didn’t rest until I was too exhausted to lift the brush to the canvas. The result was something more violent than I’d intended, rawer emotionally, but there it was, my guts laid out in acrylics.
It felt good, somehow, to have released all that pent-up angst, and I knew that I could sleep, at least. Well, it was something.
So I went to bed, making sure to turn off the cell phone on my nightstand before I slipped under the covers and closed my eyes, too tired to weep.
But not too tired to dream.
I found myself wandering around the grounds of a state fair, brightly colored lights and overloud laughter swirling around me. I didn’t see anyone, though all the rides were in motion, the Ferris wheel rotating, the Tilt-a-Whirl spinning.
I heard a voice, someone calling, “Andy, please, help me,” and I tried to follow it, but I wasn’t sure where it was coming from. Everything seemed to echo in my ears. The lights blurred my vision.
Out of nowhere, a figure in a red cape flew at me, hooded so I could see no face, though she proffered a black pot in which a green stew bubbled.
“Cabbage soup?” she asked in an odd sort of cackle.
“Homemade cabbage soup?”
I turned and ran from her, hearing that voice, still calling my name, and I entered the House of Mirrors, where I was suddenly surrounded by infinite reflections of myself, so I hardly knew where I started and the mirrors began.
“Andy.”
There it was again, only it sounded so near.
I spun around and saw him, standing smack behind me.
“Malone,” I said, glancing back, over my shoulder.
But he wasn’t really there. Only more mirrors, deceiving me.
“Brian, where are you?”
I ran ahead to where I thought he was, but I hit the glass.
Turned around and went the other way, only to smack into another dead end.
“Tell Cissy I’m sorry to miss the party,” he was saying, starting to fade, looking blurrier by the moment. “I love her cabbage soup.”
He kept talking, but it turned into gibberish, words that made no sense.
I pounded the mirror with my fists, screaming his name, until the silvered walls around me shattered, raining shards of glass.
Raining.
Pitter-pat, pitter-pat.
My eyes flew open, and I blinked at the gloom, grabbing at my clock on the nightstand, which showed nearly eight-thirty.
The dim outside the shutters made sense when I realized it was actually raining, water tapping on the windowsill.
Not slivers of glass.
Then I heard a louder tap-tap , and it wasn’t my head hammering.
I sat up in bed, strained to listen.
Someone was knocking on my door.
My T-shirt and striped sweatpants rumpled, I swung my feet to the floor and padded across the carpet that stretched wall-to-wall throughout the condo. Squinting through the peephole, I sighed at the sight of my mother, standing on my doormat, shaking out a large umbrella.
What was she doing here?
Mother rarely showed up anywhere uninvited. And I definitely hadn’t extended an invitation. Although she did have a sixth sense as to when I was at a low point; often the perfect time for her to twist my arm into doing something I wouldn’t do if I felt stronger. Maybe she needed another warm body for a committee she’d agreed to chair to raise money for out of work oil barons.
God only knew.
With Cissy, it could be anything.
Reluctantly, I opened the door, and she looked hard at me, wearing an impatient frown.
“Do you realize your phone is off the hook?” she asked, front and center, before using her umbrella handle to push the door out of my hands, wide enough for her to enter past me. “I’ve been trying to call you all morning, for heaven’s sake. What on earth’s the matter with you? Are you sick?”
Was I sick?
Interesting question, I mused as I shut and locked the door.
Did heartsick count? Although I was officially in denial about that, being the neofeminist that I purportedly was at heart, far beneath my ever-sensitive girlie girl skin.
“I have to finalize
It felt good, somehow, to have released all that pent-up angst, and I knew that I could sleep, at least. Well, it was something.
So I went to bed, making sure to turn off the cell phone on my nightstand before I slipped under the covers and closed my eyes, too tired to weep.
But not too tired to dream.
I found myself wandering around the grounds of a state fair, brightly colored lights and overloud laughter swirling around me. I didn’t see anyone, though all the rides were in motion, the Ferris wheel rotating, the Tilt-a-Whirl spinning.
I heard a voice, someone calling, “Andy, please, help me,” and I tried to follow it, but I wasn’t sure where it was coming from. Everything seemed to echo in my ears. The lights blurred my vision.
Out of nowhere, a figure in a red cape flew at me, hooded so I could see no face, though she proffered a black pot in which a green stew bubbled.
“Cabbage soup?” she asked in an odd sort of cackle.
“Homemade cabbage soup?”
I turned and ran from her, hearing that voice, still calling my name, and I entered the House of Mirrors, where I was suddenly surrounded by infinite reflections of myself, so I hardly knew where I started and the mirrors began.
“Andy.”
There it was again, only it sounded so near.
I spun around and saw him, standing smack behind me.
“Malone,” I said, glancing back, over my shoulder.
But he wasn’t really there. Only more mirrors, deceiving me.
“Brian, where are you?”
I ran ahead to where I thought he was, but I hit the glass.
Turned around and went the other way, only to smack into another dead end.
“Tell Cissy I’m sorry to miss the party,” he was saying, starting to fade, looking blurrier by the moment. “I love her cabbage soup.”
He kept talking, but it turned into gibberish, words that made no sense.
I pounded the mirror with my fists, screaming his name, until the silvered walls around me shattered, raining shards of glass.
Raining.
Pitter-pat, pitter-pat.
My eyes flew open, and I blinked at the gloom, grabbing at my clock on the nightstand, which showed nearly eight-thirty.
The dim outside the shutters made sense when I realized it was actually raining, water tapping on the windowsill.
Not slivers of glass.
Then I heard a louder tap-tap , and it wasn’t my head hammering.
I sat up in bed, strained to listen.
Someone was knocking on my door.
My T-shirt and striped sweatpants rumpled, I swung my feet to the floor and padded across the carpet that stretched wall-to-wall throughout the condo. Squinting through the peephole, I sighed at the sight of my mother, standing on my doormat, shaking out a large umbrella.
What was she doing here?
Mother rarely showed up anywhere uninvited. And I definitely hadn’t extended an invitation. Although she did have a sixth sense as to when I was at a low point; often the perfect time for her to twist my arm into doing something I wouldn’t do if I felt stronger. Maybe she needed another warm body for a committee she’d agreed to chair to raise money for out of work oil barons.
God only knew.
With Cissy, it could be anything.
Reluctantly, I opened the door, and she looked hard at me, wearing an impatient frown.
“Do you realize your phone is off the hook?” she asked, front and center, before using her umbrella handle to push the door out of my hands, wide enough for her to enter past me. “I’ve been trying to call you all morning, for heaven’s sake. What on earth’s the matter with you? Are you sick?”
Was I sick?
Interesting question, I mused as I shut and locked the door.
Did heartsick count? Although I was officially in denial about that, being the neofeminist that I purportedly was at heart, far beneath my ever-sensitive girlie girl skin.
“I have to finalize
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