A Symphony of Cicadas

Eleven



“I brought some oatmeal bread,” my sister said, standing on the other side of the apartment door facing John. “I just made it last night and thought you and Sam might want a loaf. You look terrible, by the way.”

“Um, thanks,” John said, giving a small laugh before moving aside to let her in. “How are Kevin and the kids?” he asked. He raced in front of her to grab the laundry that was starting to pile on the couch again and dump it into the laundry basket in the corner of the room. As he attempted to straighten up, Sara waved her hand to dismiss his efforts.

“Please don’t worry about cleaning on my behalf. You’ve seen what the girls can do to my house in a matter of moments. I’m not afraid of a few clothes and papers lying around.” She placed the bread on the counter and surveyed the dishes that filled the sink. Rolling up her sleeves, she turned the water on over them and let the sink fill with sudsy hot water. John made no efforts to stop her. “The family’s doing fine. Kevin received a small promotion last month that gave us a little extra income in the household. But as a result, he’s been working longer and longer hours at the office. The girls and I have been going at it alone much of the time, which isn’t as fun as it sounds with two little kids.”

“Must be hard to have him gone so much,” John said, trying to sound sympathetic.

“It really is. I feel like a single mom! I don’t know how Rachel did it for so many years.” She paused then, realizing how all this sounded. “Oh god, John. I’m sorry. Here I am rambling on about being alone in the house, and…” She didn’t know how to talk her way out, hesitating in the awkwardness that lay between them.

“It’s okay, Sara. It’s been six months. The emptiness of the apartment is starting to feel normal. I don’t even see Sam that much these days.” John grabbed a towel and began drying the dishes that Sara had washed.

“How’s he doing?” she asked.

“Fine, I guess. He doesn’t talk to me much, though I can’t blame him. I wouldn’t talk to me much either. He mentioned his mother the other day, talking about moving in with her for a little time.” Sara set the dish she was washing back in the water and looked at him in alarm.

“And what did you say? Did you tell him no? Wendy doesn’t seem to have much time to be raising a kid. Besides, you’d be left here all alone!”

“Well, it’s his choice really.”

“I guess, from a court’s point of view. But he’s your son! Surely you told him it wasn’t a good idea!” she protested.

“Not really. And he’s her son too. I mean, I wasn’t happy about it, and I think he knew that. But I didn’t fight him about it. Besides, it was more of a musing than anything else. I don’t think he really wants to move in with his mom. He’d have to leave behind all his friends and his school,” John reassured Sara, and himself.

He left the subject at that, not telling Sara the relief that also lay in the thought of his son moving in with his mother. He was failing Sam every day he slipped into his grief, unable to get out from underneath it and move on with his life. If Sam moved out, he could check off his parental duties and be free to fall headfirst into his sadness and pain. While it was true that Wendy lived far enough away that Sam couldn’t continue at the same school, summer vacation was close enough that Sam could stay there for the summertime. John couldn’t help but feel that this was a good answer for both of them.

“I guess you’re right,” Sara said. “And I get his natural curiosity about wanting to know about living with his mom. But it wasn’t like Wendy was the most attentive parent when she was here. Has he talked with her about this? What does she say?”

“I’m not sure. If he’s said anything to her, she hasn’t told me. Hey, how’s the flower shop doing these days?” John asked, changing the subject. Sara had a million more questions about Wendy, and what it would mean for Sam if he went to live there. But she caught John’s cue that he was done talking about it. She wasn’t sure why she was feeling so protective of Sam in that moment. Perhaps it was even John she was protecting. All she knew was that the idea of Sam moving in with his mother felt like a bad choice, and she was disturbed by how apathetic John was being in a decision that could mean losing his son. It made her think of her own daughters, and how she would fight tooth and nail to keep them with her if she were faced with a custody battle. She shuddered at the thought.

“The shop is doing really well. With summer approaching, we’re at the peak of our game as orders have been flying in. Thank goodness for Hannah!” she breathed.

“Is that the new girl? How is she?” John asked.

“She’s great! She came at such a difficult time, when we were all reeling from the loss of Rachel. But she holds such an air of grace and professionalism, the transition was almost seamless - from a business standpoint, of course,” Sara noted in haste. “No one could ever take the place of my sister. But Hannah has really pulled through in understanding what needs to be done while also being sensitive to the fact that she has this job because Rachel passed away.” Sara finished the last dish and set it in the rack on the counter, drying her hands on the towel while glancing at the clock. “Speaking of which, I need to be getting back to the shop. Do you need any other help around here before I go? I’m a whiz with a vacuum and a dust cloth, you know.”

John looked around and gave a sheepish grimace when he realized how far he had let the place go once again. It was going to take some practice getting back in a routine of keeping things in order.

It was ironic since he had been the stickler for tidiness when I was still alive. He was often on Joey’s case when he left tiny tornado paths in every room he visited, and shaking his head at the permanent pile of clothes and books I kept next to my bed with a promise that I’d clean it later. Now he was the one who had a hard time remembering to switch the clothes from the washer to the dryer, sometimes washing them three times to get the mildew scent out of them from sitting damp for so long.

“You’re really kind, Sara. But I have a handle on it. I can’t thank you enough for just washing the dishes. I’m embarrassed that you even had to do that, but it helps a lot,” he said, giving her a hug. For a moment he smelled me in her hair, and he breathed deep, holding her a moment too long before letting her go. He blinked hard when he saw Sara’s face in front of him, and he shook away his mistake in hopes that Sara hadn’t noticed.

Sara had no idea that I was the thought that had passed through his head when he hugged her. She was too preoccupied with the feeling of intimacy that came from just a simple hug.

‘What is wrong with you?’ she asked herself. But she knew. It had been so long since she had been held with such care, making the distance that had been growing between her and Kevin that much wider. She pushed away the feelings of comfort the hug gave her, giving a vague smile to John as she picked up her purse.

“If you need anything – a friend, a home-cooked meal, a cheap maid – I’m here,” she told him. He chuckled and led her to the door.

“I will,” he promised.

When Sara was gone, John did another quick survey of the room. He began to pick up the various piles of clothes, and then stopped. He just wasn’t in the cleaning mood. He knew that’s what got him in this mess to begin with, but it just seemed like a waste of time at the moment.

“I’ll do it later,” he promised himself, taking a line from my book in a phrase I often used. He grabbed his keys and scribbled a quick note out to Sam.

“Went to San Anselmo, be back tonight. Don’t wait up,” it read. With thoughts leaning toward black and white checkered floors and a walkway lined with flowers, John headed out of the apartment and toward his car in the covered parking lot. He was going to the house he was building – our house. I clapped my hands in excitement, stowing a ride in his car as he crossed the bridge and headed toward the familiar road that led home.

I’d visited the abandoned project often in the past few weeks. I’d wandered the dusty hallways, the floors covered in sawdust below lights that swung from fixtures that still needed to be fastened to the ceiling. I ran my hands over the bare walls, imagining our family photos covering every square inch of the smooth plaster with our laughing faces. I’d stood in the center of our bedroom, remembering the last time we’d made love before we’d been interrupted, placing us in this bedroom instead of the one in our cramped apartment. I spun circles in the large kitchen with sunshine streaming through the picture window over the sink, brightening the room despite its unfinished state. I dug my hands in the soil outside, pretending I could feel the dirt form to my hands and travel underneath my fingernails.

I kept waiting for John to resume his work on the house, even though I knew that if I were in his position, I’d never set foot in the place again. But that didn’t keep me from hoping he could overcome the temptation to scrap the project and move on. I’d taken to whispering images of the house into his ear while he slept. I was delighted whenever he dreamed of the two of us unpacking wedding gifts in the living room, lounging on the couch watching TV, making love in the grassy backyard… But always, when he woke up, the visions were forgotten at once, and he would be mistaken in his sadness about being unable to dream.

“You can only mess with the living so much,” Jane had told me on one of her occasional visits as we jumped from dragonfly to dragonfly. “You may be able to see him, hear him, even smell him. But you’re still worlds apart.” It didn’t stop me from trying, though.

As John pulled in front of the house, I settled into the reflection of his blue iris and looked at the house through his eyes. His carpenter’s mind saw past the perfection in the wide porch with solid railings, the inviting red door, the friendly double-paned windows that let in the sunlight but kept out the sounds of the outside world. Instead, he saw the way the unfinished wood on the porch bowed in the middle. He saw the brown crabgrass that had choked out a once-plush lawn. He saw the minuscule chips in the red paint on the door, the way the bottom of it had too much of a gap to keep the house warm, the smears on the windows from months of neglect.

John walked up to the house and put his key in the door, opening it with slight hesitation as if something were behind it. The hinges complained under the movement, the creak echoing through the vacant house. John walked in, the sound of his footsteps on the wood floors ping-ponging off every surface in the house. He had turned off the electricity months ago, knowing it would be some time before he set foot in this house again. The sun was high in the sky outside; its rays spilling into each room through the large windows I’d insisted belonged on each modest wall. But despite the bright light it still felt dreary and dark in the empty house. John flipped the light switch in the living room once or twice, as if a little leftover charge could be pulled from the wires.

There was still a lot of work that needed to be done on the house, but when John peered past the walls that still needed painting and the naked electric sockets, he could also see how close he was to the end. He didn’t know what he was going to do with the house. He wasn’t sure he could live in it without me, but he was afraid to sell it and be done with it. Even renting it out seemed like a betrayal to me, allowing someone else to have a part of the dream we’d created together.

He concluded that no decision was necessary right now, but that leaving it to rot among the manicured lawns of the quiet neighborhood seemed a shame. Grabbing a broom, he put all his energy into cleaning up sawdust from the floors and swiping at the cobwebs that hung like drapes in the corners. He kept at it well into the evening, not noticing as the sun cast its rosy hue on the walls as it set in the late spring sky. It wasn’t until the streetlights lit up outside the living room window when the late hour caught his attention. He picked up his cell phone, noting a missed call from Wendy on it with no voicemail message attached. He also noticed it was after nine o’clock at night, and Sam was probably wondering where he was. He pushed the guilt out of his mind that Sam was on his own for dinner, excusing it with all the times Sam hadn’t shown up for dinner at all in the past couple of months.

John didn’t arrive home until almost ten o’clock at night. The lights were off when he opened the door of the apartment and peered in. He figured Sam was in his room, seeing the note he’d written crumpled up on the counter next to a plate with the remnants of unknown leftovers. John picked the dish up and washed it along with the dirty pans abandoned on the clean stove. He was left with minor frustration at how they were just left behind in the sink despite the fact that the rest of the kitchen was sparkling clean.

He was even more irritated when he saw that half of Sara’s oatmeal bread was missing before he could even cut into it. John dried his hands and cut himself a slice in a hurry, as if waiting any longer would result in the bread disappearing right from underneath him. While no longer warm, it still held the fragrance of just being baked. He bit into it and smiled as if sharing a private joke with someone in the empty room. Through him I could taste the dryness of the bread that was almost good. Sara had never been much of a baker, or anything that mothers were assumed to be good at. It was always a source of family amusement when she became a mom, as she had a difficult time boiling water without burning it. But she managed just fine with the girls and they were better for it, even if her bread-baking skills left something to be desired.

Not wanting to disturb Sam, John ascended the stairs with quiet footsteps. He paused at the top, looking over at Joey’s room that held all of his belongings, my belongings, me. He diverted his attention to Sam’s room, the light shining through the gap underneath the doorway. John tapped on his door and listened for movement to signal whether Sam was awake or not. No sound could be heard. He knocked a little louder and still no one answered or even stirred behind the closed door. He turned the doorknob and pushed against it, but something was blocking him from opening it more than an inch. John groaned when he saw that Sam had pushed a chair against the door to keep him from opening it. Ages ago, John had removed the lock from Sam’s door, tired of being locked out while Sam ignored him from the inside. He had taken the lock off the door to give him a chance of reaching his son. This was Sam’s habitual way of keeping the barrier in place.

“Sam, come on. Would you open the door?” He wasn’t surprised when Sam still didn’t answer him, so he struggled with the door to get it open. Little by little, the chair moved with the door until John could reach his hand through the space he’d created to push the chair over. Sam sat at his desk and regarded his dad with eyebrows raised, as if John was just an overreacting child.

I’d seen him give me the same look countless times when I’d try to reason with him. Rather than speak, he’d just let that look land on me for a few moments too long as if to size me up or see if I’d waver. On the outside I’d remain firm. But inside my blood would boil, just as John’s was doing now under Sam’s calm and amused gaze. And then Sam would do whatever it was I was asking him to do, whether it was to clean his own bathroom or stop acting as if all of us were in the wrong. But he’d do it with an air of conceit, letting us know through his silent demeanor that he was only doing this to promote peace, and we should be thankful he was humoring us. It infuriated me then. But now I was beginning to understand why he acted this way, why he found pleasure in the figurative steam coming from his father’s ears even as he climbed to the top of the power struggle by using his father’s force against him.

“I am sick and tired of you wedging your chair against this door, Sam!” John yelled, his face red in his growing fury. “It wrecks the door and can break the chair.” John breathed hard while looking at him, waiting for Sam to say something against it so they could have at it. Sam, knowing his dad was anticipating a challenge, kept quiet for a few moments, his stone cold demeanor standing firm before he gave his dad the reaction he wanted.

“It wouldn’t wreck the door if you didn’t try to push it aside all the time. Maybe if you just gave me my lock back, your precious door wouldn’t get ruined.” He said it in a calm voice, looking John in the eye as he spoke. John, in the meantime, was feeling crazy on the inside, flailing against the air of Sam’s cool disposition.

“Damn it, Sam! You don’t have a lock because then I’d never see you! Why can’t you just do what I tell you to do?” he shouted.

I could see the sparks in the air as Sam broke, something snapping inside of him after months of walls upon walls being built up between them.

“Because you’re never here! Even when you are here, you’re not! You don’t want to see me, you don’t even talk to me. And tell me what to do? It’s not like you’ve even been a parent to me at all since Rachel died. It’s like you’ve locked yourself up in that room with all her stuff and have nothing left for me. But Dad, I’m not dead, I’m here!” Sam stormed, clenching and unclenching his fists as he yelled at his dad. It was the same argument from a few weeks earlier, the unresolved emotions flying up between them after having been pushed down and ignored for too long. “I’m sick and tired of this house, this city, YOU! I can’t stand it here any longer!”

John held his breath at the words, realizing what was coming next. As much as he’d thought this eminent plan of action would bring him relief, he was suddenly faced with fear at the thought of his son moving out. At the forefront, he knew he’d miss his son. But underneath this fear was the knowledge that once his son was gone, John would be faced with my presence in every wall, on every surface, and in the air he breathed despite the fact that I and all my things were locked behind Joey’s door.

“What are you saying, Sam?” John asked, his body rigid as he waited for what they both knew was coming.

“I’m moving in with Mom.”

John let out a slow breath, sitting on the bed across the room as a wave of unexpected peace washed over both of them. The fight ended with those words. John wasn’t going to forbid it, a fact proved obvious in the way he looked at the ground. And while Sam hoped his father would protest a little, he didn’t expect him to. Besides, it wouldn’t have made a difference even if he did.

“Does your mom know?” John asked.

“Yeah, I called her when I got home and saw your note. But I’ve been thinking about it for a while,” he admitted.

“I know. I mean, I knew this was coming. It doesn’t make it any easier though,” John said. His eyes watered, though he held the tears at bay. But the sentiment wasn’t lost on Sam who needed to see some kind of regret from his dad. The wall between them crumbled piece by piece as they stood at the crossroads, finding their truce at the most unlikely of places. “What does she say about it? Is she fine with this decision?”

“She was actually happy about it. She said she’d call you to hash out the details.” John remembered the missed call from Wendy, realizing that was what she was calling him about. He was glad he hadn’t heard his phone ring.

The move wasn’t going to happen for a few more weeks, allowing Sam to finish his sophomore year at his current high school before summer vacation started, transferring to the school in Sebastopol in the fall. When it was settled, John embraced Sam for the first time in years. Sam leaned into John, just as he had when he was young, when life didn’t mean death or the end of marriage, when families stayed intact and everyday life was predictable.