by Lauren Dow
I want to survive this. I want to have a future. I want to live.
She stood in the middle of the barren room, staring at the balcony doors. There was still time for her to change her mind about whether or not she’d go outside to smoke. Amelia unlocked the latch of the door and stepped outside. She grabbed the ashtray on the patio table and dumped the remains of her cigarette butts into the garbage. With only two cigarettes left in her pack, she made a bold move and threw them away to be buried with the ashes.
What next?
Luna whined at her feet. Maybe this was why Luna had switched things up for them. Maybe this was God’s way of reminding Amelia that things could be different.
She put on her Bluetooth headphones, grabbed her phone, and buckled Luna’s harness. They ran downstairs and started jogging towards the Capitol building. Her chest was burning and her feet aching.
This is how you start. Somewhere. Anywhere. One foot in front of the other.
Amelia was barely able to keep up with Luna’s pace. “Maybe, IDK” by Jon Bellion came through her headphones. This was another song that had changed her life. It was the one that solidified her desire to travel. The song had shifted the foreseeable future in a way she never expected.
The anxiety crept in, making it difficult for her to breathe. Her lungs were sending a signal through a thick layer of ash and smoke. Amelia picked up the pace, Luna beside her and ready for the race. She stuck out her chest and pushed through the anxiety, through the tears, through to the end.
They came around the corner of 13th Street and back through the gate of their apartment building. Barely able to bring her wobbly legs up the stairs, they finally made it home before they both crumbled to the entryway floor. Luna sprawled out on her stomach, panting through a giant smile on her face.
Once Amelia caught her breath, she went into the bathroom and turned on the shower. She washed her hair, shaved her legs, exfoliated her face, and removed the cloud of cigarette stench that smothered her. Another shower to scrub away everything that reminded her of the person she never wanted to become.
In a weird way, it felt like she was dominating Dominic, the person who got her to start smoking again and the person who couldn’t kick the habit himself. But Amelia could. One small victory at a time.
She got out of the shower and dried herself off. Fresh clothes without the lingering smell of cigarettes. Amelia heard her phone vibrate on the nightstand. She looked down towards the screen and her smile was stripped away. She froze at the sight of Dominic’s name, responding to Amelia’s text she’d sent on her birthday almost four days ago.
She held her breath and opened the message.
DOMINIC: Hey. Yeah, I’m good. Got a little place near the beach in Mexico before I figure out what’s next. Happy belated birthday, I didn’t wanna fuck with your b-day by texting you. Hope everything is good with you and Luna, too.
Amelia contemplated the message, trying to decipher what name to give to the feeling she had. Another helpful tool provided by Miranda. Naming feelings helped her understand them, it gave Amelia the grace she needed to confront them.
Nothing. I feel absolutely nothing.
All this time she thought she was terrified to talk to Dom, to see his name pop up on her phone, or to hear the sound of his voice.
But when she saw his name, when she read the words, she felt nothing except a sudden urge to cry. They weren’t tears over Dominic. On the contrary, she was so elated that the only way she could deal with how happy she felt was by crying. Amelia’s fears were no longer there, gone like a leaf taken by the wind. She wasn’t sure what this meant for her recovery, but what she did know was that she was free. What she would do with this newfound freedom was another thing all together.
If there was one take away from the last year and half living in Denver, it was that there was nowhere in the world she felt more at peace than in the mountains. It was cliché, but true. She knew exactly what she needed to do next. Amelia put on a pair of leggings and a tank top, not even considering that her arms would be exposed for everyone to see. She laced up her hiking boots, filled her CamelBak, and stuffed her day pack with headphones, dog treats, poop bags, and even a snack. She wanted to spend the rest of the day hiking in the woods with Luna.
Amelia was finding faith in herself. She wasn’t about to let the momentum stop. A body in motion stays in motion. Newton’s third law, only it was usually the other side of the law governing her life, a body at rest stays at rest. Not this time. Not this day. Her day of rest would have to wait. The mountains were calling, and Amelia was listening.
She’d have to drive at least an hour and half heading west to beat the heatwave the city was enduring. The hailstorm had passed after just a few minutes and with Colorado’s unpredictable weather patterns, she was willing to take the chance it wouldn’t happen again. She and Luna got in the car and started driving towards the highway, each turn taking her closer to their end destination. The farther she drove through the winding roads of rockslides, the less people would be around, and the greater the chance that she could find some solitude. Being alone was now a choice rather than an obligation dictated by her inner monster.
About an hour and forty-five minutes outside of Denver, Luna and Amelia arrived at Chicago Lakes Trailhead. The parking lot was almost full. With the beautiful weather on a Sunday morning, it was inevitable that people would be out for a day trip. She’d done this trail before, knowing it would usually be packed up until Idaho Springs Reservoir. If she made it beyond there, the trail was open for her. She got Luna out of the car, locked everything up, put on her headphones, and headed towards the trail.
Every step she took was more exhausting than the last. Her lungs couldn’t keep up with the momentum of her body. Smoking had clearly done plenty of damage, but it was a reminder of what needed to be repaired.
“There’ll be days like this, my mama said…” The voices of The Shirelles blasted through her headphones. How fitting. Her ankles weakened, but she continued to push through to the halfway point. The trail opened up to expose the miraculous scenery of Idaho Springs Reservoir. She found a secluded spot along the shore where there was a log she could tie Luna to, leaving enough slack to let her wander into the water.
Amelia could try to force herself to hike several more miles to the top of Chicago Lakes, or she could listen to her body and stay put. This was a prime moment for the voices to trickle in. Instead of beating herself up and allowing them to pursue her, she decided to rewrite the narrative.
Amelia sat on a rock facing the water. An exhausted, panting Luna to her left, a ring of mountains and tall, thin trees cradling them both. The clouds created a flawless proportion of sun and shade. Amelia’s heart struggled to keep up even though she was sitting down. Her skin vibrated as she gasped for air. She inhaled as deep as she could, filling up her lungs to the brim, trying to slow her breathing. They’d burst if she inhaled any deeper. She counted to four and exhaled. Out with the old. Every second, every breath, every moment gone to be replenished with the new.
Luna, twisted in her leash, was covered in mud, dirt, and fallen brush. She smiled at Amelia with her mouth wide open and tongue bouncing to match her panting breath. Her own rhythm to her own song just like Mother Nature, this one a tune that only she and Amelia were able to hear.
The wind blew across Amelia’s face as a fly gently landed on her arm. Its movements were quick and staggered. She looked back over at Luna—circling herself one, two, three times until she finally sprawled her long body, belly down, allowing herself a moment to rest with her mother.
A bird chirped from a tree above her, calling out for something, or maybe someone. A plane soared faintly overhead.
God was there in those mountains. He was the maker, the master, the painter, the sculptor. She could feel Him wrapping His arms around her, letting Amelia know that she wasn’t alone, that she belonged—belonged to no one, to everyone, to nowhere, to everywhere. She belonged to Him and wi
th Him. She was not alone, no matter how hard she’d tried to push Him away.
A moment of clarity engulfed Amelia, one that didn’t tease her or trick her into believing it was only temporary. This could be her future: a life without worrying about the constant need to appease others, without letting others hold onto the reins of her life.
A bottle of pills could’ve ended everything…
And now here she was, sitting with God and a few strangers on a reservoir hidden in the mountains. Amelia was certain she could have the future she always wanted.
How she got here baffled her. All of the ups and downs and nights filled with drunken tears, sadness, and heartache. Alcohol had become her crutch towards self-destruction. She’d reached her breaking point two nights ago, the line she never wanted to cross. Amelia had to get clear about what that future was going to look like in order to ensure she never wound up at that dark place again.
A gray cloud slowly crept in. That was a common thing in the Rocky Mountains. A shift in the air pressure could bring on a storm within twenty minutes. Just like the hailstorm earlier. Once again, there was no way to ever predict Colorado weather.
Don’t forget to look up.
Amelia laughed with herself as she thought about the old man in San Bernardino alle Ossa in Milan, Italy. A man who she hadn’t thought of until just now when she shot her gaze towards the sky. She recalled the story he had told them in the famous church of bones.
The cold November air made the world around her feel somber. Thousands of Italian men and women filled the busy streets of Milan. It felt like being in New York City with big screen billboards lighting up the sea of skyscrapers. Musicians and street performers shared their crafts outside of the plaza, busking for tips. Men and women sold street food from along every corner of the hustling city.
Amelia was completely out of her element. The fast-paced city of models, fashion designers, and more tourists than she felt comfortable being around caused her to sink lower into herself. It ignited a strong desire to hide beneath more layers of sweaters and scarves, to cover every inch of her skin.
Dominic’s need to keep moving had brought them to the hundredth church they’d visited since they began their travels three months prior. They walked the metropolis to Santuario di San Bernardino alle Ossa, a small chapel near the city center. It was no ordinary chapel. It was an ossuary, a resting place that held the skeletal remains of the dead.
Amelia and Dominic walked through the front doors and into an empty church. An altar stood directly in the center. Signs in Italian and English requested a small donation for entry. They dropped a few euros into the donation box and followed the velvet ropes that lead them into the room of bones.
Amelia looked around the chapel, her head taking in the walls that were decorated from floor to ceiling with hundreds—thousands—of human skulls. Bones filled the gaps in between. Ribs and femurs were stacked upon each other and tucked with precision behind wire mesh, forming the patterns and crosses that covered the entirety of the room. She was awestruck. The bones looked smaller than she had imagined. She’d thought the human skeleton was something much larger.
A tour group of teenagers walked into the chapel. They were led by an older gentleman with untamed gray hair who looked to be in his mid-sixties. Amelia heard the man speaking in English just outside of the front door. She couldn’t help eavesdropping.
“Now, before we enter the chapel, I want you all to get in line. Close your eyes and put your hands on the shoulders of the person in front of you as I begin to tell you the tale behind the bones.”
The man ushered a line of blind teenagers through the fifteen-foot-tall entryway.
“The official story is that in 1210, a nearby cemetery ran out of space to hold the remains of those who died and so they built this house of bones. But there is another story…..”
The group circled up around him.
“Now, open your eyes.”
The teenagers slowly opened their eyes, almost afraid to see their surroundings. One by one, their jaws dropped as they looked at the chamber of bones that encompassed them.
“Now, what do you notice about these skulls?” Amelia wanted to know what the man meant. She looked around but couldn’t spot a difference, not that she regularly studied human skulls.
“Do they seem smaller to you?” Exactly what Amelia had just been pondering! The heads stared with their empty eye sockets.
“According to an old tale, these were the skulls and bones of children—orphans that had nowhere to be buried because they didn’t have a family name to give them a proper burial place. So instead, they saved the remains here in this ossuary. Again, this is just one of many fables out there, but it is a possibility nonetheless.”
He continued on with his tall tale, almost as if he were telling a ghost story to frighten the children. Amelia wasn’t entirely convinced it was true, but the way he spoke was captivating.
Dominic walked into the pew and sat next to Amelia. They were silent, soaking up the indoor cemetery. After several minutes, the tour group began to file out one by one to wait while the others finished taking photos of the remains. As the last teenager left the building, the older gentleman came up next to Amelia and whispered something in her ear.
“Don’t forget to look up.” He pointed towards the ceiling and Amelia’s head slowly followed. Just like the teenagers, her jaw dropped as if it were about to detach and fall from her face.
Above the darkened cemetery was one of the most beautiful murals she’d ever seen. With an almost three-dimensional affect, a massive painting lined the high-vaulted dome. Sun rays beamed through the clouds and cherubs playing harps flew across the mural. In all of the pain, suffering, and darkness there was beauty still overlooking the dead. Angels were watching from the sky, reminding mourned and mourner alike that there is more, there is light in the dark, there is hope. Death will level us all, but not always today. Amelia didn’t want to waste another minute.
Amelia came back down to Earth as a drop of water hit her forehead directly between her eyebrows. She opened her eyes and saw that the gray clouds had become significantly denser. With the storm approaching fast, she packed up her belongings, untangled Luna, and proceeded back towards the three-mile trail of switchbacks and steep declines towards the car. As she started walking towards the trail, her brow furrowed. There was still one more thing left to do.
She returned to the water’s edge. Amelia closed her eyes, inhaled deeply, and began to talk to Dominic, knowing he would never hear the words she was about to say out loud. But the words weren’t meant for him. They were meant for Amelia.
“It’s the first time I’ve been tucked away in the mountains alone since you left. Before it was always you and I. Dominic and Amelia. I think I was just afraid to do anything without you. You made me feel like I needed you, like my existence depended on yours. Everything with us felt like so much work and I am so damn tired of working for something that no longer exists.
“Once I got here, once I made the fifty-three-mile drive through the empty dirt roads winding through the mountain side with no one except Luna, I realized that I did this entire thing called ‘life’ once before—and not because of you, but because I loved it. I loved life once before you, and I can most certainly love it after you. I can do this alone, I can lead my life and be strong, innovative, smart, fearless, and brave. I can have a life filled with love, and I can have that without you. Goodbye, Dom. Thank you for leaving. Thank you for teaching me what it means to save myself.”
She looked down at Luna.
“Ready?” Luna’s excited paws pounced in place as she looked up at her mother. “Ya, me too, Luna.” The two girls turned back around towards the trail and headed home. It was time for Amelia to plan for a future she never thought she’d have. The future she deserved.
Epilogue
“Meditation with intention is one of the greatest things you can do for yourself.” Miranda’s words resonated in her
head. “It’s one thing to think about your future, but it’s another to visualize it. Use all of your senses. Close your eyes and think about what you want your future to look like, smell like, taste like. What does the view expose when you remove the boulders and finally overcome your challenges?”
Amelia’s mind wandered at a pace she could barely keep up with. The panic rose towards the surface of her skin, tickling with goosebumps up and down the length of her arms. Her thoughts were racing as if they held their foot on the gas, taking her from zero to a hundred in a matter of seconds. The future held more possibilities than ever.
Her future was on a ranch, a wall of mountains surrounding her while children and dogs played in raked up piles of autumn leaves. Amelia started looking up the cost of land further west and how much weight her compact SUV could tow so she could live out of a trailer.
Her future was working at a hostel in Cape Town. She typed “how to bring a dog to South Africa” into the search engine. Her future was in New York, in a city that constantly buzzed from millions of people running to and from their jobs, pursuing their dreams of becoming actors on Broadway or stockbrokers on Wall Street while she worked at a bar in Greenwich Village. Amelia shifted gears and started researching how much she needed to save in order to live in New York City. Her future was in Florida with her mom while they flipped houses together like the dynamic duo they were always meant to be. She scrolled through her phone to text someone who could teach her carpentry.
Amelia paced around the apartment along her usual path. Down the hall outside of her bedroom, through the dining room towards the doors of the balcony, and back up again. Her body shook with a constant humming that matched the ambiance filling the room.
I was doing so good. What happened? Why can’t I slow down?
She wanted to run away. She wanted to make the thoughts in her head stop rushing into each other like a car crash you can’t stop watching. The familiar thoughts of packing a bag and driving away were becoming too powerful. She was manic and could see herself falling right back into the vicious cycle, the hamster wheel of chaos.