Alice had entered my world like a force of nature. I’d never known anyone like her, and I had thought what we had was the love others searched for. She was always laughing and smiling. I had been drawn to that the first night I met her. In the end, she had been a master manipulator and I had been the idiot who believed she was real. The warning in Annie’s words the night we ran off to Vegas to get married were possibly the only truths I’d been given from either of them. I hadn’t listened. Believed as Alice had told me so many times that her sister was always jealous of her. She didn’t want to see her happy because she was miserable. It had been easy to believe because I wanted it to be true. Alice was pregnant with my child and marrying her had been the next step. Even if there was doubt trying to edge its way in, I had forced it out just like I had chosen not to believe Annie’s warning.
Remembering was easier I realized as I stood there letting it all replay like a movie reel in my mind. I had worked so hard at forgetting. Not allowing it to resurface, afraid of the darkness that always came to pull me under. There was the ache that would never go when I remembered the son I had lost. I wanted that memory and I held onto that pain. Some sorrow was meant to stay. The hatred I held for Alice was what I didn’t want to allow to control me anymore. Holding onto that kind of anger and hate kept you from living.
“I loved a woman that didn’t exist,” I said aloud, needing to hear the words. Admitting it and accepting it was like a weight lifted from my shoulders. Forgiving her might never come but letting go of the memory of what I thought she was made the emptiness inside me fade away. The love I’d had for Alice was never real because I hadn’t known the woman she truly was. My inability to think about her, about the past had kept me from accepting it for what it was. A freedom came with letting Alice go. The last words Annie had said to me was, “Alice had been chasing death since we were kids.” I had hated her for so many things but hating a woman who was damaged since childhood was pointless. It had been me who ignored the truth.
I opened the drawer beside my bed. The box I had placed in there had been unopened since I placed the items inside of it six months ago. I’d bought the small slender cedar box at an antique store two days after leaving Sea Breeze. During the first days of my journey while I was trying to figure out what I wanted in life, I had stopped in little towns that intrigued me. Diners, coffee shops, and unique stores that caught my attention filled that first week for me and kept me moving farther away. I had traveled through four states before slowly turning and heading back east until I ended my journey only hours from where it began.
The box had been my first purchase on that trip. I had walked through the store so full of items from my childhood. It had made me homesick and I wondered more than once while examining toys, lunch boxes, and even china that my gran had if I was doing the right thing.
Then I’d seen this box. The words SPREAD YOUR WINGS had been engraved on the top of the box. As if fate had been trying to talk to me and remind me why I was out here on the road, I repeated the words several times then knew I had to buy the box. Back then I’d been a dreamer and believed it had been words meant for me.
Sitting down on the edge of the bed, I opened the box and did nothing else. The photo that sat on top of the papers folded neatly inside still filled me with regret and sorrow. But I knew that was okay. Losing a child wasn’t easy and if the pain didn’t come with his memory then what kind of man was I? I held onto the way seeing his small face made me feel. It was all I had of him. All I would ever have of him. I didn’t touch the photo but simply studied the small face. That night forever marked me. Holding him had made me realize I had never truly experienced real heartbreak. But more than that, he taught me about unconditional love even though he never took his first breath.
Gently, I closed the lid and placed the box back inside the drawer beside the bed where I had always kept it no matter where I lived. However, this time I couldn’t close the drawer. I’d been unable to look at the box and face the reality of the contents for so long yet now the thought of putting him away bothered me. I took the box back out and placed it on the nightstand instead. Hiding his memory never made it fade. I never wanted to forget him.