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muchtooarrogantLJI Week 2: If it’s any consolation
Ben had never imagined himself as someone who could foretell the future, and yet, as Ellen moved around their bedroom packing, a certainty grew within him that he was watching the end of his marriage. The piles of clothing she kept adding to her suitcase, the stack of books she crammed into her travel bag ... Would there be anything left in the closet by the time she finished?
"I need some time away," she had announced while they were eating breakfast that morning, "a place where every object I look at doesn't remind me of her."
The "or you" felt implicit in her statement as well, a gradual distancing that had started when they lost their daughter. Although her exclusions had been painful, he had been able to convince himself that they were part of the normal grieving process; an unwillingness to participate in any conversation, walking out of rooms he entered as though even his silent presence was too abrasive to tolerate, leaving the house for long walks in the middle of the night. As the weeks had dragged into months, her absences had grown longer, her abandonment of their relationship an accepted reality between them. There was a part of him that wanted to scream at her, to rage that she wasn't the only one who had lost a child, but in personal relationships at least, silence had always been the familiar course he plotted.
When she walked into the breakfast nook that morning, set down her bowl of cereal, and settled into the chair across from him, he had rejoiced internally. It had been so long, but she was back. He had given her the time she needed, allowed her to grieve, granted her the space she so desperately craved. Now though, now that she had returned to him, perhaps they could begin to map out some sort of future? Together, maybe they could find something--a goal, a purpose to bring some sliver of meaning to the bleak expanse of days stretching out in front of them?
Time away? How had he failed so completely? They had created a life together, created Maya together. He had sat down stairs for what felt like hours, eventually followed her up to their bedroom, and now stood watching while she disassembled another part of his life. When she was done, when she had taken away everything she wanted, would there be enough of him left to continue breathing?
Unable to watch any longer, he turned away, seeking refuge in a familiar place. The guest room. It was filled with standard bedroom furniture, devoid of any personality. His parents had stayed with them for a couple of weeks after Maya's accident, but there was no visual sign of their brief habitation. As a child, he had loved the smell of his parents' bedroom, his mother's lotion, his father's aftershave, but there was no cent of them left behind in this space.
Maya's room. The door was closed. Had anyone opened it since she vanished from their lives? When she was a child, this door had always been open, her small figure constantly dashing back and forth between their room and hers. When she became a teenager, it was always securely closed, and where once he and Ellen had been dragged inside whenever they attempted to walk passed, they were now instructed to knock for admittance. He raised a tentative hand, on the verge of knocking again, but eventually dropped it back to his side. Ellen might hear.
His home office. He sank into his office chair, and pushing the keyboard aside, rested his head on the desk in front of him. Normally, he worked here every day, except the one time he should've been here. The day of Maya's accident he had been out of town at a business conference. If he had been here, would it have made a difference? Would he have driven her to her band recital, or would she have still gone in with her friend? Would the accident have happened no matter who was driving?
"Ben," it was Ellen's voice.
Had he fallen asleep?
"Ben, I'm leaving. The Uber is here."
He sat up, rubbing the sleep from his eyes, and there she was in the doorway. The overstuffed travel bag was slung over her shoulder, while she grasped the handle of the largest suitcase they owned in one hand. She looked tense, poised for flight. As though the least motion from him would send her leaping across the landing and running down stairs.
"Uh, okay." He struggled to his feet, gripping the edge of the desk to steady himself. Something felt wrong! "Can I help you with your suitcase?"
She was shaking her head before he finished his question, in the act of turning away even as she answered, "No, I'm good."
While her steps faded into the distance, he turned to face the windows behind him. They looked out over the front of the house, and while he didn't particularly want to watch her leave ...
The windows were gone. The wall was gone.
He was looking into a hotel room. Not just any hotel room, he realized with astonishment, it looked like ... it was the hotel room he had stayed in for the conference during the week of Maya's band recital. There was his suit jacket, draped over the desk chair. On the desk was his work laptop, open to a page showing flight schedules.
"I don't understand why you can't come back early," Ellen had told him over the phone. "This recital is so important to her."
Honestly, there was no reason why he couldn't have come back a day early. His primary purpose for attending the conference had been to present the paper he had submitted that had subsequently been accepted, and he had already done that. His boss wouldn't have cared, as long as the presentation went well--and it had--he was golden. The only person who would have cared was in accounting, the earlier return flight was more expensive, but he could've easily defused that problem by putting the extra charge on his personal card.
No reason, except that Ellen's call had felt manipulative. No reason, except he had resented giving up a relaxing day of attending conference sessions in exchange for crowded flights and interminable layovers.
He stumbled forward, almost tripping when the flooring underfoot changed from the hard wood of his office floor to the hotel room carpet. This was insane! Was the stress of the day's events making him hallucinate? He rubbed his eyes with the sleeve of his shirt, and then gaped down at his outfit. It was Saturday, had been Saturday, but his casual weekend attire had been replaced by a button down shirt and slacks, the matching outfit to the suit jacket hung from the chair in front of him.
Spinning around, he saw that his office was still there, although there was a slowly thickening wall of fog, as though at any moment the hotel room wall would coalesce into existence. He could still get back, but ...
It is your time of choosing. Stay here, or go back.
"Back," Ben laughed, retreating to put even more distance between himself and the materializing wall in front of him. "Back to what?"
It was almost midnight when he arrived home. Ben got out of the Uber, waited impatiently for the driver to pop the trunk, and retrieved his briefcase and suitcase.
"No tip if you don't help with the luggage, buddy," he thought sourly.
Shrugging off the momentary annoyance, he hurried down the sidewalk to the front door. Digging the keys out of an outer pocket in his briefcase, he stabbed the correct one in the lock, and dragged both bags inside. Dumping them in the foyer, he headed for the stairs, and then hesitated.
She had a band recital tomorrow. Given that, where would Maya be? Ellen would almost certainly be asleep by now, so she wouldn't be practicing inside. The patio?
When Ben opened the door to the back yard, he was greeted with a cascade of musical notes. Maya was there, cradling the flute in her hands, doing the one thing she loved above all others, creating music. He stood frozen for a moment, immobilized by the miracle of her existence.
Although focused on the piece she was playing, some sense eventually alerted Maya to his presence, and she glanced over her shoulder.
"Dad!" She carefully lowered her flute into its case, sitting on the table in front of her, and only then jumped up. "You came back early!"
She threw her arms around him, but squawked in surprise when the ferocity of Ben's hug lifted her off her feet.
Never let go, never let go, never let go!
"hey, hey," she gasped, playfully drumming the edges of her hands on top of his shoulders, "you're squishing me."
Eventually, he forced himself to put her down. Until now, until holding her in his arms, he hadn't actually believed that anything that had happened since he walked into the hotel room was true. He was dreaming, or perhaps hallucinating, and at some point this pretend reality would be ripped away from him.
"So good to see you!"
"You too," she giggled, "although you kinda look like they dragged you home behind the plane, instead of letting you ride inside."
"Yeah, it feels like that too," he agreed, leaning back against the wall behind him.
She was here, she was safe, but none of that would matter if she still drove to school with her friend tomorrow morning. How could he change that?
"What time are you going in tomorrow?"
"Ms. Hannah wants us to practice before the recital, and that's at 7:00 A.M., so Amy said she'd pick me up at 6:30."
Ben felt a growing unease. He was here, so that obviously meant the past could be changed, but how much resistance would there be? Was he given carte blanche because the universe had sent him back to relive this portion of his life? Somehow he didn't think so. He couldn't screw this up.
"How about I drive you and Amy in tomorrow?" he asked. "I'll buy you both breakfast, and then drop you off right in front of the band hall. That way you won't have to search for a parking space."
She grinned at him and suggested, "Starbucks?"
"No!" he groaned, pretending to slump to the pavement, "I'll have to take out a second mortgage."
There was too much light in the bedroom. He had set the alarm to wake him up at 6:00 A.M., plenty of time to get dressed and make it down stairs before they had to leave, but it looked later than that. He rolled over, saw the time, and felt as though someone had hit him in the stomach. 7:09 A.M.
"Good morning."
Ellen was standing in the bathroom doorway, one towel wrapped around her body, with another encircling her head. Fresh out of the shower.
"You didn't even move when the alarm started ringing," she explained, perhaps catching a bit of his stricken expression, "so I turned it off and let you sleep a little longer."
"Maya?" he croaked, the only word he could manage. The only word that mattered.
"Oh," Ellen said dismissively, "her friend Amy drove her in." She walked back into the bathroom. "You know, Ben, I'm glad you came back for her recital, but you didn't have to make the whole day about you. Did it ever occur to you that she might want to spend time with her friend?"
He had failed again. Did the universe believe in second chances? Would it let him go back to try another time? Was there a universe where Ellen wasn't his wife, a universe where she wouldn't exist to destroy everything he tried to achieve?
His cell phone was ringing. Struggling upright, he fumbled around on the nightstand until he found it and looked at the screen. Maya?
"Daddy, there's been an accident. There's so much blood. I think ... I think Amy's dead."
Author's Note
Back in 2014, I was participating in Last Chance Idol, a spin-off Gary had started for previously eliminated season participants who wanted a chance to get back into the main Idol competition. My first LCI submission, In The Garden, took place in the same universe as the story you just read. In my first story, the main character decided not to accept the choice he was offered, and I always wanted to write another story where the main character did accept.
My idea for this story was, yes the past can be changed, but as Ben discovered, there's a balance that has to be maintained. If Maya doesn't die, someone else must die in her place. Sorry, Amy.
If you're wondering what piece of music Maya was practicing for her band recital, I'd like to think it was a Vivaldi piece like this one.
Dan
Ben had never imagined himself as someone who could foretell the future, and yet, as Ellen moved around their bedroom packing, a certainty grew within him that he was watching the end of his marriage. The piles of clothing she kept adding to her suitcase, the stack of books she crammed into her travel bag ... Would there be anything left in the closet by the time she finished?
"I need some time away," she had announced while they were eating breakfast that morning, "a place where every object I look at doesn't remind me of her."
The "or you" felt implicit in her statement as well, a gradual distancing that had started when they lost their daughter. Although her exclusions had been painful, he had been able to convince himself that they were part of the normal grieving process; an unwillingness to participate in any conversation, walking out of rooms he entered as though even his silent presence was too abrasive to tolerate, leaving the house for long walks in the middle of the night. As the weeks had dragged into months, her absences had grown longer, her abandonment of their relationship an accepted reality between them. There was a part of him that wanted to scream at her, to rage that she wasn't the only one who had lost a child, but in personal relationships at least, silence had always been the familiar course he plotted.
When she walked into the breakfast nook that morning, set down her bowl of cereal, and settled into the chair across from him, he had rejoiced internally. It had been so long, but she was back. He had given her the time she needed, allowed her to grieve, granted her the space she so desperately craved. Now though, now that she had returned to him, perhaps they could begin to map out some sort of future? Together, maybe they could find something--a goal, a purpose to bring some sliver of meaning to the bleak expanse of days stretching out in front of them?
Time away? How had he failed so completely? They had created a life together, created Maya together. He had sat down stairs for what felt like hours, eventually followed her up to their bedroom, and now stood watching while she disassembled another part of his life. When she was done, when she had taken away everything she wanted, would there be enough of him left to continue breathing?
Unable to watch any longer, he turned away, seeking refuge in a familiar place. The guest room. It was filled with standard bedroom furniture, devoid of any personality. His parents had stayed with them for a couple of weeks after Maya's accident, but there was no visual sign of their brief habitation. As a child, he had loved the smell of his parents' bedroom, his mother's lotion, his father's aftershave, but there was no cent of them left behind in this space.
Maya's room. The door was closed. Had anyone opened it since she vanished from their lives? When she was a child, this door had always been open, her small figure constantly dashing back and forth between their room and hers. When she became a teenager, it was always securely closed, and where once he and Ellen had been dragged inside whenever they attempted to walk passed, they were now instructed to knock for admittance. He raised a tentative hand, on the verge of knocking again, but eventually dropped it back to his side. Ellen might hear.
His home office. He sank into his office chair, and pushing the keyboard aside, rested his head on the desk in front of him. Normally, he worked here every day, except the one time he should've been here. The day of Maya's accident he had been out of town at a business conference. If he had been here, would it have made a difference? Would he have driven her to her band recital, or would she have still gone in with her friend? Would the accident have happened no matter who was driving?
"Ben," it was Ellen's voice.
Had he fallen asleep?
"Ben, I'm leaving. The Uber is here."
He sat up, rubbing the sleep from his eyes, and there she was in the doorway. The overstuffed travel bag was slung over her shoulder, while she grasped the handle of the largest suitcase they owned in one hand. She looked tense, poised for flight. As though the least motion from him would send her leaping across the landing and running down stairs.
"Uh, okay." He struggled to his feet, gripping the edge of the desk to steady himself. Something felt wrong! "Can I help you with your suitcase?"
She was shaking her head before he finished his question, in the act of turning away even as she answered, "No, I'm good."
While her steps faded into the distance, he turned to face the windows behind him. They looked out over the front of the house, and while he didn't particularly want to watch her leave ...
The windows were gone. The wall was gone.
He was looking into a hotel room. Not just any hotel room, he realized with astonishment, it looked like ... it was the hotel room he had stayed in for the conference during the week of Maya's band recital. There was his suit jacket, draped over the desk chair. On the desk was his work laptop, open to a page showing flight schedules.
"I don't understand why you can't come back early," Ellen had told him over the phone. "This recital is so important to her."
Honestly, there was no reason why he couldn't have come back a day early. His primary purpose for attending the conference had been to present the paper he had submitted that had subsequently been accepted, and he had already done that. His boss wouldn't have cared, as long as the presentation went well--and it had--he was golden. The only person who would have cared was in accounting, the earlier return flight was more expensive, but he could've easily defused that problem by putting the extra charge on his personal card.
No reason, except that Ellen's call had felt manipulative. No reason, except he had resented giving up a relaxing day of attending conference sessions in exchange for crowded flights and interminable layovers.
He stumbled forward, almost tripping when the flooring underfoot changed from the hard wood of his office floor to the hotel room carpet. This was insane! Was the stress of the day's events making him hallucinate? He rubbed his eyes with the sleeve of his shirt, and then gaped down at his outfit. It was Saturday, had been Saturday, but his casual weekend attire had been replaced by a button down shirt and slacks, the matching outfit to the suit jacket hung from the chair in front of him.
Spinning around, he saw that his office was still there, although there was a slowly thickening wall of fog, as though at any moment the hotel room wall would coalesce into existence. He could still get back, but ...
It is your time of choosing. Stay here, or go back.
"Back," Ben laughed, retreating to put even more distance between himself and the materializing wall in front of him. "Back to what?"
It was almost midnight when he arrived home. Ben got out of the Uber, waited impatiently for the driver to pop the trunk, and retrieved his briefcase and suitcase.
"No tip if you don't help with the luggage, buddy," he thought sourly.
Shrugging off the momentary annoyance, he hurried down the sidewalk to the front door. Digging the keys out of an outer pocket in his briefcase, he stabbed the correct one in the lock, and dragged both bags inside. Dumping them in the foyer, he headed for the stairs, and then hesitated.
She had a band recital tomorrow. Given that, where would Maya be? Ellen would almost certainly be asleep by now, so she wouldn't be practicing inside. The patio?
When Ben opened the door to the back yard, he was greeted with a cascade of musical notes. Maya was there, cradling the flute in her hands, doing the one thing she loved above all others, creating music. He stood frozen for a moment, immobilized by the miracle of her existence.
Although focused on the piece she was playing, some sense eventually alerted Maya to his presence, and she glanced over her shoulder.
"Dad!" She carefully lowered her flute into its case, sitting on the table in front of her, and only then jumped up. "You came back early!"
She threw her arms around him, but squawked in surprise when the ferocity of Ben's hug lifted her off her feet.
Never let go, never let go, never let go!
"hey, hey," she gasped, playfully drumming the edges of her hands on top of his shoulders, "you're squishing me."
Eventually, he forced himself to put her down. Until now, until holding her in his arms, he hadn't actually believed that anything that had happened since he walked into the hotel room was true. He was dreaming, or perhaps hallucinating, and at some point this pretend reality would be ripped away from him.
"So good to see you!"
"You too," she giggled, "although you kinda look like they dragged you home behind the plane, instead of letting you ride inside."
"Yeah, it feels like that too," he agreed, leaning back against the wall behind him.
She was here, she was safe, but none of that would matter if she still drove to school with her friend tomorrow morning. How could he change that?
"What time are you going in tomorrow?"
"Ms. Hannah wants us to practice before the recital, and that's at 7:00 A.M., so Amy said she'd pick me up at 6:30."
Ben felt a growing unease. He was here, so that obviously meant the past could be changed, but how much resistance would there be? Was he given carte blanche because the universe had sent him back to relive this portion of his life? Somehow he didn't think so. He couldn't screw this up.
"How about I drive you and Amy in tomorrow?" he asked. "I'll buy you both breakfast, and then drop you off right in front of the band hall. That way you won't have to search for a parking space."
She grinned at him and suggested, "Starbucks?"
"No!" he groaned, pretending to slump to the pavement, "I'll have to take out a second mortgage."
There was too much light in the bedroom. He had set the alarm to wake him up at 6:00 A.M., plenty of time to get dressed and make it down stairs before they had to leave, but it looked later than that. He rolled over, saw the time, and felt as though someone had hit him in the stomach. 7:09 A.M.
"Good morning."
Ellen was standing in the bathroom doorway, one towel wrapped around her body, with another encircling her head. Fresh out of the shower.
"You didn't even move when the alarm started ringing," she explained, perhaps catching a bit of his stricken expression, "so I turned it off and let you sleep a little longer."
"Maya?" he croaked, the only word he could manage. The only word that mattered.
"Oh," Ellen said dismissively, "her friend Amy drove her in." She walked back into the bathroom. "You know, Ben, I'm glad you came back for her recital, but you didn't have to make the whole day about you. Did it ever occur to you that she might want to spend time with her friend?"
He had failed again. Did the universe believe in second chances? Would it let him go back to try another time? Was there a universe where Ellen wasn't his wife, a universe where she wouldn't exist to destroy everything he tried to achieve?
His cell phone was ringing. Struggling upright, he fumbled around on the nightstand until he found it and looked at the screen. Maya?
"Daddy, there's been an accident. There's so much blood. I think ... I think Amy's dead."
Author's Note
Back in 2014, I was participating in Last Chance Idol, a spin-off Gary had started for previously eliminated season participants who wanted a chance to get back into the main Idol competition. My first LCI submission, In The Garden, took place in the same universe as the story you just read. In my first story, the main character decided not to accept the choice he was offered, and I always wanted to write another story where the main character did accept.
My idea for this story was, yes the past can be changed, but as Ben discovered, there's a balance that has to be maintained. If Maya doesn't die, someone else must die in her place. Sorry, Amy.
If you're wondering what piece of music Maya was practicing for her band recital, I'd like to think it was a Vivaldi piece like this one.
Dan
