Point the Way | Melissa Fiegel
Reese looks at the hole in the facade, tempted. There could be animals in there, hiding from the winter. Old pieces of broken bottles. Jagged little teeth. Yet, she still shines her phone light inside and is met, not with eyes, but a set of tiny objects: a photograph, a yellow ribbon, and a folded piece of paper. Reaching in, she wraps her gloved hand around the photograph and ribbon and pulls them out. The note, whatever it says, is too far away.
It’s too bad she will never get to read it.
***
Reese sits at her kitchen table, willing her sister to respond to the text. Sobriety is no longer shiny. At first, each day was a mountain she was proud to climb, but now Reese is sick of climbing mountains. There are only so many Lemon Blackberry flavored waters someone can take. When she is this bored, she worries her 211 days will all be for nothing.
Her fingers tap, tap, tap on the cheap wooden surface but cannot speed up time. Of course Elizabeth wouldn’t respond right away. She has her husband and kids, dinners to make and activities to plan. Reese doesn’t like to keep too much on her plate at once.
Do you know who this is? I found this picture under mysterious circumstances and am intrigued lol. It says it is from 1997 so she might have been around your age in school.
Reese glances at the faded photo again. In it, a girl stands in a yard, bright yellow earrings hanging from her ears, matching exactly the tone of her over-sized yellow sweater and hair ribbon. She is smiling with her head cocked slightly to the left, a look that reads as pleasure, energy, and fascination. Love. On the back in handwritten letters it reads, “Me, 1997, before.”
Reese gets up and puts her plate in the sink. The sound echoes in the house and she worries that the plate has cracked. She does not check.
Hopefully, she thinks, Theo is in bed by now. She could text Troy and ask but doesn’t want to talk to him. Theo’s room sits filled to the brim with books, toys, and his new bed. Even though it is dark, the whole thing is lit in a vacant glow, the streetlights bouncing their rays off the snow and into the room. It is full, but it is empty.
She goes to grab the ribbon from the table. What in this person’s life drove her to shove her girlhood away in a tiny hole, never to look at again? Did she mean it is as time capsule or a tomb? Reese knows she is being too empathetic, but it is so easy for her mind to fill in the blanks, to fill in the girl’s trauma with her own. Grabbing the ribbon, she walks into the bathroom. The lights are brutal on her eyes, but they are honest. Reese is gray hairs and crow’s feet and ashen skin.
She delicately braids her hair for bed and ties the ribbon around its edges. As clear as day, as brutal as the lights, she thinks: maybe we can help each other.
Her phone dings and she runs back to the table.
Omg yea I know her. Where did you find this? Her name was Emily something. She was a year older but she got pregnant in her senior year. I know a few years later her and her son got in a car accident. They both died. Im surprised you don’t remember it was kind of a big deal. Rumor was that she was drunk but idk how true that is.
Why are you asking though? Is everything okay?
***
Reese lays in bed, thinking the ABCs to push everything else away. This woman killed herself and her own child. The thought sends another chasm straight into her chest. Theo was not in the car when Reese got her DUI, but the distinction is minimal. He could have been. Reese is cold under the blankets. The oblivion of sleep had been so urgent that she didn’t even have time to put on pajamas.
She reaches to her hair and touches the yellow ribbon, her heart aching for Emily and for her son. The ribbon feels like ice, and when she pulls her hand away, her fingertips feel extra smooth, like they have been burned.
There is one moment, as soon as she is drifting off, with the soft blanket brushing the bottom of her nose, that she believes she is safe. That everything is fine.
But when the coldness presses against her, it feels like a body. Hard, its curves matching hers. She throws the blankets back and flips the lights on. Obviously, nothing is there.
What could be there?
Just herself.
Her feet carry her to the kitchen and to the fridge door, reaching for a sparkling water, something for her hands to do so her mind has a chance to slow down. It isn’t enough.
The back door beckons and suddenly it is open, her body eager to feel the rush of cold. The breeze is not enough, her body pushes for more, so she grabs her long winter coat, slips on her boots, and walks outside into the night.
The biting air instantly pushes all other thoughts from her body. The moon is high in the sky, pointing the way, casting a bright light over the peaceful night.
In the garage, on a back shelf, in a box, under old pieces of chalk, it sits. Waiting, in case she has friends over or throws a party. For someone else.
It was true and it was not true.
Then, she is at the kitchen table, pouring one shot, then another, and she is finally warm inside, after so long. In her mind she pictures a white car against a tree. Mossy hands wrapping around it, crushing, embracing. Welcoming her home.
Bonus audio of Melissa reading her piece…
about the author:
Melissa Fiegel lives in Milwaukee, WI, and teaches Middle School English. She spends most of her time watching procedurals, parenting, reading, and tending to her hoard of houseplants.