And as she looks at me, smiling, I shudder a little even though I don’t understand why. There’s something unsettling in the way she can switch gears so easily, how her sadness can meld into a sweet smile so quickly. There’s something unnerving in her eyes, a darkness flashing for the briefest of moments.
I try to shove it aside. When you have so much time to think, sometimes your mind goes to dark places unnecessarily. Sometimes you overanalyse, see things that aren’t there. I don’t trust my mind one hundred per cent these days. An ageing mind is sometimes a faulty one. I’m just being crazy, I tell myself. Certainly, that’s it.
Despite my best efforts to quell my uneasiness, though, I can’t. She sips her still-scalding tea and I stare, the queasiness in my stomach undeniable. For the first time, I inexplicably feel like Jane isn’t as sunshine yellow as I once thought. Suddenly, something seems off, seems weird – and it isn’t just her unhappiness over her lack of a family. There’s more to it, there’s something different.
Is it in her lips, the way they sometimes stretch too widely over her perfectly white teeth in a smile that feels both unnatural and suspicious?
Is it in the whiplash of her emotions, from rage to sadness to happy in minutes?
Or is the way her hands shake, outwardly showing the bubbling of emotion within?
No. These things make me wary, for sure. But it’s something else, I realise.
She has wild eyes, ones I’ve seen before. Ones I thought I’d never see again. They seem to convey a truth her lips, words and actions try to cover.
You can smile to hide evil thoughts. You can steady your shaking hands and you can win someone over with the proper amount of charm slathered on. But the eyes – they are, truly, the windows into the blackest of black souls. They cannot be encouraged to mask the uncanny truths lurking inside even the craftiest human.
Her eyes threaten to give her away – and what I see in them is something that makes me shudder, something that makes me want to cower underneath the table until she leaves.
I do nothing of the sort, though, ignoring the chill in my blood, shaking aside the fear.
Her wild eyes study me from across the table as she sips her tea, her shaking hands carefully lifting the mug to her perfectly wide lips. I command myself to calm down. What could I possibly have to be afraid of?
Amos rubs my legs now, meowing, before rubbing hers. She reaches down to pet the cat.
And then, the devil cat does something he knows better than to do. He rushes over to the door off the kitchen, the one on the back wall. I wince. He knows better than to go near the door. He’s not allowed over there.
I yell at him, ‘Amos, no!’ How dare he go near there. Fury bubbles inside. We ignore the door. We do not go near that god-awful door.
The hideous creature doesn’t listen to my yelling. He ignores all reason and rules. Instead, he raises a paw to claw the door as if in an act of open rebellion.
Jane is on it, though. She rushes over.
‘Amos, darling, what’s in there? Do you need to go in there?’ She reaches for the doorknob.
Suddenly, the will to move fast is back, and my legs listen.
I leap from my seat, bellowing, ‘Stop!’
She turns to me, a hand on the doorknob.
I rush over, yanking her by her wrist.
She gasps as I tighten my grip on her.
‘What are you doing?’ I scream, inches from her face. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’
Stunned, she tries to say something, but she can’t get out any words.
‘We don’t go in there. We don’t. We don’t,’ I spew out, tears coming to my eyes. My heart races so fast, I think this might be it. This might be where I die, where my heart explodes, a bloody burst of fears, regrets and organs.
‘I didn’t know,’ she retorts. No apology, no concern. She says it with a nonchalance, like she’s talking about the weather or about the oil in the car or about a dirty dish.
‘Don’t touch it. Get away, now!’ I demand, not caring that the moment is ruined, not worried about niceties. My whole body vibrates with uncontrollable anger, every muscle in my body tensed for a fight.
She could’ve ruined everything. She could’ve undone so much. How dare she come in here with those wild eyes and try to ruin it all.
‘I’m leaving now,’ she practically spits at me. She yanks her wrist back, and I reluctantly let go, ready to pounce on her if she reaches towards the door again.
I can barely see her through my blurry eyes, the tears welling. I swipe at my face, my breath shallow and fast.
Amos meows at me, sitting near the door. I lean on the stove, almost burning my hand. I pull it away fast.
She slinks away, out of view. I don’t take my eyes from the door, still staring at the familiar knob even though the tears are fogging my vision.
The front door clicks. She’s gone.
‘Stupid cat,’ I yell, and Amos puts his ears back, meowing as he dashes to another room.
The stupid cat almost did it. He almost did it, indeed.
Chapter 8
I turn the tap on the bathtub as I carefully step over the ledge, a feat I know I won’t be able to do much longer. I’m actually quite impressed with myself that I can pull it off. This old woman’s still got some miles left in her, I guess.
The hot water shockingly scalds my cold toes. I want to leap out, but I don’t want to slip. Wet feet on a tile floor aren’t a good mix. I endure like I always do, my feet blazing. I always make the water too hot.
After the burning sensation has settled to a bearable level, I judiciously lower myself down, clinging desperately to the sides of the claw-foot tub. I don’t want to fall. A broken hip now and I’m a goner. I’ll shrivel up in the water until I either die from starvation or from being waterlogged. Or I’d have to drown myself to put an end to the misery.
I always thought drowning would be a terrible way to go.
Such morbid thoughts, I chide myself. These are the thoughts of a frighteningly dark person, ones that won’t do in old age. In truth, I guess I always had a little bit of a penchant for melancholy.
I lean my head against the ledge of the tub, the pockmark from the chip that’s been there for decades settling against my neck. I stare up at the familiar ceiling, the dusty cobweb in the corner taunting me. How long ago did it take root up there? No matter. It’s not like I can get to it anyway. It will live another day.
I settle my feet against the other end of the tub, thinking about what it would feel like to perish here. The chill of the water as it got colder and colder. The feel of my skin wrinkling, pruning from the waterlog. The endless moments of starvation, of pain, of wanting it all to be over. The harsh reality of being alone, all alone, in the final moments, something that’s always near to my fears.
I sigh, shaking my head.
Yes, Mom always did accuse me of being a dark child, a shadowy character. Maybe that’s why things turned out the way they did. Maybe that’s why it happened. She should’ve known better than to push me, I suppose.
Then again, knowing limitations was never Mom’s thing. Neither was justice. Or maybe she was right and I was just too sinister to tend to.
Maybe if my child were that way, I’d have done the same thing. Of course, I never had the chance to find out, a harsh reality I’ve faced over and over in the past decades.
In reality, I suppose I wasn’t the most typical of little girls growing up. I was the girl caught torturing a dying bird in the corner of the school playground while my sister and her friends jumped rope. I was the girl fascinated by hell after a sermon at church, wondering how Satan chose his cronies. I was the girl drawn to blood in an accident when the other little girls averted their eyes. I was the girl who played with knives instead of dolls, who hid them under her pillow just in case.
I wasn’t like the other girls, it’s true. I wasn’t normal, I suppose. Then again, what’s normal? And I turned out okay, didn’t I?
Maybe my murky thoughts today are understandable, though. Maybe they have a lot to do with yesterday, with what nearly happened.
I’ve almost forgiven Amos.
I’ve almost forgiven her.
She didn’t know. She couldn’t know.
Still, who does she think she is, wandering about to and fro in my house, touching things that aren’t hers? What kind of woman just goes about as if she owns the place? Sure, we were becoming – friends? I don’t know – but still. There are boundaries.
She’s pushed them. I don’t like boundaries being pushed.
I settle into the hot water, relaxing into it, my creaking joints almost sighing audibly at the feel of the water surrounding them. It’s been too long since I’ve afforded myself this luxury. I don’t know why. It’s not like I have anything else to do. Who cares if a bath takes a long time? What else can I do?
I open my eyes, staring at the ceiling again, the swirls always lulling me into a peaceful state. Today, though, staring upward, I feel reminiscent. Sometimes, I don’t want to remember. It’s too painful to think of all those other times in life when I wasn’t lonely, when life was so different. It’s hard to think back to the freedom when now I just feel suffocated and trapped. The window is my only outlet to the real world, and even it dims in comparison to my life experiences.
However, the mind is a curious thing, and despite the fact I know it’ll throw me into a fit of sadness, it takes me wondering back now. Like a time machine, my brain escorts me to a segment of my life when I wasn’t so lonely, a time when I wasn’t the black sheep or a lonely widow. I return to a time when I was on the verge of excitement and newness. It was a moment when it felt like life was opening up instead of closing in on me, a time when a big bathtub and hot water weren’t my greatest excitements.
A time when he was mine.
* * *
My coat wrapped snugly around me, I nestled into my scarf a little tighter as the January air bit into my face. I smoothed together my lips, hoping to redistribute the lipstick after the kiss we shared under the starlit sky.
‘Beautiful night, huh?’ he said, his silky-smooth voice enveloping me, making me feel at ease.
‘A cold night, but beautiful,’ I admitted as he grasped my hand, leading me down the street towards our favourite restaurant.
‘Just like the woman I’m with,’ he replied, and I felt my cheeks warm, my lips turning up into a smile. Just a few simple words, and I was putty in his hands.
We’d been dating for two months at that point, and I felt … different. He made me feel real, made me feel like life was beautiful. In a family where I was often labelled as the odd one and so frequently pushed to the outskirts, he made me feel special. He made me feel worthy. He made me feel like his number one. He made me feel like life could go somewhere, my hand in his. Most of all, he made me feel like the past – that thing I didn’t want to talk about – didn’t matter. None of it mattered with him. I would be better with him.
I never wanted to be owned by a man, by anyone really. I didn’t want my heart to be his and his alone. Then again, I never thought I could be loved like that. I never knew I could actually let love in. But he made me feel otherwise. Those dark eyes, that smile, the sensation of his hand on mine. It gave me hope. It made me think life with him could be different, could be magical, could be beautiful. We could make something of this life, turn it into something grand. Being with him, I could be someone else.
When I saw him, I saw a future, a family, happiness. And when he saw me, he didn’t see my shortcomings – which there were many of – he saw me, pure me, and apparently he liked it because he hadn’t stopped coming around since that first night.
‘I have a surprise for you. I hope you like it,’ he murmured as he opened the door to Jack’s, our favourite restaurant. He smoothed back his hair, a gesture I’d come to learn over the past months. It was his nervous gesture. I liked that I made him a little nervous.
‘Oh, yeah? I hope it’s that cheesecake they took off the menu. Did you talk them into putting it back on?’
‘It’s better than cheesecake,’ he promised, leading me to our booth, our usual table, as the waiter came over to take our order.
Thirty minutes later I learned that the surprise wasn’t cheesecake.
It was forever.
‘I love you. Since the first time I saw you, your heart reached out and grabbed mine. I think I can see forever with you. You make me more confident, more happy, more me. Will you be mine forever? Will you see where this life goes? Will you marry me?’ His words caressed me from across the table, wrapped themselves around my brittle heart.
Tears formed in my eyes and I smiled wider than I thought I ever could.
Down on one knee, this gentle, sweet man was pledging his life to me. And I found myself saying ‘yes’ without thinking.
I said yes to him, to the life we could have, and to the hope that it would be the start of a changed forever, one I never imagined was possible.
* * *
The water is chilling, as my toes tap on the side of the tub. My eyes are wet, but I honestly don’t know if it’s from the bathwater or from the memory.
So long ago. Who was I? Where is that woman with those luscious curls, tight breasts, smooth hands and hope in her eyes now?
I think about that sweet start, the feelings of forever and possibility swirling in my chest. I was happy once. I’ve almost forgotten that over the years, forgotten how happy I was with him that night. I’ve forgotten how he reminded me that I could be happy. I wish I could just go back, live in that moment forever. Such peaceful, optimistic thoughts that day brought.
It’s good to remember, but it stings too. The pain of what can never be again is almost too much to bear. It weighs on my chest, seizing everything inside with a grasp so tight, it threatens to strangle me. Things could’ve been so different. Why weren’t things different? And how could life take such a sharp detour from what I pictured that night at Jack’s?
I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to block out the sad montage that’s destined to play – all the moments and smiles and hardships. If only I’d known then what I know now – if only I could’ve shaken that girl, lost in the promise of love and happiness. If only I could’ve warned her that life wasn’t made on cheesecake promises.
I was too wise, too aware of life’s harsh realities even then to naively believe everything could be happiness. How had I had been so foolish? Maybe I just needed an escape, starved for love, acceptance and forgiveness.
I had things I needed to make up for. I thought he would be the chance to do that. He would be the opportunity I needed to start over, to right so many wrongs and to find fulfilment I hadn’t uncovered. For a short period of time, I saw myself as he did. I could see a person destined for a life of happiness instead of the person I used to be.
I saw a goodness in myself that he had recognised and brought out.
If only I could’ve hung on to that version of myself. There are so many if onlys.
I open my eyes, willing the montage of regret to stop. I stare at the water in the tub, thinking about how hard life is. Thinking about how hard getting old is. Thinking about how much I miss that couple, that girl I was once.
But there’s no going back, not really. What’s done is done, what’s been lived has been lived.
Chapter 9
I think it’s a few days after the door incident when she returns. I – like I so often do – lose track of time, of the days. When you’re my age, every day is so similar that it hardly feels like there’s a point to distinguish between them. They run into each other, every wakeup like the one
before. Calendars become arbitrary when no one is expecting you anywhere. The days just meld into one giant string of moments of survival.
I’m getting the mail, a few advertisements for places I don’t visit and the water bill, when I see her emerge from 312 Bristol Lane. She’s wrapped in a hat, scarf and coat, an early-season frost having settled on the ground.
I study her from the crack in the door, wondering if she’s over what happened. Wondering if she can move on.
She tentatively lifts an arm and then offers a wave and just the hint of a smile. I do the same.
We stare a long moment as if contemplating who will make the first step. It’s her. She pulls her door shut and ambles down her steps, crossing the distance between our houses with ease. I wordlessly gawk at her, mail in my hand, as she bounds up the stairs on my porch and stands before me.
‘Hi.’ Her eyes pierce mine.
‘Hi,’ I reply, the soft word a whisper off my lips.
Once more we stare, not sure who will give in. This time, it’s me.
‘I’m sorry. I just …’
‘It’s okay. You don’t have to explain. But wow, it’s cold. I could use some tea.’
‘Me too.’
And with that, I turn, leading the way into the kitchen and our old habits, pleased that we are able to move past the awkward encounter and stubbornness.
Because I could sure use a cup of tea, and, in truth, I could use company.
We settle into our routine, the shut door lingering in the corner of the kitchen like an elephant. Somehow, though, we both manage to ignore it.
‘So, anything new?’ I ask as she puts the water on, opening the teabags but not yet putting them in the perfectly lined-up mugs.
She shrugs. ‘Same old.’
‘Boy, don’t I know about that,’ I mutter.
A silence lingers between us, one filled with tension. Things aren’t smoothed over between us, not really. Perhaps it’s my fault. There’s still a deafening anger settled in my chest over what could have happened. Maybe it’s irrational after all this time. Maybe it’s ridiculous to blame her.
The Widow Next Door Page 6
