Sawyer Says

by Carey Heywood

  “How is she?” I ask Marie.

  “I am not sorda.”

  She is not deaf. I meet Carmen’s eyes and feel ashamed for losing touch with her over the years. I spent most of my summers with Jared and his mom, but during the school term, Carmen raised me.

  “How are you?” I hold her gaze and walk closer to her bed.

  Marie moves from her chair so I can sit and offers me the bowl so I can help Carmen eat.

  When she reaches for me, I set the bowl down and clasp her hands.

  “La mia Sawyer.”

  Her Sawyer. “La mia Carmen.”

  Her eyes crinkle as we just look at each other. I have questions for her, but I don’t want to overwhelm or tire her with them. Time has shrunk the woman who once was larger than life to me. She had always seemed like a force of nature, an unstoppable force. She was what I always wanted to be when I grew up.

  When I was still in school and I would tell her this, she always reminded me never to grow up, that that was the trick of it all. I’ve kept those words with me all these years.

  She drifts while I sit with her, and Marie beckons me to follow her to the kitchen. There she makes me tea and offers me breakfast.

  “How is she, really?” I ask.

  She drags a pack of cigarettes across the counter, taps the pack a couple times then pulls one from it. After lighting it and taking a long pull, she breathes out a cloud of smoke.

  “She sleeps more each day and does not eat. Is no good.”

  I shake my head. “Is there anything I can do?”

  She shrugs. “She is happy you are come. That is good.”

  Because I am here, Marie uses the opportunity to run to the store and pick up some groceries. She is looking forward to having someone to cook for tonight.

  After I shower, I go back to sit with Carmen. “Carmen, there was a ring I found in my grandmother’s house. It was simple…”

  She lifts her hand, cutting me off. “It was her wedding ring.”

  “What ever happened to my grandfather?”

  She shakes her head. “One day he just left. She wore the ring for years, hoping he would come back. When she took it off, she said she would never love again.”

  “Never again?”

  Carmen nods slightly, her eyelids heavy.

  I start to stand. “I should let you rest.”

  She lifts her hand again to stop me and points to a book next to her bed. The woman who read me stories at night wants me to read to her. Life truly does have a way of coming full circle.

  It’s an Italian translation of Little Women. The book is so worn I wonder if it’s the very one she read to me when I was little. I don’t ask. I just read. By the time Marie is back from the store, Carmen is asleep again. I help her bring bags in from her car and then unload once they are all in the kitchen.

  We talk more about Carmen’s condition. She is diabetic and her kidneys are failing. She isn’t healthy enough to be considered for a transplant. At this point, her body is just shutting down. A hospice nurse stops by weekly and more frequently if Marie calls her.

  Keeping Carmen as comfortable as possible is their focus.

  Once everything is put away, she squeezes my arm. “You should try and talk to her.”

  I nod and head back to her room. She’s asleep, but I sit in the chair next to her and wait for her to wake. When she does, my presence seems to startle her. Marie hurries in to explain again, who I am. Could she have forgotten me? My heart tightens as I watch for a sign of her knowing me.

  “Sawyer. Sawyer,” she rasps.

  I reach my hands out to hers and let her fold them into her grasp once she is calm.

  “Talk now,” Marie orders.

  I take a deep breath. “Carmen.” Deep brown eyes fixate on mine. “Why didn’t my grandmother want me to live with her?”

  She shakes her head.

  I lean forward. “Why did she send me to you?”

  “Agnes had problems.”

  “What kind of problems?”

  “Marie.”

  “Marie knew my grandmother?” I ask, confused.

  She shakes her head.

  “Do you want Marie?” I glance out the door.

  When she nods, I stand and go to get her. “She’s asking for you.”

  I follow her back to the room and watch as she leans close to Carmen, listening to her. Whatever Carmen says is too quiet for me to hear.

  Marie stands and comes to me. “There are some things she has for you that may answer your questions.”

  She turns and walks to the closet and pulls a box out from under some blankets. It’s the size of a shoebox.

  “She wants you to have this.”

  “Should I sit with her more?” I ask, looking over at Carmen.

  “Yes.” She nods. “Then you help me cook.”

  I can’t suppress my smile, and I lean over to kiss her cheek. She pats my back and winks at me before heading back to the kitchen. I tuck the shoebox under the chair and start to read to Carmen again.

  Marie comes back with soup for Carmen and tells me to take a shower because we will have company for dinner. I take the box with me and leave it on my bed. After my shower, I change into black jeans and a blue sweater. It’s the dressiest thing I have with me. Carmen is sleeping, and I find Marie in the kitchen dicing tomatoes.

  It’s nice to relax and just follow Marie’s directions. We’re making an old family chicken recipe and a friend of the male persuasion is coming over for Marie. Once everything is prepped and cooking, she goes to her room to get ready.

  “You look smokin’ hot,” I gush when she comes back out in a low cut dress that hugs her curves.

  She flounces her hair and gives me a sexy pout.

  “Why didn’t Carmen ever get married?” I ask, remembering how sought after she had been while I was in school.

  She lights a cigarette. “She never want to settle down. I think if she had it to do again, she perhaps act differently.”

  “Was there anyone in particular?” I ask, trying to remember.

  “I know there was a man. She loved him very much, but she was a proud woman. She would not change.”

  “I know a bit about that,” I admit, thinking of Jared.

  “There is a man you love?” she asks.

  “He loves me. I love him, but I don’t know if I love him, love him.”

  “What is this love him, love him?” She waves her cigarette back and forth.

  “He’s my friend. I just don’t know if I can give him everything he needs,” I try to explain.

  “Do you have the sex with him?” she counters.

  When I blush and look away, she continues, “So yes. And this sex, is it good?”

  “The best,” I breathe.

  “Is he good man or bad man?”

  “He’s amazing.”

  She stamps out her cigarette and rolls her eyes at me. “You love him. The rest is thinking too much.”

  Is it really that simple? “But what if I’m not good enough for him?”

  She reaches out and grabs my chin, holding my face, her eyes locked on mine. “He thinks you are good enough.” then shrugs, “Is all that matters.”

  She leans closer and kisses my forehead before releasing my chin.

  When the doorbell rings, she smacks my butt and points to the door.

  There’s a short bald man with a bouquet of flowers. He’s just my height and reminds me of the man on the popcorn box.

  “Come on in,” I grin.

  “You must be Sawyer,” he says reaching out his hand. “I’m Tom.”

  “Nice to meet you, Tom.”

  “Where’s Marie?” he asks, looking past me.

  “I’m here,” she calls out, walking to join us. “Hello, Tom.” She leans down to kiss his cheek and says, “You shouldn’t have,” when he hands her the flowers.

  “They pale in comparison to your beauty.”

  My eyes widen, and I glance at Marie to check out her r
eaction. Based on the blush creeping across her cheeks, I’m guessing she likes him.

  “Thank you, Tom,” she replies in a breathy rasp before turning and going back to the kitchen to put them in a vase.

  Tom and I stand awkwardly in the living room until she comes back. She returns with wine for all of us and sits. We follow her lead when she sits. While we wait for dinner to finish baking, she explains my presence to Tom. From the conversation, I glean that Tom lives nearby and has been slowly wooing Marie for some time.

  I wonder if her caring for Carmen is what stops her from taking the next step with him. It seems so simple to diagnose problems around me. If only I could do the same for myself. Marie excuses herself to check on Carmen.

  I fill the time with small talk. Tom is quite a character, a self-made man. He reminds me of everything I miss about Jared. Not wanting to be rude is the only thing that stops me from calling Jared. I wonder what he’s doing, how his day was, and if he’s thinking of me at all.

  I’ve gotten so good at extracting myself from physical relationships over the years; it’s foreign to me to crave his nearness. In the past, the distance was enough, the thrill of new experiences and people. Have I finally found something that makes all new adventures lose their luster?

  Marie returns when the oven buzzer goes off. They’re too polite to make me truly feel like the third wheel that I know I am. Once we’ve finished eating, I excuse myself, claiming exhaustion and retreat to my room to give them space.

  Marie ignores my escape attempt and somehow talks me into having some dessert. After a few bites I manage my escape. Their togetherness only enforces my loneliness.

  I reach for my phone and call Jared.

  “Hey, stranger.”

  “It hasn’t been that long,” I argue.

  “Feels like it.”

  “Do you miss me?” I whisper.

  “You already know the answer to that,” he counters, his voice taking on a husky tone.

  “I miss you.”

  “Come home,” he pleads.

  Something breaks inside me. I’ve lived in Denver for years but having Jared tell me to come home, to him, makes me realize how long it’s been since I considered a place home.

  “As soon as I can. I promise.”

  “I’ll be waiting.”

  My throat feels thick as I say goodbye, trying my hardest not to cry. He said he’d be waiting. That’s a good thing. Why do I feel so emotional over it? I seek solace in sleep.

  When I wake up, I open the box, finding old letters from my grandmother to Carmen. With shaking hands, I open the first one. Her handwriting is the same as from her journal, but this letter is nothing like the bullet point list.

  This letter is dated September 18, 1971. My father was only ten years old and had broken his arm falling out of a tree. Her love, her fear, her care for my father is so abundantly clear from each word she wrote. Her affection for Carmen is evident as well. She called her “my dearest Carmen” and asked her to come visit.

  I read letter after letter, finally being granted a glimpse of the life of not only my father but my grandmother as well. She had been witty, loving, and adventurous in her letters. She was nothing like I remembered her.

  By the time my father turned fifteen, the letters began to change. The details were the same, the essentials in written correspondence, the who, what, when, where, and why. The heart was lost, though. The witty remarks that made each letter exude warmth were gone. They were no longer addressed Dearest Carmen, but Dear Carmen.

  Something had happened. There were hints in the following letters. In one, she wrote, “I don’t feel well.” In another, “I’m lost.” What had happened to make her feel this way? I avoid the clock next to my bed and the droop of my eyelids as I struggle to read every letter.

  The last message has a haunting. “I’m losing my mind,” before sleep claims my body. Waking up in unfamiliar places has never bothered me. My internal vagabond embraces it. The only thing that irks me, like an itch I can’t reach in the corners of my mind, is her letters. What did she mean she was losing her mind?

  I head straight for Carmen’s room. Marie is feeding her.

  “May I?” I gesture to the bowl of oatmeal in her hands.

  She nods, smiling, kissing me on the cheek as she passes it to me. Carmen’s eyes soften as I move to sit next to her. I feed her until she slowly lifts one hand and gently shakes her head.

  I set the bowl aside, reach for her hand, and hold it in mine. “I’ve been reading her letters.”

  “My Agnes,” she smiles.

  “What happened to her?”

  She pinches her eyes shut, and when they reopen, I’m startled to see them wet with tears.

  “Her mind.”

  “I don’t understand,” I reply gently.

  “Keep reading, la mia Sawyer.”

  I lean forward, kissing her cheek, and get up to let her rest. I will read. I head back to my room, ignoring the grumble of my empty stomach. With each letter, my tension builds, as her hints become full-blown screams. I lift the next letter, its envelope different from all those before it.

  I read the return address and gasp, “Nadow View Mental Hospital.”

  My grandmother spent time in a mental hospital?

  I hang up with Sawyer and fight the impulse to punch something. Her voice, her fucking voice kills me. Why does she have to do this all by herself? I can’t help her, and it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done.

  I’m not scheduled to work today, but I decide to head in just to clear my head. The season is winding down. Temperatures have been below freezing overnight so we haven’t lost much snow. Our days are numbered, though. Spring is just around the corner, and the resort is gearing up to start their other outdoor activities. Hiking isn’t bad, I guess. It’s just not boarding.

  It’s a weekend, end of season, so it’s not crowded. I’ve never liked sharing a lift with a stranger. I lose myself in my thoughts and just let my instincts take over. I know this mountain like the back of my hand. I think back to my first couple of years working here.

  I was a wannabe player. A few years back, I used to time it so I’d get on with some hot girl. Majority of them were out-of-towners. It was easy to find someone to hook up with. It was fun until it stopped being that way.

  I was having the same conversation repeatedly with the same result every time: some mindless sex for a day or two and then some halfhearted promise to stay in touch once they went home. It was draining. I just couldn’t do it anymore.

  I went through a hell of a self-imposed dry spell before I met Kristy. Apart from the attraction, I never got what she saw in me. I felt like I was going through the motions the whole time we were together because I just couldn’t handle being alone anymore.

  When she got pregnant, it only made sense to get married. I just wanted to do the right thing. For a while there, I had the world convinced I was happy. Now I know I was doing my best to try to tell myself I was, because what type of asshole isn’t excited to become a father?

  When she lost the baby, we both knew. I think she loved me and finally realized it was more than how much I loved her. I liked her, but she deserved better than that. I haven’t spoken to her since I was in New Hampshire. She sounded so hopeful on the phone.

  Knowing how I feel about Sawyer, I cannot be the type of man to allow another woman to indulge in feelings about me. What she does on her own time is her business, but it would be wrong of me to do anything to encourage her. We shared something awful, something that I will live with the rest of my life; but I’ve moved on, and she deserves the opportunity to do so as well.

  I consume each letter as though they will ease the ache inside me. My grandmother spent six months of 1979 living at Nadow. Something happened between her and my father that prompted her to stay there. What, the letters do not say. It was the year he graduated high school and went on to Dartmouth.

  Whatever it was had been enough that for the remainder o
f his years my father distanced himself from her. She wrote about her treatment with a detached eeriness, considering the horrific treatments she was subjected to. The treatment that seemed most effective at the time was shock therapy. Her letters changed drastically after that. This was the cause of the introduction of the bullet points.

  The treatments affected her short and long-term memory. Her coping mechanism became lists. She wrote how her life had dissolved into endless lists, but without them, she would forget to eat, to shower, and to change her clothes.

  After I was born, my father tried to repair the distance between them. In one letter, she tells Carmen of the letter she sent my father. He had wanted to bring my mother and me up to New Hampshire to spend the holidays with her. She was terrified that he would figure out something was wrong with her.

  She had pushed him away instead, telling him she hadn’t wanted to see him, that he had made a mistake getting married so young. Tears blur my vision as I see her admit that that letter broke her heart.

  The letter to Carmen telling her that my father died was the worst of all. “Carmen, it has been five days since my Henry died. Each day I forget. Each day my heart breaks when I learn it again. Each time feels like the first time.”

  When it comes to grief, it’s true the pain is always there, but I shake my head trying to imagine the agony of not having the grace of time to dull the first bite of that loss.

  “What am I to do with Sawyer? How can I be trusted with a child? I sent her to her godmother for now. What else can I do?”

  I feed my fist to my gaping mouthed wail. Marie rushes into my room to wrap her arms around me.

  “I didn’t know. I didn’t know. I didn’t know.” I rock back and forth in her embrace.

  She tries to ask me what happened, what I have read to cause me such pain. I just hold her as she holds me. All these years I just assumed she didn’t want me. Why didn’t someone tell me along the way?