3. Echoes of the Past
THREE
ECHOES OF THE PAST
? Cough Syrup - Young the Giant
NOAH
“Uncle Noah?”
Auggie’s solemn voice drifts into the quiet living room I’ve been sketching in for the last hour. Normally, I’d still be in the studio working on a few pieces for my clients, but with Auggie here, I have to be home earlier in the evening.
“Hey, bud. What’s wrong?”
He steps out of the shadows, his shoulders hunched. “I can’t sleep.”
“Wanna talk about it?”
He shakes his head, rubbing at his bleary, bloodshot eyes.
My heart gives a painful squeeze. I set my sketchbook and pencil on the coffee table and gesture for him to join me on the sofa. He walks over slowly and sits on the very edge, his feet dangling over the side of the cushion. Sometimes, I forget how little he is.
My parents were addicts, which meant Jonah and I had to grow up faster than most, and my memories of our childhood are a mishmash of good times and bad.
They battled with their sobriety for years. Sometimes, they’d be gone for days on end, and we’d have to fend for ourselves. But when it was good, it was really good. Mom was a ray of sunshine, and Dad thought the sun rose and set only for her.
She overdosed when we were eighteen. Dad grieved for five days, but he couldn’t stand the darkness she left behind, so he got high and wrapped his bike around a tree.
One day, we had two flawed parents, and a week later, they were gone.
If I learned anything from their marriage, it’s that love is just another form of addiction.
The thought that Auggie could be just as fucked up as we were weighs heavily on my chest every goddamn day. Everything he’s going through—losing both of his parents within a year of each other—I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.
“You know… when me and your dad couldn’t sleep, we’d sneak out of our bedroom, grab all of the blankets and pillows in the house, and build a big fort.”
“Really?”
“Yep. We’d get our flashlights, make shadow puppets, and see who could stay up the longest.”
“Did you win?” he asks curiously.
My eyes lose focus as the memory surges to the forefront. I let myself live in the past for a few seconds before I blink myself out of it. “Never. I always fell asleep first.”
He laughs, and for a second, he looks a bit like my mom.
She loved us the best she could. I always wondered if I’d done something that made her turn to drugs—if our life was so unbearable that she had to find an escape.
It’s why I never wanted kids of my own; I wasn't sure if I could be the one to break the cycle. I just didn’t expect Jonah to fall victim to it.
It doesn’t matter, in the end. The addiction won, and now it’s taken my brother, too.
I have to do better for Auggie.
I grab my phone and turn on the flashlight, holding it under my chin. “What do you say? Should we build Fort Weston?”
He hops off the couch, bouncing on his feet. “Yes!”
“Alright. Here’s what we need to do. You go to your room and grab as many pillows and blankets as you can find. I’ll get the rest, and we’ll meet back here. Got it?”
With a determined nod, he says, “Got it.”
Auggie rushes down the hallway in his superhero pajamas while I head to my own room, grab all of the available blankets, and stop by the linen closet on my way back. Ten minutes later, every scrap of fabric we could find is piled on the living room floor.
With four stools from the kitchen island, a few stacks of books to weigh down the edges, and a couple of chip clips I found in the junk drawer, we manage to finagle a halfway decent blanket fort in the middle of my living room.
I grab a set of flashlights from my emergency kit, and we crawl inside, lying on our backs amongst a mound of pillows.
“What do you think? Do you like it?”
He shrugs. “It’s ok.”
I laugh. “Tough critic.”
“What’s that mean?”
“Never mind. What should we do now?”
“Can you read me a story?” He stares at me expectantly, and there’s no way in hell I could deny him.
“Sure. Go pick a book.”
Auggie crawls out of the fort, leaving me alone with my memories as his footsteps fade into the distance. I grab one of the flashlights and turn it on, then shape my hand into a rabbit, letting the light cast their shadow onto the makeshift wall.
In many ways, losing my parents changed me; it hardened me against the harsh realities life can dish out and robbed me of my childlike wonder, but the memories are still there. The Noah I used to be died long before our parents did. Losing them was just the nail in the coffin.
Auggie returns a few minutes later with a book about outer space clutched against his chest, but when he sees the vague outline of a butterfly on the wall, his eyes widen, and story time becomes an afterthought. “Can I try?”
“Sure, bud.”
I show him how to make a camel, then a cat, and as I’m adding the fluffy tail on the bunny, he lets out a long yawn.
“How about that story?” I say, patting the spot to my right.
He lies next to me, resting his head on his pillow with his teddy bear clutched against his chest. I pick up the book and open it to the first page. Halfway through, just as the astronauts, who happen to be zoo animals, are about to launch into space, Auggie’s head lolls against my shoulder.
I close the book and set it down at my side, then carefully extricate myself from under the sleeping kid.
Once I’m halfway outside the fort, I scoop Auggie into my arms and carry him to bed.
He doesn’t stir the entire time, and as I back out of his room, leaving his nightlight on, I mentally pat myself on the back.
“Night, Auggie,” I murmur, knowing he’s already asleep and he won’t hear me. On the off chance that he does, I add, “Love you, buddy.”
My parents weren’t always equipped to raise children, but we knew they loved us. I could fuck up in a million different ways, but Auggie will always know he has me in his corner.
CLIO
“I don’t know how to do this without you.” My hands shake as I sign the words.
Aunt Penny’s quivering hand cups my cheek. “You survived before me, Cici. You’ll survive long after I’m gone.”
“Don’t speak. You need to save your energy to fight this thing.”
Penny was diagnosed with late-stage uterine cancer nine months ago. By the time they caught it, it was already spreading. After another three-week stint in the hospital, Aunt Penny asked to be discharged so she could pass at home surrounded by all of her things.
She shakes her head, her tired eyes searching mine. “I can’t fight anymore.”
The burn of fresh tears stings my eyes when it dawns on me. She’s trying to say goodbye.
“Please don’t leave me. Everybody leaves.”
“Then you need to be the one who stays.” She takes my hand in hers, offering comfort when I should be strong enough on my own. “I would stay if I could, my darling. I’d live forever if it meant I could stay by your side and watch Lexi grow up, but it's not up to me.”
She pulls her hand away, leaving behind a shiny new penny. “Find a penny, pick it up all day long, you'll have good luck.” She recites the all-too-familiar poem like it’s going to be any sort of consolation. “Find my lucky pennies, and you’ll know I’m watching over you.”
We always loved finding them on the sidewalk—it became a sort of tradition for us, but it just won’t be the same without her.
I tuck the penny into the pocket of her overalls. “You need it more than me.”
“Luck isn’t going to save me now, but I will go happily,” she says. “Knowing I have loved and been loved is enough for me. You and Lexi gave me the family I never thought I would have.”
She settles back in her rocking chair with her blanket draped across her lap and her feet propped up on the ottoman. “I think I’ll rest now,” she signs. “I’m tired.”
The dream fades just as Aunt Penny did. She only lived two more days before she quietly passed in her bed, the way she always wanted.
I don’t know what’s worse—the dreams about my childhood back in New Jersey with Rodney at the forefront, or the ones where I relive my last days with Aunt Penny.
I suppose it doesn’t matter; they both leave behind a hollow ache that can’t be filled.
I’ll always be grieving the childhood I never had, and the woman who did everything she could to make up for it.
Sometimes waking is worse than the nightmares.
I sit up in bed and wrap my favorite quilt around my shoulders—the one Aunt Penny gifted me years ago with orange, yellow, and pink windmills hand-sewn out of thrifted fabrics. She was incredibly crafty and loved creating things out of thrift store finds. She called it treasure hunting.
I pad through the apartment, stopping to peer into Lexi’s bedroom.
A sliver of light illuminates her serene face.
There’s some solace in the knowledge that by some miracle I’ve given her the life I wasn’t afforded—a childhood free of pain.
Losing Aunt Penny was hard for her, but we prepared her as best we could, and she knows Penny is at peace now.
I don’t know what comes after this life, but even nothingness would be better than endless suffering.
Tears cascade down my cheeks. The memories continue to haunt me even when I’m wide awake. As if my feet have a mind of their own, I head for the entrance. The apartment door snicks closed behind me, and I tiptoe into the hallway, colliding with something hard and unforgiving. “Oof.”
Strong hands grip my shoulders for only a second before they disappear again.
“Shit. Sorry. I didn’t think anybody would be out here.” I swipe at my tears and do my level best to plaster on a smile.
Inhaling a fortifying breath, I open my mouth to apologize for my behavior the other morning, but before I can get the words out, Noah’s brows draw together. “What do you have to be sad about? Did your glitter factory explode or something?”
I channel a little of Aunt Penny’s fierceness and round on him. “Do you always have to be such an asshole? Who raised you?”
His eyes darken, and his jaw ticks. “Princess Clio. Always so fucking perfect. You wouldn’t know hardship if it bit you in the ass.”
“Screw you, Noah Weston. You don’t know anything about me.”
“Thank fuck for that.” He storms off in the opposite direction, disappearing from view.
I scoff. “And to think I was going to apologize.”
My chin quivers as I make my way down the stairs to sit on the front stoop, the night air soothing a little of the residual tension. Guilt swamps me, but I tamp it down. He was rude to me first, so what if I gave it right back to him?
God, I sound like a petulant child.
A glint catches in my periphery, and my heart skips a beat.
I reach for the bright copper penny and clutch it in my fist like I could will her to speak to me somehow, but it never works.
I have dozens of lucky pennies now, and no matter how many I collect, nothing will fill the hole she left in my life.
When I moved in with Aunt Penny, I was already six months pregnant with Lexi.
She was this eccentric, lightning bug of a woman on her third divorce from the same man, and she swore it would stick this time—it did.
Without a second thought, she took in a pregnant teenager and loved me like I was her own.
I called her Aunt Penny, but she was more of a mother to me than my own ever was. When Lexi came along, she doted on her. Everything I learned about motherhood, I learned from her. She may not have had any children of her own, but she was a mother to anyone who needed it.
If she could see me now, what would she say? Would she be proud of me? She always encouraged me to find Callie and rebuild our relationship. I wish I could tell her I at least accomplished that.
An hour passes before I make my way back to the apartment. I head into the kitchen and pull out the old strawberry-shaped cookie jar, depositing the penny with all of the others before settling on the couch, where I lie awake until the sun rises and it’s time to get ready for work.