me the process of photosynthesis when I was in second grade, and used a dead houseplant that sat for months on top of the fridge to do so.
“To help you, your mom ordered you a Christmas present that she had to send back because it got damaged in transit. She wrote you a card and I was going to give it to you when a new one arrived in the mail. She had scrimped and saved for a long time, but was proud of you and had faith in your patience and endurance. It arrived at the house the day we moved you to Camden.
“I had every intention of giving it to you before we left, but after meeting your aunt, I decided to hold onto it,
for the sake of it, you, and your mother. I thought now would be the best time to present it to you.” He pulled a latch under the steering wheel and I heard the tailgate pop open. “When you’re ready, it’s in the back.”
He smiled and I opened the side door. The cold air attacked my warm face and toasty limbs. Meadow was lying in the snow, making her third snow angel that I could see. I walked to the back of the Hummer, excited to see my mother’s gift. The fact that I was getting a gift from my mother, a year after she died, touched me so deeply. I wanted the anticipation to last. This present was a gift and the last one I would ever receive from my mother. Once I opened it, it would be gone.
Sitting in the back of the trunk, half covered by a brown fleece blanket, was a box in snowmen wrapping paper. My mother collected snowmen at Christmas. I would buy her a snowman pin every year at the school’s Holiday Market. The wrapping paper sparkled in the dark interior and a silver bow sent a spectrum of color around the tailgate when I pulled it out into the light. An envelope was taped below the bow, and in her equally spaced, bubbly writing, was my name.
It was my name in the same style I remember printed on my Barbie lunchbox in grade school, on notes she left me around the house, and on the banner she hung in the living room every year on October second to wish me a happy birthday. I took it off the wrapping paper gingerly, as not to wreck it. I hadn’t thought of my mother’s writing until now, what else was I slowly forgetting about her?
It was a Christmas card. A child, bundled in layers of clothes looked up at a beaming snowman on the cover. The snowman shimmered with subtle glitter that came off on my coat and gloves. Her distinct handwriting was inside the card as well.
Dear Christie,
I wish words could express how proud I am of you. Every mother should be proud of their daughter, but you’ve been exceptional considering the circumstances of this past year. This gift is to help you go further in life and for you to always ask yourself, ‘What did I learn today?’ even though I won’t always be sitting across from you at dinner.
As for my Christmas 2000 advice (did you think I would forget?), here is a quote by Rainer Maria Rilke that I discovered in college and of which I kept dear to my heart: “Be patient towards all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers which cannot be given to you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will find them gradually, without noticing it, and live along some distant day into the answer.”
I love you, forever.
Mom
My eyes blurred with tears and I wiped them away with my gloved hand. Every Christmas Mom gave me a card with some quote or advice in it, since I’ve been able to read. She would leave it in my shoes, halfway under my pillow, on top of the toilet seat, or in a box of cereal. I hadn’t noticed that I hadn’t gotten one last year, or maybe I wrote it off to a change of tradition. But now, more than ever, I was determined to make my mother proud of me.
Very carefully, I put the letter back in its envelope and picked up the heavy box. Had some company wrapped the package? Did Kevin wrap it, not knowing I wouldn’t open it for another year?
I slipped my fingers under the flaps and tore the tape from the ends. I ran my bare finger across the back of the box until the last piece of tape released the wrapping paper’s hold from the box. It fell into the trunk and saw myself holding a brand new laptop.
It felt like my mother was there, to cheer me on as I started my first day of college.
II.
Ally No More
“Here I Go Again” – Whitesnake
After I saw Meadow and Kevin off to the airport, I sat down at the desk in my dorm room and stared at my new laptop. I set my fingers upon the keys and pretended I was writing an essay for school. I pushed play on the CD player and looked at the quilt on my bed that reminded me of Meadow. This was my dorm room. My space. My laptop. My CD player.
I was now free. Free from the haunted corners of Camden that reminded me of him. Free from dark nights and cold, lonely days.
Weeks had passed and I was enjoying college life. I enjoyed school, and classes, and art, and my classmates, even the cafeteria food!
One day, after one of my afternoon classes, a classmate of mine, Heather, wanted to borrow an art book I had on Neoclassicism that I inadvertently stole from that flamboyant room in Melbourne.
We were discussing the similarities between Neoclassicism and Art Deco when we walked into my dorm room to see Ally putting on her gym shoes. She had on a pair of running pants and a white sports bra. “Hey, I’m going to the gym, want to come?” Ally asked.
“No thanks,” I said. “Heather and I have a project to work on.” Truth be told, I didn’t have a gym membership, nor could I afford one. “By the way, this is Heather and this is my roommate Ally.” They exchanged mutual hellos, although Ally seemed much less chipper than usual.
I pulled out a small suitcase from under my bed and dumped out a number of books, old letters, pictures and cards. I spread out the books trying to find the one I wanted. “Ah ha! Here it is!” I said pulling it from the pile.
Handing it to Heather, we turned to leave. “See you later, Ally,” I called back as she threw on a thermal shirt and gave an awkward wave.
March was just beginning and we had the first unbelievable day of weather—the first warm day without a cloud in the sky. When my morning class was dismissed I decided to take a walk rather than sit in the library for two hours before my next class. The birds were chirping, students were sitting outside, some playing Frisbee in the melting snow and muddy ground.
I was walking down Kimball Avenue, singing a 98 Degrees song in my head, thanks to Meadow’s newest Frister Mix, Volume 6. I smiled and said hello to a burly man standing inside a newsstand, bundled in layers and sporting a pair of dirty yellow mittens, despite the immaculate weather. He watched his periodicals carefully and eyed me suspiciously.
“Good morning,” I said and waved, off on my merry way.
Then I stopped dead in my tracks a few feet later. I would have kept walking if what my eyes saw next didn’t glue me to that spot. My picture took up half a magazine, while Galvin’s face took up the other half. “Love’s Pain to Blame?” was the title that blazed across our pictures. I picked it up and opened it up. The picture of us at the Grammy's and Galvin’s mug shot were printed with the following article:
Lead singer of the German rock band Prey for Chance, Galvin Kismet, 20, has been running into some hard times. After losing his long term girlfriend, Christine Kelly, in October of last year, reports of drunk driving, drug deals, and recklessness have been abundant.
Within the past five months, Kismet has been charged with assault and battery, two DUIs, possession of meth, cocaine, cannabis, and, most strangely, has shoplifted many copies of his bands own album, Clandestine from music stores in Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, and Atlanta. What caused this change from young, successful German musician to the out-of-hand, fathers-hide-your-daughters, police magnet? Is Christine Kelly truly the one to blame for his downfall?
Sources report that Kelly broke it off with Kismet after he proposed marriage. In a fit of rage she declined to marry him numerous times, breaking Kismet’s heart. If that wasn’t enough, she went back to him the very next night to rub in how much of a disappointment he is to her. Undoubtedly, these events caused the change we’ve seen in this rocker, to date.
In a letter Kismet wrote to Kelly, shortly after their break up, he explains, “When you came back the second night, I was suddenly filled with so much hope and happiness when I saw your face. I thought we had a real chance—that you wanted to give me another chance—but you left before anything could happen.[…] When I’m not with you, I feel this gaping hole of pain and I can’t seem to fill it. I’m sorry I disappointed you by using drugs. I’m sorry I cheated on you. I’
m sorry I’m not everything you want me to be, but I’m willing to do whatever you want me to do in order for me to get you back. I don’t know how I lived before you.” Did Kelly ever receive this message or does she want Kismet to suffer the pain that she thinks he deserves?
“I’m positive that she received the letter,” says one source. “But she never mentions his name [Galvin] at all, ever. She’s extremely happy with her life right now and I suspect it’s because of all his pain and how it’s been reported in the media.” Kismet and his agent have not been available for comment.
Hey Christine, if you’re reading this, can you take one for the team and bring back the rockin’ Prey for Chance music that we all love?
It was a slap in the face. “What?!” I exclaimed, unable to keep it inside. The burly man moved closer to where I stood. I put the magazine down, fuming.
Not again, was the only thing that crossed my mind as that familiar sinking feeling took over. Pictures of Galvin and me on my birthday as well as pictures of him smoking and drinking at numerous parties were plastered on the cover of another magazine. The headlines blamed the bands declining popularity on drugs, alcohol, and me. Can you believe that? I mean, people actually started a club called The Anti-Christie!
The warm prickly feeling of tears forming tickled my eyes, and a cold dry hand gripped my chest in dread. Not again! Not again! My heart beat faster and I managed to keep tears from falling as my face grew warm and red with anger.
These rumors of my past life were not supposed to cross over the threshold into my new life in New York! This was supposed to be my escape, my new address where the skeletons in my closet couldn’t find me! I stormed away from the newspaper stand on a mission.