Turning on my heels, I walk down the path, but coming closer to the Brooklyn side after talking about my parents only makes it harder for me to breathe. “Everyone is always sorry.”
He catches up to me. “What’s it like?”
I glance at him, not understanding what he’s asking.
“I don’t mean to pry. Sorry.” He stuffs his hands into his pockets because I’ve opted to wrap my arms around myself.
I’m sure he feels the rapid chill coming off me. It always happens when I talk about my mom.
“It’s fine. I was ten. The government allowed my parents to be deployed at different times. My dad went first, and my whole family hoped the war would be over quickly and he would return safely. The war continued, so one month after my dad returned, my mom went. Six months later, she died when her Humvee was ambushed.” Repeating the details is easy. It’s like a speech I’ve rehearsed a million times.
When someone hears that my mother died when I was ten, there are questions in their eyes. Some pry and others try not to, but I can tell they want to know how because they want her to have died in a way that they can’t. After they hear the details, it’s like they think they’ll be safe as long as they don’t become a soldier and go to Iraq.
He remains quiet as we walk.
“Anyway, my dad raised me, but truth is when they say it takes a village, in my case it truly did. I owe a lot to the families who took care of us. Afterward, my dad didn’t reenlist, and he fell into a depression for a few years.”
“Are you close?”
He probably assumes we would be. Wouldn’t the shared grief over the woman we loved most in the world bond two people together? Maybe in some families, but not mine.
“Not really.”
“So he’s not depressed anymore?” His voice sounds almost hopeful.
I laugh from thinking about the last time I had to witness his new girlfriend making herself comfortable in our kitchen. The one where my mom would make us meals with love. “Not at all.”
We reach Brooklyn.
“Let’s go.” He raises his hand for a taxi, and one stops for us. I can’t imagine he would ever have a problem getting one with the authority he exudes.
“Where are we going?” I ask after I crawl in.
“We’re in Brooklyn. Let’s go to your childhood house. Show me where you grew up.”
My eyes narrow as I wonder why he wants to know so much about me. “Why?”
“I’m curious how the other half lives.” He laughs and knocks his shoulder to mine in the back of the cab.
“Okay, but it’s not that interesting. We don’t have gold plates and a servant to make us a late night snack.”
He shakes his head, but his smile says he’s amused.
We arrive in Carroll Gardens before I’m prepared. The taxi asks for a specific address, but I instruct him to pull over.
“We’ll walk,” I say.
My footfalls on the pavement of my old neighborhood while Adrian pays the taxi driver.
“Which way?” Adrian asks when he joins me on the sidewalk.
Although it’s getting later, there are still a lot of people out on the streets, coming from dinner or wherever they were. We walk down the sidewalk, and I point out the bakery that has the best black and white cookies, wishing they were open for me to share one with him, then the cafes and small Italian restaurants. The neighborhood has evolved, with Brooklyn becoming a more popular place to live, but there’s still a sense of the neighborhood I grew up in. The people who care for and look out for one another.
“Where did you live? Does your dad still live there?”
I point forward. “Four blocks and a left.”
He tugs at my sleeve. “Show me.”
“Unless you want to be stuck in a conversation with my father, I suggest we stick to the common areas.”
He shrugs. “I’ll talk to your father.”
Just the thought has my heart constricting. “And tell him what?”
“How enamored I am with his daughter. Come on.” He tugs my sleeve. “Are you embarrassed of me?”
“No, but—”
“Then come on.” He walks backward in front of me, almost taunting me. Unfortunately, nothing good comes from when people challenge me.
“You asked for it.”
We walk the four blocks, stopping at a liquor store to buy a bottle of wine because Adrian doesn’t believe in showing up empty-handed. This entire thing seems weird and awkward and I’m thankful I never lied to him about my childhood. I might have omitted some things, but my dad won’t talk about my mom anyway. That’s a taboo subject in our house.
Turning down my street, the same feeling that washes over me every time I visit envelops me. My heartbeat races, but at the same time, my heart feels as if it weighs as much as an elephant. After my mom died, I lost my sense of home. The house became walls and floors and a roof—shelter.
I see a sign in the distance that looks as though it could be in front of our house, but I squint, unable to tell through the darkness.
There’s no way.
My feet move a little faster, though Adrian’s able to keep up with his long strides.
“You have to be fucking kidding me.”
Chapter Seventeen
Sierra
We stop, and my eyes zero in on the For Sale sign. All the reluctance to come to my childhood home and introduce my dad to a man he’ll never see again is replaced with anger, heating my veins until my skin burns and I’m stomping up the walkway, digging in my purse for my keys.
I was here last month, and he said nothing. So help me God, if this is his new girlfriend’s idea, there’s going to be a hair-pulling girl fight.
Adrian is oblivious, waiting for me to get my key—I half wonder whether it will still work—into the lock and open up the door. “Did you not know your dad had it up for sale?”
Guess he’s not oblivious.
“No,” I say, seething.
The door opens and it’s complete darkness inside. My dad’s been an insomniac since my mother’s death, so I’m pretty certain he’s not sleeping. When I flick on the lights, my footsteps stop and Adrian runs right into my back, his large hands on my biceps to prevent me from falling forward.
New furniture, new paint. Where are all the pictures? Adrenaline pumps through my veins and I step out of Adrian’s hold, flicking on light after light, inspecting every room and every surface.
He’s erased her.
He’s erased me.
Every picture is a flower or a destination he’s never been to. All the army signs and “proud to be a soldier” stuff has been stripped away too.
“Sierra?” Adrian calls when I open the basement door and pound down the steps. “What’s going on?”
He follows me, but my search only becomes more frantic. Where did he put them? He doesn’t deserve them anymore if he’s going to stuff them in a box in the basement.
Then I spot them. Three boxes filled with pictures of our family. The only remembrance of my mother is her folded flag that’s still on the mantel upstairs.
The vault I’ve locked up so securely cracks as if someone pounded it with a sledgehammer, and a tear falls down my cheek. Part relief that they’re here, part pain that they are.