From the Ground Up - Backwards Activity

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I slapped the keyboard in frustration. I just couldn’t put my heart into it.  Transitions had always been the hardest for me.  I stared at the brand new, clean, white, and most importantly empty page before me.  It seemed to taunt me. “I’m waiting, what’s wrong with you?”  I tried not to reply, I would be too embarrassed with myself if the sassy blank page won an argument with me in my own mind.  “I just can’t do this!”  Against my will, the banter commenced, “Why not? You have the characters ready, and the plot already laid-out. You just need a beginning.”

“I give up.”  I thought.  I closed the laptop, got up and got myself a glass of water. It was a beautiful day. The sun was shining, and little kids on bicycles and scooters passed by laughing raucously.  I sighed a bit sadly, maybe if it rained, I could have the right mood to begin this story.  It wasn’t right for terrible things to happen when the sky is clear and blue, grass green, birds singing, and gentle breezes blowing. It wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair. My heart hurt just thinking about it.

No, I needed to get outside; maybe if I enjoyed some of this weather, I’d be able to start that blasted book. I started toward the door, and caught sight of my front flowerbeds.  They were full of dead tulips. I realized I hadn’t even looked at them since he… my heart stung as if I had poured salt over my own wound.  Enough was enough.  I grabbed my sun hat. No way could I let myself go on like this. It was time to stop, it was time to clean up the flowerbeds and start fresh.  My heart groaned in protest, but I squared my shoulders and ignored it.  “Time to let the brain do the thinking” I told my heart.  “You don’t have a brain. You’re stupid, and you have to let it go.  Just like Sophie.”

Good! I encouraged the train of thought that lead back to my book, “Sophie’s the reason her family will stay together, she doesn’t let go, even though it would be stupid to keep holding on like she will.

With that, I strode out into the sun.

It was nearly the middle of July, and so the time for tulips had passed. The wilted petals had fallen and scattered ages ago, and now the stems and leaves too were falling under the heat of the sun.  They had had a good growing season this year, I thought as I lifted my green gardening hoe and began hacking at the dead plants at the foot of the flowerbed.  All the colours had been gorgeous. Pink, yellow, red, and orange. They perfectly lined the steps to the house. My heart felt a pang as I remembered some compliment he had given me. I pushed it aside. No, it’s been months now, the flowers have been dying slowly ever since. It ends now.

I continued hacking at the poor plants. I would replace them with petunias, or some other small summer flower. Most likely petunias, that is what mother always put in her garden. Mother was right, petunias would look very nice. Mother was right about everything after all… I felt another pang, and I fell to my knees sobbing.  Hadn’t she warned me?  Hadn’t she told me he would do exactly what he did?  She knew! She knew that he wasn’t worth it.  I shuddered, what mother hadn’t known, was that my heart would stick to it. Bruised, broken and then finally ripped whole from my chest, still, all the while, clinging to a dream.

He never gave anything to me like that, mother was right. He wasn’t worth it. My heart may have been built for endurance, but he didn’t deserve to have a heart that strong.  There’ll be someone else, the right someone else this time, and then, then my heart can latch on for dear life and never have to let go again.  Let go?  I thought bitterly as I cried. My heart doesn’t let go.  Doesn’t know the meaning of it, I’ll have to tear, cut and pry him out of its grip before he’ll ever truly be gone.  And then what?

I stared out at the street, the dead tulips scattered around my knees. My heart throbbed and I could almost see him there, all over again, walking away with a sort of sulking stride. Once more, despite the slowness of his pace, I felt my heart wrenched out of my chest as though attached to a winch.  He kept walking, my heart dragging along the pavement behind him.  Even after so long, I saw it as clearly as if it had happened at noon today. Evidently, my heart was still there, bleeding and scraping along behind him.  

I got up quickly and darted toward my door. I took one last look at the street, then I went back into the house and wrote, “It is midnight, the rain is beating on the windows.”  It was not midnight, it was not raining.