Chapter 2 #2
I stand at the bedroom door of my old room, breathing in through my nose, blowing out through my mouth. Letting the door swing open and stand there with my eyes closed. I know what I’ll find in here and, fuck; I don’t want to.
Stepping into my time capsule, everything is the way I left it the night I left.
An old, crocheted blanket is thrown over the twin bed, books I never got to finish lay on the bedside table, and pictures.
Pictures of all the years spent in Driftwood Bay.
I spin in a circle, taking it all in. And smile when I land on the pictures of Baylee and me.
One by one, I pull them from the wall, gently removing the tape from them.
Tears blur my focus as each picture plays like a movie, bringing back exactly what we were doing in those moments.
Us at ten, no worry in the world, only about what time her parents would let her come over to the cottage for the day.
Thirteen, the smile on our faces let me know that was the day we both got our first kiss…
by the same boy. A small chuckle slips out.
We didn’t care that we had to share our first kiss.
We just wanted it to be over with finally; to say we kissed a boy.
He thought it was the best day of his life when he was our pinky promise at eleven while wading through the waves on August Cove.
Opening the closet, I pull out all the clothes hanging up and throw them onto the bed.
I’ll just donate them because there is no way my thirty-year-old body could fit into these now.
One by one, I go through the drawers, pulling shirts out and throwing them into piles; when my hand lands on one, it knows the feel of the thinned-out fabric from wear.
I fall to my butt, my hands fisting the T-shirt. I want to tear it apart, but the other part of me wants to smell it, to see if it still has a hint of him lingering on the fabric, embedded in the fibers.
I shut my eyes hard, bringing the T-shirt to my nose, inhaling deeply.
And that smell hits me like a freight train; memories ooze back in, ink into my veins, flowing through my system.
It’s like a drug. Immediate high, but also sickened at myself for allowing myself to do this.
But after all this time, it still has the faintest scent of him.
Prying my eyes open, I spread the T-shirt on the ground, the letters almost faded, but still legible: ‘Driftwood Marina ’.
Rolling it back into a ball, I toss it in the giveaway pile, forcing myself back onto my feet and finish what I started.
By the time I’m done, I have a box full of pictures, keepsakes, and memories of the life I once lived. Everything else is going to donation.
The floorboards creak under me as I make my way from my room to my parents’ room, where I sit on their bed, made up, waiting for them to return, even though they never will.
“Get it done and over with, August,” I tell myself.
Even though I don’t want to touch this room one bit.
It’s their room. But it has to be done. I empty the side tables, holding on to things like my father’s glasses and my mother’s Bible.
Their room is plain and simple. They’d say, “Why have it all decked out when you can look out that door and see the perfect creation? That’s the only decoration we need.
” And now that I’m older, they were so right.
One picture sits on their dresser along with my mother’s jewelry box. Them when they said ‘I do’ on the cove, thirty-one years ago. My mother was already pregnant with me, unbeknownst to them, right before my dad almost lost August Cove forever.
The picture frame feels heavy in my hands as I try to take in each of their youthful faces, full of life, not having a clue that one would leave too early, and the other would want to follow.
Laying the frame on the dresser, I pull my mother’s jewelry box toward me; it has a thick layer of dust on it.
My finger wipes some off, revealing her name, Jenny.
Opening it, I’m perplexed when I see a letter right on top, my name in big letters.
Eyebrows fuse together in confusion. The envelope is light, but I know that handwriting—my father’s chicken-scratch letters.
Dropping the envelope back into the jewelry box, the lid slamming. I grab it, the picture, my father’s glasses, and the bible, letting the bedroom door slam behind me as I rush to the living room.
I drop it all on the sofa, still confused.
Why did he leave a letter here? I was with him for the last few months in the hospital; he could have given it to me there. Why leave it here? What if I never came back?
“Fuck it,” I mutter, walking to the icebox, knowing I’ll find something with alcohol in there. And thankfully, there are two beers sitting there. Who knows if they’re expired? I couldn't care less.
Grabbing them both and the envelope on my way out to the porch, I keep walking across the wooden slats and down the stairs to the sand.
And don’t stop. The sound of the ocean calls to me.
The sun still peeking over the horizon. With each step, my heart pounds harder; memories of that night want to emerge like a sunken ship at the bottom of the sea, but I force them back down.
The water licks my toes before I sit in the wet sand, legs outstretched in front of me. This is the closest I’ve come to water since I left that night eight years ago.
Popping the tab on the beer can, I drink the cold liquid down until it’s halfway empty.
I need courage, and I’m hoping this will give it to me.
The letter screams at me to open it, but I wait…
until the second can of beer is halfway gone.
I can feel the buzz filtering around my brain as the tide comes in.
I’m forcing myself to have immersion therapy, letting the water come higher up on my legs, even though I want to scoot backward, get away from it.
I don’t. I sit in the uncomfortableness.
Breathing deeply, I pick up the envelope, not knowing what it would hold.