How Sweet It Is - Alice J. Wisler [62]
His reply is spoken from his heart, and his honesty surprises me. “I’m getting better. After she died, I didn’t want to live at first.”
I nod a few times. Oh yes, I do know just how you felt.
“Jonas was strong for me.”
“Jonas is gold.”
And then I realize Zack has those same golden characteristics. He’s so gentle, so patient, so kind. His tenderness is ripping up my insides as though he were slicing each part of my anger and bitterness with that knife he has in his hands.
I want him to put the knife down and let me fall against his chest, let the barrier collapse between us. I stare at the suds, feel my hands grow wrinkled like prunes. He is going to leave. He’s looking for a way out of the kitchen. He’ll exit my life after making me wish for things I cannot have.
I wait.
Instead of leaving, he says, “Is that coffeepot clean yet?”
“What? Uh… why?”
“So I can dry it.”
This time I let myself view his face, his smile, those two dimples wasted on a man. I grin, or try to. When I rinse the pot that has never had such a good bath in its life and hand it to him, he says, “You are not so different from the rest of us.”
Suddenly Lucas seems very far away, like a fog you drive through, and when the sun comes out, beaming and hot, you forget what the fog looked like, or how it felt to be surrounded by the mist. All you can feel is the warmth of the sun, and the sun is the only place you want to be.
I’m not sure which is more remarkable—that Zack is drying dishes next to me or that I don’t mind that my sleeves are pulled up so that parts of my scars are visible and that what caused them doesn’t seem so horrendous anymore.
When I smile at Zack this time, his eyes hold familiarity, like he knows what is going on in my mind and heart right now. Like I am not alone; he has traveled this winding, steep, narrow path, as well.
And in fact he is still trekking on it. Determined to get through, without losing himself. Without losing me.
twenty-nine
I’ve burned my fingers in the oven many times—by accident, of course. When Chef B or any other employee at the restaurant heard my yelp, the ice pack kept in the freezer for just such an occasion was handed my way. “Be the more careful,” Chef B would say as he watched me wince with pain. “You must to use the hot pads. See? I buy new ones last Tuesday.”
I cannot imagine what it would feel like to have my feet burned on a hot stove. There are things in life I want to thrust into the Do Not Open drawer, and after doing so, conveniently forget that such a drawer exists.
I can’t push the haunting truth of what happened to Darren out of my mind.
I see him clearly in my thoughts tonight as I clean the upstairs bathroom. Darren slouched over his notebook, drawing things he never lets me see, refusing to participate. Does he draw happy pictures? I know that the poster he created for the bake sale had a fancy border and lettering that was curvy and bold. He used red, purple, and green and even drew a picture of a slice of cherry pie and a large carrot cake in one of the corners.
He’s a child, I think as I scrub the sink. Bad things have happened to him—things no child should have to face. He’s been seriously damaged. The scars on his feet are only the tip of the iceberg of what he’s really suffered.
Exhaustion covers me, and I yearn to sleep. Instead, I spray Windex on the mirror and wipe off the streaks with a paper towel. What kind of person would burn a child’s feet? I ball up the towel and throw it into the copper-colored waste can. I see Felicia with her vibrant orange hair and push down the nausea filling my throat.
I slip into bed, grateful for the soft sheets. But my mind is full and sleep doesn’t come for a long while. Eventually, I get up, sit outside on the deck; against the wooohooo of the owl, I write about Darren in my journal until, at last, I can welcome sleep.
————
“If only Zack didn’t affect me like he does,” I whisper to the mirror in the loft bedroom