“Hey, kid,” I called out to my granddaughter who, at thirty-six was still as much of a whirlwind as she’d been at six.
Like her grandmother, she was an artist, but her stories had always come in the form of dance. I had loved watching the two sit together over the years, the elder and the younger, one with a pen and paper, the other twisting her body like a pretzel as they chatted about the art of storytelling.
“Hey, Old Man,” she said, entering the room, her long dark hair in its ever-present ponytail, her willowy silhouette all grace and fluidity.
She’d been the prima ballerina at the San Francisco Ballet for a decade, hanging up her shoes only four years ago to take a job as lead choreographer for Seattle’s Pacific Northwest Ballet Company. How it thrilled us to see her featured in the newspaper, appreciated for her “fresh take on old classics, while honoring those who had come before.”
She was a star. A star who, at close to forty, still had the impish look of the girl she’d been three decades before, and a mischievous streak to match.
“You start that job I tasked you with?” she asked, narrowing the blue eyes she’d inherited from me. It was the only physical trait that linked us. But the mischief she got from me too.
“I got close,” I said, raising my hand and holding my forefinger and thumb an inch apart.
“Old Man...” she said, shaking her head. “I’m disappointed in you.”
“But the longer I hold off, the more likely you are to come around and check that I did it, providing me with much needed company.”
“You’re not fooling anyone.”
She winked and then turned to her mother and the two headed toward the boxes stacked against the wall. There were hundreds of books. Author copies Olivia had held on to for giveaways, for friends and family, and donated to women’s shelters and local charities. To go with the novels there was also the swag. Book bags with her book covers emblazoned on them, pins, buttons, pens, stickers, bookmarks, and mugs. There were a handful of custom bobbleheads we had made when one of her characters became so swoon-worthy, she’d given him his own series of books. There were fleece blankets, candles, and a tin of mints for a novel that had come out fourteen years ago.
Much of it was destined for the trash bin, some would be sent to her publisher and agent for special gift sets they were putting together for her most rabid fans, and the rest would be given away, Lizzie, Emma, and I keeping only what we couldn’t bear to part with.
While the women discussed who was taking what where and when, I threw on my favorite worn-in cardigan and ambled down the hallway, my slippers scuffing across the hardwood floor as my gaze skimmed over the family photos lining the walls, the most recent at the start, the oldest at the far end. Memory Lane, Olivia had dubbed it. On these walls, one could document nearly our entire life together as a couple, starting from the night we met, thanks to a mutual friend having a camera on hand. We met moments before the flash went off, and then spent the rest of the night talking tentatively, both of us carrying pain we could hardly bear, but not wanting it to rule our lives.
Olivia was a salve. Funny, kind, and determined to not let herself dwell in the past. And I was a distraction. Maybe not what she was used to, but someone she came to rely on, trust, and eventually fall in love with. We often told those who asked that we saved each other. Right time. Right moment. Right person.
I stopped for a moment in the doorway of her office. It had always amused me that such a sunshiny woman did her work in a space so dark. But she’d insisted on the deep blue wall color, the plush plum velvet couch, and dark wood desk.
“I need to be in a cave,” she’d said. “I need to sink down and disappear into my stories. Light and bright will just distract me.”
Sometimes I’d join her, slipping quietly from my office across the hall while she typed away, her glasses perched on her nose as she leaned toward the screen to peer at some word or sentence. I’d sit in the corner of the couch, a book or sketchpad in hand, and be a few dozen pages in before she noticed she wasn’t alone. Rather than be startled though, she’d just grin, give a happy little sigh, and get back to work.
My eyes took in the familiar sights of the room that was hers and hers alone. This was where one came to find the real Olivia. This was the room where all her barriers came down. Where she didn’t pretend to be anyone but herself. Not wife, not mom, not evenNew York Timesbestselling author Olivia Mitchell. She was just her. Silly and ruthless and perfect.
“This is where I let the kid in me out to play,” I’d overheard her tell a friend once as they perused the comics she’d clipped from the newspaper and tacked to a bulletin board. Three stuffed doggies took up the corner of the couch opposite the one I always sat in, dolls she’d found while traveling sat on shelves along with numerous other knickknacks and images she’d found funny or quaint or inspiring and had stuck here and there all over the room.
I sagged against the door frame. It seemed impossible that it had been a year. A year and six days exactly since she’d said my name, held my hand, or brushed her fingertips across my cheek. A year and six days since those warm brown eyes had closed to me for good, taking with them her opinions on what glasses looked good on this old face, the hand that reached for that last bite of toast I may or may not have wanted but would always give to her regardless, and her side of every story we were ever part of together.
I sighed and turned, staring into my own office where a large box of photos sat on top of the trunk I used for a coffee table, a catch-all, and a footrest.
I’d been circumnavigating the box for a week, and steering clear of the room altogether if I could help it. It wasn’t hard, the only work I did anymore was consultations, and I could do my daily allotment of word games from anywhere in the house with the shiny silver laptop Olivia had bought me two Christmases ago. At one point I’d even shut the door. But I’d always loved how the light that poured in from Olivia’s office met with the light that poured in from mine, meeting in the middle of the hallway. Shutting my door had cut off the joining of our lights, making me feel lonelier than I already did, so I’d opened it again, leaving me with no choice but to just keep ignoring the large box of photos of my wife at all her many author events through the years. I’d been tasked with going through them. Disposing of some, keeping others, and gathering a pile to send off to her publisher.
I took a seat on the sofa and slid the box toward me, glancing down at the old trunk it sat on and running my hand over its smooth surface.
Olivia was the only person, aside from myself, to ever see the contents of the trunk I’d hauled stateside from Europe. It had been covered up, shoved into the shadows, forgotten and found again, and then finally placed in this very spot several years ago by my late wife who’d claimed it was an important part of my story, and she hoped one day I’d share it with our daughter and granddaughter. But like so many others who had served, sharing that part of my life was the last thing I wanted to do, and so it had stayed locked, its contents unseen and unspoken about.
The night Olivia had seen its contents was the one time early in our relationship that I’d stood her up for dinner. Rather than accept such treatment, she’d driven to my house, marched up the muddy front path, and banged on my door, ready to give me a piece of her mind. But when she’d seen the state of me, drunk and red-eyed from crying, she’d immediately dropped her purse to the floor, slipped off her mud-splattered heels, and led me to the couch where the trunk sat open, what was inside on full display.
She took a beer from my fridge, sat beside me, and asked careful questions about the comrades standing beside me in one photo after another. After a while, I felt a glimmer of hope for my future. This woman wasn’t daunted by my pain, my sorrow, or the photo of a pretty young blonde woman staring into the lens of my borrowed camera with obvious love in her eyes. She’d run a gentle finger over a sprig of dried bluebells she’d found pressed within the pages of a book. She’d smiled gently, understanding my agony. She knew what it was to have loved and lost.
After she’d finished her drink, she’d helped me place the memories back inside the trunk, lock it up, and set fresh cans of beer and two bowls of spaghetti I cooked for us on top. I never opened the trunk again, and she never asked. But a few weeks later I woke in her bed to find her watching me. Hesitantly, she handed me a small velvet bag.
“What is it?” I’d asked, watching her cheeks redden.
“I hope it’s okay,” she said. “I just thought...” She shrugged and bit her lower lip. “It’s okay to remember.”
I gave her a quizzical look and then untied the string and turned the bag over, watching as a small but heavy dome of glass fell into my palm. Inside it were the bluebells.
