The Four Corners of my Past
Page 19
- Dad, have you missed me? – I asked him breaking the silence protecting us.
- You never left. – he answered.
- In a way, I did – I said in a low voice – why did you let me leave? Why haven’t you looked for me in the last ten years?
- Because to love also means to respect the space of the ones you love – my mother had expressed exactly the same way the day before – To understand that love is not always reciprocated and that we have to let everyone live and love freely. I couldn’t force you to love me, I couldn’t force you to come and see me... I respected your space, the liberty of your decisions and I loved the way I considered best, the way I thought you wanted, from a distance.
Each one of us acted as we considered best and we had owned up to the consequences. Ten years without seeing each other were too many for a misunderstanding, a whole life ahead of us was just the time to recompose the missing pieces.
When I got in the car, leaving behind something more than just the landscape of my Childhood I felt at peace. A new peace, with a washed face, no folds or hidden labyrinths. I had understood that the story of our family had liberty as a solid base of respect and love. That the decisions that Helen and Manel made, were generous of others, that having a family that’s different didn’t mean it was worse, on the contrary, it enriched the nuances and gave me a new prism with which to see the world with all its colors.
I felt fortunate, immensely fortunate. The beauty wasn’t only that place, it did not reside exclusively in the words or in the eyes of a father that for the first time shared his story with me and showed me his truth, the beauty was the unconditional love that Manel and Helen showed each other. The beauty, was the unconditional love that the both showed me.
When I turned on the last corner before arriving at the office on the morning of my fortieth birthday, I saw my father standing in front of the door of the building of the Beauty Building Company.
We had arranged to meet at one o’clock for lunch with Helen and my daughter, which was why it startled me to see him so early. It wasn’t nine yet.
- Dad... - I said when I saw him – you’re here already? We’re not supposed to meet until one.
- I know Elena, but I wanted to give you a present before our meal.
Since the afternoon I went to Tossa de Mar to meet with him again, my father turned into one of the most important people with whom I shared the journey of my day to day. His magic, his fantasy, his unique way of seeing life, was a spring perfume, the smell of mandarin of a love letter. I returned to spending my summers at the house number four of a street parallel to de sea and my daughter grew up with her bare feet, knees covered in scratches and sand in her ears. To her, he is Manel, the poet boatman. She doesn’t ask, she likes the mystery of her existence, the company of the old mysterious man that awaits her at the sea shore, always with a new story on the tip of his tongue, an invention and a star of the ocean. Each one of us belongs to a landscape of our history and my father is always surrounded by salt water.
- The day I met you, it rained for hours – he said -. It seemed as if the sea had gone up to the sky to get a better look at you and upon seeing your little face, it began to cry. Of pure excitement. You were so little... but you were glowing... how you were glowing Elena! You illuminated the room, the hospital and the look of every person how came near you. Everyone wanted to enjoy your light, to take shelter from the rain next to you. Your mother couldn’t have picked a better name for you. Elena... - I pronounced it slowly – radiant like the sun.
My father was staring at me, he could go over that day through his memories, from the deep expression of his eyes. They were a mirror to the past, at the beginning of my forty years.
- I knew instantly – he continued – that you were the star that had guided me all of these years. You were not a legend, you were real and when you came home, I wrote a poem I have kept with me during all this time. I didn’t know if I was going to give it to you, if that perfect moment would come, but this morning the sea was rough and as I approached the beach I saw the old boat tired of fighting against the tide. Today was not a good day to go sailing and when I came home I understood that without my lighthouse, I couldn’t go anywhere. That’s why I’m here, searching for my light, remembering that you, dear Elena, are my star of the sea.
He took out a paper from the pocket of his pants and placed it in my hand. He kissed me on the cheek while caressing my hair and before he left, he whispered to my ear, the way he did forty years ago.
- For you, my daughter. Happy birthday!
Standing, in front of the door to my office, when there were only two minutes left before nine in the morning, I opened the paper that my father had left in my hand and I read:
The light of my star
infinite and fleeting.
My girl, my candle
my ocean wonder.
The waves bring you,
the waves take you,
they cradle you, they sing to you,
they want to pamper you.
You are my star,
you are my ocean.
You are Elena
my sense of love.
- Mom, mom... make a wish!
When we finished lunch, my daughter came out of the restaurant’s kitchen with a carrot cake, my favorite. Over its circular shape, there was no felicitation with my name on it but there were two big candles, almost as big as the cake itself. On the left, the number four, on its right, accompanying it, a zero. It was my fortieth birthday and I was celebrating it surrounded by the most important people in my life, the only ones that really mattered. My mother, my father and my daughter.
I’d had a busy morning of unexpected encounters. I had gone through the corners of my past. The lessons learned of a wonderful life that had taken me to the place I was now. Every step, every mistake, every tear and every joy, were part of me and I felt proud. Looking back that morning didn’t cause me any damage, it was like taking out an old family photo album and fondly remember the person I was. If I could go back in time I would retrace every step, there was nothing, absolutely nothing that I wanted to change. That was my story, it didn’t need to be rewritten.
- Mom, mom... make a wish! – claimed my daughter.
My mother was looking at me with the satisfaction of a well done job, while my father remembered the first time he saw my face, in the hospital cradle and he thought that his best poem, was and always would be me.
- Mom, mom... make a wish!
My daughter was a wonderful eight-year-old girls who lived surrounded by love. She was born free, like I did and she would become whoever she wanted. Us, her grandmother, her grandfather and me, will be exceptional witnesses, secondary characters in the first row of action, but she will always be our favorite writer, the director of a life in which she will be the protagonist herself.
- Mom, mom... make a wish!
My wish has already been fulfilled.
NOTES FROM THE AUTHOR
In this story, there are little winks in the form of anecdotes, characters, places and names that make references to people I love or who were important at some point in my life (you will know when you read it).
Thank you for accompanying me on this journey. You are a part of my story, of the many corners my past has.
Thanks to all the people that have accompanied me in the wonderful journey of La Castañera. You have made me believe that this dream is possible.
Without your support I never would have begun to write a second story.
Thank you.
Alaitz Arruti, Bilbao 1985.
After leaving her hometown to embark on an adventure of travel and emigration that led her to visit several countries and reside in various cites both in Spain and the United Kingdom, Alaitz Arruti, finally establishes herself in Italy, place where she decides to breathe and write.
The four corners of my past is her second novel. In the year 2016 she published her debut, La Castañera.
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