I sit and then stand, anxious more than curious of the box that’s been sitting there on the table since It arrived here four days ago, its ratty cardboard fraying and peeling at the edges.
It’s my birthday, and my mother said to open the box on my twenty- first birthday. Maybe I should wait for Garret to get here and have him open it.
My thoughts move to Garret and the anniversary of our relationship fast approaching. He wants more from me but doesn’t understand why I wouldn’t be ready for such things as marriage and children, despite him being a therapist. My therapist.
He knows how I feel about not knowing who I really am, who I come from. It’s a discombobulating emotion.
I don’t feel like a complete person. I’m particles of a whole but the whole is fragmented and floating like dust particles caught in the stream of light, visible only when it shines through a crack in a window.
My adoptive parents have been wonderful, and not remembering anything about my family before them made it easier to bond with them, but there has always been a disconnect with any attachments I make.
A murky cloud haunts me in the back of my subconscious, warning me that those you let close can hurt you worse than any other.
My cell chimes, alerting me to a text from Garret. Already knowing it’s going to be him delaying his visit due to work, I don’t even read it.
He’s a doctor, so patients always come first.
“Evi, you know the boundaries I have to form for this to work out.”
Boundaries are always a thin line and I’ve never met one person who hasn’t crossed them.
My fingers dance over the rough edges of the worn box urging me to open it and learn from the contents, but instead I abandon the thing and go make some food.
What’s inside?
Flicking the iPod on to my lake house playlist, soft melodies fill the silent space and croon around me, comforting me like a warm hug.
If I concentrate on the lyrics and instruments, my mind won’t wander into the dangerous places that will hold me hostage in their darkness.
The empty time in the afternoon is always hardest for me to fill; boredom sets in motion bad behavior and cravings I shouldn’t have.
But nighttime—nighttime is where I become prisoner to past wounds howling in the moonlight to be heard.
I don’t give in to the demons clawing at the surface of my reality. Instead, I live the lie. I live this person I created after waking up in the hospital all those years ago without knowing who I was before.
I wish I could start over. Be someone else. Choose who I was created from, but I’m no God and this is no fairy tale.
My stomach growls and hunger pains follow, cramping my muscles. Cooking was something I enjoyed and was good at.
I go to the fully stocked cupboards and pull out the ingredients for cheesy pasta bowl, filling a pan with hot water and lighting the stove.
I’m just pouring in the dried shells when a familiar inkling heightens my senses.
Thud…
The awareness of being watched stiffens my posture as I move the pan from the hob and walk toward the window.
If that little snake is watching me again…
I peer outside but the sun has begun to set and my own reflection surrounded by darkness is all I see staring back at me.
Don’t let him in
My appetite diminishes and I find myself tossing the food I just began to prepare into the trash.
Pushing through the front door, I watch the sun set over the lake and try to ebb the intense feeling of being observed by unwanted appreciation.
This all feels so familiar, like it’s a rehearsal I’m repeating.
Don’t let him in
A snapping twig signals from the brush and gains my attention.
“Daniel?” I call out.
“Daniel?” Leroy scoffs bitterly, coming into view. “Is that a joke?”
My heart speeds up and then settles when I see who it is.
“Leroy. I meant Leroy. I’m sorry.” I shake my head, guilt seeping out of me even though he’s trespassing on my property again.
“It’s fine.” He shrugs. “Mom says we look the same. Could have been twins.”
I don’t agree.
Daniel was taller and had a more masculine form. Lifting weights for lacrosse had given him a strong, defined physique, whereas Leroy is slim and breakable.
“What are you doing out here?” I ask, my tone accusing.
“Getting some wood. We’re going to make a pit and cook barbecue.”
He just stands there, no wood collected because he’s been too busy looking through my windows.
“Why are you getting wood here and not on your own property line?” I growl out through clenched teeth.
Folding his arms over his chest, he spits on the ground and sneers. “Because my dad told me to invite you over.”
My stomach twists with pain from not eating. It’s their son’s fault I’m starving right now and not eating.
I guess it won’t be too painful to sit with them for an hour and get fed.
“I could eat.” I watch with enjoyment as his eyebrows nearly meet his hairline.
“I told him you wouldn’t come.”
“Well, I’m hungry.”
Going back inside to grab a sweater slung on the couch, I return to find Leroy has left.
Jerk.
The smell of flame-grilled meat thickens in the air the closer I get to the Holst’s household.
Golden licks of light shine through clearings in the trees.
Edward sees me before anyone else and he pokes at some food on the barbecue with a giant fork.
“Evi. Leroy said you weren’t coming.” He looks over his shoulder at his son, who’s slouched in a deckchair, holding a stick over the fire pit they’ve made.
“She must have changed her mind,” Leroy grates out.
I move closer and stand awkwardly, already regretting my choice.
“Well, I’m glad she did. I could do with some adult conversation.” Edward winks at me and gestures with his free hand to one of the three deckchairs in a circle around the fire.
Leroy jumps up from his seat, making a show of tossing down his stick. That’s when I realize it has a mallow stuffed on the end and it’s now melting into the mud like wax from a candle.
“You do know she’s closer to my age than yours, right?” He snorts at his father.
Plating up the food he’s been cooking, Edward places it on a table next to me and ignores him.
“Evi, plates are over there. Help yourself.”
The meat sizzles next to me and the smell is intoxicating, initiating a burst of saliva to form over my tongue.
The sound of the front door swinging open and crashing closed signals Leroy’s departure.
I squirm in my seat, knowing I invaded their space, and I’m now left alone with the doctor.
Grabbing a plate and fork from the small pile stacked next to the barbecue, I fill my plate with steak and sausage and then take the seat offered to me.
Edward follows suit and beams over at me from the few feet that separate us.
“It’s nice to see a girl eat real food. Jacqueline always insists on a salad.”
I swallow down the mouthful I’d just shoved in and ask, “Will she not be joining us?”
Frown lines mar his forehead and he studies his food without eating it.
“I doubt it. No mother should have to outlive their child, and it makes it all the more difficult not having his remains to bury. The thought of him being out there all alone… it breaks her daily.”
Grief slams into me, nearly buckling me over. I drop the plate of food and stand abruptly. “I need to go.”
Edward gets to his feet, placing his plate on the seat behind him and holding his hands out toward me as you would an injured animal, scared and trying to flee.
“I’m sorry. It’s morbid, I know.” He voice is heavy with sadness.
“I just… I’m sorry.” I dart off toward the trees and flinch when a twig scrapes across my leg, but I don’t stop.
My feet pick up pace until I’m running back to my house and slamming the door closed.
My breathing is labored, my lungs squeezing, restricting my airflow.
The room spins and I wobble on my feet until I collapse on the couch, sucking in oxygen.
My eyelids droop closed and faint, like voices from a choir muffled by closed church doors, I hear crying.
It beckons me.