She looked at me with furrowed eyebrows and pursed lips, like when she looked at her misbehaving grandchildren. I looked to my own kids corralling their own kids. The eldest grandchild was only ten, but she looked like she was a hundred with that mopey face she wore, her nose buried in a book. I envied her escape. The other kids were playing tag in the grass, trying not to think about their sad parents. They couldn’t be sad. I didn’t blame them. They barely knew Jerry. Christmas cards and the occasional phone call just weren’t enough to connect. He was only an idea to them.
They will act like this at my funeral. Whenever that would be. Maybe not running around, but just as distant and detached. Distracted. My own kids looked miserable. I could almost see the heat radiate from their aching joints, a consequence of a rushed economy flight across the sea.
This was an inconvenience. Their childhood home was no longer available for them to use as a place to land either. I would have been frustrated too. But wasn’t death always inconvenient? The wind blew my hair into my face, and I batted it away.
It took me a few moments to realize Erin was still in front of me nodding. What else was there to say?
I stared at Erin’s wrinkled hands. I wanted those hands. I wanted the years of something other than my hometown blemishes on my skin. She had scars, her veins were rivers, the wrinkles were maps to the places and the things she’d done. My hands were wrinkled and pale, but not nearly as haggard and beautiful.
When things finally died down and the last of the goodbyes were said, I began organizing the tulips in the backseat of our car. My car, exclusively, now, I suppose. It felt rather odd to have shared your life with someone for forty years and then suddenly revert from the “we” to “I.”
But we try. I try.
“Mom, are you serious about this?”
“Good grief, Auggie.” I said it with a smile, but he still looked at me with a flat face. He wasn’t himself. He was puffier than I remembered, like a statue in a wax museum. He had a vague piece of my son to him, but he was different now.
“I just don’t know why you guys couldn’t have stayed here.”
“We retired,” I sighed. “And we wanted a project. Neither of us wanted to sit in front of the telly and get soft. We thought this was a good project. It is a good project. You should really see it.”
“I know, I know, a beautiful cottage right on the sea with a cute little path and a big yard.”
“What’s not to love?”
“I don’t know,” he snapped. “The shag carpet, yellow wallpaper, and cracked floors?”
“We were going to fix it together,” I said.
“And now you’re alone, so find a place here, with your friends.” Auggie stole a glance at his sister, June. “She is worried about you, we all are, but we won’t be here to take care of you.”
“That has never been an issue.”
He looked like he was going to say something. His lips pursed and jaw tightened. He looked so much like my Jerry, but he relaxed when June Bug joined us.
“Hey Mom.” She glanced at Auggie, who shook his head imperceptibly, at least he thought so. I raised my brows at the two.
“What?” June started. “We are just worried. Do you even know the first thing about flipping a house?”
I threw up my hands. “The bones are fine. That’s what your dad said! The foundation and walls are fine. I can’t do any damage other than cosmetic! And trust me, anything I do will be an improvement.”
“Fine, fine. I just—I don’t know! You’re edging closer to seventy than sixty and—”
“You’re worried about me?” I couldn’t help but grin. “What? That I may fall and break my legs? The same two legs that carried me across not one but two marathons last year?”
June held up her hands in defense. “All right, all right, I just had to—you know, be the concerned daughter.” There was an awkward silence before she added with a sly smile, “You guys would have killed each other working on this.”
Auggie smiled a real smile, not even a hint of guilt for doing it at a funeral.
“Yeah, we would have.” I laughed, and that might have been the last time I laughed. “But he had agreed to let me do what I wanted to the house so long as he got to do whatever he wanted to the workshop.”
“Ma, why’d you have to sell the house?” Auggie finally asked.
“Because we wanted this new one.”
“It was paid off!”
“So is this one.” I smiled calmly, and I saw them shift, not wanting to rock the boat. I didn’t have the heart to tell them the boat crashed along the rocks, and I was hanging onto splinters. And this old house.
The birds scattered, and the kids wrestling paused to watch their wings stretch.
“Look,” Auggie said. “We just want you to, you know, not be alone during this time.”
I thought about scaring him, taking it as an invitation to join him in Germany, but he sensed this opening and quickly followed up with, “You have friends here, a life.”
“A life with your dad. I want to finish the new life we planned. Just relax, okay?”
He sighed, and June nodded. We hugged and kissed and said goodbye. I squeezed them fiercely. It had been—what? Four years since they made it back to the states. I doubted I’d see them for another four. Their spouses would collect the kids, and they’d head off to the airport together, one to Germany, serving in the army, and one to France, also for work.
“It’ll be okay,” I reassured them from the rearview mirror as I lost them around the bend. I knew this was more for me than anyone else though. I couldn’t help but glance down at my hand to see if any scars or rivers appeared.
I finally saw the house after weaving between the potholes of the long driveway. The storage container with all of our things was nestled against the house. We had planned on living minimally while we replaced the floor. “No sense moving everything twice,” Jerry had said, and I couldn’t have agreed more. Except I was pulling out a sleeping bag and air mattress from my trunk, and I couldn’t help but think of the comfortable mattress buried in the container among our other junk.
The house was a glorified shack with weathered and splintering walls, the wrap-around porch bending in some places. But still, the house stood tall, even among the taller trees. The ocean’s roar greeted my ears. The salt filled my lungs. I smiled despite the chill seeping into my bones, turning my joints to ice.
Entering the house did nothing to suppress the wind. The carpet sank under my feet, and I swore plumes of dust rose with each step, swirling with the breeze that managed to seep through the walls. The house was empty save for an old refrigerator, clawfoot bathtub, a dated chandelier, and an old wingback chair positioned in the center of the open living room.
Dust floated down from the ceiling and settled among the grime on the floor. I eyed the chandelier. “We’re home, Jer bear.”
He’d fallen in love with that ugly light fixture, and now that he was gone, I should have had no qualms about changing it, but I found I rather liked the crooked and ugly piece above the living room now.
I found the master room, well, the biggest room. The portable fan on the queen-sized mattress hummed and shook more dust loose. As I inflated the mattress, I did a rapid and surface-level clean and felt better about everything, like I was wiping the grime from today away too.
The sun was still high in the sky, only obscured by the clouds. I spent the rest of the afternoon unpacking the flowers and my suitcase. I couldn’t help but stare out the windows each time I passed one, each angle from the house a new view to treasure. A wooded area on one side, a straight line to the coast on the other. It was a dream. The constant crashing of waves was a metronome I worked to. The waves were like a drum that beat my bones and shook my core. I looked at my hands again, still pale and wrinkled.
I pulled back my hair and tied it in a low bun and set my sights on the bathroom. I unloaded the supplies I had thought to bring with me from when we first dr
opped off the pod, what, three weeks ago? Was it only three weeks since we bought this place, packed up our old house, and moved things? Then the death, funeral, memorial, and now this?
I scrubbed the yellowing vanity and toilet. I was still in my funeral uniform, but I didn’t care about the bleach straining my black dress. I even got on my hands and knees to scrub around that clawfoot tub. A little ember of excitement ignited in me when I imagined the long bubble baths I’d enjoy here, the ocean view just out the window, framed by towering trees.
I thought it was a good idea, back when I had ideas.
I had to take a walk outside, around on the porch. I breathed in the clean air and let the salt wash the bleach from my sinuses. I forgot to eat dinner. Instead, I found myself nestled in my makeshift bed with a sleeping bag and flat pillow and couldn’t be bothered to get up. I stared out the window at the graying sky, still wearing that damned funeral dress. I told myself I’d cut it into rags. I fell asleep before I could catch the shadows slipping inside the walls.
At least that’s how I remembered it all starting.
THE GHOST
She didn’t hear me settle into the corners of the room and melt into the walls. She slept fitfully. She tossed and turned in rhythm with the waves. But she woke and convinced herself she slept well. Good for her. She had been telling herself that each morning she woke here. I didn’t know how long it had been. I didn’t deal with time.
I followed close behind as she trotted down the creaking stairs. She said hello to the chandelier, like she did every morning, and made herself a pot of coffee. The kitchen looked more like a kitchen since her recent trip to the grocery store. She forgot coffee again, so she was stuck reusing the old grounds. This was what—day three of that?
She murmured to herself, “807 Friends Way, Rockaway City,” forcing a smile on her face each time she repeated it. She hadn’t had to memorize an address for thirty-eight years, and the new incantation messed with her mind. Well, it was one of the several things pulling at the folds of her brain. I was one of them, of course.
She poured more milk than coffee into her mug, and she surveyed the room. The carpet was gone, torn to pieces and in the dumpster out back. It left exposed hardwood flooring in such terrible shape she bumped up “replace flooring” to her next thing on her list.
She stared at the chandelier from her spot in the wingback chair. “Looks good, Jerry.”
“It does,” I said.
She heard me, of course she did. If she looked closely, she could have seen my breath turn the dust around her. But she nodded and closed her eyes while she took a gulp of the warm coffee and pretended not to hear me. The weak coffee ran down her throat. Some dribbled from her lip.
She worked through the morning, cleaning and wiping down the splintering floors. Measuring and re-measuring the living room and kitchen. She swept and mopped again. She imagined she could still smell the tulips, now dried out and crumbling on the kitchen counters.
“Go outside,” I whispered.
She did as I told her and walked into the fresh air, though she didn’t know it was me who commanded her. She liked to think she had her own ideas. Everyone liked to think that.
Her lungs hummed as they emptied of dust and filled with salt. She licked her lips. She walked the trail that led to the beach; I trailed in her footsteps. We reached the clearing between the trees. She sat on the bench that overlooked the waves, among the tall grass and the purple wildflowers.
She was angry, her hands flexed into fists. Her eyes scanned the trail, looking for a rock, stick, anything to throw into the water below. The lookout was the perfect place for launching anger and frustration and fear. And memories. She stared at her hands and stood, walking back the way we’d come.
I missed my chance, but I knew there would be more.
We made our way back down the trail, past the sea, and back to the house. I let her feel my whispers against her neck each step we took back.
“Oh Jerry, what am I doing here?” she asked the chandelier.
Her phone rang, and she searched for it, finding it wedged in that old wingback chair. I think it was green once. It’s was gray now.
“Hello?” she answered.
“Hey Mom,” June said.
“Hey sweetheart, what’s going on? How are the classes going?”
The smile split her face and filled the room with more brightness than the chandelier. I shrank back into the walls.
“Classes are fine. My students are much more motivated when finals are just around the corner. Hey, I was just wondering, why you didn’t call Auggie yesterday? For his birthday? He called me and said he couldn’t get a hold of you.”
The woman glanced at the wall next to the fridge where the calendar was. Where it should have been. At least that’s where she kept it at the old house. She ran her hand through her silver hair, getting her fingers tangled in her bun.
“Oh yeah, I was just going to call him. I lost my phone for a bit there. Your call helped me find it actually.”
“He said he called three times.”
“I couldn’t find my phone. I love you, sweetie, but I’m going to call him now.”
“Wait—before you go, what’s the new address? I want to send you something.” We both heard the smile in her voice.
“Oh, 1411, North Main Street.”
“That’s the old place,” June laughed into the phone. “I need the new place.”
“Right.” The woman chuckled, still trying to get her fingers and ring untangled from her hair. “Old habits. It feels strange to say something new after all these years. It’s—” She glanced at the note taped to the refrigerator. “807 Friends Way, Rockaway.”
“Thanks, tell Auggie I say hi.” And June hung up.
The woman paced across the creaking and splintering wood floors. She stopped at the wall and picked at the wallpaper, peeling back the layers. It was like peeling her own skin, and she stared at her hands again. Still no scars, she thought.
She eventually pulled out her phone and checked her calendar before giving Auggie a call and the same excuse about losing her phone. They chatted about nothing in particular; she peeled the wallpaper the whole time.
She got off the phone—still apologizing to Auggie for misplacing her cellphone, but never once about maybe, potentially, probably forgetting his birthday. She looked at her hands and back at the walls and peeled some more.
I had her right where she needed to be.
THE WOMAN
I started my day like normal. I walked down the creaking and cold stairs, said hello to Jerry, a peculiar habit I’d picked up and refused to quit. I sometimes heard him whisper back. I knew it was all in my head, but part of me thought he lingered here. I listened for him, hoping he’d help me pick out colors and tile and backsplashes like he said he would.
I made some weak coffee in the pot I found at the thrift store. I sipped the weak stuff as I walked around the cold room. The creaking of the floorboards under my toes made me feel like I wasn’t alone.
Things had been so strange these past few months. I knew after a life surrounded by routine and people it would be a change, but nothing prepared me for the strange noises at night. I always woke with a dull headache. It could be the mattress. But things moved. I lost my calendar, and it hung from the refrigerator, like it had always done. Then one day it was gone. I felt like I was being watched. My chocolates were gone. I always had some in my pockets but someone was stealing them. Sometimes I had to fight the urge to sprint as fast as my old bones would let me back into the house after my afternoon walks. My heart thumped in my chest, like someone was chasing me all the time.
I stared at the now clean wall. The stripping of the wallpaper took longer than expected. There were layers upon layers of the stuff. I watched the decades go by in the shape of wallpapers—peachy floral print for the nineties, baby’s breath prints for the eighties, palm tree prints for the sixties.
I ran my fingers over the smooth
and bare walls and asked what color they wanted to be. I splashed some maroon on a wall, added the color of trees on another. An orange somewhere too. I took the color of the sea and threw it on as well. I didn’t care about getting it on the floor; I was going to cover it soon anyway. The sea gray joined the splatters of orange and maroon on the wooden floorboards, the shag carpet long gone. The laminate I would use as flooring sat on the porch, and it bowed under its weight.
I stared at the mosaic of color, eyeing each shade, listening for Jerry’s whisper, a “this one” or “pick that one.” But there was nothing. None of the colors spoke to me. I sank into my chair and watched the dust fall from the chandelier, hoping it would swirl around one of the colors and make the decision for me.
I liked the maroon. I liked the orange. But neither seemed right. It was like one was trying to be the other, so I helped them out. I didn’t have a clean stick, so I used my hands, mixing the red into the orange and the orange into red, and a burnt orange sunset blossomed in my hands. I couldn’t wait. I smeared the color on the wall. My heart swelled. It was a sunset I managed to bring inside.
I could hear Jerry laugh, and I thought I saw the chandelier flicker. A smile from him. I smiled too, and it felt like I could finally breathe. My hands shook, but I scooped up the sun and smeared it on the walls, coating the sea and trees I’d foolishly tried to bring in. I’d have to go over it again with a brush to smooth out the lines, but the idea of spreading the sun and making Jerry smile made me frantic. I wanted him to be happy.
“I am,” he said.
“I just want you to love this house.”
He didn’t say anything, so I scooped up more of the paint and moved to the next wall. I used my fingers to push the paint into the corners. I covered the trim. I could fix that later. In the end, the floor was as orange as the walls.
I sat back on my green velvet chair, sunset color drying on my arms. I loved it. The chandelier flickered again. I knew Jer Bear loved it too.
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