Alex nods, and adds more ketchup to his plate.
Roxy, the Corgi, sits and pants at Harlan’s side, hoping that he will drop a piece of sandwich. The dog is lovingly hungry, a fixture at every meal.
“She’ll have to come home one of these days.” Harlan says. He points a finger at Alex from the side of his roll.
“You promise me something, kid. Don’t move too far away from home. Your parents care too much to let you get too far away from them.”
“I don’t think I’d want to move far away. I love it here, with my friends, and my school.”
“Friends and school are one thing. Family is another. As my own father used to say, at the end of the day, when your job and the rest of your life deserts you, the people who stay to listen to you bitch about it are the ones that really love you.” Harlan playfully taps Cynthia on the shoulder.
“Watch your language, you dirty old man!” She scolds him.
“Who are you calling dirty?” The mayonnaise from his sandwich drips down his chin.
“I just wish she’d come around again. I miss her all the time.” Michael says.
“She just doesn’t understand the value of family, Michael.” Cynthia replies, casting a warm look to Alex.
Lauren looks out the window, into the yard. An object prods at the wall of her mind. She can hear it tapping, like rain on the roof upstairs.
Jim Atkins.
“Well,” Harlan said, taking a drink of his own. “She’ll understand it after one of us is gone.”
Lauren stands abruptly, the chair shooting back from the table, the rest of her sandwich now abandoned on her plate. She walks away in a brisk step, one hand over her mouth, her footfalls padding over the floor becoming fainter and fainter. The rest of those at the table watch her leave—Harlan with his hands raised, Michael shaking his head, Alex’s heart beating fast. Cynthia rises and follows her slowly, casting a glare of pure disappointment back at Harlan. Alex stands up as well, but Michael motions for him to stay. Harlan keeps his hands raised as if surrendering to an armed intruder. Michael’s eyes tell his son, sit down and let Grandma handle this.
“What did I say?” Harlan asks Michael.
“It’s been nearly five years since her brother’s death.” Michael picks up Lauren’s half-eaten plate and moves it to the counter.
Harlan closes his eyes, muttering.
“It’s alright, you didn’t remember.” Michael coughs.
“Didn’t he …” Harlan starts. Michael’s nod finishes the exchange as his hacking finally subsides.
“Yeah, carbon monoxide. She doesn’t talk about it at all, but it has to be weighing on her.”
Alex peers down at Roxy. The corgi never has any problems. She just needs a walk, a hug, and love, and then she’ll put the family’s well being ahead of her own. He pats the dog’s head. The glow of the day is gone.
Lauren cries in the master bedroom. Cynthia follows her carefully. While Lauren is not her blood, her movements look to apologize for Harlan’s words. She pushes through the door. Lauren sits on the bed, its maroon bedspread ruffled. Tears slowly leak down her face from her usually soft eyes, turning red as they bleed emotion. Lauren notices Cynthia as she enters, five years of her past triggered by a sentence.
“I’m sorry,” Lauren manages.
Cynthia offers a compassionate smile, and then joins her on the bed.
“No,” Cynthia says. “I’m sorry. Harlan should know better.”
Lauren shakes her head. “It’s just, as soon as he started mentioning missing people … my brother’s five year anniversary is three days away.”
“I know.” Cynthia takes hold of one of Lauren’s hands. The older woman’s wrinkled skin radiates a sense of love. Lauren holds her hand, tears starting to fall again. Her brother’s face is now free from its compartment.
“I can tell you miss him a lot.” Cynthia whispers.
“I do.” Lauren confirms. She wipes her eyes.
“Do you ever talk to anybody about this stuff?”
“No. It’s too painful.”
“Well, if you ever feel the need, I’m always here.”
“I know, Cynthia. I just find it so hard to believe. He was so young! He had his entire life ahead of him.” Lauren starts to break again.
Cynthia pulls her close. One of Cynthia’s closest friends had passed in a terrible car accident caused by a drunk driver when she had been 18, and every day, Cynthia thinks about years of opportunity lost in a few minutes of time. She’s seen those older, younger, and similarly aged pass before her. Lauren needs to learn not to try and capture a container of compressed air fit to explode; if the vessel isn’t strong enough, it may start to crack.
“Listen to me,” Cynthia says, whispering into Lauren’s ear. Lauren’s breath steadies.
“He’s still with you. He’s always with you.”
“He didn’t want to be here, Cynthia.” Lauren’s words come out shakily, creaking like a weather vane.
“He was in so much pain. All he ever talked about was how he would be scared. He’d be sitting up late at night in the old armchair our father left him, watching something on television. He was a massive fan of baseball, and those Indians. He’d be sitting there in the middle of his house, with nobody. He never married, he never had kids. The closest he came to a son was Alex, and we saw him maybe once a year. I didn’t even really call him too much. But he’d sometimes call me, saying how he was sitting in the middle of his house one minute, and the next he’d be seeing flashes, or explosions. He would always be so ashamed, Cynthia. He would be ashamed to tell his own sister about his problems, but he’d do it anyway. And then by talking to me he felt both guilt, and remorse, and he told me that there was nothing we could do for him because he was beyond all help. I’ll never forget him sounding like a child, whispering to me through that receiver about how they were coming for him, with the bombs and their guns and the face of his companions blown to shreds in the back of his mind.
“And then one day I got a phone call, one I knew was coming but never wanted to answer, knowing that when I picked up the receiver I would hear those few words that nobody should ever have to hear in their entire lives: we did all we could, but it wasn’t enough. My mom and dad were destroyed, Cynthia. My mom can’t walk past a picture of him without crying, without seeing all the things her perfect little boy could’ve been, all that potential, all those memories, gone. And I think to myself, there had to be something I could’ve done to stop this.”
Cynthia doesn’t speak. She squeezes Lauren a little tighter.
Lauren sighs painfully. Shame replaces her sorrow, the frostbite after standing outside in the cold. Her curse is that she disrupts all the benefits of her life. Her family doesn’t deserve such a spastic. Her brother’s face floats in her mind, accompanied by a wave of guilt for her father-in-law sitting in the kitchen.
Alex peaks around the side of the door. He sees his mother embracing his grandmother, her soul a whirlpool slowing to a stop, a lulling break in the middle of a thundercloud. Alex keeps his distance, watching, close enough to help but outside the proximity of hurt. The wall shelters him from his mother’s storm.
Michael views the panorama of his yard from the kitchen window: the patio holding the picnic furniture, the shed that houses unfinished jobs, the cars containing gasoline and machinery—all extensions of a Palace, which houses pain.