Akilina: Out of the Woods

by Patricia A Bowmer

  “I love to see her run like that,” Eden said.

  “Now we’re both free.”

  They watched as she rejoined the herd, as she touched noses with the lead stallion. Halley felt another piece of herself, long missing, slide back into place. Eden stepped away and appeared to be fascinated by the frogs at the edge of a small stream.

  “Ahem.”

  Halley started and turned: a very old gentlemen was standing next to her, also watching the horses run in the distance. Halley’s mouth went dry. What was he doing here! Where had he come from! Her eyes sprinted over him. He was familiar. In a moment, she took him in, and knew he was wrong.

  Though old, the man’s posture was upright – he stood as if he could stand for hours without discomfort, as if his joints bore him well. His skin was the deep, weathered brown of an old sailor. Like Halley, he was lean, with a similar strength to his build. His calves in particular were still thick and powerful. He was dressed simply: tan shorts held up by a brown leather belt; a blue crewneck t-shirt; old, dusty sandals. Between his teeth, he held a brown pipe, and he sucked at it as he watched the horses.

  The pipe was okay. It belonged. It was the only thing that belonged. The smell of the smoke was sharp, that of an inexpensive tobacco, but was appealing in the way familiar scents often are. His hair was white, fine, old man’s hair. It would be soft to touch. His blue eyes peered mischievously from a nest of wrinkles. They were the marks of a person who’d spent a lifetime smiling. These smile lines were wrong too, like almost everything else about him. Smile lines? They were not what she’d expect.

  Halley consciously drew her mouth closed, and stood staring, looking as though she were trying to process some impossible algebraic equation.

  The old gentleman simply watched the horses run. Finally, he looked at Halley, and removed the pipe from between his teeth with one hand. “Ahem,” he said, clearing his throat again. “Hello, Halley.”

  Tears came to her eyes.

  “Dad?”

  Her voice was a whisper.

  It couldn’t be. He’d been dead for fourteen years. And Dad had dressed like a country gentleman. This fact seemed, oddly, more important than the fact of his death. Her father would have been in his tailored tan raincoat. He’d be wearing his fine woolen slacks and a long-sleeved shirt with a collar. He wore this every time they went to see the horses. He didn’t believe in slovenliness. My father in shorts and sandals? Impossible.

  Still, he was her father. Halley’s legs were trembling. The old gentleman reached out a hand and touched her shoulder. She stared at the hand, at the thick, straight, strong fingers. The smell of pipe smoke drifted around them.

  “Even your hand is wrong.”

  “You will be all right,” the old gentleman replied.

  The words made her ears ring; the crow, the one she had met at the very beginning of her journey. He had brought a note. It had said exactly that: “You will be all right”.

  The world shifted under Halley’s feet. The old gentleman left his hand on her shoulder, and placed the pipe back between his teeth. He puffed, and she stood trembling in the cloud of familiar smoke. In time, the trembling ceased. A little while later, she could speak again.

  “But…” she said, not meeting his eyes, “but, you are dead.” The word ‘dead’ felt slippery on her tongue. “I remember. When you died. A part of you was with me on the train when I was trying to get to you. A part that wasn’t in the hospital. I knew you had a choice and I held you and said No, don’t go but you chose to leave. I… I felt you go.”

  The words held the dry, brittle kernel of anger she had carried all these years. As she spoke, she felt the hard kernel swell and burst open. “You had a choice. I know you did…”

  She bit the inside of her cheek. He had left before she was ready; he had left her unprepared, and unprotected.

  He took the pipe from between his teeth and held it between two fingers. “I know, love. That day. That horrible day.” He looked away from her, out to where the horses ran. He rubbed his chest, as if, even now, it still pained him. “I’m sorry, love…I just couldn’t stay,” he finally said, shaking his head. “My heart would never have worked properly again. I know it was sudden…” He pressed on her shoulder, his fingers strong.

  “Sudden…” Halley said bitterly. “It wasn’t sudden – it was impossible.” Her eyes overflowed.

  The memories had never faded. Memories were supposed to fade. The grey of his hands on the clean white sheet; the knuckles that had been deformed by arthritis; the strangely over-white half-moons on his fingernails; the down-turned lips; the thinned hair that was not quite white anymore but an inexplicable yellow. Pulling the strip of ECG paper off and rolling it into a tiny tube and tucking the tube silently into her pocket because it had recorded his last heart beat, and telling no one about it ever; it was something he would have done himself. His heart had stopped beating and they’d never known why.

  He puffed at the pipe. “I couldn’t face being incapacitated, being dependent. I would have been in your way. And you were all that ever mattered. Love, you were what made my life worthwhile.”

  She took a deep breath and rubbed her hand across her face. “You wouldn’t have been in my way. You might have saved me.”

  “Ah, but Halley…I knew you would save yourself.”

  Halley was silent, overcome. It helped explain his leaving. You believed in me.

  She thought about what else he’d said, about not wanting to be dependent. That had been his way. He’d been strong and silent in the face of tremendous pain.

  She stared at the man. The words were important. But more important was the fact that he was dressed wrong. It made her doubt him. There was something funny about the way he spoke too. She pondered what he could have said that made her think that, as he watched the horses. She played his words over in her head. It was the nickname. He had called her “Love”. Her father had always called her “Sweet”.

  The elderly gentleman spoke. “You’re right. I am not the father you knew.” He said it as if reluctant to explain. He met her eyes. “I am who your father would have become. Had he lived. Had he had time enough…to become…” The old gentleman stopped. “I am who your father has become. In you.”

  With that, he let the pipe fall to the earth and pulled Halley into a close embrace.

  Halley didn’t hug him back.

  The old gentleman held her away.

  “I have watched you since I left. It taught me what I’d never seen in life, that you needed me to tell you the things I took for granted that you knew. Like the fact that I love you.” Before he spoke again, he glanced around quickly, as if he sensed danger. “Listen carefully. I must tell you something.” He held her an arm’s length away, his long straight fingers placed gently on her upper arms. “When you were very little, I frightened you.”

  “What?” Her body tensed.

  “I frightened you. I’m sorry. I thought it wouldn’t matter. Not if I loved you well the rest of your life. But it did. I’m sorry.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Yes, you do. One day, you will face it. Then you will hug me back.”

  She tried to relax her body, but couldn’t. “At least you loved me well for the rest of my life.” She tried to smile; the old gentleman did not smile back.

  “I never could tell you how I treasured you. Not in words. It wasn’t my way. But I did, Halley, I treasured you. By God, I did.” He squeezed her upper arms gently. The palms of his hands felt warm as he looked her full in the face.

  He drew a deep breath; what he was about to say was very important.

  “You must see all of who I was,” he said. “You must let me step down from this pedestal you have placed me upon. I was only a man. A father. I made mistakes. You must see all of me now. You have no need to fear my anger any more.”

  Halley swallowed. “Angel parachutes,” she said impulsively.

  “What, love?”r />
  “Angel parachutes. That’s why I blew the seeds off the dandelions – I was helping the angels get to earth,” Halley said. It was odd to feel like a child again in his presence.

  The old gentleman smiled. “By God, you’re right! I didn’t know that then – it made me so furious that you were purposely ruining our lawn – but I can see now. That’s exactly what you were doing!” He looked into the distance. “The world can always use a few more angels on the ground.”

  The horses were galloping in the distance and the white form of Athena caught Halley’s eye. Her father followed her gaze.

  “Athena,” he said. “I gave her that name when she was born. Do you remember?”

  Halley nodded.

  “I never told you why,” he said. His eyes disappeared into their nest of wrinkles. “Athena was a Greek goddess – the goddess of wisdom and war. She was grey-eyed too, just like your Athena. Not as hairy though, I’m sure. And she certainly didn’t have a tail.”

  He laughed and this made Halley laugh too.

  “Athena,” he continued, “was a protector of heroes. That was the reason I named your horse Athena. I thought it a fitting name for a horse that would carry you.”

  “That explains my name too.”

  “Yes. Do you remember? I told you when you were very small. Halley means hero.”

  Hero! An ill-fitting name if ever he had heard one. If there were a name that meant “coward”, then, that would be fitting. His lips curled in a sneer.

  Yes, she had escaped him a few times. That didn’t bother him so much.

  Her time was running out. Soon the car, inert under the deep river, would be full to the roof with water. Soon, none of this would matter.

  One way or another, he would have her. But this way would be more fun.

  He swung his canteen back over his shoulder, and rubbed his hands together. Unaccountably cold on this warm day, he decided to increase his pace.

  As suddenly as he appeared, her father was gone. Halley’s shoulder tingled where his hand had lain. She placed her own hand there and spread her fingers wide. She wanted to soak up his essence; to draw inside what had been outside, to become one with her father who was so long gone. Her hand fell back to her side, and she heard the sudden sound of the horses thundering as one who had recovered a lost sense of hearing.

  “You okay?” Eden asked.

  “Did you see him?”

  “Of course I did, silly! Dad. He’s always showing up!”

  “He is?”

  “You’ve just got to know how to look,” Eden said. She picked up the discarded pipe – it had burnt out – and played at holding it between her teeth. “I like how he dresses now much better – silly old thing, with his pipe – it was time he let go of that too!” She giggled and let the pipe fall back to the earth. “Why do you look so surprised? I told you he was real!”

  Halley didn’t reply. She was thinking about what her father had said, about facing all of who he had been. It seemed like Eden thought he was perfect too.

  Eden began to trot forward like a horse. “We’ll have to do the trotting ourselves now. Come on, let’s pretend we’re mustangs!”

  Eden didn’t trot for long: the weather changed and trotting became less fun. First, the sky dulled. Then the clouds slid off the mountains, dropping heavily upon them, forming a thick fog. The world became opaque, the air thick with mist and yet uncomfortably hot. Halley sweated heavily and the sweat didn’t dry – it lingered on her skin, and she ran her hands down her bare arms and flung it off. “With this fog, I can’t even tell if we’re headed in the right direction. I don’t understand – it was so clear this morning. Now I can’t see two feet in front of me.”

  “I like the fog,” Eden said. “It makes it easier to play hide and seek!” With that, Eden darted a few feet away, giggling.

  “Where are you? Come on, I don’t want to play right now.”

  Eden jumped out of the fog, tapped Halley on the back, and then darted back into the whiteness, shouting, “Right here,” and then laughing.

  “Oh – I see!” Halley spun around; she could only see fog. “Okay – where?”

  “Right…” Eden tapped her on her kneecap, “…here!” And jumped back. “No…” Eden jumped and touched the top of Halley’s head, “…here!”

  Halley finally laughed. “Okay, okay, you win! I won’t be so grumpy about the fog. Come on, come back.”

  With a little skip and a hop, Eden reappeared.

  They walked on. The fog thickened, swathing them in a blanket of white. Thus cocooned, their conversation felt both secret and safe.

  “What were you like when you were little?” Eden asked, without preamble.

  “Hmmm?”

  Halley’s eyes were smarting from the effort it took to see through the fog.

  “When you were little…what were you like?”

  “Little? You mean, like your age?”

  “I’m not little,” Eden giggled. “No – little…you know…like four or five.”

  “I’d rather not talk about it.”

  “Why?”

  Halley bit the inside of her cheek and looked away.

  Eden waited.

  Hailey sighed heavily.

  “Scared,” she said.

  As if she hadn’t had enough to worry about before. Dad – the man who watched the horses with her, she corrected herself – had to remind her of the way he’d scared her when she was little, had to speak his futile, ‘I’m sorry’. She hadn’t thought about it in years, and his ‘sorry’ was a long time too late.

  “Are you mad at me?” Eden asked.

  “No…it’s just…”

  Eden looked at her appraisingly and Halley looked down, and unclenched her fist.

  “Why were you scared? You had Mom and Dad to keep you safe. That’s what parents do…”

  “That’s what parents should do,” Halley corrected. “And Dad did, very well…before, and after. Just not when I was five.”

  “What happened then?”

  “Mom died.”

  The words seemed to clump, like sticky rice.

  “When I was five. She died. Left me. No more ribbons in my hair. No more little dresses. Dead.”

  “Oh.”

  Eden crossed her arms across her chest; it was a defensive movement and Halley noticed it and was surprised.

  “What is it?”

  Eden shook her head, and looked away.

  Halley looked at Eden’s hands – they were small and soft, still the hands of a child.

  “Tell me,” Halley said.

  The fog was so thick, they had stopped walking.

  “It was my fault.”

  “Your fault?”

  “That she died. It was my fault.”

  Eden spoke as a child who had learned the rules, and was well aware that she’d broken the most important one of all. It was black and white, and she was black.

  “Mom died of cancer. That can’t be your fault.”

  It was becoming hard to see Eden in the fog.

  “It was my fault. She got it when I started school. That’s what caused it.”

  “But…”

  How could Halley explain that what Eden believed so absolutely made no sense? It was the theory of a five-year old, who had put two unconnected events together – her mother’s death and her own starting school – and glued them solid with cement made increasingly impregnable with each passing year. The theory had never been disproved. Halley knew this for sure, because there was a place inside her grown-up mind – somewhere hard, just left of center – that believed exactly as Eden did: Mom’s death was her fault.

  “Anyway…” Eden was saying, drawing the conversation backward, onto safer ground, “It doesn’t mean you weren’t safe, just because Mom died.” Her words were rehearsed, like she was parroting something she’d been made to read in a book. “Lots of people die – it’s the ones who are still alive that keep the children safe…”

  Halley
looked at her in dismay; she knew what Eden said wasn’t true. Not this time.

  Eden continued, as if speaking to herself, but dawning awareness made her sentence break into small bits, like a favorite toy, smashed.

  “But. But I didn’t feel that way. Not safe. Not when I was five.”

  She looked at Halley with wide eyes, like she’d like to run into the fog and hide away.

  Halley reached out a hand but Eden didn’t seem to see it. “The basement?” she prompted.

  “The basement,” Eden agreed.

  How awful to shine light on dark truths. Far easier to think about how good her father had been, how smart and kind and gentle. Why did they have to talk about how everything had changed? Why even think about it? They should stay in the time before her mother’s death. Not after. Not then. Not the basement.

  Halley tried to walk again, but in the thick fog she tripped on a rock and nearly fell. “Ouch,” she said.

  “You know I’m a good listener…”

  Now Eden was shining the light; they kept trading places, one probing and then backing off, and then the other.

  The fog made Halley’s head pound; if only she could see her way through. “After Mom died…” she began. She stopped. “I haven’t thought of it in years. It doesn’t matter. It’s ancient history.”

  “No, it’s not.”

  “What do you mean, ‘No, it’s not?’”

  “Ancient history is about ancient stuff – like the Greeks and the Romans,” Eden said. “This is like…well, more like…modern history…”

  Halley had to smile. “I guess you’re right.”

  “Tell me like it’s a story about someone else. That makes telling stuff easier.”

  “Don’t be silly.”

  Eden just looked at her.

  “Okay…Once upon a time, there was a little girl whose mother died…God, this is ridiculous!”

  “What happened when her mother died?”

  “It was all different. Her dad would get home from work, like usual, just like before. He’d kiss her and she’d hug him and he’d be ‘Nice Dad’. Then he’d go to the basement…”