Memory Tree

by Pittman, Joseph

Brian didn’t know what to say, so he just watched.

  He had to admit it was a pretty amazing picture, and the ensuing scene only got better, as Janey got up from the ground and seemingly took to the wind, running around the field, laughing, dashing, darting, the dog following her every move, barking with delight, the two of them fast friends, who no doubt would be as inseparable as Christmas was from miracles.

  “Okay, you’ve had all day to think of a name,” he said.

  “Mark and Sara had nine months,” she said.

  It was bedtime, and while the arrangement had been for Didi to tuck her in tonight, on this night when Christmas would shut its twinkling eyes for another year, Janey had requested that all of them join her in her room. All meaning Kevin, Didi, Brian, and a black Labrador retriever whom she had played with all day and who now rested on the edge of the bed, clearly exhausted. On the walls of her room, portraits of Annie and Dan Sullivan stared back, almost as if they too had received a special invitation. On her bed was her ubiquitous frog, looking a bit long in the tooth. Why not? Didn’t he turn ten years old today?

  “First I want to say thank you again. I can’t believe it . . . Brian . . . Dad, wow, we have a dog.”

  “There’s a lot of responsibility that comes with owning one,” he said.

  “Owning? We don’t own him, Brian, he’s . . . one of us, part of us.”

  “Family,” Didi said.

  “Just like all of you; you’re my family.” She paused and said, “So if the puppy is going to have a name, then so is my frog, finally, and trust me, he needs one after going all these years without one. I can imagine what that’s like because, well, for the longest time I struggled over how to refer to . . . you, and you.”

  Kevin and Didi nodded with understanding. Brian realized he should have handled this a while ago and not have had Janey for the past two weeks awkwardly fumbling with their names or just clearing her throat when she wanted their attention, and now he was feeling guilty that it was a child who’d had to broach the subject. In the end, he supposed it was okay. Children had a way of filtering out the plain truth.

  “I never had any grandparents, so I’ve never really had to say the words,” Janey said. “And it took me so long to call Brian . . . Dad, and sometimes even today I slip up. So, if he’s my dad and you’re both his parents, do I get to call you Grandma, or maybe Grand?”

  “Well, I don’t see how Grand works; there’s two of us,” Kevin said. “Why not Grandma and Grandpa? I’d like that.”

  “As would I,” Didi said.

  Brian watched as Janey considered this quick solution, finally nodding her approval. “Wow, my family got really bigger today, and now that we have that settled. . . let’s see about the dog’s name. All day I’ve been torn between two names, and it’s only now that I’ve decided. I liked both names, so I figured whichever one the dog doesn’t get . . . the frog will.”

  “That sounds like a very smart plan,” Didi said.

  “Janey, are you sure you don’t want to talk about this first, you know, just us?”

  “Dad, don’t be silly,” she said with a roll of her eyes. “Although he usually is.”

  Kevin and Didi laughed at their son’s expense.

  “Okay, let’s have it. I don’t want to be calling out over the backyard ‘dog.’ ”

  “His name is Sully,” Janey said, “and the frog’s name is Dunc.”

  “Sully?”

  “Dunc?”

  “Yeah, as in Sullivan and Duncan, our last names. The frog is joining our family, so he becomes Dunc. And Sully . . . well, he has to know of his other family, and so when he’s running around the windmill Mama will know it’s okay to share things with him too.”

  Didi leaned down and kissed the top of Janey’s head. “You’re a very wise young lady.”

  “Perfect names, indeed,” Kevin added.

  “Wow, two pets, a dad, and grandparents, all together,” she said, “and we’ll be a family for as long as we can. Because I know once Christmas is over, Grandma and Grandpa have to go back home.”

  “Janey, we can worry about that when the time comes,” Brian said.

  “Not so fast, the both of you,” Kevin said. “You don’t get rid of us that easily. Christmas is over, there’s the door?”

  Brian spun around, his father’s words surprising him. “What do you mean?”

  “Your mother and I were saving one last Christmas surprise for you, Brian,” he said. “I was wondering, perhaps you might need help down at your tavern. After all, if we’re going to be neighbors, I’m sure there are nights you’ll need off to help this little lady.”

  “And on nights you have to work, a woman’s influence will do her good,” Didi added.

  Brian was thinking he should have gotten new ears for Christmas, because the old ones weren’t working. “I’m sorry, did you say neighbors?”

  “Yes, who do you think bought the Knights’ farmhouse?”

  It wasn’t words that ended their day of holiday magic, because Brian could find no more, and as his parents left the room with a chuckle and the promise of more details later, Janey closed her eyes and with a sleeping Sully warming her feet and Dunc in her arms, Brian had the chance to concentrate on the sails of the windmill as seen through Janey’s window, their endless rotations not unlike the passage of time. Brian realized that in the land of the windmill, there were fresh memories to be made and indeed, many things to look forward to.

  EPILOGUE

  Clocks turn even when you’re not looking, the sun rises and falls as the passing days move gently into the quiet of night, and so time effortlessly glides by, unseen but ever present. For those with little to look forward to in life, time can drag on till it seems the earth has stood still, while for others the endless rotations of its axis move far too quickly, leaving them with a sense of time running out, always planning, seldom living. Time is universal, yet it represents so many things to so many, and while it can be enigmatic, even mysterious, it also represents one of the few constants in the universe. What no one has in common with time is how much of it they have.

  In reality, the world marches on, and before anyone realizes it, time has flown by on the currents of the wind, with another day, month, and year having elapsed, leaving us all a little older, perhaps a bit wiser. And always wondering, Where has the time flown?

  Sometimes people anticipate the arrival of a certain day, a birthday or anniversary, a trip that will take them to the far reaches of the earth, feeling it will never come. And then suddenly it’s gone, whisked away by time’s inevitable advancement, leaving in its wake those things called memories. Sometimes people wish time would grind to a standstill, allowing them to forever treasure a moment so hard to catch, like witnessing a falling star, the first bloom of love, a long-planned wedding, only to realize that time is a part of life no one can lay claim to—its hold on us strong, our grip tenuous.

  Time is always present, but it’s remembered in the past, thought about for the future.

  “Remember that time . . .”

  “Time will tell.”

  Time means everything and yet it ultimately means nothing, leaving a place like the small village known as Linden Corners somewhere between yesterday and tomorrow. For eager kids down at Linden Corners Middle School, a year of studies can feel like forever; for anxious adults in the simple act of waiting for a cup of coffee down at Martha’s Five O’Clock Diner, time can come to mean impatience; and for the elderly folks down at Edgestone Retirement Center, who have seen their lives fall behind them, time taunts like an enemy. Even the iconic, majestic windmill that looms over this countryside knows of time’s unstoppable dance, its spinning sails silently recording every step.

  But then come those special times of year when folks dream of better lives. Holidays are like time-outs from the rigors of daily life, filling out days with Memorial Day picnics and Fourth of July fireworks, these events like time caught in a bottle. At Thanksgiving, we take time for our
families and ourselves, giving thanks for all we have, all we share. And then of course there’s Christmas, which stretches the notion of time to extremes, for it is not just a single day amidst a cold month, but something joyfully referred to as Christmastime, one built on a giving spirit, on tradition. And what is tradition but time told in reverse.

  Only one thing in this world can halt the passage of time.

  Only one thing in this world can transport you to another time and another world.

  That one thing is called a dream.

  For one wide-eyed girl in Linden Corners, she with freckles on her usually scrunched-up nose, dreams were sometimes all she could cling to.

  Once more in this fading, unforgettable year, the willowy shadow appeared in the dark of night, as though brought back to the little girl on the currents of an unseen wind. Shutters clacked, and the wind whistled, a homespun melody she knew by heart. As Sully slept beside her with his tongue hanging out, unknowing of the visitor, the shadow beckoned to her.

  “Mama, is that you? Oh, I’m so glad you’re here. There’s so much to tell you.”

  “There’s so much I already know, and so much of tomorrow still to be discovered.”

  Her golden glow was so like the windmill, still shining brightly as the New Year neared. As she rose from her bed, Dunc the purple frog fell over against the soft pillow, his sewn mouth seemingly upturned, unafraid now to be in the dark. Janey feared nothing either, and it was as though believing so allowed her body to float over the floor, and soon she was being transported across the field. The windmill drew her to its gently turning sails, and in moments she was back upstairs, just as she had been on Christmas Day, just as she had been during her two previous dreams, one that gave her a peek into the past, the other showing her just how wonderful her Christmas this year would be, and both had proven to reveal truths she’d shared with no one.

  “Mama, what are you going to show me today?”

  “Look through the window as before, Janey, and tell the wind all that you wish.”

  “Do I have to say it aloud?”

  “Dreams defy voices,” she said, leaving Janey thinking it was another riddle.

  But she quieted down, enjoying the silence, the stillness of the world around her. That was when she closed her eyes, and inside her mind colors opened up before her. They may have been out of focus, yet also so blindingly bright, and she thought of things in this life she had and she thought of things in this life she didn’t, and then she wondered if there was something missing in be-tween . . . someone. At last she opened her eyes, and that’s when the sails passed by the window and the images began to flicker, like a movie reel.

  She saw a Christmas tree, and she saw people gathered in the familiar room. Stockings hung on the mantel, fire crackling beneath them. It was her living room, her home. She thought she could hear music, the lulling sounds of “Do You Hear What I Hear?” which Janey had learned only recently was one of her grandmother’s favorite holiday tunes, and so that indicated to Janey that whichever Christmas was unfolding before her, Didi and Kevin Duncan were around, and indeed, that’s when she saw them, almost as though thinking of them had willed them there. They were hanging their ornaments on the tree.

  “Mama, this dream is just like the last one,” Janey said.

  “Just watch, Janey, and listen.”

  She waited, but nothing changed, perhaps her words having scared away the future.

  Then she saw a dog bound into the room, his dark coat and white ruff just like Sully’s, his red collar distinct. It was him for sure, but he appeared older, no longer a puppy. Chasing after him, Janey saw herself, and unlike in the first dream, when she’d been a baby, and unlike in the second dream, when she couldn’t see herself, she was different too, somehow older. She blinked and suddenly she was gone from view, but she could hear her own laughter as she called out to Sully, whose bark Kevin shushed.

  “Brian, when are you ever going to train this dog?”

  “Sorry if I’ve been a bit busy.”

  Janey recognized Brian’s voice, and she watched for him to enter the frame. There he was, and he didn’t look much older, his hair still brown with no flecks of gray, so this scene couldn’t be taking place too far into the future. Maybe it was only next year. Janey decided that had to be the case, thinking the dream was about to end because she’d seen all her family. She knew, however, there had to be more to come; nothing different had really been shown to her.

  “Brian, why don’t I take the baby?”

  The baby? Janey wondered. Had Sara and Mark brought their newborn over? Or maybe it was Jake, but then she remembered that Cynthia and Bradley had already been gone a few days, and of course they had taken Jake with them. They were halfway across the country by now. So, wait, who was this?

  “Mama, I don’t understand. What are you showing me?”

  Janey was forced to look back, where she saw Brian hand over a baby who appeared to be no more than one month old. One last person entered the room, but she was blurry, and no matter how hard the little girl who was not so little anymore tried to adjust her eyes, no face was forthcoming, no identity would reveal itself. But whoever she was, she had an aura about her, and Janey could feel warmth spread all through her body, even as outside it had begun to snow. Like somehow the chill of winter was fast dissipating, as quickly as the images she had seen through the windmill’s window.

  Time was advancing; a new season loomed over the horizon.

  “But, Mama, where did the pictures go? I want to see her. Who is she?”

  “That, my sweet and beautiful Janey, will have to wait,” Annie Sullivan said, her voice an echo, as though the wind were taking her far from home and everything she loved, to lands distant and unknown, a place that remembered the past and gleaned the future. Her willowy shadow was no more, and Janey could have sworn it was just the wind that spoke her mama’s’s final breath.

  “Another story for another time.”

  If you enjoyed The Memory Tree, return to

  Linden Corners in Joseph Pittman’s

  A CHRISTMAS WISH

  Turn the page for a special excerpt.

  A Kensington mass market paperback

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  CHAPTER 1

  If tradition dictates the direction of your life, then it was inevitable that my mother called me two weeks before Thanksgiving to ask whether I would be joining the family for our annual dinner. Every year she makes the same call, every year she asks in her deliberately unassuming way, and every year I respond in my expected fashion. Yes, of course, where else would I be? This year, though, so much had changed—in my life and in my parents’ lives, too—that I had to wonder whether the notion of tradition belonged to a bygone era, appreciated only by thoughts of the past, no longer put into practice. How I answered my mother on this day proved that indeed change was in the air, a first step toward tomorrow. Because I informed her that before I could give her an answer, I needed to consult first with Janey.

  “Brian, dear, that’s very sweet, but you don’t ask children what they want to do. You tell them,” she stated matter-of-factly.

  “No, Mother, Janey and I, we’re a team. We make decisions together.”

  “Brian, dear, you have so much to learn about children.”

  Actually, I thought my mother had a lot to learn about her son.

  I had been in the kitchen at the farmhouse, mulling over dinner. I hung up and was left to brood the remainder of the day while I cooked, even when Janey came home from school filled with an undimmed light that usually brightened me. I put on my best front as she busily talked about her day. We ate a bland chicken, turkey’s everyday fill-in, and still I didn’t bring up the idea of the holiday. I waited until bedtime to ask Janey her thoughts on the subject of the coming holiday.

  “Thanksgiving? Away from Linden Corners?”

  I nodded. “It’s your call.”

  “Do you want to go, Brian?”

 
“I will if you will,” I replied.

  “That sounds evasive.”

  “Where did you learn such a big word like that?”

  She rolled her eyes. Vocabulary had never been an issue with Janey. “See, evasive.”

  I laughed. “Okay, okay. Yes, I’d like to go.”

  “Good. Then I will if you will,” she said, her smile uplifting. “Funny, I get to meet your family. I never thought about them before. That you have parents . . . do you have a big family? Where are they? Do they have a dog. . . .”

  “Slow down, slow down. All in good time.”

  “I’m just curious. Up until now you’ve always been . . . well, you’ve been Brian.”

  “We all come from somewhere.”

  She thought about that a moment, and I feared it would lead the conversation down a path she wasn’t ready for. I certainly wasn’t ready for it. But then she just innocently stated, “I can’t wait.”

  Her sudden pause had me wondering what else she was thinking. You could always see the wheels of her mind turning, almost as though they spun her eyeballs.

  “Is your mom like mine?”

  No, my mind said. I chose not to answer that one directly. “Everyone is their own person.”

  “Evasive,” she said.

  I couldn’t help it, I laughed. “So, it’s agreed, we go. You and me, hand in hand.”

  “Hand in hand,” Janey agreed.

  That’s how it worked with us.

  As night fell and Janey slept, I phoned my mother back and told her to add two plates to the Duncan family’s dinner table, that the Linden Corners faction of the family would join them.

  “You know how much this means to me, Brian.”

  Yes, I did.

  And while accepting the invitation may have been a relatively smooth process at the time, now, as we turned the corner off Walnut Street in Philadelphia and were only two blocks from my parents’ stately new home, anxiety and trepidation ran through me like a monsoon. Sweat beaded on my brow, nerves taking control once I’d parked. The trip had taken us six hours (with a dinner break), but really, it had been an even longer time coming. Nine months had passed since I’d last seen my parents, and during that elapsed time my world had drastically changed in a way none of us could have predicted, myself at the top of that list. I had quit my well-paying job as a thankless corporate drone, sublet my tiny New York apartment, and left behind the supposed woman of my dreams. Setting out on a journey of self-discovery, I had landed in a place that was not far from all I’d known in terms of miles, yet worlds away. I’d met Annie Sullivan and I’d loved her and then I’d lost her, we all had, and as a result I had been given the care of her only daughter, eight-year-old Janey Sullivan, a wonder of a girl, the true one of my dreams. Since then, I’d been very proprietary in terms of exposing Janey to new things. I hadn’t allowed any visitors, not friends or family from beyond Linden Corners, wanting this time of transition between me and Janey to take shape without any further disruption. Even now I had my concerns about taking this precious girl out from the safe confines of her life, but realized, too, there was a time for everything, even for moving forward.