My hands went clammy, but I opened it anyway.
Her pen bled blue across every page, a frantic cursive that varied from certainty to despair and back again. Most of the entries were short, half-thoughts, confessions hastily scratched before she lost her nerve.
I read them anyway, my eyes stinging from the dust and the knowledge that Mom had never really intended for anyone to see this part of her.
Jan 6: didn’t sleep. Don’t think I ever will. The girls deserve more, but I am so tired. Amelia is too smart for her own good; she’ll run away first (I wouldn’t blame her). Lillian still loves me. Thank God for small things.
Jan 9: drank again. Hate myself. Promise to stop tomorrow. (I won’t.)
Jan 19: Saw myself in the mirror today and didn’t know who it was. Thought about walking into Lake Winona and just dissolving. Maybe the cold would clear my head.
Feb 2: Called Brian a bastard at the store. He is. But so am I. Amelia hid in her room crying today. I could hear her breathing on the other side of the door. She thinks I don’t know, but I do. I always do.
March 1: Lillian’s birthday soon. Need money for a cake. Should ask Kaylee, but I don’t want to owe her anything. Maybe pawning those old earrings will do. Amelia says Lillian doesn’t want a party. I think she doesn’t want me to ruin it.
There were dozens of entries like these, each one ringing with the same cracked bell of regret. There were multiple journals, some half-finished, some barely written in.
The one on the bottom was more recent, and I opened it, despite my pounding heart and tears that were slowly unraveling.
The entries skipped weeks at a stretch, then would appear in desperate clusters, as if Mom only wrote when she was about to vanish under the weight of herself.
April 4: Cleaned the whole house or tried to. Nothing stayed clean. I miss when Amelia would play music loud and fill the kitchen, even if she rolled her eyes at me. Don’t remember ever hearing silence before. Now it’s everywhere, like mold. Missed a call from Dr. Finn. Don’t want to call back.
April 19: Spilled coffee on the couch, tried to scrub it out, only made it worse. Called Kaylee and hung up before she answered. I want someone to yell at me, tell me to get my act together, but there’s nobody left. Lillian is gone, and Amelia too, even if she’s still alive somewhere. All I ever wanted was for them to know I loved them, and all I ever did was prove I didn’t.
May 9: Dreamed about him last night. He was the age he was when we married, and I was old, ugly, teeth fallingout. He told me it was my fault he left. Maybe it was. I hate myself for missing him, but I do, I do, I do.
June 17: Amelia’s birthday is soon. I always get the date wrong. She was so little when I ruined that first cake. I have the photo somewhere. I hope she’s found someone better than me. I hope she hates me a little less with each year that passes.
July 20: Woke up on the floor. Smell of mold, carpet burns on my knees. I yelled at Lillian in a dream, but when I opened my eyes, it was just me. If I called Amelia, she wouldn’t answer. I wouldn’t answer me either.
July 28: Lost track of days again. Stared at the ceiling so long that I started to see faces in the paint. Thought about calling Amelia, but didn’t want to ruin another day for her. Maybe tomorrow will be better. Maybe tomorrow I won’t be me.
August 7: Passed the old school on the way home. Remembered Amelia screaming at me on the sidewalk, telling me to go fuck myself. She was right, she was always right. I can still hear it. Some words never leave.
August 15: The TV is too loud. The silence is worse.
The entries went to August, and then the handwriting changed. Shaky, barely legible, as if she were writing with her left hand underwater. My hands trembled as I thumbed theedge, searching for the end, for any sign that she’d softened toward herself before she’d gone. I found, instead, a cluster of entries, every sentence more jagged than the last.
August 18: Drank. Forgot how to feel anything. Tried pills and wine together. Only felt heavy. Not enough to stop thinking.
August 22: Called him after I tracked him down. He picked up. I asked if he’d ever loved me, and he said, “Not in the way you wanted.” Laughed like it was nothing. I hung up. He texted later to say sorry if he hurt my feelings. If. If.
Why did I ever marry him? Why did I let him ruin me?
There was only one other entry. It was dated days before she ended her life in this sad house.
September 22: There is a sharpness to wanting, like bone against bone. My girls are better without me. I see that now. I wish I could have been different for them, but the world is full of wishes. I am tired of being the reason nothing gets better. I hope they forget my smell, my voice, my name. I hope all this pain is water and they float to shore.
Underneath, scrawled in a frantic tilt, almost an afterthought:
Maybe tomorrow it will be easier for everyone.
The ink had pooled and bled there, as if Mom’s hand had hovered, uncertain and heavy, before she set the pen down for the last time. The rest of the page was blank.
I pressed my forehead to the page and let the ache tunnel through me, not even trying to blink it back.
Here I was, reading the last words of a person reduced to decaying bones. I flipped through the blank pages that followed, as if she might have left a secret note tucked between, a coded message: ‘Never mind, I didn’t mean it.’
