Willow

by Julia Hoban

  They look at each other across the table without saying anything, but this time the silence isn’t nearly as uncomfortable.

  “So.” Markie leans forward and looks at Willow with a little of her old sparkle. “Is he part of the reason you haven’t called?” She gestures at Guy, who is standing near the counter, with his back to them. “Because I might forgive you for that.”

  “No, but I havewondered what you would think of him,” Willow confides as she too leans across the table. Their elbows touch and for a moment it is as if they have never been apart.

  “He’s incredibly cute.” Markie glances over at him again. “Is he your . . . boyfriend or something, or just a friend? I mean, who is he?”

  “Well . . .” Willow follows Markie’s eyes. How can she possibly explain what Guy means to her? He’s something far more than a friend. Something other than a boyfriend, a lover maybe, in everything but the technical sense. . . .

  And then she looks back at Markie and says the truest, most honest words that she has ever said to anyone: “He’s someone that knows me, and someone that I know.”

  “Oh.” Markie nods thoughtfully as she takes this in. “Umm, maybe we should talk about something else,” she murmurs. “’Cause he’s headed back this way. You know what?” she continues in her normal voice as Guy approaches the table. “I have to get going, I mean I really don’t want to. I wish I could stay, but my mom’s expecting me, and I’m guessing that you would rather not have her know that I saw you . . .”

  “Definitely, don’t mention it. Please.”

  “Okay, so, I mean, I can’t use running into you as an excuse for why I’m late.” Markie stands up. “Well, I guess that I’ll just have to save everything I wanted to talk about until I hear from you . . .” She says this awkwardly, but her earlier hostility is gone.

  Willow stands up too. “I hope that . . .” she begins, but words fail her. She reaches out to her friend, tentatively, afraid of embracing her when she is so wet. But Markie is not hesitant at all. She grabs Willow in a fierce hug.

  “See you.” Markie lets go after a moment. She looks at Guy, smiles a little, and walks off.

  “Good-bye.” Guy smiles back at her. He sits down in the spot she has just vacated. “Our stuff will be ready in a couple minutes,” he says to Willow.

  “Oh . . . good.” Willow stares at him vacantly. She’s too focused on what happened with Markie to really take in what he’s saying.

  “Everything okay?” he asks. “I mean, was it good to see her?”

  “Well, I’m glad I did, anyway. . . . Listen, do you mind getting the stuff to go?”

  Guy just looks at her.

  “I know, I’m complicated and difficult, but look, you said it was all up to me. I just feel like getting home now. Sorry.”

  “No, no, I mean it’s not that hard to get our stuff to go, and I don’t exactly need to sit in some girly place, but are you sure that this time, you’re ready?”

  “You think this is a girl’splace? All the guys in my school used to love it!”

  “Uh-huh. What kind of guys went to your school? Anyway, are you sure this time?”

  “I’m sure.”

  “Hey, could you wrap that stuff up?” Guy calls over to the woman behind the counter.

  “Well, wait a sec.” Willow tugs on his sleeve. “What’s so girlish about it here?”

  “Describe your napkin.”

  “Pink linen with violets embroidered on it.” Willow shrugs.

  “Right. Okay, let’s go.” Guy gets up and pays at the counter.

  The drive back to the house is uneventful, except for the fact that the rain is coming down as heavily as ever, and that their clothes got even more drenched as they ran to and from the car.

  “Can you hurry up and open the door?” Guy says, his teeth chattering.

  “Sorry.” Willow fumbles in her pocket for the key. “Got it.”

  She opens the door and they both step inside. The house smells musty, it seems obvious somehow that it’s unlived in, empty. “Well,” Willow says as they stand in the entryway shivering in their wet clothes. “We’re here.” She puts down her bag and the cup of hot chocolate, still untouched, on the floor.

  “Okay,” Guy says slowly. He steps closer to her. “What do you want to do now?”

  Willow has no idea what she wants to do. She still hasn’t figured out why she needed to come home in the first place. She’d expected that the moment she entered the house she’d know, that she’d open the door and everything would become clear.

  But nothing is clear. There is no great epiphany. The moment seems as flat and meaningless as before when she stood by the side of the road staring at the place where her parents’ lives ended.

  Willow’s at a loss. Guy seems anxious on her behalf, curious as to what her next move will be.

  “Do you want to see my room?” she asks suddenly.

  Guy looks surprised. It’s clear that this isn’t what he was expecting.

  “Sorry.” Willow shakes her head at how stupid that must have sounded. She isn’t in first grade and she doesn’t want to show him her doll collection. “That didn’t come out right. I meant I have some stuff up there, and we can change into something dry.”

  “Oh great.” Guy nods. “Only, I’m not sure that we’re the same size.”

  “Stop it.” She laughs. “My brother has some things here too. C’mon.” She takes his hand and leads him upstairs.

  “You do have a lot of books,” he says as they enter her room. “I’ve got to say, though, I never pictured you as having black walls.” He wanders over to the bookcases, still holding her hand, and looks at the different titles.

  “Oh, this used to be David’s room, he painted it black,” Willow explains. “When he went to college I inherited it. Now he uses my old room when he visits.” She pauses, aware that she has just used the present tense.

  “Let’s go to my old room,” she says, pulling him down the hall. “My brother keeps his things there. In here.” She opens a door on the right. “Some of this should fit.” Willow frowns as she rummages through the chest of drawers in the corner. “I mean, you are the same height. . . . Here.” She tosses him a sweatshirt and a faded pair of jeans. “I’ll see you in a few minutes. . . . Umm, I’m going to uh, change in my room.” Willow closes the door hurriedly as Guy starts unbuttoning his shirt.

  Willow undoes her braid and runs her fingers through her hair. Markie’s comment had made her feel self-conscious somehow. In any case, it should dry much faster now that it’s loose. She goes through her closet searching for something to wear. She is amazed at all the things she owns, clothes that she has forgotten about, and she wonders if David or Cathy would notice and question her if she brought some of them back with her.

  Maybe I should put a dress on.

  She runs her hands through the folds of the many skirts hanging in her closet. Guy has never seen her in anything like that. . . .

  Willow shakes her head at how frivolous she’s being. The purpose of this visit is not to stage a fashion show. . . .

  Except she really doesn’t know whatthe purpose is. . . .

  “Hey, are you ready in there?” Guy knocks on the door.

  “Uh . . . Just a sec.” Willow steps into a dry pair of jeans and buttons up a shirt. “Come on in,” she calls out.

  “What should I do with these things?” he asks, walking into the room with his wet clothes in his arms. “Hey, your hair is different.”

  “Easier to dry this way.” Willow shrugs.

  “I’ve never seen it like that. It looks beautiful.”

  “Thank you.” Willow blushes, then she looks at him and starts to laugh. “I guess you and David are the same height, but that’s about it.”

  “What’s wrong with what I’m wearing?”

  “Nothing, absolutely nothing, it’s just, well, that sweatshirt is a little small.”

  “Hey, you’re the one who gave me this stuff. . . .”

 
; “No, no, it’s great.” Willow can’t stop laughing. “Listen, promise me that you’ll never stop rowing, I mean really. Even if you end up doing fieldwork, pack a pair of oars or something.”

  “Whatever.” Guy shrugs, but Willow can tell that he’s flattered.

  “Umm, you know what?” She looks at the bundle of wet clothes in his arms. “I guess we should do a load of laundry.” She gathers up her own assortment of dripping things. “C’mon, it’s in the basement.”

  As they walk through the empty rooms, Willow can’t help thinking how strange, how lifeless the house is. No one coming in for the first time would mistake it for the home of a family that has gone on vacation. There is a quality in the air that absolutely forbids such a notion. It is as if the house senses that its occupants are gone, dead, scattered, and has reacted in sympathy.

  Willow stops dead in her tracks halfway down the stairs to the basement. How could she have forgotten what was here? She sinks down onto the steps and stares at the half-dismantled bookcases. The screwdriver, her first accomplice, lies off to one side.

  “What is it?” Guy sits next to her.

  Willow shakes her head. Once again, she feels that she should be overcome, that the sight of this, like the site of the accident, should be her undoing. She wonders why she isn’t in desperate need of her razor, why everything is leaving her cold. She turns to look at Guy and is shocked to see how strongly the sight is affecting him. He is pale, ghostly almost, as he stares at the screwdriver. He is the one who needs to be talked through this.

  “Are you okay?” she asks, concerned. “Guy, are you all right?”

  “I don’t know.” He turns away from the screwdriver and looks at her. “I just know that that has to be the ugliest thing I’ve ever seen in my life.”

  “I’m sorry. I don’t know why I dragged you here.” Willow brushes the hair out of his eyes. “I mean, why I made you drag mehere. I thought . . . I don’t know what I thought.” She shakes her head. “I think I made some connection with David and the way he was that time we came here and the way he cries. . . . But I don’t know, and that doesn’t make any sense anyway. And even if it did, I’ve spent so long not crying, not feeling, making sure that I can’tcry, so . . . why would I be courting it now?” She buries her head in her hands.

  Guy puts his arm around her shoulders, but doesn’t say anything.

  “Maybe I was just supposed to run into Markie,” Willow says. She lifts her head up and looks at him. “Maybe that’s why we came out here.” She shrugs. “I mean, it’s not like I even knew that was going to happen, but . . . Whatever. . . . Look, I guess I’ll just run the wash, and then I might as well get the Bulfinch,and then I don’t know, do you want to wait here until the rain stops before we head back?”

  “Okay, well, at least until the laundry’s done anyway. But are you so sure that you’re finished here?”

  “I don’t even know what it is I came to do,” Willow says as she gets up from the stairs and dumps their clothes into the washing machine. “That’ll take a while.” She puts the detergent in and presses the on button. “So, let’s go back upstairs, and I don’t know, I’ll just get the book. . . .”

  She climbs up the steps dispiritedly. “You want to wait in here?” She gestures toward the living room. “I’m just going to go and get the Bulf inch . . .” Willow doesn’t want Guy to go with her, because there is something she wants to give him, something from her parents’ study, where the Bulfinchis, and she wants it to be a surprise.

  “Are you sure that you want to be alone now?”

  “I’m fine. . . . I just . . . look.” Willow walks him into the living room. “This used to be my favorite place in the whole world to read.” She climbs up on the window seat. “C’mere.” She smiles a little as Guy sits down next to her. “I’ll just be a second, okay?”

  “Take your time.”

  Willow walks down the hall to the study, wondering if the room where her parents spent most of their time, where they did all of their work, will leave her as numb as everything else has. But as she opens the door and surveys the floor-to-ceiling bookcases and huge partners desk with the burgundy leather blotter, she realizes that once again she feels nothing.

  She crosses to the bookcase and pulls out the Bulfinch. Then she looks for a few seconds until she finds Tristes Tropiques. She knows that if David ever finds out that she’s given their father’s copy away, a first edition in perfect condition, he’ll kill her. But she can’t imagine that will be anytime soon, and anyway, she’s sure that it will have meaning for Guy. She desperately wants to give him something special.

  Willow walks around the study for a few moments desultorily picking up random books. There is a fine layer of dust that covers everything like sand. She supposes that there’s something fitting about the way the house now seems like an archaeological site. She sits at the partners desk and leafs through the papers on the blotter, morbidly curious to see what her parents had been occupied with on the last day of their lives.

  There is nothing special, some notes in her father’s barely legible handwriting, a few bills, and a letter to the housekeeper in her mother’s bold script:Hannah,

  Thank you so much for staying late and holping with the party, I couldn’ t have gotten every thing together without you. Don’t worry about the vacuuming today, but when you go to the store could you make sure to get the calcium-enriched orange juice?

  Calcium v.v.imp for Willow!

  Willow takes the note—she thinks maybe that she would like to have it on her desk back at David’s house. She has no other keepsake of any kind. She can’t take a picture, David would certainly notice something like that. There doesn’t seem to be another piece of writing to hand that might be more interesting, anything like that would be on the computer anyway. It’s just a little thing, quite meaningless really, but she would like the small scrap of paper with her mother’s handwriting on it.

  She takes the books and the paper and leaves the study, stopping on the way back to the living room to tuck the copy of Tristes Tropiquesin her bag.

  “Hey, what are you reading?” she asks Guy, who is flipping through a book as he sits on the window seat.

  “You weren’t kidding when you said that your parents had thousands and thousands of books,” he says, gesturing at the shelves in the living room.

  “Oscar Wilde.” Willow sits down next to him and looks at the title he’s holding. “He’s pretty fun. I bet that tutor of yours must have given you a lot of his stuff to read.”

  “What are you holding on to, I mean besides the Bulfinch?” Guy asks, looking at the piece of paper in her hand.

  “Oh just some note my mother wrote. . . . Nothing really.” Willow shrugs. “I’m sorry that I made you drive me here. I mean, it was a lot to ask, and I don’t know how much you minded missing school and . . . Well, it didn’t accomplish anything. Thank you for doing it though.”

  “You don’t have to thank me,” Guy takes the paper from her hand. “Calcium v. v. imp for Willow,”he reads.

  Willow doesn’t realize that she’s crying until Guy takes his hand and reaches over to wipe away her tears. And she knows then that she was right about her brother, that it takes unbelievable strength to feel this kind of grief, and she doesn’t know if she can handle it, because it really hurts, hurts her more than the razor ever could. And she doesn’t know why, after visiting the place where her parents lost their lives, after looking at the spot where she forged her unholy alliance with the screwdriver, that something so simple, so trivial should finally affect her so much.

  Maybe it’s because, as she listened to Guy read the note, she realized as she did when she saw David with Isabelle, that she will never be anyone’s child again. No one will ever worry about her the way that her parents did, or care about her the way they did. The only other time that Willow will ever experience a bond like that is when she herself becomes a mother. And even then she will still need her own mother, and she won’t be there,
she won’t be there because she is dead. Dead. Decades too early.

  And she is amazed, really amazed, that the razor managed to numb her so well and for so long, because the way she’s feeling now is so overwhelming, so overpowering,that it would take a lot more than a few slashes with a blade to transmute her anguish.

  She holds her stomach, afraid that if she doesn’t she will double over from the pain. Guy doesn’t say anything to her, he just holds her hair back from her face and occasionally blots her tears with his hand.

  “I’m . . . I’m . . . not . . .” She chokes on the words. “I’m not anyone’s daughteranymore!” Willow says this as if it is something that she has just figured out. “And I know . . . I know that I should be sorry for my brother, that . . . that . . .” She stops for a second; she’s gasping for air so violently that she thinks she might hyperventilate.

  “Can you breathe?” Guy asks.

  “Yes, I mean no. Just give me a second.” Willow wipes her nose with the back of her hand. “That was polite, I’m sorry.” She laughs, a little hysterically. “I can’t breathe when I cry really hard. . . . And I can’t remember . . . the last time I cried like this. . . .”

  She stops talking for a second and tries to dry her eyes. But it’s useless, like trying to stem a tidal wave. Her hands get entangled with his and she grips his wrists and turns to face him as they sit side by side on the window seat.

  “I should . . . feel sorry for David because he doesn’t have parents either. And I know . . . I know that . . . that I should be sorry for my parents because they didn’t wake up that morning knowing that they were never going to see another day. . . .” She squeezes his hands so tightly that she wonders why he doesn’t cry out in pain. “But all I can think about is that I’m not anyone’s daughteranymore. . . .”

  She stops, once more overcome with tears, and gasps for breath.