Saturday, November 2, 2013

Out Of The Fire



I was just excited. It had been a few terrible days for all of us, and I was sure my homecoming would lighten the mood.

Instead, Beth answered the door with an alarming indifference. I got my first look at the apartment as I followed her in. It was a lint trap of a place. The whitewashed walls looked like crepe paper over a coffee stain. Dad was off in a corner, and Mom . . . I didn't know.

"Heeey." I said, a smile on my face and my arms held out.
Beth faced me and rolled her reddened eyes, "Ugh." she groaned. "I'm sorry big bro." She wrapped her arms around me. It was water in the desert to my soul. I held her a long time. She came away with tears in her eyes. I watched her walk to the hallway that I could only assume led to the bathroom and our rooms.

I approached Dad carefully. He sat at the table crushed by the weight of the moment. I put my hands on his shoulders. He was quick to grasp my hand. And he squeezed. He squeezed so hard. I squeezed back.

He let go of my hand and turned, his eyes drowned. He just hugged me. He didn't rise from his seat, he just wrapped his arms around me and squeezed. He wept silently.

"Oh Martin!"

That was Mom. Then Beth. They joined our reunion. I was being squeezed to pieces by four surprisingly strong arms. Beth leaned on my back. Wrapped up in their warmth and smell I finally lost it. I told them everything - the walk, Summit, the church, Scott, the Marines, the bureau-rats. All of it.

We sank to the floor together, and slumped in a comfortable heap.

"I'm so sorry, son." said Dad.
I just shook my head. Such is life, even in a zombie apocalypse.
"Do you remember shaved ice?" asked Beth.
Dad and I nodded.
"I had options," said Mom.
"What, mom?"
"Options." she said, again, "I was offered a scholarship to Emerson College. I was going to be a stage director, or set designer. Or both."
Her eyes glassed over.

"Holly." said Grandma Reese, "What are you going to do, sweetheart? That money will pay tuition, and part of your education costs. The rest, well, I'll convince grandpa he should help."
Grandma got a reply in a sweet, but sad smile.
"I appreciate the offer, Grandma." breathlessly she said, "I really really do." She hadn't been told that a heartbreak made a sound. Suddenly her ears were ringing.
"I just . . ." she paused.
"Just, what, Holly? You would be the first Reese girl to go to college!"
Holly looked her grandmother in the eye. Grandma looked back, her eyes gray and solid.
"It doesn't feel right." said Holly. She looked into the street where the neighborhood kids rode their bikes, "Martin does."
She expected grandma to roll her eyes, smooth out her dress, lean forward, and give her the matronly stare that said you listen, and you listen closely, child.
Instead grandma chuckled. The old woman was smiling at the children on their bikes, riding circles in the street. She seemed to be looking beyond the children, though her eyes still followed them.
Suddenly she was back in the present.
She looked at Holly, "Sweetie, if he feels right, chances are very good that he is right."
Holly's lip trembled.
"Oh baby." said Grandma. The old woman took Holly's hand in her own, and squeezed with a surprising strength. "I'm not upset. You follow your heart."

"Emerson?" I asked.
"Set designer?" asked Dad.
"You missed out on college for Dad?" said Beth. She then looked, eyes wide open at Martin, Sr., "Sorry Daddy. I meant . . . I would have chosen you, too. It's just. Set design would be so cool."
They laughed, the Ashtons in an intimate huddle on the floor of this apartment the remaining powers that be assigned them. It was pretty awesome.

We had been a close family before, each person comfortable, and annoyed just enough by one another to be a loving unit. But now my absence, and successful return amidst chaos, and death seemed to push us over the brink of a nice family, and into becoming essential to one another's life. I had never felt more at home . . . not even at home.

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