LONG AGO, I LEFT THIS PLACE never to return. I buried my heart somewhere in this house, along with its memories. I thought that I could escape from my own past and that it would never catch up to me, that I would always be two steps ahead.
But now I realize that I was a fool to believe that. The ghosts of my past haunt me whenever I look in the mirror. They walk with me. They sleep with me. They rule my every thought and every action. I thought I was free, yet now I see it was just a stupid illusion. I never stopped being the lonely girl who felt unworthy of love, who cried herself to sleep while praying to a deaf God to make her parents love her back. No, I don’t think I ever truly left this house full of regrets and fears.
Chewing my bottom lip, I stare at the white Victorian house where I grew up. At the two perfectly matched flowerpots that border the faded red door and the navy blue shutters framing the windows. I’m not even sure what coming here will accomplish. All I know is that my dream still haunts me and I haven’t been able to shake off the feeling that I need to be here.
Once I ring the doorbell, I fidget nervously, attempting to fix my clothes one last time. The lights of the porch come immediately on as a woman exclaims that she’s coming.
She opens the door and gasps in surprise as her gaze lands on me. “Blaire?” She opens the door wider. “Is that you?”
“Hello, Mom,” I say, surprised that my voice sounds so calm.
She stares at me silently and I think she’s about to tell me to leave when she steps forward and embraces me in a hug so fierce I can almost feel the air disappearing from my lungs. It freezes me to the spot. I want to return her embrace but a part of me forbids it with rancor, while the other cries for her. So I stand still, unable to move.
After a moment, my mother pushes herself away from me. It seems like she wants to touch me again, but she won’t. Her eyes rove over my face. “I thought I was never going to see you again.”
I bury my hands in the back pockets of my black skinny jeans. “Me too.”
My mom lowers her gaze, focusing on her hands. “It’s been a long time.”
“Yes, a very long time.” The words hang between us just as the many lives that we have lived without each other. I wonder if she, too, remembers our good-bye as clearly as I do.
“My goodness, I’ve forgotten my manners.” She looks up and smiles sadly at me. “Would you like to come in?”
“I—”
“Please?” she pleads.
When I was fourteen, I developed my first crush. His name was Brendan and he had a penchant for bathing himself in Aqua Di Gio. That year, I loved Aqua Di Gio. Brendan sat in front of me in Spanish class. I would close my eyes, lean in a little closer and breathe in his smell. I would picture us going to the movies. We would hold hands and he would pay for popcorn and soda. He would pretend to stretch his arms just so he could wrap an arm around my shoulders. It was lovely. It was unattainable. Brendan didn’t know I existed. Brendan also had a crush on Paige. Somehow Paige discovered that I liked Brendan, and unbeknownst to me, she got him to ask me out to the movies, just like in my teenage dream. I showed up at the movie theater, heart beating fast. My first date with a boy. Brendan did show up, but he wasn’t alone. He was with Paige. And boy, did they put on a show for me.
I grew to hate the smell of Aqua Di Gio.
Now, that cologne is forever associated with Brendan, the heartbreak of my first teenage crush, and Paige. So, yeah, I can’t stand the smell.
And like Aqua Di Gio, this house bombards me with memories as I follow my mother into the living room, most of them painful. A part of me wants to run out the door, forgetting that I ever came.
But it’s too late to turn back.
I sit down on a couch I don’t recognize as I look around, my attention arrested by a picture of my parents. Together. Older. I frown. My mom follows the direction of my gaze, walks toward the frame, and picks it up. She caresses the glass tenderly, her fingers stroking my father’s face. The frown grows deeper. Am I missing something here? Or am I falling down Alice’s rabbit hole?
When my mother looks back, she must see the perplexed expression on my face because she places the picture down and smiles sadly. “I love this picture.”
“Um, yeah … I can see that,” I say but what I really want to ask is, why?
She stares at me for a short while, studying me. I want to fidget under her gaze, but I manage to sit still. “You’re more beautiful than I remember,” she murmurs softly.
“And does that bother you, Mom?” I reply, poison dripping off my every word.
She flinches as though I just slapped her. “I deserve that.”
“No,” I reply, angry with myself for being rude. “You didn’t. I’m sorry.”
My mom sits on the sofa across from me. “We used to do that, didn’t we? Go for each other’s throats? See who could slash deeper, hurt harder.”
To avoid looking at her in the eye, I pretend to study my nails. “Doesn’t matter now, does it?”
The silence that ensues is deafening. Our past shouts at us. Each and every memory raising its voice demands to be heard.