by Liz Kessler
“What happened next?”
“I was so upset, my parents cut the vacation short. It put them off the place for good.”
“So you never came back?”
“Never. At least, not till last year, when you saw me.”
“Last year? You mean yesterday?” I say without thinking.
“Takes a bit of getting used to, doesn’t it?” she says quietly.
“So why did you come back at all?”
She doesn’t answer.
“Was it to look for him?” I ask.
“You’ll think I’m an old fool. As crazy as my poor parents thought I was back then.”
“I won’t. I promise.”
“Do you know something, Jenni? You are the first person I’ve told any of this to in my entire life. Do you realize that?”
I try to imagine keeping something like that a secret for my whole life. It would be like always wearing a mask over your face, which everyone believed was the real you. You would be the only person who knew it wasn’t — and who knew that you could never take it off.
“I’m sorry,” I say eventually. I don’t know what else to say.
“We had this thing,” she says, staring out of the window again. “Used to joke about it. ‘We’ll come here when we’re fifty,’ he’d say. ‘We’ll buy this place and run it together.’ ‘We’ll be married then,’ I’d reply, and he’d laugh at me. I never forgot, though. All my life. I mean — yes, of course I moved on. He wasn’t my only love. But he was the first — and the deepest — and my heart never gave up the corner it had reserved for him all those years ago. So I did.”
“You did what?”
“I came back when I was fifty! There, now. Stupid old fool, like I said. As if he’d be here. As if he’d remember.” She shakes her head and laughs. “Can you imagine that? Bought a share in a condo and everything. Couldn’t get rid of the darned thing till now.”
“Get rid of it?”
“What use is a place like this to someone like me? No, I’ve sold it. At a loss, of course, but it’s nothing compared to the losses I’ve had. I’ll be gone after this week. Won’t come here again. Nothing here for me now, is there? Not that there ever was. I know that now.” She looks away and seems to be looking far into the distance. “Do you know what I did last night?” she asks with a wry smile.
“What did you do?”
“Wrote him a letter. Silly mumbo jumbo my daughter tells me to do when people upset me. She says write it in a letter, then address it to them, but don’t send it. She figures it gets rid of the feelings at least.”
She points to a writing pad at the other end of the table. “So I wrote a letter. My daughter says then I have to destroy it, so I will later. I’ll go down to the weir and throw the silly thing in. Get him out of my head once and for all, and that’ll be that. Over and out.”
“You never forgot him,” I say quietly.
She shakes her head. “Bobby was the one, Jenni. Was for me, at any rate, even if the feeling wasn’t mutual. The one that shone through the others. Sounds like something out of a cheesy movie, doesn’t it?”
“So, you never fell in love again?”
“Oh, yes. I got married. Divorced too. Because it wasn’t a movie. It was real life, and the girl doesn’t always get her boy in the real world. I moved on, lived my life. But there’s always been a sense of — I don’t know, unfinished business, I suppose you’d call it. Knowing that everything could have turned out so differently — and wishing more than anything that I could have that year again and turn it into the life I really wanted.”
“The one where you married Bobby?”
She smiles. “I used to write it all over my homework books: Irene Barraclough. I thought it sounded quite nice.”
“Barraclough?”
“Bobby Barraclough. That was his name.”
My insides turn cold. “But there’s a Mr. Barraclough who works here. He did, anyway, two days ago — or rather, two years ago.”
“Mr. Barraclough.” Her face has turned white. “Bobby Barraclough?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never known his first name. I think he’s left now. He said it was going to be his last year. Said he was staying for his fiftieth birthday and then that was it. He’d be off.” As I say the words, the cold feeling seeps and snaps its way through my body. His fiftieth birthday — was that why he was leaving? Did it have anything to do with Mrs. Smith?
Mrs. Smith is staring at me, the color drained from her cheeks. “Oh, my goodness,” she says. “Oh, my goodness.”
“What? What is it?”
“His fiftieth. His fiftieth. I’ve been such a fool, even more of a fool than I’d thought. I had my whole life to prepare, and I got it wrong.”
“Got what wrong?”
“He was a year older than me! I came a year too late!” She gets up and paces the floor. “It was his last year, you say?”
“I think so.”
“And what was he going to do after that?”
“I — I can’t remember. I think he said he was going traveling.”
“With his family? Was he married?”
I try to remember what I know about him. I’ve only ever seen him on his own. But then you don’t take your wife to work with you, do you? “I don’t think so. I don’t know,” I say eventually. “I’m sorry.”
She stops pacing. “No. I’m sorry.” She tries to smile. “Look at me. Just can’t let go, can I? It’s over. The silly dream of a silly girl. A silly old woman. There’s no going back. It’s done now. He’s gone. He’s moved on, and it’s time I did the same.”
“But maybe he hasn’t moved on!” I burst out. “Maybe that’s why he was leaving. Maybe that’s why he stayed till then — for you!”
She looks at me, a glint of hope in her eyes. Then she shakes her head. “No — I’m not going to get my hopes up over nothing. He’s gone now, anyway, even if it was as you said — which I very much doubt.”
“Come back with me and find out!” I burst out. “The elevator — it’s working again!”
“The elevator? So I was right — that’s how it happened to you, too?”
I nod. And then I remember something else. “It was the day after he was there.”
“Who was there?”
“Mr. Barraclough — he was trying to fix the elevator! Maybe that was why! Maybe he was fixing it for you!” I try to remember what he said to me at the time, but I can’t. All I can remember is that he didn’t make any sense. But maybe he did! Maybe this was exactly what he was talking about.
Mrs. Smith runs a hand through her hair. Then she shakes her head. “No. I can’t do it,” she says.
“Why not?”
“Jenni, your theory is full of ifs. Far too many to hope that all of them would go my way. There’s no going back. I’ve lived all these years with that as a permanent refrain in the background of my life. You cannot go back. You have to go forward.”
“But what if you —?”
She stops me with her hand. “No, I can’t do it. Maybe last year, I would have. Even a couple of days ago, perhaps I might have said yes. I might have dared face another humiliating rejection. But not now. Now I realize why I came here again.”
“Why’s that?”
“To let go. To move on. I’ve made my peace with all of this, and I’m not going to risk shattering that now. I can’t, Jenni. Not at my age.”
“But maybe he —”
“No, I can’t do it. I won’t. My whole life has been about moving forward. I can’t go back. And, anyway, I don’t believe he’ll have given me a moment’s thought in the last thirty-some years. Now that I’m here, I can see that even more clearly. He’s gone. It’s too late. He was just getting his last tasks done before he left this place behind for good — and that is exactly what I’m going to do.”
“So what happens now?”
“What happens now is that I pack up, I go home, and I get on with my life. It’s about time.”
&
nbsp; “Will you be OK?”
She picks up the juice glasses and takes them to the sink. Running the faucet, she talks to the window. “I’ll be fine,” she says. “I’ve been all right up to now, haven’t I? I’ll survive.”
As she’s talking, my eyes fall on the writing pad. What did she say to him? What’s it like to be fifty and in love? I didn’t know it was possible!
“Can I see it?” I ask nervously. Did I really ask that? Jenni Green doesn’t ask things like that! But then I realize — perhaps Jenni Green isn’t the same person she used to be. And I don’t just mean a haircut and tighter clothes. I mean something more than that — something inside.
Mrs. Smith turns around. “See what?”
“The letter,” I say, nervously. And then I have a thought. Or half a thought. I don’t even know exactly what the thought is, never mind whether or not I could pull it off. I just know that I have to try to do something. I can’t shake the feeling that Mr. Barraclough still loves her the way she loves him. I can’t persuade her to take the risk and try to find out. But perhaps there’s a way I can find out. And if I knew what the letter said, maybe somehow that could help. “Can I read it?” I add. “To help me understand what you’ve been through?”
She dries her hands on a towel and comes back to the table. “Do you know what?” she says, smiling genuinely for the first time since we’ve been talking. “I’ve got an even better idea.”
Then she picks up the pad, tears off the first three sheets, and hands them to me. “Have it,” she says.
I look at the pages of flowery writing in my hand. “Why?”
“I promised myself I’d write the letter and then dispose of it. I didn’t specify how. This way, I get rid of the letter — and you have a permanent reminder.”
“Of what?” I ask.
“Of what happens if you just accept what happens to you and don’t try hard enough to change it. It’s too late for me — and maybe it always was. But I don’t want you to have a life like mine. Try harder than I did — while you still can!”
I carefully fold her letter in half and put it in my pocket. “Thank you.”
Mrs. Smith smiles and wipes her hands on her dress. “There we are now,” she says. “It’s done. So really I should be thanking you.”
“I should get back,” I say as I stand up. Talking to Mrs. Smith has given me some answers, but I need more. I still need to know how things are going to work out for Autumn’s family — and for mine.
She holds out her hands to me as I get to my feet. “Good luck, Jenni. I hope your life turns out differently from mine.”
“Thank you,” I say as she pulls me toward her and hugs me tight.
“Don’t just accept the life you’re given,” she says at the door. “Question everything. Always attempt the impossible. Be brave. Will you do that, for me, Jenni?”
“I will,” I say. “I wish I could do more than that for you.”
She reaches out and briefly takes my hand. “I’m OK, Jenni. I’ll be fine.”
I nod. I try to smile, and then I turn and head for the stairs.
“There you are!”
I’m just coming out the front of Autumn’s building as Mom runs over to me. I took the stairs because I want to stay here, two years ahead. I have to know what’s going to happen.
“Come on,” Mom says.
“Come on what?”
“We’re leaving. I’ve been looking for you.”
“Where are we going?”
Mom sighs. “The dairy farm, Jenni. Craig’s in the condo with Thea. I said I’d only be two minutes. Let’s get going.” She smiles. “I can’t wait to see Thea’s face when she sees all that ice cream!”
We’re outside the first-floor condo that was Autumn’s last year. Is she still there? What’s changed? I’m desperate to find out. And I’m desperate to read Mrs. Smith’s letter, too. It feels as if it’s burning a hole in my pocket, but I can’t read it with Mom and Craig around.
“Do I have to go?” I ask.
Mom’s face falls completely flat. “I thought you liked doing these things. And I thought you liked being with me.”
“I do. Of course I do. It’s just I really need to see Autumn.”
Mom sighs again. “Oh, Jenni. Can’t you leave Autumn to her own devices for one morning? I know it’s awful of me to say but . . .”
“But what?”
“Well, I know how much she relies on you — but just this once, can’t you let them get on with things and spend some time with us? Especially with Autumn being so unpredictable at the moment. You’ve said it’s been hard lately.”
“I have?”
“Well, not in so many words. But I can see that’s how you feel. You never come home from her house smiling like you used to.” Mom’s face colors instantly. “I mean — not that I’d expect you to. I’m sorry. I just sometimes wish we could have a bit of the old Jenni back.”
You and me both, Mom!
“She’s my best friend,” I say.
“I know. Just — well, sometimes it seems like you’re acting out of some kind of . . .” Her voice trails away.
“Some kind of what?”
“Oh, I don’t know. It’s not for me to say. I’ve been bad enough myself. I’m only just starting to get my own act together, you know, now that your dad and I —” She breaks off and walks away, heading back toward our block. “Come on, let’s get going,” she says.
I catch up to her. “No, tell me,” I say.
Mom stops and turns to me. “OK, I’ll say it. Guilt. Like you can never do enough for her, always trying to fix things, make her life better. I mean, I understand — of course I do — but sometimes I can’t help wondering if it’s holding you back from moving on with your own life. It’s as though you won’t let yourself be happy again until Autumn is.” Mom reaches for my hand. “And I don’t know if that’s going to happen for a long time,” she adds softly.
I don’t know what to say. All I can think is — so nothing’s changed.
“Come on. Let’s go,” Mom says, still holding my hand as we head back to the condo. I walk along numbly beside her. I’ll have to leave Autumn and my letter till later. It seems Mom needs me as much as Autumn does this time.
“Is Dad coming?” I ask as we approach our condo.
Mom stops in her tracks. “Jenni, that’s not funny,” she says, staring at me.
I stare back at her. “What?”
“Of course your dad’s not coming.”
“Why not?” I ask. In the silence before she replies, I realize I’m holding my breath.
“Oh, Jenni. Please don’t start this again.”
“Start what again?”
“We’ve been through it so many times. This is my week with you and Craig.”
My stomach turns cold. “Your week? You . . . you’ve split up?” I say numbly.
Mom stops on the doorstep, looking into my eyes. “I thought you were all right with this,” she says, more gently. “We agreed it was for the best. It’s better for you and Craig in the long run, don’t you think?”
“What’s best?”
“It’s not good for you to be in such a tense atmosphere.”
“Tense atmosphere? There’s never a tense atmosphere at home — you and Dad get along great!”
“Jenni, that’s kind of you to say — especially since I know a lot of it was my fault. But you don’t need to pretend. We all know what it’s been like.”
“What what’s been like?” I ask. What’s happened to my family?
Mom just shakes her head. “Jenni, where have you been for the past two years?”
“I . . .” Yeah. Good question, Mom.
“We’ve both tried our best, but since, well, you know, since Mikey —”
A sword slices into my chest, and I catch my breath.
“It just hasn’t been the same,” Mom goes on, oblivious. Since Mikey what? Is he still alive? What’s happened to him? I can’t ask outright. Mom will se
riously worry about me then. She’s still talking.
“We’ve both changed, and it’s good that we’ve acknowledged that. Things just aren’t right between us anymore. We all know it. This is for the best, Jenni.” She takes my hand. “And I’ve been coping better, with Thea and everything, now that we don’t have all the drama. You’ve said so yourself.” She tries to smile. “And we’re happier,” she says. I don’t know if she’s convincing herself, but looking at her eyes, she’s certainly not convincing me. “At least, we will be,” she adds, maybe reading my mind. “It’ll take time. But you’ll get used to it. We all will.”
She turns back to the condo. “Come on. Let’s get going. It’ll be OK,” she adds with half a smile.
Craig slides into the car beside me. He looks so different! He’s wearing jeans and a lime-green T-shirt. His hair has been chopped into a crew cut. Trendy little eight-year-old. I can’t help smiling. He sticks his tongue out at me as he pulls the door closed.
Thea sits in the little baby seat that I remember using for Craig. She shakes her legs and points out of the window, shouting, “Baa, baa!” every time we pass a sheep, and “Eee orr” when we pass a field of horses. Her innocent delight briefly takes my mind off everything else, and for a few moments in the car, I relax and smile, allowing myself to get lost in her world.
But then we get to the dairy farm, and while we walk around, I can’t concentrate on anything. I just want to get back and see Autumn. I can’t bear not knowing what’s going on with her.
Mom, Craig, and Thea sample virtually every ice-cream flavor between them. Craig has at least three helpings of raspberry, and Mom goes back for seconds of the lavender, the honeycomb, and the chocolate orange and Cointreau. Thea covers every bit of her face and clothing in brightly colored goo, much to everyone’s delight.
I get a vanilla ice cream, just so Mom doesn’t hassle me and worry if I’m OK. But I can’t eat it. My insides are too churned up and my throat feels too thick, so I just take the occasional lick and knock bits of it into the trash can when no one’s looking.
I can’t stop worrying about what’s going to happen when we get back. I can’t stop thinking about Autumn and wanting to know what’s happened to her and her family. Wishing and hoping and praying that, despite what Mom was saying earlier, things have changed for them. That Mikey’s gotten better, that Autumn’s OK, that her parents’ lives are back on track. Maybe Mom was exaggerating before. Maybe she was wrong. I have to find out. Not only has all that happened, but now it turns out my parents have split up, too! This future world is getting worse and worse. The only good thing about it is Thea. There has to be something else good in this reality. There has to be.
