Page 8 of Fragments of the Lost
“Trust me, it was the quickest way to deal with him.”
I rolled my eyes. “So many secrets, Caleb. You play theguitar?”
He saw what I had in my hand and laughed. “Hardly. It was a gift from my grandparents when I was younger. I don’t know how to play.”
“At all?”
“Nope.”
The guitar, I then saw, had a fine layer of dust covering the sides. Remnants of a spider web clung to one of the tuning keys at the top. I brushed away the dust and debris, swung it in front of my body, looping the strap onto my shoulder. I placed my fingers in the position of the single chord I knew the best, which my father had taught me years earlier.
“Wait, you can play the guitar?” His face contorted, stuck somewhere between confusion and delight.
“I wouldn’t say I canplayexactly, but apparently I can play better than you.” I strummed another chord, smiled, tried to remember the few basic bars from the handful of lessons I took back in middle school. The guitar was out of tune, but the notes still sounded familiar.
“What else don’t I know about you, Jessa Whitworth?” he whispered, leaning closer. We were at that stage where we thought we already knew all the important things, but then something like this would come along, and we’d realize how much more there was still left to discover.
“Well, for one,” I said, placing my hand over the strings, to still them. The room fell silent. “I don’t like being hidden in closets.”
He tipped his head back, laughed—laughed louder than he expected. He cut himself off, cut his eyes to the stairway. “Point taken,” he said. “But we should go before Sean comes back inside, unless you want to end up back in there.”
I slid the guitar strap off my shoulder, handed it to him, and watched as he restored it to its original position, in the back of the closet.
“Who owns a guitar and doesn’t know how to play?” I mumbled.
“I’ll let you teach me if you want,” he said. He threw me a look over his shoulder, then motioned for me to follow him silently. We snuck down the steps, peering around corners, until we were down the front porch steps, in the open air, then in his car, driving to a place I can no longer remember.
—
Now I hold the guitar to my hip. He never asked me to teach him. I never did. It sat in the same spot, apparently for nearly a year, unmoved, untouched. The strings remain intact—I strum them once, then place my hand over the top, to stifle the sound.
I lean the guitar gently against the wall at the door—it won’t fit in a box. Still, it has value, if his mom decides to sell it. I figure that’s the point of all this packing: an ordering of what needs keeping and what can be donated or sold.
—
I’ve filled boxes, labeled themShirts, Pants, Shorts, Socks.They tower along the wall, but the room is still full. He’s still everywhere. It’s Saturday afternoon, and there are six boxes of Caleb on the staircase, and I’m wondering how much longer it will take before the room becomes something else. Before I stop seeing him in every corner, every heartbeat, every tick of the godforsaken clock. Before I can breathe deeply without this suffocating feeling.
It’s the pictures, I decide. His eyes. They’re everywhere.
I think of the last time I walked up these steps, peering into this room, when he was still here. The way he stood in the entrance, his arm outstretched, bracing himself against the doorjamb. His body said everything:You are not welcome.
And now here I am, precisely where he let me know that I amnot welcome,and I feel him watching me. Watching as I go through his things, tossing pieces of his life aside.
His words from that day, his expression flat as he said, “What are you doing here, Jessa?”
I hear the words again. Coming from the walls. Coming from everywhere.
I lunge for the window and push it open. The cold air rushes in, seizes my lungs midbreath. The room flutters all around me, coming to life. Pictures flap against the wall in a wave; a paper on his desk turns over, as if Caleb himself were circling the room. I hang my body out the window, resting my waist on the ledge, and I know I must look like I’m trying to escape, that there’s a fire, or thick smoke, when really there is only me.
There used to be a screen here. I’m not sure what happened to it.
I listen to the birds, to the wind through the tree branches, to a car engine turning over down the street. I close the window, and the cold lingers. It will take a moment for the heat to rise again.
The pictures come down next. One by one. Because I can’t stand him looking at me. I can’t standmelooking at me. The way we used to be, taunting me.
I’m somewhat surprised to find the pictures are still up. Maybe he was keeping up appearances; maybe he hadn’t had the time or the energy to eradicate me completely from his life yet. Maybe he had grown so accustomed to the images, like background music, that he didn’t really notice them anymore. Or maybe—and this is more painful—he was an optimist underneath everything, too.
As I take them down, I notice he’s written on the backs of them, in pencil, and something in my chest squeezes closed. Who prints pictures anymore? It’s sweet. This is too much.
