Days Past, in the Present

     Anthony leaned against the porch railing, contemplating the warm haze which lay over the countryside.  He despised it: it made him feel as though he were trapped under a smothering blanket.  The stillness of it frustrated him, made him feel both restless and lazy at the same time.  He sluggishly pulled out a cigar and lit it, breathed in its smoke deeply.  He switched his eyes from his twitching hand to that plum tree, alone, bordering the woods.  That plum tree beneath which he proposed to Laura nearly three years ago.  Looking at it, he was affected by a contented, happy feeling.  Laura, after all, was a good wife: even as she sat there, mending one of his shirts, he thought she not only had a pretty face, but a good heart.  And, after all, those were the two most important qualities any wife should have--so everyone said.  Yes, she was his love, his partner for life, and he was pleased.  The corners of his mouth upturned slightly into a smile; his head leaned against the porch column.  A moment later, he vaguely--subconsciously--thought, “Yes, pleased and complacent, stuck beneath this blanket.”  An uncontrollable shiver ran down his spine; he shut his eyes and stiffened his jaw.  “I’m not as happy as all that.”

 

 

     Charlotte lay stretched out beside the placid lake, looking up into the azure sky.  She sighed more than once while spreading out her golden hair flat on the grass.  Laura’s and Anthony’s place was only a five-minute walk away, and Charlotte tried to think up a good reason to stop by for a visit.  Before she betrayed her feelings that winter night five months ago, before she clearly communicated to Anthony that she loved him, going to see him and Laura had never been an energy-consuming task.  She did it all the time.  Now she felt as though secret information had been thrown into plain view and she had to try her best to erase its existence.  “Yes, I’m trying, but it’s too painful to make it in any way easy--or complete,” she thought, rolling over, watching a small spider weave its way through the grass.

     She was sorely tempted to spend the next ten or fifteen minutes recollecting, piece by piece, the details of that fatal night.  It stood at the threshold of her consciousness, clothed in all of its innocent beauty, but whether it entered depended upon her reasoning; the door was locked, she thought.  She silently acknowledged this, and imperceptibly jumped a little in surprise.  “Since when have I been able to control you?” She thought.  Maybe it was a sign that she was “getting over” Anthony.  Yes, that had to be it.  Smiling a humble smile, she closed her eyes and inhaled deeply.  Then groaned a little--his trusting face had unlocked the door, for its key was held by only him.  A tear trickled down her cheek, and she didn’t bother to wipe it away.

 

 

     Laura set down her husband’s shirt and looked up at him.  “Darling, what are you staring at?  You’ve been standing motionless for almost an hour.”

     Anthony hesitantly pulled himself out of his meditations.  He looked at Laura, then at his cigar, which he had snuffed out long ago, he remembered.

     “Hm?”

     Laura sighed, then recommenced her mending work: “This heat--this God-awful heat.  It does the strangest things to us.  You look tired, why don’t you take a seat?  I could bring you some lemonade, you know.  Or water.”

      Anthony ran a hand over his dark hair.  It seemed to take almost all of his will to utter a few words.  “No--I’m fine.”

     His wife smiled gently up at him.  He appreciated that smile.  He appreciated her understanding in all matters, even the most trivial ones.  She had always been peaceful, always been demure. 

     “But she’s never been Charlotte.” The thought had snaked its way unawares into his brain.  Where had it come from?  Anthony never wanted to answer the question for himself, though he was positive that he knew the answer.  He tightly gripped his forehead, rubbing the sweat drops into his skin.

     “I’m finished--finally.”  Anthony swung his head around, and saw Laura standing behind him, holding the shirt.

     “Thanks.” He said.  It was the best he could do.

     “You look so out-of-sorts.”  Laura’s voice had deep concern in it.  “Then again, I probably do, too.  It’s this heat, I’m telling you.  I’m running over to Margaret’s to have some iced tea--she suggested it yesterday.  Care to come along?” She tugged at his sleeve.

     Anthony’s growing focus on Charlotte had been growing stronger and stronger each second of his wife’s talk.  Its control overpowered his own.  It was all he could do to mutter, “No.  Go ahead.”

     Laura kissed him on the cheek, lightly walked into the house for her hat, then trotted down the front steps.  “I’ll be back before supper.  What would you like me to ask Roberta to fix?”

     Another moment of hesitant exertion.  “I don’t care, really.”

     Laura cheerfully replied, “A nice fresh salad, perhaps?  The tomatoes are looking lovely.  And some of that fish you caught this morning, of course.  We’ll have it baked this time--with some rosemary and lemon, perhaps.”  She briskly walked away, light cotton dress blowing in the wind, hair pinned up perfectly in place, past the oaks, through the white fence, then down the hill.  Anthony ran a heavy hand over his face and jogged in the opposite direction, toward the lake.  He wanted to rest in the grass, think, and surrender himself to the oppression from within and without.

 

 

     Charlotte squinted as she looked at her white hand caressing the grass.  The thought of that winter night loomed ahead in her vision, began to replay again.  The same caressing hand grew warm as the scene in which he had held it came closer.  He was supposed to hold it, of course--she was sprawled across the lake ice, helpless with her broken ankle.  But he wasn’t supposed to continue his grip on it the entire walk home--not while he was carrying her.  And he wasn’t supposed to hold his face so close to hers, his breath warm against her forehead.  His carrying her was necessary--she couldn’t walk.  But that warm hand enfolding her own, rubbing it softly the entire time, their faces pressed so close together--that was most certainly not necessary.  Then, when he set her down on a chair in her kitchen, she had kissed him on the cheek and thanked him simultaneously.  She wouldn’t have done it if her parents had been present, and she wouldn’t have done it if he had not held her hand that way.

     Charlotte’s eyes began brimming with tears, and she sat up, glaring across the lake.  She squeezed her lids shut and felt herself being pushed back, just like she had been immediately after she betrayed her feelings for Anthony.  “I should’ve kept it locked up.  Such a fool.”  She breathed into the motionless air.  He had indeed pushed her back, muttered angrily that he was going to his house to find his in-laws, and slammed the door on the way out.  And she had watched him wiping his face with the backs of his hands as he walked across the lawn. 

 

 

     Laura worried about her husband on the way to Margaret’s.  Why was he so silent today, and during the past few weeks?  No, for several months now he had acted differently than all during their three previous years of marriage.  More introverted, more moody, more melancholy.  She simply didn’t understand the change, but also felt that she didn’t want to understand--or couldn’t.  Whatever was affecting him seemed as though it belonged entirely to him, so much so that she was incapable of sympathizing with his depressed mood, even if she had wanted to. 

     She saw her parent’s home, small and white against the horizon, on the top of another hill.  She wondered why Charlotte had been acting so aloof, so disconnected for the longest time.  It bothered her, because growing up together, they had shared everything.  Or, at least she had shared everything.  Charlotte had always listened more than talked, though out in society the roles reversed.  Now, she was doing neither--just staring above people’s heads when they talked to her, asking to be excused early at family gatherings under the pretext of a headache.  Well, she was already past twenty, two years past in fact, and people were beginning to talk.  Was that why she had stubbornly refused to go to the Fourth of July picnic last week?  Probably so.  And when Laura had visited her that evening, she could have sworn that she had been crying--she had apparently stayed in her nightgown all day, shut up in her room, crying and writing, for there were ink stains all over her right hand.  Laura didn’t draw attention to her, only stayed for a while, and tried to ignore the strange fact that, placed on her desk was that photograph of Anthony and Charlotte sitting on a swing, smiling, him about fifteen years old and her one year younger.

     Laura exhaled and quickened her pace.  “She just wishes that she could be a child again--she always said she hated growing up.  Yes, that’s it.”

 

 

     Anthony trailed down to the lake, that place where he could slip into his reverie about Charlotte.  He jogged to its edge and rested a moment, hands on hips, looking across it toward the woods.  His vision became blurry with tears as he thought of what those very same trees had witnessed just four or five years before--him and Charlotte walking amongst them, hand-in-hand, or climbing them, sitting together on their branches, talking for hours, sometimes all through the night as they watched the moon and stars through the branches overhead. 

     He resolved to go there, to that once-joyful place, despite his knowing that it would only cause him irremediable pain.  He briskly walked through the grass, breathing hard, eyes fixed ahead, thoughts tormenting him more than ever before.

     “Why didn’t she marry him like she said she would?” he thought.  Charlotte had hurt him nearly four years ago, when, the day after her eighteenth birthday, she told him she had accepted a proposal from Jacob, his own brother.  It was only after he had admitted openly to himself that indeed, yes, he loved her--terribly so--not only as a lifelong friend but also as a beautiful woman he wanted to be with until death, raise children with--it was only after they had spent their entire childhood and teenage years together--it was only after she had looked that way in the moonlight when she said that she’d never want anything else in life so long as she had his devotion--it was only after all of these events that she had stared at the ground, hardened her face muscles, and told him, “I’m marrying Jacob in six months, Anthony.”  And when Laura had spent an entire evening trying to console him, he had thought that if he couldn’t have Charlotte that way then he might as well have her nearest likeness.  Laura really was more level-headed and predictable than Charlotte; he never had to work to understand her.  Charlotte had maddened him with her endless streams of thought and her secretive ways.  But it always turned to purest happiness once he had somehow forced her to be candid and “Tell it to me straight for once, won’t you?”  Always her laughter and sparkling eyes had melted away any frustration in him before she stroked his hair and said, “All right.  Fine.  You needn’t be such a boss about it, though.”

     He stopped mid-stride, put his hands on his knees, and wiped his watering eyes against his shoulders.

 

 

     Charlotte placed her hands over her eyes, decided to recollect the details of that fateful night, four years ago.  Jacob had always been quietly fond of her--of course, she just never noticed his liking for her under his persistently silent attitude.  It was Anthony whom she liked to be with.  But never in an inseparable way, she had thought.  She was frightened when he began to watch her incessantly, smiling softly with his green eyes beaming.  She didn’t want that at the time.  No, that would have been much too intimate--she wanted sole possession of her complete self.  When she admitted how much she treasured his devotion, that had scared her, too.  She had shared so much with him, he knew her so well, that a conjugal union would have sealed it all"and she didn’t want to be with someone who would know her as deeply as was possible.  Their friendship precluded marriage.  It had to, she thought at the time, because she couldn’t possibly have both fused together.  Now, however, the idea of it filled her with the utmost longing, and the utmost grief.

     So when Jacob had asked her to be his wife--him, nearly twenty-five with no experience with women whatsoever--she had asked him why he wanted her.  He had replied that he had seen in her a good heart and a kind spirit, and that he’d always been too afraid to ask for her. 

    That night, she had gone home and lay awake all night thinking about it, thinking about Jacob.  It was only then that she recalled how much silent attention he had given her over the years.  It was only then that she recalled how melancholy he looked when he saw her and Anthony side-by-side, faces close together, laughing loudly, or arms around each other in a warm embrace.  She had decided that night that she’d marry him, because he was truly a good man, and she hadn’t laid bare her internal world for him to see.  Much more comfortable, much more proper, and much less frightening for her.

     She’d gone to see him the next morning, only to find his house empty.  The yard, the garden, and the barn were empty, too.  She had come across Anthony walking toward her house, dressed in a casual, handsome suit, preparing to leave for the university for several weeks.  His goodbye had been reinforced with him running his hands through her hair, drawing her face near his, only to be pushed away after her abrupt confession. 

     Charlotte groaned a bit, turning her head to the right and resting it upon her shoulder.  She had followed his dejected form all along the fence-line until he had met the road and disappeared beyond it.  Jacob was nowhere to be found that day, and everyone was worried.  It was only three weeks later that the family got news that he’d taken a trip to Cuba to work as a journalist.  His job took him there, of course.  That morning he had gotten the notice, they needed him right away.  There was war going on, they needed people to cover it.  He had been killed after two weeks by a stray bullet there, in some place called El Caney. 

     Charlotte thought, “Strange how Fate works out.”

     Anthony had received the news the day before his wedding, and had kept his eyes more on Charlotte than on Laura during the entire ceremony.  At the time, she’d still been ignoring her true feelings, so none of it moved her much.  Fate had decided to let her lift her self-imposed veil of denial, extinguishing her true feelings concerning Anthony, until Laura had just discovered her pregnancy.  Two and a half months more and Anthony would have a baby in his arms.  She bitterly cursed herself.  “Fate has got me under Its thumb.”  Then, drawing herself up and standing with clenched fists, “I was such a fool.” 

 

 

     Anthony’s thoughts had pulled him into a numbed state; he was senseless of reality because he was playing out in imagination what should have been, not what was.  He didn’t care about what was.  What should have been was much more important, and he thought it was a gross injustice that human beings should have to exist with a perception of what should live and breathe and thrive in the world in the midst of its indifferent, careless flux.  Well, what could he do about it? 

     He clenched his jaw, saw Charlotte walking with her back towards him, and ground his teeth in anger against Fate's control of things.

     He knew it was true, but decided to defy Its presence--if not succeed in eliminating It, then at least fighting against It, showing It that he could, that It didn’t hold a full monopoly over him, that It hadn’t blinded him.

     He called over to her, and walked towards her, watching her frozen form in its repeated attempts to move forward, jerking her hands a bit, clenching her dress.

     Charlotte’s eyes didn’t meet his until he stood in front of her, lifting up her chin and penetrating her tired gaze with his own sadness and acknowledgement of exactly what was consuming her.  She slowly blinked her eyes, the exhaustion after such violent confrontations washing over her, affecting Anthony with the utmost sorrow.  He wanted words as a confirmation, as a means of communicating it all while lessening the pain.  For words didn’t carry so much import as did their silent communion, but at least they didn’t tear him up so badly.

     “You’re wanting me to be yours now, only after I’ve wedded myself to a good woman.”

     “Yes.  But there’s nothing to be done.  I’d feel sorrow either way, now, with you or without you.  I can’t ignore morality, but at the same time I can’t ignore the inseparableness of our spirits.  Not like I can choose to kill the connection…”

     “Nor I.”

     They stood silent for a minute.  He finally let go of her chin.

     “It’s not entirely your fault for realizing it now.” 

     She questioned him with her gaze.  “Do you really believe that?” 

     “Don’t you?”

     “Yes, perhaps.  Perhaps Fate was the player, and I was the board-piece.”

     “We were all board-pieces, then.  Jacob seemed out of place, then, I suppose.”

     Charlotte placed her hand on his shoulder, moving her dark eyes back and forth as if trying to choose a response from many invisible speculations.  “Fate doesn’t decide things like that.  It has no will like that.”  Anthony’s face grew puzzled.  Charlotte smiled softly up at him, answering his questioning with her own.

     “Should I change my mind?  Maybe it does depend on us, isn’t it possible?”

Reviews

[WriterMe]

Ummm... I'm a little confused with the story line. It keeps on switching perspective which seems a little troubling to the reader. Good descriptions, good wording and grammar too, but its just the story line which i find a little difficult to comprehend. Why did Charlotte marry Jacob even though she liked Anthony?
Over all, a very pensive, thought filled story. It had its moments but your might need someone else to give it a good proof read to mend the storyline glitches. But then again, dont take my work for it, it might be just me.