8 Chapter 8
“Sarah, you’re here early.”
“Oh, look at that! Pigs must be flying,” Sarah said, a blade of grass dangling from her lips as she lay back on the ground.
Seeing them arrive, Sarah packed up her things and left.
The girl who was once locked in a tower was finally living a full life, wanting for nothing.
Sarah came to the tree early today. She wore the white dress I always loved and brought a slice of cheesecake. We sat together on the grass.
Through her, I learned that Victoria and Jake had received their punishment: long prison
sentences.
Their backs were hunched, their bodies trembling.
I don’t know how long I stayed under that oak tree, only that Sarah visited me almost
every week.
Then, one day, Sarah didn’t come alone. A man-her husband-was with her.
She told me about the little things in her life, funny stories from work, and news about my
family.
When the wind blew, I would drift with it. It was my only pastime.
Sarah always had a clean, fresh scent, like laundry detergent.
I floated up to a branch and shook a blooming flower loose. It landed right in her palm.
The three of them, struck by her words, bowed their heads in silence.
The weekly visits became yearly. The once-lonely Sarah now had a warm companion, and
eventually, even a toddler stumbling along behind them.
Sarah told me she was moving far away and might not be able to visit every week
anymore.
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My mother had cried so much that she was now completely blind.
I leaned against her gently, closed my eyes, and quietly took in her presence. With my blessing and her hopes for the future, she turned and walked away.
Sarah smiled, as if she was finally emerging from the shadow of my death.
But a paternity test revealed the child wasn’t his.
So, my parents had known what I liked and wanted as a child. They had known a child’s heart could break. But they had chosen to ignore it, to procrastinate. They had pretended to be deaf, dumb, and blind.
“Em, Victoria got what she deserved. She actually got the leukemia she faked. She doesn’t have much time left. She’s on chemo all the time, lost all her hair. And Em, Jake was beaten to death in prison,” Sarah told me on another visit.
They brought the cakes and expensive treats they used to secretly buy for Victoria when
we were children.
The son Victoria gave birth to was left in Daniel’s care.
I felt content and relieved.
My family quickly arranged the food in front of my gravestone and began to pour out their
regrets.
A mango popsicle, a beautiful dress, a photoshopped picture of me on a beach in Hawaii, and the silver bracelet were all neatly arranged before my gravestone.
The child Victoria had left for Daniel was eventually taken in by Jake’s parents.
Daniel’s company went bankrupt. He was now living a miserable, broken life.
Now they offered them to me, but I felt nothing. Not a flicker of surprise or gratitude.
Behind her, my parents and Daniel approached, their steps slow and heavy.
Spring had arrived.
As she spoke, my mother began to sob uncontrollably again. The two men could only
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support her as they staggered away.
Gradually, fine lines etched themselves on her face, but she never married.
Later, Sarah told me that Victoria had died from her illness. My parents, consumed by grief and sickness, passed away one after the other.
I couldn’t help but smile. When it came to verbal sparring, Sarah was undefeated. Every word was a poison-tipped dart.
The day after the child was taken, Daniel took an overdose of sleeping pills in his apartment and died.
The weather was warm and sunny. The world was awakening, and tender green shoots sprouted from the tree branches.
Sarah looked at the flower in her hand and smiled through her tears.
She seemed to feel me there and began talking to herself.
I sat quietly under the tree.
She propped her head on her arms and spoke with dripping sarcasm. “I can’t believe you actually remembered Emily’s birthday. I thought your brains only had room for files on
Victoria.”
Even Daniel, once so full of life, now had a head full of white hair. Eroded by time and regret, he was no longer the man I had once loved so deeply.
