by Beth Harden
“I’ll join you soon,” I say. “I want to spend a little more time here.” Seth, the youngest, turns back concerned.
“It’s going to fog in and you’re not dressed for it. Plus you rode with Dale and your car is back at the house. C’mon, kid,” he pleads teasingly.
“Listen, I’ll wait at the wharf and then give her a lift home,” offers Aaron. “Go on ahead and I’ll swing her home when she’s ready. “
“That works,” I say, relieved. My baby brother shrugs and joins his siblings as they heard back up the slope in a pack.
“Can you hold on to this for me? Just put in your truck. Don’t look inside, though. It’s a surprise for later.”
“Sure. Take your time,” says Aaron. “I’ve got some phone calls to make so no hurry. I think the fresh air will do you some good.” Aaron turns on his heels and follows slowly behind the gang. Not once does he turn back to see if I’m okay. But then why should he? It’s wasn’t his duty to rescue me back then and it isn’t his job now. I’m on my own. I knew it was only a matter of time before I broke down and cried, but what triggers it finally is the realization that I never saw my mother weep in front of me. She had somehow stymied up the ductwork to her emotions and was able to face the biggest of life’s trials with calculated and dry-eyed detachment. I am terrified that I am going to end up the same way.
I choose to take the route around the bold front of the Point slipping over fatally slick seaweed until I can ascend up over the giant boulders that nest in the shallows. It’s death-by-dashed brains if one slips up. The cormorants dip and dive as fishing boats lumber noisily in the rough tide setting traps and snagging lines. At one spot, the ocean has eroded the cliff and pushes a full head of breakers under the overhanging trees. I am forced to climb a long flight of wooden stairs that lead up from a private dock in order to bypass the interruption and complete the journey around to the boat house. When I reach the wharf, I’ve pretty much exhausted my well of sorrow. I spy Aaron out on the float sprawled on the hull of one of the overturned rowboats. He waves as I walk out onto the pier, then springs up to meet me at the halfway point where the movable walkway can change angles from perpendicular to near parallel depending on the depth of the tide. Today it is a sloping forty-five degree hop, skip and a jump. When he comes closer and sees the crumpled expression and smeared eyeliner, Aaron instinctively pulls a tissue from his pants pocket. He dabs gently at the residue of dried tears and salt spray stuck to my face, a gesture so familiar it starts full-blown sobs all over again.
“Come here, Lissa,” he says, pulling me against him. I let the shudders roll through my body. Aaron holds me and willingly absorbs each one of them. We stand pinned together like two consecutive pages in a torrid romance novel. My damp hair tangles around his wrist. The wear-and-tear of this world is gone from his face as the evening comes on and he is transformed into that boy in the faded blue Colby sweatshirt underneath the stadium bleachers where we crept to consummate our love at second sight.
“I’m ready to get better,” I state finally. My voice is hoarse from crying.
“Oh, sweetie. It takes time, possibly even years before you get by a loss this big,” he says reassuringly.
“No, this is not about my mother. I’m talking about me. I mean the mess of my life.”
“You are miles and miles better,” he replies, squeezing me with encouragement and admiration.
“In body, yes. But now it’s time to heal the soul too,” I whisper. Aaron takes a step back and holds me at arm’s length so that there is no mistaking the expression on his face or the import to his pledge.
“I will do anything I can to help you accomplish that. You know that. Whatever you need, Lissa.”
“It’s taken a long, long time but I’m almost there,” I say.
“That’s wonderful to hear. It’s all I want for you.”
“I wish we could have that one night over again. The one that was taken from us,” I say in a weepy mew. Aaron doesn’t hesitate. All the logical reasons that overrule love are dismissed before they can object. We don’t mention his wife. We don’t talk about my history. We don’t speak beyond a humming chant of our names meshed and married in a sing-song of regret. Instead we hug each other with passionate regret for all the promises and pledges and plans we were never allowed to make or keep that night so long ago.
“C’mon. You’re getting chilled. Let’s go sit in the truck,” he says. We walk back up the small incline. It’s cold enough on these summer evenings in Maine to warrant a quick run of the heater. A plume of sea smoke is creeping around the backside of BealeIsland. The horizon is cut off from view.
“Are you a happy man?” I ask eventually.
“Yes, I am. Now more than ever,” Aaron replies.
“I want you to know you were never the cause for my restlessness,” I say cautiously.
“I obviously wasn’t a good enough reason for you to stay here. In Maine. I blamed myself, Lissa. For not being there to protect you in the first place and then for falling short in understanding what you needed.”
“But you shouldn’t have, Aaron. It was my choice. You never deserted me,” I insist.
“It’s hard to imagine that spending your days with criminals and your nights alone was preferable over being a wife and mother. I’ve always respected your intelligence but I had to question your judgment,” Aaron replies.
How can I explain it to him, how I was stunned at the moment of impact when trauma struck? Stopped dead in my developmental tracks much like an alcoholic who floods his brain with pickling solution at a young age and never progresses beyond the immature coping skills he has saddled himself with. I learned how to attract boys and men with the flitting beauty of physical youth way before the substance that forms a woman had time to root and grow. I was struck down, held back, left with the inconsistencies of a brash teenager and the paralyzing fear of a little girl taunted within inches of her own life. I never really had a chance in the grown-up department. Since I couldn’t fix myself, I helped others. Isn’t that what martyrs do? Powerful men like Malcolm X who knew in his heart it was better to forfeit life as a mortal person in favor of a greater principle. He was a prophet that transformed from a street hustler to the black shining prince of his people, someone who unwittingly but willingly became a god-like inspiration to so many misguided men. We have more in common than I ever imagined. Me, the ‘blue-eyed devil’ and my fiery Islamic brother were partners in walking the fine line between violence and justice. He ultimately reached his iconic status; my transcendent climb is only partway complete.
“It’s hard to explain,” I say.
“It’s even tougher to grasp,” Aaron replies with a shrug. His lack of resolution is understandable, but I know for certain that I did the right thing. I had protected him from my dangerous instability. He wasn’t safe with me. I wonder now if that first longing look cast across the front seat of that old Plymouth Fury was truly love or just need. We hold on to what makes us feel good and project its power into all the shadowy, uncertain places on our trek to find an end to life’s dark tunnel.
“I want to show you something,” I say, sitting up. “I think it might help you understand why I did what I did.”
“Not now. Just be here with me,” says Aaron. At his urging, I lay back and rest against the seat. He tentatively slips a working man’s arm around my shoulders. As he does, his wedding band snags briefly on the cotton fabric but it doesn’t halt the motion. He lifts his free hand to my cheek and traces the irregular scar that runs from mouth to temple. Aaron leans in and plants the gentlest of kisses along its tangent. His fingers continue to search the contours of my cheekbone and jaw line making new discoveries where the fullness of age has blended bone and flesh into new contours. I hold still, hoping that he can feel and sense the raw beauty that has taken hold now. I am no longer that emaciated girl with protruding collarbones and bony knees that could punch holes through cardboard.
“Just stay a littl
e longer, please,” he asks. I comply, moving closer and wrapping him up in a subtle, rolling motion. We cling fiercely together and rock ever so slightly in a synchronized sway. I burrow into the warm musk of his chest.
“I never stopped loving you,” Aaron says. “And I never will.” We lie quiet, still bound together and completely at peace like it was the very first time and knowing that it might very well be our last.
“You’re a good man, Aaron Mitchell. You always have been,” I say with conviction. I want nothing more than to have his respect.
“And you are a hero in my book, Lissa Braum. And always will be,” he says. A small spattering of sun spots and moles cascade near his right temple His eyes are half shut as he mumbles and blinks the puffy eyelids trying to ward off exhaustion. He is after all a middle-aged man with a long work week behind him. I reach across the seat to find his warm thick hand and slip my fingers around his. We cuddle up on the musty cloth seat of his old pick-up. It feels like we are two teenagers holed up for the night and plotting our next move after a long day on the run. Truth is, we’re headed in different directions.
“Wait. What is it that you wanted to show me?” he asks, fighting back the growing tide of fatigue. I glance over at the paper bag that holds the dream catcher and Noble’s note. To anyone else it might seem like insignificant crap created by misguided men with too much time on their hands; but in my estimation, they are proof positive of my purpose on this wayward planet.
“I’ll leave it here. You can look in the morning,” I whisper.
In the morning, it turns out, Aaron will wake up and as promised, he will continue to love me. By then, I’ll have left Maine far behind in a cloak of glowering clouds that have scuttled up over the horizon and are bustling with brilliant fuchsia streaks and scarlet underpinnings. Red sky in the morning, sailors take warning.
It is time to bury the past.
#
Sixteen weeks it takes, two-thousand six-hundred and eighty-seven hours before Mr. Willis opens his eyes and when he does, he is at totally blind, partially deaf and partly brain-damaged. His kidneys are shriveled and useless as dried beans. He is dependent on an artificial filtering system to remove the waste from his body. He has atrophied down to spidery bone and sinew. If he attempts to walk, he must depend on the kindness of his physical therapy aides, two at a time with a gait belt. He will soon complete his sentence and become a free man. Free to wander within a matrix of convoluted thought like a corn maze at night with vision obscured on all sides, movement hedged in by a monotony of stiff unyielding stalk. The only way out is by looking up at an azure sky and following the sun’s compass towards home. But he has no more reliable memory to lead him. He will live with this dose of interminable torture with a mind clear enough to comprehend that he is damaged. The immensity of his incapacitation is staggering. Pity has no place here. This business is not for the faint of heart.
“Mr. Willis!” I shout to catch his attention. His hearing aid picks up the vibrations and relays them to the auditory nerve. He turns slowly in my direction, eyes like clouded marbles and bulging with expectation.
“Yes?” he answers, hopeful for a visitor.
“It’s Lissa Braum,” I say slowly and distinctly. Willis cocks his head and his eyes roll side to side sorting for some association.
“We met when I was twenty-two and you were twenty-five. Remember?”
He has no recall. His fingers turn the dial on his hearing aid and he waves for me to step closer.
“Were we friends?” he asks.
“No, we were strangers,” I say slowly, enunciating every syllable clearly. A puzzled look fleets across his sallow face. His right shoulder flinches and relaxes several times. A tic.
“That’s an eternity ago,” he mumbles.
“An eternity it is,” I reply.
“We met again. At Hazen.”
Willis hesitates and begins picking through the faces framed in his mind. It is a lengthy line-up and he must concentrate extra hard to finger the right one. He scans again squinting down hard, honing in on the familiar. The voice is the most telling. Suddenly, he shoots up straight in his seat. A wave of recognition rolls over his confusion and for a moment, the ceaseless rocking in his mind is still.
“Could it be…Counselor?” he asks tentatively, putting the emphasis on the crisp consonants which are easier to mouth with tongue clucked in the back of his mouth. A wide smile breaks out. It has been a long time since one has been spontaneously forthcoming and not forced as a matter of practice by a speech pathologist.
“Yes. Mizz Abrams,” I say. His hand leaps instantly in my direction as he gropes for a defining touch. He is leaning away from the not-so-distant past—what was— and reaching out into the near future—what still might be.
“Thank the Lord. I’m not forgotten. You came back.”
“I didn’t forget you for a minute. I told you I would see you on the outside, remember?” He nods and his head inclines in my direction.
“What happened? Do they know what made you so sick?” I ask.
Willis tries to muster up complete sentences but it’s like juggling three batons successfully until the fourth is tossed into the mix and concentration is lost. His eyes wander in an incongruent stare as he searches for a way to reassemble his thoughts and his ears scan the auditory horizon for a sign that his visitor is still there with him. It’s more difficult than I thought to stomach the sight of such suffering. Too damn bad! The bastard deserves worse. I swallow back a swell of indigestion.
Getting in the door of the Westerville Health Care Center turned out to be as easy as a stepping through the pair of automated doors. Security was non-existent. Quite frankly, so few visitors ever came to this outpost that the staff was more than happy to welcome me in. No one questioned who I was or if I was kin. The badge at my waist spoke loudly enough.
“Do you know what time it is?” I ask. Willis shakes his head, ponders for a moment and takes a wild guess.
“Four o’clock, I think,” he replies. “Maybe you could take me out for some fresh air?” he asks innocently.
“No, it’s time to go to sleep. Now, you’re gonna close your eyes, count to three and then start your praying. When you finish, I’ll be gone.” My words are purposed and sharp with diction. He hesitates. My former torturer is bewildered. In the pause of several minutes, I say nothing and do nothing. I let the realization sink in slowly in its own timing. Mr. X is suddenly agitated, flailing in thin air, overtaken by emotions I can well imagine like the sheer terror of realizing that his life has been wrenched from his own control and rests in the hands of the person who casts a shadow across his crouched frame. But unlike me, he will not get better.
“But before you nod off, take a good listen. You’re in the presence of a legacy,” I whisper. “Because what I do with the rest of my life will far outlast your shameless waste of time on this planet. And nobody, least of all you, can rob me of this right. Remember I predicted this? Years ago, I told you it would happen. Your existence would be erased from this earth’s memory. There’s nobody lined up to their respects, now is there? Let’s hope that when the time comes for you to meet your Almighty Maker that your measly name is jotted down in his Book of Life. And eternity is an awful long time to spend alone, my friend. Trust me,” I add.
Willis sits bolt upright in his chair paralyzed by a dawning awareness. I can guess what he must be thinking. Could the compassionate woman who had seemingly taken genuine interest in his future be somehow connected to that college girl from long long ago? Maybe he’s remembering her bloodied face as the last on his horizon before he dashed off into the night on his fugitive run from justice. I can only hope that when karma brought this devastating illness to his door and silenced his final moments of clarity with concentric circles of confusion and darkness closing in, he was consumed by one thought and one only — that he was slowly and unequivocally dying. I know the feeling all too well. Willis thrashes in his chair and fumbles to fi
nd the call bell clipped to the front lapel of his robe.
“Nurse, nurse,” he yells. Saliva dribbles down his right jowl. I lift the corner of the blue paper napkin clipped under his chin just like the ones at the dentist office. Willis balks by pulling his head back
“Open your mouth!” I order. It is the most beautiful imperative I have ever uttered. He is stuck. Victims know when it is time to bend to the will of their perpetrator. In his panicked state, he complies. There on the right side of his jaw is a line of pink, spongy gum with four spaces empty of enamel. Proof positive. This is the man who tried to take my life. And I am the young woman who wouldn’t let him. We both know it.
“Thank you,” I say, softly dabbing the spittle off his cheek. I put a calming hand to his shoulder. “Sweet dreams, lovely!”
“Please…sorry… don’t…” he stammers in a voice shaken with remorse and fear. Before he is able to finish his sentence, I am out the door and back on the Turnpike heading home, breezing by small boroughs lit with wood fires and warmed by happy families. Good people live out here, nestled in serene valleys brightened by a galaxy of glittering hope overhead.
#
“Here, Gemini. If you don’t mind taking these lists and handing them out to the block officers, I’ll go get the classroom open and aired out. God knows, it’s going to be hot as a greenhouse in there with all this late-summer humidity. Maybe I can drum up a fan from the supply room.”
“Sure thing, Mizz Abrams,” he replies amicably. Gemini takes the papers from my hands and gives me an indulging wink. I swear his breasts have grown another cup size. The plus side of having a transgender clerk is that it’s highly unlikely that either of us will be accused of granting sexual favors behind closed doors. There’s no lack of takers who come to visit Gemini at all hours of the day and night. In a place where no man is your friend, I can count on this sweet she-boy to run interference on my behalf. Gemini sashays off down the mainline and I head into the off-limits corridor where the supply room is located. Two of the lifers are running buffers over the floors. Another older gent is on his knees scrubbing the baseboards with a frayed toothbrush.
