Ever create something because you needed something to stimulate your mind and life? Wrote this story last night amidst the tortures of pure boredom (actually, I think I was waiting for my computer to upload pictures... it took forever). Anyways, feel free to critique.
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Sometimes the body works absent of the mind. A young girl was laying by the pool, her hands dangling over the cement into the water. She listened to the gurgle of water flowing into the pool and could feel the vibrations of her neighbors powerful riding lawn mower. Even with her cheek pressed to the ground, she could smell the fresh-cut-grass permeating the air. One hand made a ripple in the water and she watched it narrowly. Even though she saw all this, and sensed all of this, she couldn’t real feel it. Her mind was faraway, picturing the casket closing over her mothers’ face.
Somewhere in the distance, children were screaming playfully. The girl could faintly hear the sounds of a sprinkler, and pictured a young brother and sister dashing through the spraying water and shrieking that it was too cold. A wry smile lit her lips as she remembered how her mother used to watch her from the window and rap sharply on the glass when she was getting too loud.
“Joella?” A man called through the porch door, and on seeing her stopped in the doorway to look at her. “What are you doing?”
There was no response. The girl only twirled her finger in the pool and stared at the ripples she was causing.
“Listen, you can’t be like this. We’re all having a hard time of it.” He seemed frustrated with her, but as he came to sit by her he visibly took a steadying breath to calm himself. “I need you to be understanding, honey. You’re young. You don’t know how it is for me.”
The girl only shook her head fiercely, her lips trembling as she fought back tears.
“Your mother’s gone, sweetheart. She’s gone.”
Joella spoke more to the water than the man beside her. “I hate her.”
“Your mother?”
Joella shook her head no again, her dark hair falling over her stormy eyes and freckled cheeks.
“Oh. Sarah. You mean you hate Sarah.” The man took another deep breath and put his fingers together in a contemplative cone, and couldn‘t seem to think what to say. Finally he shrugged and said, “It’s hard for a man to be alone.”
The girl turned towards him with flashing eyes. “Well you’re not the only one alone! Did you ever think about that?”
“Shh, shh, the neighbors will hear you.”
“Well, I don’t care. Let them hear. They can have their happy sounds and I’ll have mine. At least the sounds will be real.”
“You’re not making any sense. You need to think rationally, sweetheart. I think you’re just not giving Sarah a chance. She’s so nice and she just wants to make you happy.”
“No, she wants to make you happy. She wants to make herself happy. She wants to make the new baby happy. All of you guys can be happy, happy, happy, but I don’t want it.”
“You don’t want us to be happy? Don’t you think that’s a little selfish? Listen, I know how much your mother meant to-”
The girl shook her head, “Don’t.”
“She was sick. We all stood there by her when she was struggling. She suffered, sweetie. She wanted to go.”
“No, she didn’t. Don’t say that. Don’t say that. She didn’t want to go! She wanted to stay. She loved me!”
“And she still loves you, but she couldn’t stay so sick all of the time, could she? She was always sick. How could she take care of you when she was sick? Don’t you see? She had to go. She’s happier that way.”
“I would have loved her even if she stayed sick. How can she really be happy? If she loved me, she’d want me happy. And I’m not happy so she can’t be either.”
The man sighed heavily and put his large hands on his knees, watching the girl wipe her smudged tears from her cheeks and sniff deeply. He felt immense pity for her beyond the grief of the moment, because Sarah had once told him that Joella would need to develop a good personality because she was a fairly plain little girl. Nothing was too outstanding about her small shoulders and her high, freckled cheek bones, or her frizzy dark hair and upturned nose. The only thing in her favor was her intense eyes that were now flashing with built up neglect, pain, and anger. Even then, Sarah was right. Joella needed to work on getting a personality, and unpredictable tears were not going to help her with that.
The girl hunched her lithe shoulders over and hugged her knees to herself. It was as though she was desperate for a listening ear, a consolidating touch, a gentle word, but she never knew when she might get it. So she tensed, and she waited for it.
He put his hand on her shoulder, and said quietly, “You need to accept it. Because your mother is gone, and Sarah and I are getting married whether you like it or not.”
Joella shrugged off his hand and ran into the house. She didn’t look back, but fled through the glass doors and passed her mothers favorite maroon couch. She had heard Sarah say the couch was ugly and she was going to get rid of it. The thought spurred Joella’s little pink tennis-shoes on angrily and she skipped the solitude of her room and ran through the front door and out to the side-walk. The sun beat down on her head warmly, and she looked up wistfully at the sunshine. All she could think about was that casket lid as it closed down over her mothers’ thin, pretty face. The people in suits told her they were sorry for her loss, and handed her a dark rose from the bouquet on her mothers’ casket, but they didn’t seem sorry. They just seemed like they wanted to be sorry. Joella kept on running. Running, and running, and running. She passed Mrs. Henry’s house and for once didn’t stop to talk to the old woman and pet her ancient little dog and hear her talk the latest love of her life. She flew past the children running through their sprinkler and ignored the mother who stood by them with big fluffy green towels. A big black car turned the corner and honked at her because she almost stepped out onto the street at the same time. She felt her hands shaking and crossed the street quickly, barely hesitating to breath as she neared her destination.
Harvards was a quaint little ice-cream shop that a lot of children Joella’s age went to on Saturday. Today was Friday, though, Joella realized with some disappointment. She plunged her hand in her pocket and brought up a few lint pieces, a Barbie-doll shoe, 3 quarters, and 2 pennies. Satisfied, she reached for the big brass handle and entered the brightly-lit shop. Lilly, the teenage girl who worked the counter, was chewing bubble-gum and talking on the phone with her boyfriend. Joella sighed, finding a a high red stool and scooting onto it silently. She could smell the double-bubble from Lilly’s mouth. Lilly glanced over at her with darkly eye-shadowed eyes and sounded annoyed when she said into the phone, “Hey, Mark, hang on a sec. I got a customer.” She looked expectantly at Joella then, and prodded, “Yes? What do you want?”
“A double chocolate cone, please.” Joella sniffed.
“Where are your parents?”
“I came alone.”
“Well, you got money? You know ice cream costs money, don’t you?”
Joella slid 77 cents hopefully towards the young teen.
“Huh uh. Mark warned me about you. You come in with half the money and hope someone will take pity on those icy eyes of yours and cover the other half? Sweetheart, you need $1.48. All of it. This isn’t a charity shop.”
“I don’t come in with half the money. Just today I did.”
“Right. Very likely, sweetheart,” Lilly tossed her hair over her shoulder and turned back to the phone. “Mark you still there?”
Joella slid off of the bright red stool and trudged out the door. The shop seemed so deceptively bright and shiny. Her home looked so wickedly comfortable and simple. Why was nothing ever as it seemed? She passed a man in a dark coat and felt that she hated him just because he looked like he had a kind face.
“I hate him. I hate the sunshine. I hate everything, I do,” she cried to herself as she walked.
“Hey, hey,” the older man said as she passed by him. “What’s wrong little lady?”
Joella looked up into the mans’ eyes and saw the worry there. She blinked twice to see if the kindness in his smile would go away. It didn’t. She shook her head to see if he would walk away like everyone else.
“It’s okay. You don’t want to talk about it? That’s fine.”
Up close, Joella could see now that the gentleman was really very old, and his back seemed to be in pain because he was standing funny.
“Uh,” he groaned, “I’m going to sit down. You don’t mind do you?” Joella shook hear head no solemnly, and he heaved himself gratefully into the bench outside of Harvards. She found herself curious about him. He must have seen that in her eyes, because he continued to talk to her,
“Yeah, I’m not as young as I used to be. Believe it or not I used to be quite the gentleman in my day.” He chuckled to himself. “I was always going, going, going. I always had places to go. But now I can’t get around so well any more and I get to sit more and think about what’s most important to me.”
“Wh-what’s most important to you?”
The old man nodded approvingly at her question and said, “My family. My family’s the most important thing to me.”
“Oh,” Joella said, her voice very small.
“My family’s not what it used to be of course. My Marty died only 3 years ago.”
“Marty?”
“My wife.”
“Oh. Really?”
“Yep, but it’s all right, because she left behind the things that were most important to both of us.”
“Oh, yeah? What was that?”
“Our children.” The old man looked proud. “I have four kids. All of ems’ grown up now, but I’m mighty proud of them. I wouldn’t trade them for the world.”
Joella looked up at him wonderingly. “Would you…. Would you want to love somebody else some day? Like, I mean, would you want to love a new baby more than your old children?”
“I think I might want to love somebody else some day. But even if I do love somebody, nobody can take the place of Marty.”
“No?”
“Absolutely not. You see, I have met a lady I‘d like to marry, but I’ll never stop loving my Marty. She has a special place in my heart. She always will. Some men don’t like talking about it, but I don’t mind sharing this with a pretty little thing like you. I had the hardest time at first, because I always thought that having new children, and loving new people, meant that I was trying to replace the people I had lost. I could never do that.”
“No, you couldn’t, because you loved Marty.”
“Still do,” he corrected.
“Still do,” she smiled shyly, and then continued earnestly, “So what’d you find out?”
“Find out? I guess I found out that loving new people isn’t all bad. I figure God didn’t give man a piece of love and tell him to cut it equally into slivers and divvy it out to people. God didn’t tell me that I needed to divide my love in half every time a new person came along and needed me to love ‘em. Nope. If God brings along a new person into my life, he’s going to double my love, so I‘ll have plenty of love to give out.”
“Double it?”
“Yeah, like an ice-cream cone. Doubled.”
Joella looked down with wide eyes. “So, does that mean if somebody new comes into my life, I don’t have to stop loving my mom in order to try to love them?”
“Absolutely not. What happened to your mom?”
“She died.”
“I’m sorry.”
Joella looked at him closely. “Yes, you are. You’re actually sorry.”
The man smiled kindly, and stood suddenly, “Hey, you’ve let me talk your ear off. Would you mind if I buy you an ice-cream cone or something? I’m supposed to meet my girlfriend at a place called Harvards. Maybe you could meet her.”
Joella’s eyes lit with excitement, and she stuttered, “But you’re right in front of Harvards! You’ve been here all along!”
“Well, I’ll be. I’m becoming a blind old man. Would you mind leading me in? I can’t see a thing,” he teased.
Joella giggled and took him by his weathered hand and led him in the big brass doors and showed him to the red stools. He sat down with a sigh, and called to Lilly on the phone, “Hey, sweet heart! We’re going to need some ice cream over here.”
Joella heard the click of the phone and Lilly came out smoothing her apron and faking a smile.
“Oh, hi. Sorry about that. That was my mother… she’s dreadful sick. I had to talk to her. What can I get for you?”
Joella rolled her eyes, and Lilly seemed to see her for the first time. Her eyes narrowed, and she seemed to stiffen and be a little less eager to help.
“All right, I’d like to try a banana split…” The old man turned to Joella and asked her, “What would you like, young lady?”
Joella took a deep breath and stared at the menu, suddenly staggered by the options she could pick from. “Mm… I think…” Lilly was tapping her foot impatiently. “I think I might try… the double-chocolate cone.” It was Lilly’s turn to roll her eyes and she disappeared into the kitchen with the orders.
Joella looked shyly over at the old gentleman and whispered, “Thank you.”
The man only winked.
The doors behind them opened suddenly and there was a cry, “Oh! Joella! Thank God, he's found you! Roger, why didn't you tell us you'd found her?”
Joella looked up in surprise at the older man, and he winked again at her. “Little lady, this is my girlfriend, Charlotte Henry.”
“Mrs. Henry? You’re his girlfriend?”
“I see you’ve met Roger,” she huffed, her eyes clearly knit with prior worry. “Your father and I’ve been looking everywhere for you. I saw you run by like your hair was on fire. I knew something was wrong.”
Joella felt a warm feeling in her stomach. She didn’t know where it came from, but she felt warm all over. Maybe she just felt… loved. Suddenly she noticed that Mrs. Henry’s little dog had followed her in.
“Jazzie’s with you!”
“Of course Jazzie’s with me. Who do you think would have protected me if I’d gotten lost?”
Joella knew she was only teasing and giggled. Roger put his wrinkled arm around Mrs. Henry and whispered something in her ear that made her laugh.
Lilly was tapping her foot. “Your ice cream is melting,” she announced.
Joella’s eyes were lit with mischief as she leaned to take a big healthy lick of her ice cream.
Suddenly, though, she paused. “Oh,” she said, “I was thinking… maybe after this I might want to go home.”
Mrs. Henry clucked like an old hen and put her arm around Joella’s shoulders. “We’ll take you over there first thing, luv.”
Lilly was tapping her foot again. “Is that all you’ll be needing?”
Roger looked up suddenly, “Oh, that’s right.” He pushed the banana split between him and Mrs. Henry and asked Lilly, “Two spoons, please.” He smirked and then winked at Joella. Joella took a big lick of her ice cream and smiled.
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