Still Water

I. A Voyage of Memory

I had always loved the lilting of the train, but on that day it did nothing more than make me nauseous and send chills up my spine through the thick cords of winter wool, sewn together specially for one last voyage of remembrance. The twists and turns had grown stale with time, like a half-eaten sandwich, and the crispness of the air had all dissolved into a tilting, rolling, winding, unending chugging of smoke and whistling of dust. The mountains, with their regal look, used to intimidate me as a child, so much so that I had to take to the endlessly comforting skirts of Panya, the only calm of the storm on those trips, and the only person ever able to make that long and arduous journey without blinking twice. I think it was a special talent of hers, the not blinking. She used to say to me with her lively falsetto of a voice that not blinking had not only saved her life on many occasions, but had also enhanced her ability to live in the moment, making each experience that much richer, longer, and worthwhile. Of course, she had to rest her eyes occasionally, but I assume that all she needed were the long winter nights at Paluu, where time seemed to stretch on for infinity and the stars came down to rest on the eternally still water at night where they congregated as school children do while waiting to be admitted to class.

Panya never prohibited me from finding solace in her skirts, although I believe that it must have grown tiring for her to have a small child holding on for dear life as if she were one step from falling off the train, when in fact I would have had to make my way out of my seat, down a narrow corridor, and then throw my body from the car by force. If it did tire her, she hid it behind her easy smile, and the constant smell of something from the bakery at home, as if she always had a spare sweet bun or pastries hidden in her pockets. The pockets had been a special addition, for Panya was nothing short of practical, just as she was nothing short of remarkable. Those journeys we made every year were made breathtaking by the lakes we passed, the trees exploding with birds making their way into the sky, and the fiery sunsets that hinted our destination was close at hand, but even these and all the seven wonders of the world I would not have needed had Panya been with me. She had a way of looking at me, one glance would suffice. Her mind would search its endless collection of information and come to the conclusion that what I needed at that moment was a glass of her tea with mint leaves and honey, or her french bread with butter. Everything else would fall into place. Sometimes, with a roll of my eyes, I would declare that no, another cup of tea was not the most pressing matter for my feelings, but saying no to Panya was as ineffective as saying no to our dog Merlo as he was about to devour the very last piece of meat from the table when no one was looking; the tea would still get drunk, the meat eaten. Soon, I would come to find that I accepted anything given to me by Panya, and thus began the unbreakable trust I placed upon her for life, the unbreakable trust one can only find between mother and daughter.

The inevitable destination of Paluu was inevitable for many reasons. There was no way one could miss it, for its appearance was legendary and many flocked to set their eyes upon the town long before we became acquainted with it. Even then, when we felt as comfortable there as we did with old friends, the place was full of surprises beyond measure and belief, so much so that we questioned if the water had changed color or had always been this blue, if the houses had grown prouder and taller in their desperate attempt to impress us the next time we returned. It was inevitable because it was the last stop on the train to the north, the last undisturbed and untouched place of its kind. One could choose to leave the train, as most did, save a few who took one look at the weathered canoes and depth of the water and felt an unrealistic but convincing fear of drowning soon upon them, or return to the small and dry villages to the south. Although it is clean and orderly, I have always found the south to lack character while the north has it in excess, a stark comparison one can make only after spending an abundance of time in both places. Inevitable also was the pull. I don’t know how to describe it because, to this day, I am still baffled by the strange power it holds over me and held over many. Even after years, months, days, seconds—it pulls you back, forces you to revisit those peculiar and wonderful times spent reflected alongside the water, and has the ability to make you question all that you have done and yet will attempt. The remembering is inevitable.

Arriving was my favorite. Seeing each little island with its house and garden sprawling with flowers ready to succumb to the cold, the neighbors rowing back and forth with their own traffic laws that few could understand and make sense of, and the water, still as a stone, a perfect reflection of life in all its joys and sorrows. My father had a special place he would wait so he could be the first to see us, for in those long months his work kept him at Paluu more than anywhere else, and all we would know of him for weeks at a time was the lingering feeling of his undeniable energy. It hung in the air when he was gone, and at times my mother and I knew that his laughter was floating just above our heads, ready to land and smother us, remind us of long conversations and nights spent talking while the moon rose to the tops of the heavens. Sometimes they did, and we had no choice but to join in, rolling on the floor with the happiness of just a few simple seconds with him, a laugh and nothing more. He stood waving with his hat in one hand, in his work clothes that gave away every single project he had done that day; his blatant openness displayed in his clothing and persona radiated out like the light mounted on the Lighthouse, an infamous building that was a strange mix between comforting and incredulous.

The reunion was sweet, and the winter seemed like a never-ending infinity of smoke curling from the smokestack, birds settling into their birdhouses, the swish of oars against the tide, the rise and set of the sun, a constant camaraderie only achieved among the kindest of neighbors and family. There were a surplus of characters we visited every year, for the cast rarely changed and the show continued on with its twists and turns, triumphs and failures. I took nicely to most of them, but none compared to her. The years after are blurred by her existence, spring with its flowers and brightly colored chalk found on the sidewalks, summer with its scorching heat and essence of freedom, fall with its changing leaves and cinnamon evenings, no season felt so far away and so short as winter. Winter, with its biting air and owls and the floating of feathers down down down, coming to rest ever so softly in my outstretched hands, a gift. Winter with the soft melody of warmth and defined by winter gloves, the burning of hot drinks, and unprecedented possibilities. No other season had I looked forward to as much, no other time had been so happy as the times we spent running in circles around my house and hers until our parents protested loudly for a break in the shouts of young girls and the pounding of feet on fragile ground. The small collection of homes did not serve as an ample environment for most children, but we created endless games and fed on the knowledge that surprises could be found if one wished with all their might to find them, that happiness could be created from a single gesture of hello. It was because of her, my first human friend, I felt life was not so lonely; that the dark had a nemesis who was far cleverer and capable of bringing light in the form of many things, in this instance, the form of a girl named Abbi.

As soon as Abbi arrived, the time spent at Paluu seemed to be the most valuable time of my childhood, a time defined by the number of stones skipped on the water, crystal clear and shining even though winter’s forces tried to halt the water in its tracks and force it, like all other things of nature during the cold, to halt its indifferent rolling and gliding. Even then, the water refused to listen to the harsh commands of winter, and continued its mild daily task of being the road for many travellers, the bowl of life for countless creatures, and the most perfect place to skip stones (as declared by two little girls). We would sit on the banks of the island, our hair flowing out behind us and mingling with the water; even it could not contain itself from reaching out and touching her; even the elements understood the importance of her existence. Her hair would flow out from behind and uncoil, reaching all the corners of the lake, each nook and stone and fish, only to return with curls intact and shinier than Panya’s gold plates after a cleaning day. When we climbed the Lighthouse, the owls resting in the eves halted their preening and with one look, came to rest on her shoulder. The owls were Abbi’s, the water was Abbi’s, the sky was hers and yet she was everything in return. It was four summers after I had met her, just enough time for me to begin to know her, although I felt no amount of time would suffice for such an enormous task of friendship and for a human being as complicated and wonderful as she was.

We had been skipping stones in the familiar rhythm and comfort of two old friends when her face turned toward me and on it was the expression of someone who had little power in the world, in fact no power at all in comparison to the dark. I had no way of knowing what was happening, and in my immature and childlike ignorance, I stood as the world moved under me and wind ripped out the grass from the ground and the water wailed in mourning. This fragile life that was Abbi’s no longer belonged to her, it was pulled and sucked out of her each minute that we stood and watched her face grow pale and her body shake with the weight of her fate. She was carried into a rowboat that groaned and protested over the rush it was being forced to perform, and by the time we reached the nearest doctor in the south, in that land where medicine won over disease and surely it would win this time, her weakness was evident and her eyes pleaded with me with a desperate look as if to beg for an explanation. I saw the winters at Paluu and all I saw was Abbi losing her footing and slipping into the lake, laughing and blaming the sugar she had consumed in the past hour; Abbi with bruises on her arms like little corners of the Earth, saying with a sly smile that climbing trees and playing in the Lighthouse had been dangerous after all; Abbi politely but firmly denying her hunger while my parents watched in amusement and shrugged that children certainly had changed their diets from the days they played as we did. Everything she had ever spoken about came into question and suddenly it struck me with such force that I fell to the ground and felt the weight of guilt on my back, one which has followed me ever since.

Her illness was inevitable, they claimed, but what did that mean? That she was doomed long before she and I played with the trust of age-old comrades, even before she had heard the name Lia and had become as entwined with my life as I had become with hers? That the disease was within her from the beginning, had used her genes as a quiet resting place until it was the appropriate time to strike, as if nothing she had done had any more significance than a passing cloud, dissipating and disappearing before one could see the shape it formed and how it changed with time? I had seen her at her happiest, at the times when the body feels so consumed by joy and love it threatens to explode right then and there, and how was I to know? No, it couldn’t be that she was doomed from the very beginning and had been deprived of the tenderness of life and the peculiar feelings of anger, jubilation, pride, the full spectrum of emotions, it was up to those around her to save her, to see what was wrong and to stop all harm from coming to this girl, the one who had deserved to live.

The last time I saw her, she was no longer Abbi. She looked at me and there was no remorse in her eyes, for how could someone as lovely as she resort to something as ugly as blame? Her hands were cold as the snow when we resorted to snowball fights on slow days, and she whispered incoherently of summers and winters, indistinguishable and mashed together just as my years were affected by her arrival every December. Of course, that did not stop my heart from breaking for all the times I had seen her in need but failed, stood idly while she laughed, why couldn’t I have opened my eyes to the slow draining that happened directly in front of me, the slow but painful draining of a life, before things were set in stone, before history was made, and before her life faded away leaving only a few meager chapters where a novel was rightly deserved.

II. The Voyage of Remembrance

The plush seat of the train was blue. Blue like the lake water, the sky in a moment of clarity, and Abbi’s eyes. My eyes still remember hers easily and with all their complexity. She will never know the guilt hidden behind mine. Years later, the incident is fresh, the wound still tender, amplified by time and regret. The south has never fascinated me, and through all the years, so many years later, Paluu pulls me from my home. I feel the weight of my shoulders hunch forward, succumb to it, board the train, watch the countryside bloom with memories both beautiful and tragic, mother and daughter wrapped in trust and excitement, daughter wrapped in sorrow and loss. The journey is an unsolved mystery, for what am I supposed to do when I arrive? Summoning the strength to leave the train is a boundary I never would have wished to cross.

The air outside is rigid and cold, locked in the stillness of winter, but alive with the vivacity of life yet unexplored. The water is unchanged, clear and undisturbed; pure. My footsteps are echoes, I cannot walk, the lake pulls me forward, places me in the boat, maybe the same boat as so many journeys in another time, in another childhood. It pulls me to the island where we ran, circling each other and outwitting the constant chase of danger on our heels, from which I escaped and she did not, but it speaks. It tells me to listen, to watch, to learn, and as I stand by the water’s edge, I remember. I remember the sound of joy, the gesture of hello, the slow but sure bridge to trust, the discovery of the nemesis, and the undeniable grief that swiftly follows. I remember the blame placed upon me so heavily and condemning me to a life of desolation, a life that I had not pursued but that had found me. The water reflects back so many memories, and the instant clarity is relief, it is untainted relief, because it is not guilt that holds us, but forgiveness. “She has forgiven you,” the water pleads, and I plead too, for forgiveness from Abbi, for forgiveness for myself, and for the world to forgive those who love so strongly they lose sight of remembrance. I erase the last image of her from my mind, I remember her as the river instructs, free and open and kind and unapologetic. I do not apologize for missing you, Abbi, I only apologize for not honoring you as I should have, in your finest hour, with the wind singing lullabies in your ear and the first grazes of snow coming to rest on your delicate fingers.

Emily Caruso is a sophomore studying Creative Writing. She is absolutely loving the program so far, especially through classes exploring the craft of fiction writing. In her free time, she buys more books than her bookcase could ever hold and drinks countless cups of tea. In her opinion, there is no better way to spend an afternoon.