Chapter 1 #3
After eating, I wandered upstairs to Devin's room.
It was a disaster zone, as usual, but it was also bursting with life.
Baseball trophies covered every surface.
Photos plastered his bulletin board, team pictures, shots with friends, a few with girls I pretended not to notice.
This room had energy. It had dreams taking shape and growing stronger every day.
I picked up his newest trophy from last month's regional championship. "Most Valuable Player" was engraved on the brass plate. The heft of it felt solid and earned in my hands. He'd worked for this. Fought for it. Deserved every moment of recognition.
I sat on his unmade bed, still holding the trophy, trying to remember the last time I'd felt proud of something I'd accomplished. The last time I'd worked toward something that mattered to me.
Nothing came to mind. Not one damn thing.
The realization settled in my core like a stone. I had nothing to build toward. Nothing to fight for. Nothing that belonged to me alone. My whole existence had become about maintaining other people's dreams while mine withered away in some forgotten corner of my soul.
My phone chimed. It’s Devin.
Devin:
Made it to Jake's. Thanks for being there tonight, Mom. You're literally the best person in the world.
I smiled despite everything. At least I was succeeding at something.
I headed back downstairs, too restless for bed but not sure what to do with myself. Brett's study was dark. The living room felt too formal for one person. The family room was designed for gatherings that never happened anymore.
I ended up in the basement storage room, looking for something to organize. Something to make me feel useful instead of ornamental. I found several boxes labeled "Lauren's Things" in my own handwriting from years ago. I couldn't even remember what I'd thought was worth saving.
The first box held college textbooks and notebooks filled with essays about books that had once changed how I saw the world. Philosophy and literature and creative writing courses. I'd been an English major with big dreams about writing novels that would make people feel less alone.
The second box contained photo albums from before everything went digital.
Pictures of Brett and me when we were young and stupid in love, when touching each other felt like a revelation instead of an obligation.
Pictures of baby Kimberly and toddler Devin, back when they thought I had all the answers.
The third box was smaller, more personal. My college diploma. Jewelry from my grandmother who'd died believing I would do something important with my life. And at the bottom, wrapped in tissue paper, a leather journal with a broken clasp.
I opened it with shaking hands. The pages had yellowed, but my handwriting was still clear. Twenty seven year old Lauren, full of plans and hunger and absolute certainty that life was going to be extraordinary.
March 15th. Started a new story today about a woman who quits her safe job and backpacks through Europe alone.
I've never been anywhere, but I dream about it constantly.
Sidewalk cafes in Paris where you can sit for hours people-watching.
Museums in Florence where you stand in front of paintings until they tell you their secrets.
Greek islands where the water is so impossibly blue it looks fake.
April 2nd. Brett thinks I should put writing on the back burner until we're more settled. Kids, mortgage, all that grown-up stuff. He says there will be plenty of time for my "hobbies" later.
May 20th. He proposed! I can't stop staring at this ring. We're going to build the most amazing life together. Everything feels possible when you love someone this much. I can have the writing and the marriage and the family. I can have it all.
July 8th. Wedding planning is sucking my soul dry.
Everyone has opinions about flowers and music and where people should sit.
Brett says it doesn't matter as long as we end up married, but it feels like it matters in ways I can't explain.
Like I'm disappearing into what everyone else thinks our wedding should be.
I flipped through page after page of dreams I'd completely forgotten existed. Travel plans and book ideas and career goals. A woman who believed she was the star of her own story, not a supporting character in everyone else's.
That woman felt like a stranger now. A naive girl who thought she could have everything without sacrificing anything.
I closed the journal and held it against my chest, sitting on the concrete floor surrounded by boxes of a life I'd packed away and forgotten about.
Upstairs, the house was silent and empty. Brett would come home late tonight. Devin was making memories with his friends. Kimberly was building her future two hours away.
And I was here, alone with proof of dreams I'd abandoned so gradually I hadn't even noticed they were gone.
The woman who'd written in this journal wouldn't recognize who I'd become. She wouldn't understand how someone could live in a mansion and feel homeless, or could be surrounded by family and feel invisible.
But maybe she was still in here somewhere. Buried under years of saying yes when I meant no, of making myself smaller when I wanted to grow, of settling for fine when I'd once demanded magical.
I tucked the journal under my arm and headed back upstairs.