34. TOUGH TO BE TENDER
TOUGH TO BE TENDER
I’m going to die. Isela sips from her mug of coffee and then cleans the tears from her face.
Olivia doesn’t respond. She takes in the sentence and tries to figure out what the main goal of the statement is.
Is this a general idea? Her death. Or is she being vague on purpose so Olivia won’t know actual details?
She doesn’t say much on her visits. She sits in the living room or goes to her old room to shuffle through her stuff for the sake of nostalgia.
Olivia wants to say: If you are going to die, you should talk to Lucia and Isabel. Reach out to them and ask for their forgiveness. It’s the least you can do.
Olivia passes the hall and pretends like the mossy door to The Inflorescence isn’t there. She’s curious to see what’s growing inside, but knows not to enter in front of Isela. What kind of ecosystem is thriving in there? Or dying? Will the room rot away with the rest of the house?
What has The Inflorescence shown you? Isela’s tone is pointed. As though Olivia broke some kind of promise.
It has shown me plants and stories. Olivia stops herself from saying the rest. She wants to tell her mother that the room didn’t belong to her. It didn’t belong to either one of them. It belonged to the earth. It belonged to the forest. It could never belong to them.
I could never have one thing to myself. You think you’re special because you were allowed to go behind that door? You think that makes you special? I have seen so much more than you in this life, including that room. You're not special. Isela watches for a reaction from Olivia.
Olivia holds her tongue. She smiles and controls her face as still as she can because she wants to roll her eyes until they roll out of the house.
She wants to tell her mother that she isn’t special either.
We don’t have to be special. She wants to tell her that she knows The Inflorescence loved her, but she didn’t think the room could love someone like Isela.
A thought creeps into Olivia: what would happen if she and Isela walked into The Inflorescence together? What would the room offer if they both went inside?
What if we went in together? Olivia gestured toward Isela, who was chugging more coffee and had now reached for her cigarettes. Smoke twirled around her face.
Why? What do I get out of it? It won’t bond us, if that’s what you’re thinking. Isela inhaled smoke and exhaled it into a miniature cloud.
Forget it. It was just a thought. Olivia walked out the door without looking back.
Her chest thrumming with anger. Her mother inside, most likely fuming from an invisible battle.
Olivia sprayed her hands with Florida water.
She patted her hands together until they dried.
She asked Saint Michael to protect her on the way home.
She envisioned a radiant golden light surrounding her body.
She whispered with gratitude to the house and to the trees as she got into her car.
She rolled the windows down and sped off.