Back to Yesterday (26 page)

“Dad,” I said, the words scraping against the back of my throat, “something’s wrong. I can feel it.”

“What do you mean?” He stood and rounded the corner of his desk, his brows drawn tightly together.

“I can feel it, Dad. I can…” My body flushed hot, a trickle of sweat rolled down my spine.

Taking me by the elbow, Dad led me to the wingback chair and instructed me to sit. “What’s the matter, sweetheart?”

“I don’t know, but
something
is wrong. Can’t you feel it?” I searched his face for validation. He only looked confused. My heart thrummed a rhythm I didn’t recognize. “You don’t feel it?”

He took his time answering me, carefully assessing the situation. He squatted down in front of me, placed his hands on my shaking knees. “Tell me what this is,” he said. His voice was calm like he was trying to talk a jumper off a ledge. “What are you feeling?”

I wiped my clammy palms over my nightgown and squeezed my eyelids shut tight. Though everything looked normal, I didn’t trust my eyes to be honest with me. I concentrated on my other senses. Sounds and smells were battling taste and touch, a cacophony of clutter swirled around me. I couldn’t separate or concentrate on any one thing. All I knew was that I could feel the Earth spinning in the wrong direction. Why couldn’t anyone else feel it?

“Maybe you had a bad dream and you’re just feeling whatever residual fear you felt while dreaming.”

Fear. I imagined Fear leering at me in the corner, over by the window, ready to do battle once more.

“Try taking deep breaths,” my father said. “I’ll even do it with you. Ready? Breathe in…” I sucked in air. “Breathe out.” I let it out in slow measures. “Again. Breathe in…and out.” We did this a handful of times. My heart rate slowed, though it beat in an awkward pattern. Sounds and smells dulled to a more manageable sensation. “Better?” Dad asked.

I lied. “Yes.”

I left my father’s study and went back to my room. I closed the door and slid down the back of it until my bottom hit the floor. My eyes scanned the room looking for anything that was out of sorts. There was nothing, yet
something
felt wrong.

“What do you think it is?” Elizabeth asked.

I had pulled her off to the side after I forced myself to get dressed and showed up for work. “I don’t know.” Then I looked at her, beseeching honesty in her honey brown eyes. “Do you feel it?”

She caressed my arm. “No, honey. But I believe that you do.”

I pinched the space between my eyes. “I feel like I got tossed overboard and I’m bobbing in the ocean like a buoy, no one else around me. I’m alone in this.”

She pulled me into her arms, not saying a word. She didn’t have to.

I was definitely alone.

Seconds morphed into minutes. Minutes morphed into hours. Hours morphed into a day. One day threaded into the next until a week passed. The feeling of doom lingered like a ghost, constantly hovering, unseen, yet felt. I kept looking over my shoulder, searching behind every corner, knowing something was there and not being able to put my finger on it.

It was driving me mad with anxiety, a constant spike of adrenaline. Even my nights betrayed me. I couldn’t find the peace in my dreams because my dreams turned into a frantic frenzy of hide and seek.

The nagging feeling that something was wrong stayed with me. I couldn’t shake it. I delved into fits of crying, the uncontrollable fits where you can’t catch your breath and you think your heart might explode or implode and you’ll bleed out.

“What’s wrong, dear?” my mother asked, brushing her hands through my hair while I sat on the bottom step of our porch having one of my crying sessions.

Drying my eyes with the back of my hand, I said, “I wish I knew. I feel like something is wrong and I can’t shake the feeling. It follows me everywhere I go.”

“Do you want to talk about it, dear?”

“It’s Charlie. I know it is. I can feel it my gut, Mom. What if he’s hurt? What if…” I couldn’t even finish the thought. If Charlie – no. I shook my head, refusing to go there. “I don’t know what to do.”

My mother cradled me to her side and held me close. “Let’s say a prayer together. Okay? We’ll pray for him.”

My throat had closed up, words unable to pass through. I nodded silently.

She said a prayer for Charlie and I held each word in my hands and released them like magical doves when we said amen. She sat with me for the longest time, waited for my trembling to taper, then kissed my head and went inside.

I looked up to the sky, recalling the beauty of Charlie’s description when he had painted it with words.

“The sky is deceptive, mysterious, and moody. It is a master of disguise. It can be beautiful one minute and deadly the next. It can set you free or trap you in invisible barriers. The strands of wispy clouds can either hug you or suffocate you. It can be violent and unforgiving today and tomorrow it can whisper hope with its soft rays of light.”

I closed my eyes, let the heat of the sun warm my skin and dry the tears that stained my face.

Tell me you’re okay, Charlie. I have to know. I have to know.

I went inside and grabbed my keys. “Mom, I’m going for a drive.” I left my worry on the bottom step and climbed into Charlie’s truck. When I got to the end of the street, I looked in my rearview mirror, hoping my ghosts weren’t following me. On the edge of town, I pulled over and picked an assortment of wildflowers that grew along the side of the road and headed to the one place where I knew I would find the quiet serenity I needed.

Placing the flowers on Tank’s grave, I stepped back and spoke to the stone that had his name etched into it.

Connor (Tank) Cassidy

March 12, 1922 – October 28, 1942

“Hi,” I said. I smoothed out my skirt and sat facing the stone. “We had a deal, remember?” The day after I first visited Julia, I came out to the cemetery and made a pact with Tank. I would look after his mother and he would look after Charlie. “I’ve held up my end,” I said, plucking grass and twirling it around my finger. “Are you holding up your end?”

I waited for his answer. I imagined a yes being whispered in the shy way Tank would have responded.

I smiled. “Thank you.”

I sat with him, wanting to keep him company. Or maybe I wanted him to keep me company. Either way, it was nice so I didn’t examine it too closely. I thought about the conversation we’d had in the hospital after Charlie slept off the shot the doctor had given him for his bee sting.

We were standing in the hallway drinking bitter coffee. “I can take you home or something if you don’t wanna stay,” Tank had said. “I’ll come back for him and let him sleep at my house. Or take him home if that’s what he wants.”

“No, no I want to make sure he’s okay. I don’t mind staying.” One side of Tank’s mouth lifted and his eyes danced with mirth. “What?” I asked.

His crooked grin turned into an even smile. “You know he’s fine. You heard him. You make him
fly
.”

“Oh hush. I do not. Confessions while medicated are no confessions at all. He was high as a kite.”

“Disagree. Confessions while medicated are the most honest ones. All inhibitions go out the window.” He tilted his head thoughtfully. “I get it, though.”

“Get what?”

“It’s your eyes. They’re… soulful. Like you’ve lived a thousand lives and have a thousand stories. He stared at me, not with any kind of seduction or flirtation, more like he was reading a blurb on the back of a book to see if the story was worth reading. “Yeah,” he said. “I definitely get it.”

Feeling a bit exposed under Tank’s examining eye, I offered a shy smile and sipped my coffee. I walked over to a wall of windows at the end of the hallway and gazed outside. I worried for Charlie and not because of his allergy to bee stings. My stomach twisted in knots every time I thought about him going back to war, and I thought about it often. I secretly hoped his leg wouldn’t heal well enough for him to fly anymore, and then I would immediately feel like a horrible villain for thinking such a thing. I was all kinds of confliction. Every time the subject of war came up, my inner-self screamed, kicked, and fought inside a soundproof room while my outer-self kept her mouth shut and dashed away before the screams broke free.

I was lost in thought when I felt a chill at my back. Tank’s hand touched my shoulder. “He’ll be okay, Sophie. Don’t worry.”

I wasn’t sure how, but Tank knew where my thoughts had gone. I placed my hand over his and said, “You promise?”

There was a moment of hesitation and then he said, “Yeah, I promise.”

My eyes traveled over the length and width of the cemetery, taking in all the sights and sounds. After a while, I got up and walked to the field beyond the headstones, walked out to the center of it, sat, and laid down so I could look up to the sky, songbirds singing all around me. The weather was warm, the sun hanging low beyond a line of trees and I wondered where Charlie was and what he was doing. Was he safe? I had no way of knowing. Closing my eyes, I sensed the presence of the ghost that kept hanging around, ready to rattle its chains. It had followed me here and I was so tired of feeling this way, like something was amiss in the universe, that something tragic had happened and I had no keys to unlock doors that held the answers I longed for.

Are you okay? I have to know. I have to know.

I sat up, wrapped my arms around my legs, and rested my head on my knees, the tears building and building. I squeezed my eyes shut and chanted…
I have to know. I have to know.

A moment later, I felt a chill at my back, a flutter against my skin, a breeze across my cheek. I kept my eyes closed and focused, imagining my plea sweeping across land and sea.

I have to know.

Another flutter. Another breeze.

I opened my eyes and stared at what I saw, afraid to make any sudden movements.

A monarch butterfly rested peacefully on my arm.

“Do you know the legend of the monarch butterfly?”

“No.”

He moved in closer, took my hand, and walked me to the center of the field. “Legend has it that monarch butterflies are messengers who travel great distances. If one appears and it touches you it’s supposed to be a sign from a loved one that they are okay. Messengers of peace.”

“Messengers of peace,” I said, staring at the butterfly tickling my arm, its wings gently moving. I looked back towards the sky and felt my chest rise and fall with a healthy dose of air. Calm descended over me. It was a sign. I knew it was.

Closing my eyes again, I felt my shoulder tingle with warmth…like a barely there touch, and the wind whispered,
“He’ll be okay. Don’t worry.”

With a broken, hopeful voice, I asked, “Promise?”

This time, there was no hesitation.
“Yeah, I promise.”