CHAPTER
thirty-nine
For years I did the very same thing on the morning of July 29. I would get up before sunrise to brew strong coffee to pour into a thermos and make sandwiches with egg salad or lunch meat. I would pack the picnic basket to the brim with all of Norman’s favorite foods. Pickles and potato chips and celery sticks.
Fixing a plate of scrambled eggs, bacon, and toast with tomato slices on the side, I’d carry it in to Norman, singing “Happy Birthday” and waking him with a kiss on the mouth.
“My favorite day of the year,” he’d say every single time, his eyes bright and his smile wide.
We’d drive to someplace out of town. I’d let Norm pick where we’d go, and I’d say yes to his every request.
Ice cream three times in one afternoon? Yes.
Wading to our knees in the fountain at the zoo? Yes.
Staying up well past our bedtimes to talk after we’d been together as husband and wife? Yes.
And every birthday night, just as he was drifting off to sleep I’d whisper in his ear, “My favorite day of the year too.”
I didn’t set my alarm to go off early that July 29 and I didn’t have plans for a picnic or any sort of getaway. I intended to live that day as if it was just any other. Not as a way of forgetting Norm. Never would I have wanted that. Rather, it was so that I’d make it through without bawling my eyes out every other minute.
Still, I woke early and got out of bed. Taking a deep breath to bolster myself, I pulled open the curtains.
Outside my window, the sun was rising.
“Aunt Betty,” Hugo said, climbing up into his chair for breakfast. “Are you sad?”
I put the two plates of scrambled eggs and toast on the table and sat down across from him. “Why do you ask?”
“You’re quiet.” He leaned his elbows on the table. “And you aren’t smiling. You usually smile a lot in the mornings.”
“Oh, sweetheart.” I found myself at a loss of what to say. “I’m sorry.”
“You don’t have to be sorry for being sad.”
“Well, you’re right about that,” I said, dropping a little jam onto my toast and spreading it with the back of my spoon. “I suppose I am sad. We all have days like that, don’t we?”
He got up from his seat and walked around the table. Up on his tiptoes, he planted a soft kiss on my cheek.
“Thank you,” I said. “Would you like me to tell you a story?”
“Yes, please,” he answered before going back to his seat.
“Once upon a time there was a girl named Ella,” I started. “She lived in a little house at the edge of the sea.”
“What color was it?”
“Ella’s home was painted pink, her very favorite color in all the world. She was happy there, every day swimming in the sea with her friends.”
“Were her friends people or fish?” Hugo asked.
“They were fish of every color and size. Fast fish and slow, big and small. And they all loved Ella so very much.”
I went on to tell him about how there had been less rain that year, that little by little the sea began to dry up. The fish all moved away, looking for a new place to live where there was plenty of water for all of them.
“When they left, Ella was all alone,” I said. “And that made her so sad.”
“Why couldn’t she go with them?” Hugo asked around a mouthful of eggs.
“Because she couldn’t swim as long and as far as they could. Remember, she wasn’t the same as them.” I half frowned. “So she stayed in her little pink house by the sea, missing her friends every day and collecting her tears in a little bottle.”
“Why’d she do that?” Hugo asked, curling his lips and squinting his eyes.
“Well, I suppose so she’d know just how much she missed them all.”
Hugo shrugged. “All right.”
Flannery jumped next to Hugo on his chair and nudged his shoulder with the top of her head before sniffing at his plate.
“Shoo, kitty,” he said, but with a giggle.
She hopped off and sat at his feet, grooming herself.
I went on to tell about how Ella stayed in her house, no longer venturing out because she saw no purpose in it. There was no one around to play with or visit for miles and miles. All Ella did was look out the window, missing her friends.
“One day someone knocked on her door,” I said. “It rattled her shutters and made Ella gasp.”
“Is it a bad person?” Hugo asked.
I only shrugged and went on with the story. “Ella answered the door to see an old man with wild gray hair and gaps between his teeth.” I tried for an old man’s rasping. “‘Little girl,’ the old man said, ‘why are you all alone?’”
“Was he a bad man?” Hugo asked, eyes wide. “She shouldn’t talk to bad men.”
“Well, you’re right,” I answered. “Just remember that this is only a story, all right?”
“Is he a bad man or a good man?”
“If it matters so much to you, he’s a good man.” I winked at him before going on. “Ella told him about her friends and her worries that they’d not be able to find a new home. She told him how much she missed them. By the time she finished telling her story, it was dark outside. ‘Will you help an old man see?’ the man said. ‘Will you give him your lantern?’”
I told of how Ella went inside and took out the only light she had, offering it to the man.
“But then how will she see?” Hugo asked.
“Ella wondered about that too,” I said. “But she knew that it was the right thing, to help the man. Soon, he began to yawn and asked if he could rest for a little bit in her yard. Ella said he could. ‘Will you comfort an old man?’ he asked. ‘Will you warm him with your blanket?’”
I told of how Ella took the beautiful green blanket from her own shoulders and spread it out on the man, feeling the chill of the air herself instead.
“But then wouldn’t she be cold?” Hugo asked.
“Yes. But she knew that it was the right thing to do, to help the old man. In the morning, when he woke up, he asked for something to drink. But all she had . . .”
“Was the bottle of tears?” Hugo finished for me.
I nodded. “But those she didn’t want to give up. Those she wanted to keep, a reminder of the friends she missed.”
I told about how Ella held the bottle to her chest. It was the only thing she had left, but she knew that it was right to help the poor old man. So, she handed it to him.
“What do you think he did with those tears?” I asked.
“Did he drink them?” Hugo cringed. “I hope he doesn’t drink them.”
“He didn’t,” I answered. “But he took the lantern and the green blanket and the bottle of tears and disappeared.”
“I don’t like the old man,” Hugo said, frowning. “He shouldn’t have taken her things.”
“Well, there’s more to the story.” I leaned my elbows on the table. “Ella went back into her house, shutting the door, thinking that all she had was lost. Her friends, her lantern, blanket, and tears. But she was surprised to find that her sadness was still with her.”
I told of how just as she closed the door there was a strong earthquake, one that made her almost lose her footing. When she looked out the window, she saw a building growing up from the ground, erupting from the dirt.
Hugo slid off his seat, coming around the table and climbing up on my lap.
“The old man stood on the steps of the building, his gap-toothed mouth pulled into a wide smile,” I said. “He called to her, ‘Come see! Come see!’ And Ella did.”
Hugo leaned into me.
“Ella followed the man into the building, not believing what she saw when she entered. The walls were full of water,” I said. “More water than she’d ever seen in her whole life. Glass held it all in, and Ella touched it with her fingertips. There, on the other side, swam fish of every color, shape, and size. Goldfish and pikes and barracudas. There was even a tank with a very small shark.”
“Her friends?” Hugo asked.
“Yes. All of her friends were there. They swam behind the glass, laughing and telling her how happy they were to see her.” I smoothed his hair with my hand. “Do you have a guess about what the water was made of?”
He leaned his head against my chest. “Was it rain?”
“No. Close, though,” I said. “The water in all of the tanks was made of Ella’s tears.”
I continued on, telling of how something above her caught Ella’s eyes and she looked up, gasping for the beauty of it.
“What was it?” Hugo asked. “Was it the ceiling?”
“Sort of. But it looked to Ella more like the sky. A sky of the most brilliant, bright, shiny green,” I said. “It was a fresh green, like the very first grass of spring, just the very same shade as her blanket. And hanging from the center of the sky was a lantern exactly like the one she’d given the old man. She kept her face tipped upward, not daring to take her eyes off the sky for fear that it would fade away.”
“It was real, though, wasn’t it?”
“Of course,” I answered. “It was then that she felt a hand on her shoulder. It was a warm touch, tender.”
“Was it the old man?”
I nodded. “He said, ‘Welcome home.’ And she smiled, all her sadness fading away.”
“Did she live happily ever after?” Hugo asked.
“I hope so.”
“Aunt Betty?”
“Yes, dearest?”
“That place isn’t real, is it? It’s just make-believe.”
“The land of the glass fish houses and green sky?” I asked. “Why, of course it’s real. How would you like to go there?”
“When?”
“Right now.”
He turned his face, and I loved the way his eyes sparkled.