Chapter 449
Mia
I pull out another photo. This one is recent. Three weeks ago.
My fingers catch on the glossy edge and for a second it sticks to the one beneath it, that static cling photos get when they’ve been stacked too long in a box. I have to peel them apart carefully.
Madison in her school play. She’s dressed as a tree.
The costume is homemade–I can see the places where I rushed, where the hot glue strings show white against the brown poster board we wrapped around her middle for the trunk. Brown tights on her legs, the kind that bag a little at the knees because I bought them a size too big so she could wear them again.
In the photo she’s on stage, caught mid–performance under those harsh auditorium lights that wash out everyone’s faces. She’s standing perfectly still.
She’s not moving. Just being trees.
“She took it very seriously,” I say.
My voice sounds strange in my own ears. Distant. Like I’m hearing myself speak from the other end of a tunnel.
“Practiced standing still for days. Said trees don’t move so she couldn’t move either p>
Kyle takes the photo from my hand.
His thumb traces the edge of Madison’s green–paper branches in the photo.
A yawn catches me. Comes up from somewhere deep in my chest, forcing my jaw open so wide something clicks near my ear.
“Sorry,” I say when it passes, when I can close my mouth again. My eyes are watering from it.
“Don’t apologize p>
I reach for another photo.
My hand moves through the air and I watch it like it belongs to someone else. Miss the edge. Close on nothing.
I blink. Try again.
This time I catch it. The edges are slightly bent, someone–probably Alexander–grabbed it wrong once.
This one shows all three children in the kitchen. Our kitchen. I can see the edge of the refrigerator in the frame, covered in their artwork held up with magnets. Ethan has flour on his face, a coating, like someone took a powder puff to him. Alexander has chocolate on his shirt, a brown handprint. Madison has both. Flour and chocolate.
They’re standing in front of the counter and the disaster behind them is magnificent. Eggshells. Spilled sugar.
“That was last Sunday,” I say.“They wanted to make me breakfast. Made brownies instead because p>
Another yawn.
“Because Ethan said breakfast food is too complicated p>
“Are brownies not complicated?” Kyle asks.
“Apparently not. They’d watched a YouTube video p>
I blink. Once. Twice.
“The brownies were terrible. Completely inedible. But they were so proud p>
The photo is still in my hands but I can’t remember what I’m supposed to do with it. I stare at the three chocolate–and–flour–covered faces and they blur slightly. Come back into focus. Blur again.
Kyle is watching me.
“You’re exhausted,” he says.
Another yawn cuts me off. This one so wide my eyes water, tears pooling at the corners and threatening to spill over.
“Okay,” I admit when I can speak again. “Maybe a little tired p>
Kyle sets down the photo. The soft click of it against the coffee table. Then he shifts on the couch, the leather creaking slightly under his weight. Not moving away. Moving toward.
“Lie down p>
“Lie down,” Kyle says again.
I lie down.
The couch cushions accept my weight like an old friend.
The fabric is rough against my cheek. That textured upholstery that was supposed to be stain–resistant. It smells like laundry detergent–the lavender kind I buy in bulk from Costco. And underneath that, something earthier. Dog. Gas sleeps on this couch. Has claimed this armrest as her favorite napping spot. There are probably dog hairs embedded in the weave. I should vacuum it.
The thought drifts away before I can hold onto it.
I pull my feet up. Curl on my side.
Behind me, Kyle is quiet.
The apartment settles around us. The specific silence of a place in the small hours. The refrigerator hums in the kitchen, a sound I usually don’t notice but now seems loud in the quiet. The heating system clicks. Metal expanding. The radiator by the window makes a soft hissing sound.
I can hear Kyle breathing.
That slight wheeze.
My eyes close.
Just for a second.
I’ll open them in a moment. In just a moment.
Something cool touches my forehead.
The sensation pulls me sideways. Not quite awake. Not quite asleep. Suspended in that space between where everything is soft and undefined and possible.
A pressure. Gentle.
Cool air–his breath–against my skin first. Then. His lips.
His lips are cool.
Then he pulls away.
My eyelids are too heavy to open.
Something warm settles over me.
A blanket. The gray one from the back of the couch–I know it by the feel of it. Fleece. Soft. One corner is frayed where Gas chewed it two years ago.
I’m falling.
Down.
Down.
The garden is wrong.
I’m standing at the edge of it. The flagstone path under my feet that Dad laid the summer I turned ten.
The stones are warm under my bare feet. The sun has been on them all day. I can feel the heat through my skin. Individual grains of stone pressing into my soles, rough and real.
I look down at my feet. Child feet. Small. A bandaid on my left big toe. Green. I remember that bandaid. Remember stubbing my toe on the coffee table three days ago. Remember crying. Remember Mom kissing it better before applying the bandaid.
I’m wearing my cutoff jean shorts. The ones that used to be full length until I outgrew them. Mom cut them off at the knee rather as I like that jeans. The denim is soft from washing, frayed at the edges. There’s a grass stain on the left thigh that never fully came out.
My t–shirt is blue. “Art is Life” in faded white letters across the chest. A gift from Mom on my thirteenth birthday. Before she got sick. Before everything changed.
The garden spreads before me.
The roses are where they should be. Mom’s roses. The ones she planted when we first moved into this house. When I was seven and everything was still good.
But the grass around them is too long. Way too long.
It comes up to my shins. The green is darker than it should be, that deep almost–blue green that grass gets when it hasn’t been cut in weeks. Seed heads wave in the breeze, gone to seed, the lawn given up on being a lawn and deciding to become a meadow instead.
Dad hasn’t mowed it.
Nobody has.
The flowerbeds are overgrown too. Weeds push up between the roses. Dandelions gone to white puffs. Crabgrass spreading in thick mats.
The garden is dying.
The sun is bright. So bright it hurts to look at the sky. That white–blue brightness of afternoon. Three o’clock maybe. Four. School just ended. Or maybe it’s Saturday. I can’t remember.
I walk into the garden.
My bare feet sink into the too–long grass. It’s soft. Cushioned. Each step releases a green smell–chlorophyll and earth and growing things. The seed heads brush against my shins. Some of them stick to my socks.
I’m not wearing socks.
I look down. No socks. Just bare feet and grass and the flagstone path I’ve already left behind.
I walk toward the roses.
The heat is oppressive. The kind of heat that makes the air shimmer. Makes everything seem slightly unreal. The edges of things blur.
I reach the flowerbed and kneel down.