Maeve
I stare at my mother’s crestfallen face through the steam rising out of her tightly held mug of tea. Her hair, once a vibrant red now cascades as pale sheets down her back. The color faded and fine white streaks lay boldly amidst the dull tresses. When I was growing up, she would pull it up, showcasing her beautiful face. Now, she has not the strength or the will to do anything with her locks. Ever her eyes, once as green as thriving moss along the banks of the river have changed and devastation now haunts them.
This is how it has been for five years and there are certainly days when I wish to flee from here. I sometimes long to find a new, fresh home with none of the dank and painful memories held within these walls. To get me to the other side of my day, I often drift back in time to daydream of how simple our lives once were. The blood coursing through my veins does no good to sustain me…only my distant memories of joy and the hope of again hearing my mother’s voice can have that power.
She told me once, when I was no more than to her knee, that she had spied my father with his tall, willowy frame bending and swaying as he cast his nets over the river and from that moment, could not conceive of living the days of forever without him. She would place emphasis on the word “forever” and wink at me. My mother no longer speaks; not to me as we sit alone for these bland meals, nor to our neighboring folk, have we the chance to pass them on our rare ventures into the city.
I have often followed her outdoors as she prepares her radiant flower gardens, praying to catch a mumble or two under her breath… a verbalized list of items to have at hand; a trowel, a watering can or her dried out pods and seeds from last years blooms, perhaps. No. Not even then would she absentmindedly allow a word to tumble and crash at her feet.
Here we live, five years and counting, which feels like an eternity after losing my father. Angus Dunleavy was a stern but loving man with his heart worn plain as day on the sleeve of his shirt. He was a great deal taller than my mother. He had a thick dark head of wildly curly hair and a beard that scratched at our cheeks when he kissed us. His kisses were warm and smelled of the woods that he would traverse. He would often hum tunes and smoke his pipe as he mended his fishing nets after a long day at the banks of the Donugare. He spoke in the strong Scot’s tongue. A brogue that was thick to even me but was a soft, comforting lullaby to my ears.
When I was just turned thirteen years of age however, his humming and joviality were snuffed out painfully by illness. He could no longer work by the river. He had lost his balance several times and had to be dragged out of the rushing waters by other fishermen nearby. Soon after losing his livelihood his eyes became as slate…cold and flat. I knew he still loved me but he could no longer find his words to say it. Dr. MacMullin said it was as if a bandit were coming every night while Da slept and would steal a few choice words.
Dr. MacMullin went on to say that everyday would be more difficult for Da as well as for my mother and I. Many nights, I would stay up and whisper an array of words into his ears, trying to combat this demon that would take them from him. As the season of sickness progressed, my strong father lay in bed all the time; unable to wash or dress himself. Unable, even, to feed himself. His dignity was something we aimed to keep viable for him but in his last days, it was impossible.
The night he died, my mother and I woke to find him fighting for air; his breathing labored and uneven. Sometimes, not breathing at all for an unnerving amount of time. We each sat upright and were at his side in an instant (I hitting my shin on a large trunk that lay at the foot of my parents bed).
The mark lasted for months afterwards and as it healed, I could swear, it took the image of my Da’s restful face. At the bottom of the black and blue, settled a large amount of blood just under my skin. It was darker than the rest and looked like my Da’s wild beard. I guess I took some strange comfort at having it there and grieved unnaturally when the last of the bruise-beard vanished into my body.
My father’s skin was pale and glistening with his pains. When he opened his eyes, they were no longer his. They appeared as if they should belong to some underwater creature from the deep, glazed with a thin white sheath draped from lid to lid. How odd to look directly at his eyes but not be allowed to look into them…there is a certain difference I cannot explain.
He clenched his blankets in his fists, his large knuckles white with the strain. A loud howling melted from his mouth and dripped into the heavy air. Saliva was caked thick and ropy at the edges of his mouth and I longed to wipe them for him. Just as I was dipping the cloth into the water, I heard the latch to the door click.
That was when she did it…my mother. She had stood straight up, grabbed her cloak and was now blowing out of the house and into the cold Autumn night air. A gust of it blew into the room, momentarily chilling my father and causing him to tremor. I was heartbroken to think that maybe his shudder was partially his acknowledgment of her abrupt withdrawal from us.
I wanted to go after my mother. To scream at her and make her be with us. I had seized my Da’s hand during one of his outcries and he had held it tightly, unwilling to yield even for a moment. Luckily, we had arranged the bed to a position by the fireplace so that we could keep his chilled body warm more easily- this served me well now as the fire was starting to die. To die, just like my Da. With one hand oppressed tightly by his, I used my free hand to get the fire stoked and cozy once again.
We suffered there for hours in a tenuous dance of writhing pain and cool washcloths; of delirium and drizzles of tea into the corner of his flaccid mouth; of bed wetting and bedclothes changing. All the while, I resented my mother. Where had she gone? Surely she should have been here helping and saying goodbye! I willingly gave every bit of energy I had to Da but I was numb to the idea that we had both been abandoned in a time that we needed her the most. Just as I was mulling over all the many ways I could hold this against her, there was an eerie stillness that filled the room.
My Da’s face had gone gray and still. He was just barely breathing and the tremors had left him entirely. His grip on my hand had now reverted to being my grip on his hand. I threw my face to his chest and listened to the off beat melody of his once strong heart. Every thump was a tiny gift. A thing to treasure that he was with me for a moment more…and then he slipped away and all I could hear in his chest were the reverberations of my own cries.
I had wept till my eyes nearly swelled shut, I began to care for my eternally sleeping Da. I combed his sweat slicked, ebony hair to one side. I wiped his ashen face with a cool cloth and shut his eyelids closed. I kissed his forehead and placed a bouquet of lavender in his hands. I then covered him with a length of some sheer fabric my mother had kept in a chest at the foot of her bed.
The Ivory colored material shrouded him without obstructing my view of him. He appeared more at peace with the cream tinged, vaporous material softening his hardened features. Just as I had finished the care of my Da and once again, restocked the fire…well, that is when my mother returned.
The door flung open, letting in large and unexpected snowflakes. My mother was pristinely white as if the snow had buried itself into her pores. Stunned, she stood breathless in the doorway, staring at my Da and alternately, at me. As the reality slithered into her heart, she appeared to have aged within only moments. New lines formed like brackets on either side of her pale mouth. Her hair was noticeably more white than it had been before her fleeing, a nest of twisted cotton tied atop her small head.
The lids of her eyes seemed to hang a bit lower. She put her hands in the pockets of her cloak and made not one more motion to draw near. After several minutes I stifled my anger, I moved to her side and helped her to remove her cloak. She made no motion to help in undressing but merely stood there, eyes fixed on Da. Still being so very angry with her, I settled myself in the farthest corner of the room and stared at Da…trying to memorize everything about him, all but ignoring her presence.
I felt justified in my bitterness but this was hard for me, the anger polluting my heart. I had always been very close with my mother. Having no siblings to share her love with, I was able to spend countless hours with her. In fields and forest, her imagination was akin to a dreamer such as myself. She and I would hang upside down from the largest trees down by the river, letting our skirts tip down over us and encase us like swollen cocoons. We would laugh until our sides seized into cramps unreal.
Her fingers, petite and nimble, held fast to mine while teaching me to stitch. We would take periodic little picnics and she would show me a new area of the forest each time. A new world for me to explore and for us to make up imaginary lands and people. My, she had been so expert at making those places and people feel real to me.
At the end of an exhausting day, she and my father would dance around our small dugout with only his humming and the cracklings of the fire for music. They would dance long into the night… long after putting me to bed in my cozy bed behind a curtain. My mother would tuck me tight and kiss not only my cheeks, but forehead and chin as well, the smell of sweetened tea on her breath.
“Ma wee bairn” she would whisper into my hair meaning “My small child”. She would repeat this over and over until it was the last thing I heard before falling asleep.
I had always wondered about my mother’s origins. She appeared like a mystical creature to me. Her history, she held from me and maybe from my Father as well. On occasion, in the wood, she would whisper to me that she came from a place of magic and endless days. I would ask her why she would leave such a place to settle in a dugout home. She would confide that the dream of having a child was so strong, it fueled her desire to start a new life. A mortal life. I am uncertain if I had ever truly believed her or not.
I suppose I suspected it was part of our play…our fantasy realm. Then again, recently, I have been finding notes tucked about the house and the property written by my mother’s hand. I am starting to believe that my mother is telling me her truth…her story. You may ask why I unabashedly put such faith in my mother’s random notations. I cannot, myself, come to explain it but I tell you this… there is a gleam in my mother’s eye when she spies me reading her scripts.
To add to that, there have also been mysterious gifts that are addressed to my mother on weathered parchment tags, left on the banks of the river. They are always left in the same place at the base of a large tree. She saves these little tags inscribed with “Lila, Dear” and often, I will find her rocking in her chair, tags clutched to her heart, eyes longingly staring out the window.
Just this morning, in fact, we performed our daily walk along the river, summer flowers lining our way. As we approached the routine “turn around” spot, I could see a large bundle of forget- me- not flowers strung together with a bit of twine- and of course, the bit of parchment we came to expect. My mother, seeming to disregard her own body’s fragility, released my hand out of hers and bounded like a gazelle, sweeping up her prize and clutching it to her chest.
As we traversed back to our home, I took to picking wildflowers for my own bouquet, enduring sticks and pokes from the thorny thistle stems. My mother glowed at me from behind her tuft of purple flowers. Now, as I busy myself with writing, I periodically pause to gaze upon my mother as she tends to the arrangement of each flower. She has tenderly placed them in a tin vase… another treasure from the mysterious gift-givers.
It all seems to mean something to her- there is a familiarity in her eyes, a softening to her face every time she receives one of these mysterious items. Oftentimes, after our trip to the river and finding a present waiting, the writings that she stashes away are more detailed and frantic. It is as if the item has awakened her from this dreary trance she is gripped by. This story is not about me, although I strongly believe that in piecing together what my Lila Dunleavy wants me to know, I will discover who and where I shall be the day I find myself without her.