Chapter Two
I can’t believe that I’m back. Avila’s trepidation about returning to Charleston resurrected itself. She clutched the steering wheel of her used sedan, glancing
at the WELCOME TO CHARLESTON sign as she approached a red light. The cobblestone sidewalk was filled with passersby and tourists, all busy window-shopping
or taking photos near the historic landmarks. As she drove toward the residential area, the stores were replaced by small
ranch homes, some with siding, others of brick.
“The GPS says we’re about a mile from the hotel,” Ebony said, looking up from her phone and observing the small town.
Terence’s parents lived two doors down from her mother’s house. Avila didn’t want to stay there and risk crossing paths with
them. That could lead to conversations about Terence. Booking a hotel was costly, but it would help her keep her distance.
She saw the sign for the rustic inn and pulled into the parking lot. Avila quickly stepped out, not wanting to see more of
Charleston than she had to, and grabbed their luggage from the trunk. She immediately went to the registration desk.
“Mom!” Ebony shouted behind her. “Wait up.”
“Sorry, hon.” Avila returned to the sliding door entrance. “I thought you were behind me.”
Ebony slung her backpack over her shoulders and rolled her eyes.
Avila headed over to check in at the registration desk. She handed the guest services person her credit card, and she swiped
it.
“Your card was declined.”
That had to be a mistake. “What?”
“I can try it again.”
“Hold on a sec.” Avila pulled her phone from her back pocket and logged into her credit card account. She had just paid the
bill to create some room on the card, but when she looked at the balance, she cringed. She had paid for Ebony’s acting lessons
for January, and the payment she had made on the card hadn’t cleared yet. The payment probably wouldn’t clear for a few more
days. Great. Where would they sleep in the interim?
This was embarrassing. “I’m sorry. I made a payment on my card, but it hasn’t been posted yet.”
The clerk gave her an empathetic look, and Avila glanced away, not wanting to meet her gaze.
Ebony gave her an empathetic look too. This was doubly embarrassing.
“Guess we’re staying at your grandmother’s house after all. Let’s go, Eb.” She rolled their suitcases back to the car and
loaded them in the trunk. Ms. Mable had mailed her the key to the house in the letter she had sent, so it wouldn’t be a problem
getting inside.
As soon as they returned to the car, she said, “Sorry, Ebony.”
Her daughter was quiet. She was probably really disappointed in Avila. Avila put the address for her mother’s house in the GPS, and it guided her out of the parking lot and toward the place she once called home.
“Beautiful town. So different from New Brunswick,” her daughter said. She pointed to Avila’s left. “Is that the church where
your mom used to take you?”
She glanced at the towering place of worship. “Yes.”
Ebony snapped a photo of it with her mother’s cell phone camera. She’d probably enjoy the view from the bell tower, Avila
thought. Folks said that you could see all of Charleston from that bell tower, but Avila had never been up there. She’d always
been afraid of heights. On top of that, she hadn’t stepped foot in a church since she had left town, and the only reason she’d
step foot into one again was for her mother’s funeral Mass.
Ebony always said that she wanted Avila to attend the Wednesday morning school Mass since parents were welcome, but she always
declined.
Avila’s mother used to say that going to church every Sunday kept her grounded, but Avila questioned that. After her father
left them, her mother grew impatient. She’d get so upset over Avila spilling juice on the kitchen floor or whenever she took
extra-long to get ready for school in the morning. Perhaps her mother was tired from working a late-night shift; perhaps her
mother was trying very hard to keep the family together and so little things like that set her off. But it still hurt.
When Avila left this town, she left religion too. The only reason why she had Ebony in that Catholic school was because Avila
had attended parochial school, and it led to an acceptance letter from Princeton University. Avila never finished at Princeton
but still...
“It’s really nice out here,” Ebony said.
Ebony’s sudden interest in the town threw Avila for a loop. When Avila had first brought up the fact that they were going down South for her grandmother Coraline’s funeral, all she heard were complaints. Can’t I stay here? I don’t want to leave. I hope we’re not down there for too long. Why do we only travel for funerals? Why
can’t we go on a vacation like normal people?
That last question had really bothered Avila. Ebony knew why they couldn’t just spend a weekend in Paris like her friends,
but Avila didn’t want to get into all of that at a time like this.
“How come you never took me here before?” Ebony asked.
Loaded question. Avila surveyed the bell tower. Her mother’s casket would be taken to that very church on Saturday. And Avila
would see her for the first time in over a decade. Her heart crimped.
“That bell tower—the entire cathedral, in fact—was designed and built by graduates from Claflin University in 1885. They were
a small group of Black Catholics who wanted a parish of their own, a rarity even now. They sought permission from the diocese
to create one, and it still stands today,” Avila commented.
“Permission?” Ebony said the word with disdain in her voice.
“That’s how it is in the church. I’m pretty sure the racial dynamics of the time made the process even worse for those who
wanted to build the church, seeing that the ecclesiastical authorities were all white. It wasn’t named a cathedral until after
desegregation.”
“Yeah, I can definitely see that.” Ebony’s gaze shifted to her mother. “Can we explore the town during our trip?”
“What’s there to explore?” Avila said, a note of defensiveness in her voice.
“Mom, you literally just told me an important piece of history. I’m sure there’s a lot more here to learn about.”
She was right, of course, but Avila had only planned to attend the funeral, go to the probate court, meet with a few real
estate agents, select one, and that was it. They were only here during school break. There wasn’t much time to explore. And
even if there was time, Avila didn’t want to do that at all.
“Please, Mom?”
The pleading in her daughter’s voice tugged at her. She rarely heard that tone these days, not since Ebony was very small. It brought back memories of the happier times between them.
“Maybe. But I’m not promising anything.” Avila hooked a left onto King Street, and they passed a Greek diner and a bridal
shop.
“Can I meet Terence? Does he know that you’re here?”
The question caught Avila off guard. She’d been talking about Terence since Ebony was little, but she wasn’t planning on telling
him that she was in Charleston. For all Avila knew, Terence could still be living in Virginia with his wife and family.
“Um. There’s no need for that.”
She saw the sign for her old street, and her heart skipped. “We’re almost there.”
Three minutes later, the home of her youth was in sight. The pale yellow vinyl siding was dirtied with age and the elements,
and the railing along the front porch steps was broken and lopsided.
Avila parked underneath the carport, glanced over at the home, and then got their luggage from the trunk. Once that was done, she surveyed the property. Weeds were everywhere, and the grass was as high as her knees. Odd. Her mother had always kept up the place. When was the last time the lawn was mowed? From the looks of it, it was a long time ago.
As a child, Avila loved to watch her mom spend hours in the garden. With a sun hat on her head and gardening gloves on her
hands, Coraline would pull up all the weeds and take care of the flowers that bloomed there, poinsettias and lilies and roses.
Once, her mother had also purchased a pair of kid-size gardening gloves, along with a sun hat, and had presented them to Avila.
“Now we can garden together,” her mother had said with a smile. Spending that time with her mother in the garden was a cherished
memory. Something she missed even to this day.
Her pulse quickened. This was too much. How was she going to focus on fixing this place when every inch of the property reminded
her of the mother she had lost? Of the choices she had made to never return?
The place looked beyond neglected. The short holiday break wasn’t going to be enough time to get this house ready for market.
How would she manage?
Ebony took her suitcase and headed to the front entrance, and Avila followed.
“Wait a sec,” she said. “Let me take a look at the perimeter of this property. See what I’m getting myself into.”
She headed to the fence that led to the backyard and unlatched the gate. It creaked open. Yep. The grass still grazed her
knees. The siding needed a good power wash. Avila stopped at the sight. Her old playhouse was still there, molded and dirtied
and weathered from the elements, but present nonetheless.
A tinge of bittersweetness returned with another memory, one she’d long forgotten. She and her mother used to play make -believe here when she was little. Then, as her mother took a second job to try to compensate for her father’s gambling habit, Avila had spent hours here in the backyard, alone.
Her mom was a complex woman, battling stressors that Avila would never understand. Those stressors brought out the worst in
her at times.
Avila walked around to the front of the house and opened the screen door. She tried to shove the key into the lock, but it
was tough to do. She jammed the key in there a couple more times until it finally went all the way through. Then she jimmied
the key a few more times to get the door to open. “I gotta put some WD-40 in this thing,” she said. She made a mental note
to do just that.
After a few moments, the door swung open and the familiar scent of Pine-Sol greeted her. Her mother had a thing for keeping
everything spic-and-span clean. This was how her mother usually kept up with things. The outside? Not so much.
“Smells fresh in here.” Ebony inhaled deeply.
Her mother was all over this house, from the photos of Avila that lined the wall and captured every year of her childhood;
to the altar in the corner that displayed three Santo Nino statues, multiple Virgin Marys, and a crucifix; to the desk in
the living room that held all of her mother’s meticulously organized mail and paperwork. This house was all Mom.
“Grandma was... organized.”
“Very organized,” Avila said without a second thought. “So the fact that the outside of the house looks so janky is odd. She
always kept up with things.”
“She was fifty-five, you know. Maybe she could only do so much in her senior years.”
“Fifty-five isn’t old, you know.”
Ebony shrugged. “To me it is.”
Something else must’ve been going on with her mother for her to have let the exterior of the home fall into such disrepair.
A wave of guilt washed over Avila. She should’ve checked in on her mother more often, regardless of how busy she had become,
but her pride kept her from doing so.
Avila opened the back patio door, and fresh air filtered into the home. She glanced over at the kitchen. It was also nice
and neat. The dishes were neatly placed in the drying rack next to the stainless steel sink. The drying towel was neatly folded.
Her mother always laid a fresh one out every evening.
There was a coat rack by the front door from which hung a raincoat, a navy cardigan, and a light gray jacket. They were the
same three pieces of outerwear that Coraline had kept with her since Avila was a child. Her mother wasn’t a pack rat, but
she somehow managed to preserve her belongings.
Seeing the remnants of her mother’s life here made her imagine what it was like for her in her last moments. Did she have
the stroke in the house? Perhaps. Avila had to ask Ms. Mable. A part of her heart broke over the fact that she wasn’t here
to help, and that too gave her all kinds of complicated feelings.
Ebony walked around the space, seemingly intrigued by the home. “How come you never brought me here to meet her?”
The question weighed heavily between them. Avila never had told Ebony about the shame she had felt about failing at her career.
“I don’t know. Life got in the way.”
Ebony’s expression flickered. “I feel bad that I never met her.”
Avila glanced away. She felt bad too. She sensed her daughter’s gaze, heavy and thick.
“Where was your room?”
The interest in Ebony’s voice took her by surprise. “Over there.” She pointed to the narrow hallway. “Second door on the left.”
They approached that area, and Avila took a deep breath. When she was packing to leave for Princeton University right before
the first day of classes, she had huge hopes for the future. She used to imagine returning to Charleston as an established
Broadway star, maybe even a Tony Award winner. Everyone in the town would welcome and applaud her accomplishments. That was
what Avila had wanted, anything to fill the void caused by her father’s abandonment.
None of that happened, and the void still remained.
Ebony turned the knob and nudged the door open. She stepped inside. Avila followed behind her and let out a soft gasp at the
sight. The room hadn’t changed one bit.
Her twin-size four-poster bed was still there, with the peach-covered fitted sheets and matching pillowcases. The heavy comforter
in a matching shade, distinguished by intricately embroidered tulips at the edge, was neatly arranged atop the mattress. The
walls of her room displayed pictures of 112, Whitney Houston, Faith Evans, and Sade, Avila’s perennial favorite artists. A
small white desk was built into the corner of her room, and there was a small shelf built into the wall. At her insistence,
her father created it for her.
She opened the curtains and the blinds. The sunlight shone brightly on her mahogany dresser but didn’t reveal a speck of dust.
Her mother had kept this room tidy too. Interesting.
“Should I sleep in this room?”
The question caught Avila off guard. An eight-by-ten photo featuring the family of three was displayed proudly on the dresser table. Avila was nine in the photo. Her father had just been laid off, and their family was beginning to show the first sign of cracks.
“Mom?”
Ebony’s voice pulled her back to the present. “Um. Sure. You can definitely sleep in my old room. I’ll give you some time
to unpack.”
Avila left. She planned to sleep on the couch in the living room. There was no way she would sleep in her mother’s bed. She
passed the door to her mother’s bedroom, which was half-opened, as if beckoning her to step inside.
Accepting this quiet challenge, she did. This room too was in pristine condition. The bed was made. Clothes were neatly hung
in the closet. The vanity table displayed more of her mother’s religious icons, some holy cards of Jesus and Mary, and small
statues of Our Lady of Mount Carmel and St. Michael the Archangel. They were perfectly lined up in a row on her table, as
if to provide a fortress of protection from the evil outside.
The room was thick with her mother’s presence, thicker than the outside of the house. Yeah, Avila wasn’t going to sleep in
this room at all.
“Hey, Mom! I’m going to check out the backyard. It looks pretty neat from my bedroom window.”
“Okay, hon.”
They lived on the third floor of an apartment building in New Brunswick, and outside their living space was an urban landscape.
Ebony must like this place.
Avila headed down the narrow hallway. Could she stay in this house for the next few weeks? Maybe she could, if she changed her outlook on it. The light brown carpeted floor was as clean as the first day the family had moved into the house. Her mom’s meticulousness gave the ranch home a coziness that Avila’s own residence didn’t have. It had a southern-Filipino-Catholic charm to it that only her mother could bring to a space. Ebony seemed to be taken with it.
But Ebony didn’t know everything about Avila’s life here, and she wasn’t planning on telling her. While the home was charming
on the inside, Avila knew that impression was fleeting. Would she be able to last here for the next few weeks? Avila didn’t
know.