“Take this one.” I pick up a box and shove it into Adrian’s arms. Picking up the second one, I put it on top of the other one in his arms. He staggers for a second to handle the weight but gets a hold of the boxes. I pick up the third. “Let’s go.”
“Sierra, let’s talk to your father.”
I shake my head. “He doesn’t deserve to have these anymore. They’re coming home with me.”
Adrian doesn’t move, so I pass him and go up the stairs.
“I honestly think you should talk to your father.” Adrian follows me.
I place the box on the kitchen table and rush upstairs to see what else my dad has done to the house. All the pictures that my mom perfectly placed up the stairs—my birth to ten, the first day of school, our first family photo, my first visit with Santa—every framed picture has been stripped from the wall. There’s not even a sign of them. No rectangular patch to show how many years it was there because… wait.
I flip on the light switch on the stairs. Sure enough, he painted my room too.
“Ugh!” I scream, my feet unable to move fast enough for me.
I open my dad’s bedroom door, and there’s all the proof I need that he’s erased her from his life. Their wedding picture no longer stands on the corner of the dresser. Her jewelry box that held her wedding ring that she didn’t want to wear into combat and all the heirlooms of her family gone. Packed away somewhere as though they’re meaningless.
“Hey.” Adrian’s hand runs down the length of my arm.
My throat tightens the more I realize that it no longer feels like my mother in this room. And all I can think about is how she sleeps here. Fae. The fake-blonde I’m beginning to hate.
Tearing away from Adrian and the room that holds good and bad memories, I head into my old room. He’s vanquished any sign of my life in this house as well. My purple bedspread has been replaced with a gray one. My track medals no longer hang next to my dresser. Pulling open the closet door, I see that my Girl Scout uniform no longer hangs on the rack with my prom dress and other memories. There are boxes labeled “Sierra’s room” stuffed in the corner of the closet, so I sit down and pry one open.
“Sierra,” Adrian says.
I know he doesn’t understand my reaction. He ran away from his family. I did too, all those years ago. I abandoned my dad as soon as I was old enough, but I never thought he’d do this without talking to me.
I look up and Adrian’s standing in the doorway of my walk-in closet, sadness in his eyes. I hate that look and everything it represents.
“You know what? I’m sorry, I’m gonna stay here. You should probably go.” I stand and walk out of the room, knowing he’ll probably follow me.
“What? I’m not going anywhere without you.”
“There’s no reason for you to stay. I’m just going to figure this all out and I’ll probably move this stuff somewhere, a storage locker or something. I’ll see you back at the apartment, okay?” I open the front door, but he stands in my dad’s new living room.
“Sierra?”
“I’m fine.”
He inhales a deep breath and his gaze bores into mine.
“What?” I ask.
“You’re hurting.”
“I just need to handle this. Please go home.”
“No.” He shakes his head and sits in a chair I don’t recognize.
“Adrian.”
He raises his eyebrows from the bite of my tone. “I’m not five and you’re not my mother. You can’t force me to do something I don’t want to do.” He crosses his leg, his ankle resting on his knee. Relaxed as though he’s waiting for a drink to be delivered so he can have a long conversation with an old friend.
“This isn’t your business.” I swallow the lump forming in my throat. Will he leave so I can do this by myself and break down alone?
“Kind of is.”
“How do you figure?” I ask.
A couple walks by the house, looks through the open front door, and continues on down the street. I used to know everyone who lived on this block.
“I’m your friend. It’s a friend’s duty to make their friend feel better when said friend is upset.”
I almost laugh at his absurd way of bringing up this topic up now. “Friends know when friends need space.”
“Friends give hugs when said friend is about to cry.” He slides up to the edge of the cushion and holds out his arms.
“Said friend needs to go home so the other friend can deal with her family.”
He shakes his head. “Said friend wants to help the other friend.”
I hold up my hand. “Please stop with the friend talk.”
“So friend stays?” he asks.
“No.” I stomp my foot like a toddler.
He leans back in the chair again, exuding patience. “Yes, said friend is gonna stay until the other friend is honest.”
I slam the front door, my amusement morphing to anger that he won’t leave me be. Let me grieve, let me be angry without an audience. “Said friend is annoying the other friend.”
“Said friend is sorry.” His smirk says he’s not going to go anywhere.
I move my hand to where my dad always keeps the remote—in the basket on the end table—but it’s not there. Looking down, all I find is a folded up piece of paper. I open it to find the itinerary of a trip.
“You’re shittin’ me,” I say, reading how Dad and Fae are on vacation in Tahiti right now.
I drop the paper and scour for the remote, finding it on the other end table. It’s not even positioned in my dad’s military OCD, pointed in the direction of the television. It’s all cockeyed.
Picking it up, I press the power button and toss the remote to Adrian. “Said friend can watch television while the other friend handles things upstairs.”
Without waiting for his answer, I run upstairs, refusing to look at the now-blank stairway wall. Sitting on the floor of my closet, I open a box and find my mom’s jewelry box.
When did this become mine and not his?
I slide both hands along the edge of the jewelry box, my knuckles running along the rough cardboard as it easily slides out of the box. I place the jewelry box on the floor and brush my fingertips along the inscription.
Nothing in here is as beautiful as you.
My hands shake as I open the box. Tears overflow, seeing her wedding ring in the slot next to her high school class ring and the emerald ring my dad gave her on their anniversary.
I sort through her earrings and necklaces, some heirlooms from her grandmothers, and other pieces she bought on her own—some expensive, some cheap. The small round hoops she wore on a daily basis except for the weekends she had to go to the Army Reserve.
Lifting the first tray, I gently place it on the carpet. The bottom is filled with jewelry boxes. Boxes I don’t remember from when I was younger and would sneak a look at her jewelry as she got ready for dates with my dad.
I open the dark boxes one by one, finding medal after medal, ribbon after ribbon. Everything she earned during her time in the Army Reserve. The last box I pick up is more worn than the previous ones, as though it’s been opened more than the others.