Watching the Sky Cry

by J. B. Hartnett

  But before I could ask any questions or even offer an opinion, Dad went on. “I’ll take care of the house. Sell it, get the money put into an account so you can live off that for a while, just until you figure out what you want to do next.

  “Dad, I can do all that. I just need—”

  “Have you looked in a mirror, Rylie?”

  I hadn’t. Mirrors were assholes.

  Then he picked me up with ease from the couch and put his arms around me. Dad dwarfed me in size. I was five-foot-four on a good day, like my mom. Dad was over six-foot. “You’re my little girl, always. I hate what’s happened, and wish I could fix it, but I can’t. I can do this though, so allow me to take care of my little girl, okay?”

  With each of his heartfelt words, I surrendered. “Okay, Dad.”

  That was about the time Mom appeared with two, full canvas bags and a suitcase. “Where’s your purse, Ry?”

  “Kitchen floor.”

  Dad came into the house from taking everything I’d need out to the car. When we were at the front door, I looked behind me.

  And that was when the horrid words I’d been avoiding finally left my lips.

  “I’m a widow.”

  Mom held one hand, and Dad the other, but it was Mom who told me, “Say goodbye, Rylie.”

  I took my hands from them and laid them flat on the front door. Then I kissed it and whispered, “Goodbye, my darling.”

  Two months later, the house sold for more than I ever imagined. Dad took care of my finances, everything, right down to closing out all the bills. My former life was packed into three boxes, my clothes and everything else I wanted with me, into two suitcases, and placed in the back of the SUV my brother rented at the airport.

  And not long after, we were on our way to the place I’d be calling home for a while.

  FIVE

  The last time Billy and I saw each other was just before Christmas. Every holiday since Nick’s death, I spent alone. I asked my parents and brother to just give me some time. The thing was, I hadn’t spent those days doing anything meaningful, nothing to mark whatever special occasion had come and gone. Every day was a variation of the one before.

  After the funeral, I stayed home for four months. Each day just rolled into the next. But one of those days, I woke up and decided I was going back to work. I thought it would be easier to be there, and it was, at first anyway. The distraction it provided allowed me to remain numb. It gave me excuses to put my friends and parents off. But last year, as the one-year mark passed, I tried to get out of bed and just couldn’t do it anymore. Though I didn’t tell anyone else what was going on with me, I did tell Billy. Our conversations were matter-of-fact, only hinting at the underlying heaviness. But now, trapped inside a car for over eight hours, neither one of us had much to say. When it became clear Billy wasn’t in the mood to chat either, I put my headphones on and drifted between napping and daydreaming.

  But I didn’t really dream.

  I remembered.

  My mother had reservations about me going to Guerneville, and they were not without good reason. I’d had friends at school, of course, but my best friend in the world was a boy three year’s my senior. The boy who’d pierced my ear and my heart. The memory of him was powerful enough to distract me from the pain I’d been living with. And somehow, it was his pain that distracted me most of all. I may have lost the man I loved, but I had a dad who would walk through fire for me, and a mother who would do anything to take away my sorrow.

  Quentin hadn’t had any of that. He’d needed a friend, someone to confide about the horror of his home life, someone who wouldn’t judge, and who better than his best friend, a little girl he met by the river one summer? So, while Billy listened to talk radio and tapped his fingers against the steering wheel, I thought about my friend from long ago and his pain. I thought about the countless times his mother would say hurtful, crazy, or incoherent things to him and his brother. And the times when she would switch. That’s what he called it. The moments when she was a wonderful, normal mom and how precious and few they were. But he saved the incidents he couldn’t say aloud for his letters.

  Today, Mom declared her love for me and Miles by carving our names into her arms. ‘See? See how I bleed for my babies?’ She just screamed it over and over again until finally an ambulance came and took her away. She’ll be gone for a few months this time. That’s what me and Miles are hoping anyway. I know I’ll see you at Christmas. Hopefully she’ll still be gone. I wish you were here now, Rylie. You’re like a blue sky when everything else is clouds.

  I looked over and watched Billy drive for a bit. He and Miles were still friends, but he never mentioned Quentin to me, and I never asked. That’s when I stopped thinking about my history and started thinking about my brother’s.

  Five years ago, Billy bought a motorcycle, a Ducati. He drove it from Washington State to Northern California to see Miles and visit our aunt and uncle. For some stupid reason, he left at night to head back north. The roads were thick with fog, and Billy clipped a tree branch and was propelled twenty feet from where his bike landed. This left him with a broken collar bone, right wrist, left leg, and a severely sprained neck. He was lucky, just like I was. He still had pain that wasn’t visible, and because the idiot hadn’t strapped on his helmet properly, his left ear was mangled from being nearly torn off by sliding across the asphalt. His hair covered it now, but I did find my eyes darting to the side of his head from time to time.

  And I’d caught Billy staring at me, too.

  Unfortunately, I knew why. It wasn’t until I was at my parents’ house that I realized just how bad I looked. That first night, I went to have a shower and let the room fill with steam. But nothing could hide the reflection of my body. Sad sacks of flesh hung where an ample C-cup used to perch. My curves were all but gone, my complexion sallow. And though I didn’t look nearly as bad as I had eight weeks ago when I arrived at my parents’, I knew I was still seriously underweight. And my current state of self-doubt had made me all too aware that John the Cop had taken pity on me.

  When we reached the signs for Santa Rosa, I knew we were approaching the turn-off. I’d discovered a new-found love for alternative classic rock which accompanied me throughout the journey. But at one point, stopped at a light, I realized Billy hadn’t moved when it turned green. His hands gripped the steering wheel like he was trying not to rip the car apart.

  “Billy?” I asked and took off my headphones. But still, he kept his eyes focused on the windshield. Cars behind us started to honk, and fearing his anger might find another release, I put on the hazards. “Talk to me.”

  He took a couple deep breaths, then removed his sunglasses before he looked at me, his eyes bloodshot and swollen, wetness sitting in wait right at the rims.

  “Billy,” I whispered and softly put my hand over his.

  “I shouldn’t have left you. I knew…I knew you weren’t okay.”

  He wasn’t trying to make me feel bad, not at all. Regardless, I felt like I’d let the people who loved me down. I’d scared them; I’d worried them. I’d been so deep in my own suffering, I didn’t see what I was doing to them.

  “I’m so sorry.” I took his hand and held it to my cheek. “I’m gonna be okay now.”

  He slowly pushed my hand away. “Are you sure about that?”

  “I need a place to think without being bombarded by history. I hadn’t let him go yet. But the day you sent Mom and Dad to get me, I said goodbye. Nick and I…our life together was in that house.”

  He took a minute to digest what I’d said. “I heard you destroyed the front yard.”

  I let out a long, beleaguered sigh. “My intention was to kill the plumeria. Things got a little out of hand.” I took a breath and smiled out the window. “And gin…”

  I turned back to see him don a reluctant grin and put his sunglasses back on. Then he reached over and turned off the hazards.

  “Are we okay?” I asked.

  “Yeah,�
� he said, putting the car back in drive. “If you’re okay, Rylie, I’m always okay.”

  Billy decided that was as good a time as any to stop and top off the gas. I bought a bag of Fritos and a Coke and made my way back into the car. My brother was gone for a good fifteen minutes, and when he finally joined me, his hair and face were wet. Billy seemed exhausted. I didn’t think it was the long drive or the late August heat. My brother hadn’t seemed particularly happy in years, as if life and all its trials had caught up with him. I just didn’t know what those trials were. Any time I tried to ask, he changed the subject. My brother and I had become experts in diverting conversation away from ourselves.

  It would be another forty minutes before we made our way into Guerneville. Dad’s family had run an incarnation of the Riverside Guest Cottages for three generations. Mom and Dad had met just south from there, at Johnson’s Beach during spring break. She’d come up with friends, intending to stay for a week. But the spring fling quickly turned into a summer romance and didn’t end there. But eventually, she had to go back home to Orange County. Grandma had suffered from ill-health since Grandpa died, and Mom wanted to stay close. And since Dad loved her, he found a job and relocated to be with her.

  It was always understood, or assumed, our parents would eventually come back here when they retired. I’m sure they would like to have come back sooner, but with marriage and kids, somehow, time got away from them. That didn’t stop them from taking us here every summer and every holiday. Mom and Dad maintained that connection, so when they moved back, it might be a place we’d be tempted to call home. And that’s what it always felt like.

  Home.

  But for me, it carried its own bittersweet scars. Time may have dulled the pain, but it didn’t let me forget the first time I fell in love. I didn’t know it then, too young to understand the connection I’d felt for this boy was more powerful than mere friendship. We’d walked along the river and talked for hours, no one ever asking where we were going or where we’d been. And as Billy drove along the winding River Road, ever closer to home, I closed my eyes and took a deep breath.

  “Close your eyes,” I recalled him saying. “Can you smell it?”

  “What is that?” I asked.

  “They’re turning the soil on the other side of the river. Sometimes, Rylie, it’s not until you close your eyes, you know the true beauty of the world around you.”

  When I opened them, Quentin had been staring right at me.

  Just as he’d been every holiday, summer was no different, and the last week in June, I found him waiting at our spot by the river. It was as if he’d been there, right where we’d said goodbye the year before. I was barely fifteen that last summer we spent together, and, instantly, we both knew something had changed between us. I arrived, not as the curious pre-teen I’d been the year before, but a young woman, aware of butterflies in my stomach at the very thought of him.

  He’d spoken to me about everything, trusting me with the delicate details of his home life. But after he relieved himself of the terrifying truths of his mother, he spoke to me about the stars, the constellations. About Norse mythology and comic books. And somehow, his words fed my soul, hungry to hear his voice settle like a cloak around us. The previous summer, when he’d pierced my ear, we’d shared our first kiss.

  And when I arrived that very last summer, I wanted him to be my first everything.

  But my crush, my summertime constant companion, was eighteen and newly graduated from high school. Only a week into summer vacation, I was told he had a girlfriend, something he never mentioned in his letters. Since we shared every detail of our lives, I felt betrayed and silly, the idea he would choose to spend his life with me absurd. My teenage fantasy was replaced with teenage angst. I refused to speak with him and told my aunt I wanted to go home. She guessed what had happened and tried to talk me out of it, claiming it was probably all a misunderstanding. My brother was busy enjoying the river and the “local talent,” as he referred to the multitude of girls who seemed to want him. So Uncle Lee took me to the airport in Oakland a few days later. I asked my uncle if I was doing the right thing, to which he replied, “Yep.”

  I ignored Quentin’s desperate phone calls. Letters that followed remained unopened, unanswered, and eventually, ripped to shreds. Before, the idea of coming here was like that dream you try to fall back asleep for so it keeps going. After that summer, I stopped dreaming.

  And only a few years later, I met Nick.

  I knew, coming up here in such a vulnerable state, it was another potential risk to my heart if I saw him. It wasn’t like I’d been carrying a torch all that time. I’d been happy, very happy. But I had no idea how I’d feel if and when I saw him again. I’d waited years after that summer to visit again, and the last time I was here, no one mentioned him. I didn’t even know if he was still in the area, but if he was, hopefully he was bald, with seven kids and a nagging bitch of a wife. If he was anything other than that, my suspicions of life being an unfeeling, unsympathetic, sadistic asshole would be confirmed.

  ****

  The sun was starting to set just as we arrived. I loved how the colors were different here, everything more vibrant. Driving through the middle of the state, you could see how dry it really was. And even here, though verdant and lush, wildfires had scarred a couple towns over. Suddenly, I smiled at the kinship I felt with the land: burnt, but still thriving.

  Uncle Lee stood with his arm around Aunt Ardie, saying something at the side of her head, then kissing her in the same spot as she nodded. I wasn’t narcissistic; I didn’t think the world revolved around me, but at the moment, I assumed whatever they’d discussed starred me as the main topic.

  Billy got out of the car first and headed toward the outstretched hand of my uncle. I stared at the dash, watching in my periphery as they shook hands and patted backs, and thought, “God, is this really it?” There was no going back for me. I’d accepted, finally, that I’d had a wonderful life with my husband. We had our problems like every other couple, but that’s what marriage was all about. And now, I could hardly remember those times that had tried us. But there was no reason I couldn’t have that again. Right? If life or fate or whatever was pulling the strings was quite done with me, I was ready and willing to embrace whatever or whoever came my way.

  Staring out of the car, the red and white cottages in the distance, I could just see the surrounding gardens were in full bloom. My aunt had a master green thumb, as her garden clearly displayed. I took a breath in through my nose and closed my eyes. I could smell the river, the earthy dampness of the soil, and the distinct scent of evergreens in the fresh air. And then his voice, “Sometimes, it’s not until you close your eyes that you know the true beauty of the world around you.”

  A knock on the window roused me from the powerful memory of another ghost. “Are you planning on getting out of the car?”

  The only thing that had changed on my aunt was her hair color. She wore it in two long, grey braids, framing her tanned face and warm smile as she opened the door and reached for my hand.

  “Welcome home, honey.”

  I cleared the door just in time to fall apart. A sobbing, grateful mess, I held on tight before my uncle took me from Aunt Ardie and had his own turn.

  Eventually, we made our way into the kitchen of their home. They had a formal dining room, but I couldn’t remember ever eating a meal there. The rectangular kitchen table was weathered pine with eight mismatched chairs. A craggy-faced kitchen witch dangled in the window above the sink, in constant flight. Pots and pans for any dish imaginable hung from a rack above the island. And lying in wait were steaming root vegetables and herbs surrounding a roast, a mouthwatering promise of a home-cooked meal my aunt had prepared with love.

  I sat down while the kettle was filled and put on the stove to boil. I’d done nothing but sit all day long. But when I propped my feet on the chair opposite my own, I didn’t want tea.

  “Mind if I have a beer?”


  Billy and my Uncle had already started, toasting the homecomings and life and whatever else they did with each swig they took. I didn’t want tea, I wanted booze.

  I wanted celebration.

  “Sure, honey.” Uncle Lee handed me a beer while Aunt Ardie handed me a bowl of sugar snap peas to string. She didn’t have to ask; I just knew what was expected. As I went about my task, I absently stared out the window until my eyes caught on something in the distance.

  “Why is there a bus parked out there?” I asked, nodding to the direction of the huge object.

  “Come on, I’ll show you.” My uncle took the pea project from me and placed in front of my brother with a grin. “Make yourself useful.” Billy chuckled and took over while Uncle Lee grabbed my beer and led us on. “Be back in twenty, Ardie.”

  Off we went, in a slow, steady pace to the back of the meadow. I batted the errant mosquito that buzzed around my ears and wished I was barefoot. This part of the property, the meadow of my childhood, was unused, a place where you could pretend to be on the battle front of a war with the neighbor kids, or hunt for centipedes under rocks. Or simply lie on your back and stare up at a blanket of fog one minute, or a sea of stars the next.

  “Missed your face, Rylie.”

  I smiled. “Missed yours, too.”

  “Glad you’re here.” And those three, stilted words were filled with so much meaning, even the way he said them in his gravelly voice, I felt my eyes start to sting again.

  But I’d already had my big cry with my parents upon arrival there. After a day filled with emotional goodbyes and hundreds of miles, I needed a break from all the drama.

  “At least here, I know the difference between a backfire and gunfire.”