He got over it . . . eventually.
“Yeah, well . . . I’m not Susan.” Agnes sighs, in a heavy way that carries deeper meaning with it. She leads me into a small corner bedroom with chalky walls and a pink crystal chandelier dangling in the center of the room. “You should have seen all the boxes he had stuffed in here. Took me all day yesterday to move them out.”
It took Agnes all day, I note. Not Agnes and my dad.
The room is now empty of everything save for a metal-framed twin bed tucked into the corner by a small window, a wooden kitchen chair next to it, and a simple white chest of three drawers on the opposite side. There’s a narrow closet with a louvered door on the wall directly beside me. The kind of old-fashioned folding door that our house in Toronto used to have, too, before we remodeled.
Not until I move farther into the room do I realize that the walls aren’t plain white, but adorned by faint pink calla lilies of various sizes.
It finally dawns on me. “This was my room.” My mother once told me that she spent the long, dark months waiting for me to be born painting my namesake flower on the walls of my nursery. An entirely new hobby for her, inspired by boredom and the fact that she couldn’t grow the real thing. Or anything, for that matter. In the end, it kept her sane until the trip to Anchorage to wait out my due date at a family friend’s house, as was necessary back then if you wanted to guarantee that a doctor would deliver your baby.
Her skill has improved greatly over the years. She still paints sometimes, usually in the winter, when the gardens around our house are asleep and she’s looking for a quiet escape from the daily grind of the florist business. Her “studio” is directly across from my bedroom, taking up the front half of the third floor. The room is bright and spacious, and decorated in canvases of ruby-red tulips and vivid peonies, bursting with pink-tipped petals, all done by her hand. Some of her pieces now grace the walls of local restaurants and stores, a small sign beneath them naming her price to sell. But she’s not in her studio often anymore, claiming that she doesn’t need to paint flowers when she’s elbow-deep in real ones all day long.
But twenty-six years ago, in a land that is unforgiving for so many things, this was her garden.
And my dad has preserved it all these years.
Agnes looks thoughtfully at me. “I figured you might like it.”
“I do. It’s perfect. Thank you.” I toss my purse to the floor.
“It gets chilly at night, so I put plenty of blankets down to help keep you warm.” Agnes gestures at the colorful and eclectic stack of folded quilts at the foot of my bed, and then looks around the space, as if searching for something. “I think that’s everything. Unless there’s something else?”
I hold my phone up. “The Wi-Fi password?”
“Yes. Let me find that. The bathroom is out here to the left, if you want to freshen up. Your dad has his own in his room, so this one is all yours.”
With a weary sigh—if I weren’t running on the adrenaline of anticipating meeting my father, I’d probably nose-dive right into that bed—I unzip the nylon track bag and begin emptying it, noting with frustration how little clothing I was able to fit.
And how most of it is damp.
“Dammit!” My black jeans are cold and wet against my fingertips, as is my sweater, my running gear, and the two other shirts I hastily stuffed into the right side of the bag. The side that Jonah so casually tossed into the puddle of muddy water. Gritting my teeth to keep my anger at bay, I fish out a small woven hamper from the closet and toss everything in.
“Found it.” Agnes holds out a slip of paper between stubby fingers. Her nails are naked of any polish and chewed to the quick.
“Great. Thanks. Where can I do laundry? My clothes are wet, thanks to Jonah.” I don’t bother hiding the bitterness in my voice.
She huffs softly and then reaches for the basket. “Jonah lost his father to cancer a few years back and he’s h
aving a hard time dealing with Wren’s news. I think maybe you got the brunt of it today.”
“So, he does know.”
She nods. “Wren didn’t want to tell him yet, but Jonah’s too aware. He weaseled it out of me earlier today. Anyway, I’m sorry if he was a bit difficult.”
Is that what crawled up Jonah’s butt and put him in such a foul mood? If it is, it’s still far from acceptable, but I don’t have to dig too deep to find sympathy for him.
But shouldn’t he also feel at least a shred of sympathy for me, then?
“The machines are off the kitchen. Come on, I’ll show you.” She slows, her dark eyes widening as she takes in the myriad of hair product, brushes, and pretty cosmetics cases that ate up half the track bag and now cover the top of the chest of drawers. “Do you use all of that every day?”
“Pretty much . . . yeah.” There’s double that sitting in my room at home; I only brought the staples with me.
She shakes her head, murmuring, “I wouldn’t even know where to begin.”
A car door slams somewhere outside. Agnes turns toward it, pausing to listen. A few moments later, heavy footfalls land on the wooden steps leading up to the front door.
She takes a deep, sharp breath and for the first time since hearing her voice in the receiver, I sense nervousness radiating from her. Still, she smiles. “Your dad’s home.”