Let Go

by Alexandra Winter

  When I lift a stack and move it over to the fireplace, an envelope falls out. I wouldn’t usually care, but this one catches my attention. On the top left-hand corner are three letters in a logo. DAP. My heart races. Underneath them are the words I’ve waited to see for as long as I can remember. Design e Arte Porto. I drop the stack of newspapers and grab the envelope from the floor. It’s empty.

  TRAVEL

  I fall to my knees, spreading every newspaper open, shaking them for any loose pages to fall out.

  It has to be here.

  Nothing drops. There can’t be an open envelope with no letter. As if my hands have a life and a mission of their own, they shove the pile around, frantically grasping the sheets of paper, ripping them off. The scent of wet ink snaps my brain on. I won’t find anything like this. So, systematically, I pull the pile back together, take one newspaper at a time, turn every page, one by one. No letter.

  A cool breeze travels past me, alerting me that Mom and Nana have arrived.

  “There are chairs in this house. No need to read on the floor.” Nana stands behind me, adjusting her glasses.

  I hold the empty envelope up so she can see. My hand is shaking, and I have to concentrate to keep it still enough for her to read it. She bends down, squints and gasps. “Did you get the scholarship?”

  “I don’t know,” I say, lifting a bunch of papers, shaking them. My voice breaks as I moan. “It’s not here.” I recall the remaining stack of papers outside and run out, past Mom in the hallway who’s closing the front door. I rip it open and grab the rest of the newspapers. It has to be in between these.

  Mom stops me on my way back in. “What is going on?”

  “I found an envelope from DAP.”

  “What? They responded already?”

  Mom frowns, probably concluding the same as I have. It’s too early. It means I haven’t received the scholarship. But I have to read the words of decline to make sure. “You didn’t know?”

  “Of course not.” Mom holds her hands out to take the newspapers from me, not knowing the letter might be in between one of them.

  “The envelope was in between the papers inside.” I pull the stack in with me to the living room and place it far from the others as not to mix what I’ve already searched through. I lift one by one, shake it, turning the pages to make sure I don’t overlook it. Mom’s on her knees copying me.

  Nana’s gentle voice commands our attention. “Found it.”

  She’s standing next to the fireplace, holding out a folded page covered in soot. She brushes it off and blows the loose ash into the leftover coal. My hand shakes as my fingers touch the paper. I look at Nana, at Mom behind me, then at the page. I’ve been holding my breath when I open my mouth to read out loud, my voice trembling.

  Dear Amalie Skar Vogt,

  Congratulations.

  We have selected you as one of our finalists for the DAP scholarships…

  My voice cracks, refusing to read on.

  I’m a finalist.

  Nana pulls out a handkerchief from her pocket, removes her glasses and dabs at her eyes. Mom throws her arms around me. “Oh, Amalie.”

  It’s not over. I still have a chance. I’m through to another round.

  A cold chill spreads through me. Dad knew about this. He knew there was another round, he said so two hours ago. I wiggle out of Mom’s arms, ready to ask her about it when tears brim in her eyes.

  “I’m so happy for you,” she says.

  How can I ruin this moment? I can’t.

  Nana lifts my chin, and holding my gaze she says, “Be proud, Amalie. You are a finalist.”

  I hand her the letter. She dries her eyes, adjusts her glasses and reads out loud, her voice steady, ending each sentence on a lower note, giving every word even more significance. “This year, we received three thousand and forty-one applications.” She pauses and smiles, before reading on. “You have been chosen as one of thirty finalists, competing for our two scholarships. All our finalists must send three designs from their portfolio representing their work. The theme for this year is family, so they must also design a poster, showing his or her family today, accompanied by an essay explaining a family struggle, how both can be improved and why it should. The jury will focus their verdict on the applicant’s portfolio, but also on how the essay compares to and reflects on their poster.”

  Family. At this moment, all I can think about is whether Dad opened my letter. “Nana? Where did you find it?”

  Nana brushes soot off the burn marks on the right edge of the page before pointing to the fireplace. “In the back.”

  I walk over and stick my head in to see where she means. The only way a letter ends up in the back of the fireplace is if someone throws it in there. Luckily, it was thrown in too hard, past the flames.

  “Mom?”

  Her eyes dart from the fireplace to me, to the letter and back faster and faster until she speaks in a high-pitched voice. “You beat over three thousand people, Amalie.” Mom takes my hands, squeezing them lovingly in hers. “You are moving to Portugal.”

  I can’t let it go. Mom knows Dad did this. It’s written all over her face. “Why did he do this?”

  Nana takes a seat on the living room sofa as if to step out of the conversation. Mom runs up to the second floor, calling for me to follow her. “I have a surprise for you, Amalie.”

  Distress pulls at me as I want to push on with my suspicion, force Mom to acknowledge that Dad opened my letter, and tried to burn it. The room is spinning. “I have to start my new application,” I say. They both seem to understand the letter didn’t walk itself into the fire, and if neither of them did it, there is only one person left in this house who could have. Still, both Mom and Nana seem keen on changing the subject, looking forward, so I’ll talk to Dad myself about it later. I run upstairs after Mom.

  Nana grins at me. “Follow Celina. But don’t tell your father.”

  I catch up with Mom. She pulls down the hatch for the attic stairs and disappears into the ceiling where she’s moving things around over me.

  “Nana gave me this when I was nineteen,” she calls through the attic floor. When Mom appears in the opening, she holds an old bright yellow suitcase with white dots and a white hem along the edges. It reminds me of a child’s suitcase, with a white handle on top. Mom hands it down to me. “I’d been offered a job as a chef at Le Chancé in London. I didn’t have anything to travel with, so Nana surprised me with this.”

  There are no marks on it, only dust. Mom pushes the ladder up and closes the hatch while I bring the suitcase down to the living room. I place it on the light gray carpet in front of Nana, who lights up at the sight of it.

  “It deserves a trip,” she says.

  Mom carefully dusts the lid off with her sleeve before flicking open the two steel locks. In a small pocket of the lining is a darkened, silver-framed photograph of her and Nana. Mom poses proudly with the suitcase in her hands. She’s wearing a light blue tucked-in shirt and high-waisted skinny jeans. Elegant. I’ve always wanted to look like her.

  She hands me the picture, and I study the image. Like me, Mom looks nothing like her mother at that age. “This is taken the day before I learned I was pregnant with you, Amalie. The greatest day of my life. It completely changed me.”

  “But what happened to the job?”

  “Le Chancé didn’t matter anymore. None of it did. Only you.” She closes the suitcase and brushes off more dust still settled on its lid. Like fog from the past, it spreads in the air around her. “Now, it’s your turn to have this and take it along on your travels.”

  I never realized I got in the way of my mother’s life in London, but at this moment, I’m even more grateful for her and her choice to stay here and have me.

  Nana leans forward. “What your mother doesn’t know is that I bought this for myself when I was young. Then, before I could pursue my dream of travel, I met your grandfather and we married.”

  “You can still trave
l,” I say.

  “Oh no, I could never leave with Grandpa in the hospital.”

  “Why didn’t you travel before?”

  “He feared airplanes, and me traveling without him.” Her voice changes, turning thick. “There’s still time.”

  I turn to Mom. “Was Dad going with you to London?”

  “Yes, he got a job at one of those fancy sports car companies. He was truly looking forward to it.”

  Why hadn’t I heard about any of this before? How would our lives be different today if we lived in London? At least Mr. Skar might finally be happy with Dad’s career. I recall Dad’s face earlier today, referring to Skar’s as a failure. He gave up his dream for me. No wonder he’s had bad days.

  Mom stops smiling. “Let’s not show your Dad the suitcase quite yet, though.”

  Nana nods in agreement.

  “I’ll show him if he admits throwing my letter away,” I say.

  “I’m sure that’s a misunderstanding.” Mom’s joy in talking about her past is gone as if someone scared it off. She ruffles her hair, and I watch the color in her face drain away.

  “Mom, are you okay?”

  She glances at Nana before turning back to me. “Don’t tell your father about this.” Her body is tense when she pulls me close.

  Hearing her heart beat faster, mine copies hers. “I won’t.”

  Mom closes the suitcase and hands it to me. “Why don’t you put this in your room and I’ll start lunch.”

  Although I want to ask more, I decide not to. I head upstairs, shove the suitcase under my bed before pulling out my sketchbook from my desk drawer. “A poster of my family with an essay connected to it” is what they want. I stare at the blank page with no idea how to portray my family. Should I show us the way I would like people to perceive us, or how Dad almost ruined my shot at this scholarship?

  When Mom calls me down for lunch, I have three stick figures on the page, one strangling the other. I rip it in half and throw it in the trashcan. Usually, I’d call Miss Ask, but after her meeting Dad, I don’t want to.

  “Why didn’t you travel, Nana? Really?” There’s no way Grandpa would keep her from following her dreams. He adores her.

  “I was scared how others would perceive me, and let that dictate my life choices. It was never common for women to travel alone back then, not like it is today. It’s taken me a long time not to live my life by what people around me expect. Or, what I believe they expect of me.” She pauses, then her glasses lift with her smile. “Portugal was and is my dream destination. So, it pleases me that soon your mother and I might visit you there.”

  I reflect on my own life, the choices I’ve made, and realize I’ve done the same as Nana. I applied to DAP to please Nana; I work at Skar’s to please Dad. I remember all the nights I’ve spent designing in my room, only for me. Designs I haven’t shown anyone yet. “How do you know the difference?”

  “In what?”

  “How you live a life for yourself from what others expect from you?”

  “Yes. Well, you see. Expectations ruin lives every day. My rule is simple. Any choice or action I can put the word should in front of is usually for others. What I do without thinking about, sometimes feeling selfish about, that is for me. You see, women my age are raised to put others first.”

  Not just women your age.

  “So, it’s like on an airplane then, when the oxygen levels drop. You put your own mask on first before helping others.” I saw it in a movie once, and it always stuck with me knowing my first instinct would be to put on my mask last which would kill me.

  “You have to breathe to help others, so yes.”

  Mom cuts in. “Speaking of others, how did it go with William?”

  “He asked me to meet him in Oslo this week. But I’m not going.” I don’t know why I said that.

  Before I can explain, Nana responds. “Probably for the best.”

  Mom says, “If you follow your family history, William will change the direction of your life.” She laughs, and I recall how they both, at my age, gave up on their dreams.

  “Someone has to break that curse,” I say. They both frown, and I use the moment to excuse myself from the table to continue my designs. No man will decide what I can and cannot do. At the same time as I think this, Dad’s comment about us working together as a team catches me off guard. Does he want that or did he say that to convince me not to go to Portugal? I’ll talk to him about it when he gets home from work, anxious at the thought, hoping deep down he has good reasons for my suspicions.

  I turn to Nana again. “Why did you dream of Portugal? There are so many places to choose from.”

  “Fado and the Douro Valley,” she says.

  “Music and wine? You get that other places as well.” They are so happy for me, I worry about how they will take it if I’m not good enough. “Let’s not book any flights yet.”

  CHOOSE

  At five o’clock the following morning, I’m at my desk staring at the blank page taunting me.

  Come on, think.

  How can I show my family on a poster? Who should I include? This is my opportunity to prove to Dad I’m good enough, that it’s not just a hobby. If I get that scholarship, he has to see that.

  If the school chooses me, dreams do come true after all. If I can do it, so can Dad. It also means I won’t see Nana or Mom for a while. I’ll have to begin my life all over, in a foreign country where I don’t speak the language. Thankfully, my classes are in English so they won’t be a problem, but how can I make friends if I don’t speak the language? My mouth drops.

  I don’t speak Portuguese.

  I grab a Post-it and scribble down Learn Portuguese! and hang the note above my computer screen, making it impossible to overlook. But first, I have to design a poster and write an essay that will get me there.

  I stare at the blank page again, waiting for inspiration. Nothing. All I can think of is letting Nana and Mom down if I’m not good enough, if I am a sheep.

  And William. He keeps popping into my mind. I haven’t talked to him since he asked me to visit him in Oslo, and I can’t text him. That will give him a chance to reject me, give him the upper hand.

  Dad’s voice snickers in my head from when he advised Mr. Dahl about Josefine making the first move on a boy at school. “She has to understand she’s embarrassing herself by making the first move. You know this, my friend. If a man doesn’t contact a woman, he’s not interested. She’s setting herself up to be used. Not smart.”

  I shake my head to get both William and Dad out of it, but William sticks. His full lips and green eyes won’t go away. Thinking about him won’t help me at all. I whisper to myself with gritted teeth, “Get out of my head, please.”

  He doesn’t, so I walk downstairs, make myself a cup of tea, and cock my head back and forth like a boxer would to warm up. I’m ready to fight my lack of creativity, force inspiration to blossom.

  An hour later, all I have are those same three stickmen I threw away yesterday. This is hopeless.

  My door creaks. Mom must have felt my frustration, so I turn my chair around to discuss it with her. But she’s not there. It’s Dad, with his arms folded over his chest. He’s usually not awake this early, but it gives me an opportunity to ask him about the letter from DAP.

  “Do I look like a maid to you?”

  “What?”

  He springs the door open wide, and like a lineman on a soccer field, he points out the door. “Go clean up after yourself, instead of doodling in your room. This house is not a hotel.”

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

  Walking downstairs, he’s on my heels. “This so-called art of yours, how you put your emotions above work, that’s why people don’t make it in this world.”

  I stop halfway down the stairs. “What are you talking about?”

  “I’m running our family business. I started it for us! Do you want to end up like Balder? Painting all day and folding
napkins? His parents are both lawyers, and you should have seen the disappointment on their faces when he quit their firm. The shame.”

  I don’t want to discuss Mr. Jensen; he’s my friend too. “If his parents don’t approve, that’s just sad.”

  “It’s not sad.” Dad points to the kitchen. “It’s his doing, his choice to disappoint them. After everything they have sacrificed for him, raising him.”

  While I continue to walk down, Dad continues to talk about how lucky Mr. Jensen has been to grow up in such a good home. I scan the kitchen to find what I have forgotten to clean up. The countertops are clean; there is no mess. “What did I do?”

  “Seriously?” He marches over to the sink, and pulls up a teabag, dangling it in front of me. “Do you think this walks into the garbage by itself?” He tosses it into the trash.

  It just did.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “No, you’re not. Your mother spoils you too much for you to understand. You know what?” He barges out of the kitchen, yelling as he walks away. “Don’t bother coming to work today.”

  “Because of a tea bag?”

  Have you gone mad?

  “How can I count on you, huh? You don’t care about anything but yourself. Expecting me to clean up after you?”

  This has nothing to do with this tea bag.

  My mind goes blank but my pulse increases in my chest. “I put everything into Skar’s. How can you say this?”

  No response, only the sound of the closet doors shutting from the hallway telling me he got his coat out and is leaving. My head hurts from the anger building up inside until it bursts out of me. I yell back, for the first time in my life, I actually yell back. “I take it seriously!”

  Running after him, I have no plan, but I can’t hold my thoughts back anymore. Nothing I ever do is good enough for him. “It’s a tea bag, I forgot it!”