As I rush out of bed I wonder if Barry will forgive me for not returning his calls. I’m pretty sure he’s mad at me for leaving without telling him. However, I wasn’t about to refuse a great job offer. It did seem very selfish of me at the time, but now that it’s been almost a year since we broke up, I’ve made enough money to buy that dream car of ours. Barry will have to forgive me after I tell him the good news.
I brush my teeth and remember how Barry hated mint flavored toothpaste, I start to reminisce over small details that Barry disliked. He always hated the fact that I squeezed the toothpaste tube from the middle and that sometimes I don’t put it back into the mirror cupboard. So I open the mirror cupboard and put the toothpaste back and my eyes get fixed on a bottle of valium I purchased about a year ago trying to get over the horrible break up I had with my high school sweetheart. I pick up the bottle and take a tablet, and slip the bottle into my handbag as I think I may need it for when I’m back home.
I put on a stunning topless black dress and a cardigan to go with it, hoping Barry will remember how nice I looked in it when he took me out on our first official date since he got that job at the law firm. It was then when Barry had made many lovely future plans of what our life together would be like. There was a house, with a blue porch and a green swing, three Dalmatians running about and of course, our yellow dream car. But of course, with the money Barry was earning and with my low paid job for the local paper, we could not possibly have any of that unless we waited out at least 10 years. And I didn’t have 10 years, or so I thought. I wanted to have it all set up for us in 2 years so Barry and I could start thinking about children. Silly me though, Barry hadn’t asked me to marry him.
As I think about how Barry never asked me to marry him, I’m now raged and I wonder if I should board that plane back home. Despite my anger, I am unable to stop my feet. Luckily for the valium I took earlier, I wasn’t angry too long.
I checked in to a hotel back home as I didn’t feel like going back to my mom’s. I just didn’t have it in me to deal with all the questions about my whereabouts. Just as I sat on the corner of the hotel bed, thinking of the things that I have to say to Barry so he’d forgive me, I receive a call, from a withheld number, and I answered it anyway. It was Barry’s sister Meg. She said Barry had left me something and she wanted me to look at it before they took it down. I didn’t know what she meant but she sounded solemn and so I obeyed her request to meet her at the old boat house by the lake.
Walking on the wooden slabs towards the old boathouse, I think of the times that Barry would carry me down there because I hated walking on those rough wooden slabs in my heels. Meg doesn’t smile at me but directed me into the boathouse with her body language. As I look around the inside of the boathouse, unable to search for words, even of questions, Meg puts her hand on my shoulder and says to me that Barry had intended to ask me to marry him the day I left without telling him and had decorated the boathouse in red and purple ribbons, my favorite colors. Still unable to shed a tear as I stand there feeling remorseful and guilty, Meg tugs on my arm and I swing around to face her. With tears rolling down her face, she hands me a box open with a beautiful engagement ring that Barry had made for me. She says that Barry would want me to have it, as he waited patiently all this time for me to return his calls and emails. As Meg turns around to walk away, I start to think if the reason I am unable to shed a tear for my ex boyfriend’s tremendous love for me was the high dose of valium. 5 steps away and Meg turns around, forces a smile, and says to me, “come on, we’re going to be late for Barry’s funeral”.
Forgetting of all the things I was going to say to Barry at his funeral and hoping he’d forgive me for not telling him when I took off a year ago, I now hoped Barry would forgive me for not forgiving him and holding on to my anger for such a long time. Perhaps, if I stayed back, things would’ve been different.
No comments:
Post a Comment