Sunday, November 15, 2009
THE SUN WAS STRUGGLING TO FIGHT ITS WAY through a thick blanket of clouds when I finally opened my eyes. I snuggled the covers up around my chin, trying to keep the cold that lingered in the air away from my warm body. The images in my mind played over repeatedly like a movie on a screen. I saw myself looking horrified and confused as Jackson described the dynamics of life in 2009. I sat there on an oversized loveseat next to the fire wearing a dark blue dress that felt incredibly heavy on my torso and fell all the way to my ankles. My hair hung in curls around my shoulders and I held a white handkerchief in my hand. I looked truly elegant, but the corset was extremely constricting. I wondered if it would ever feel commonplace to me.
Jackson looked so incredibly handsome in his navy suit with a vest, tie, and pocket watch with the chain hanging down across him. He was trying to be patient with me as he attempted to explain a world I couldn’t comprehend. It was the oddest feeling because I could actually feel what I felt as he spoke of such foreign concepts. Yet, I knew in my mind’s eye the other side of it as well. It was so bizarre.
I also recalled sitting by the fire with Olivia and Elizabeth while Annabelle, Emily, and a couple of other women who I knew were married to my brothers, sat across the room with sewing items scattered about. I felt comfortable in their presence, yet strangely anxious to be with Jackson. However, the scene before my eyes looked like something out of Gone with the Wind. The clothes, furniture, atmosphere—all of it was surreal to my evolved eyes. It was all so simple. Children running around with old fashioned toys, clothes, things that I had never personally seen before yet saw in history books and museums, flooded my vision. Apparently, my family was extremely large and almost always present. A young black girl who worked for my family would come in periodically with a fresh pot of hot coffee, and an older black man maintained the fire keeping the room warm and toasty. This bizarre world unfolded before me like a dream I could no longer awaken from.
I reluctantly climbed out of bed and headed for the bathroom. The hot water rained down on me and my tense muscles began to finally relax. I took a deep breath and wondered if this experience was ever going to get any easier.
I am barely juggling all the drama in one life, how am I going to manage two?
***
I finished blow-drying my hair and attempted to do something with it when someone knocked on my door. Instantly, all the muscles in my body tensed up again. “Yeah?”
My door slowly opened and my mom poked her head in. “Can I come in?”
“Sure.”
I tried to keep my voice as light as possible. She looked drained, not angry. I noticed she had dark circles under both her eyes like she hadn’t slept at all last night, and I instantly felt guilty.
She hesitated just inside my doorway as if she was unsure of what to do.
“Have a seat,” I offered, gesturing towards my bed.
“Thanks.” Her voice was melancholy.
She sat down on the corner of my bed looking as if she was about to burst into tears at any moment. I could handle almost anything except my mother’s tears. The guilt was unbearable. “I had a long talk with your dad last night.”
“Ethan told me.” My own voice dropped several octaves.
“I guess your mind is made up and there’s nothing I can do or say that is going to change it,” she stared down at the floor not bothering to look up at me when she spoke.
“Mom, please don’t look at it that way.”
“I did not come in here to start another argument with you, Jocelyn,” she said coldly. “I just wanted to tell you that if this is what you truly want, then I will keep my mouth shut. However, I refuse to watch my daughter throw her life away on some silly crush for a boy she’s only known a few weeks and sit idly by while college and grad school disappear. Therefore, you cannot expect me to participate in the events leading up to your downfall.”
My heart jumped in my throat and I could not speak. My entire body went numb. I couldn’t believe she was saying these words to me.
“Therefore, I have decided that I will not help you with planning anything for this disaster nor will I be attending it.” She got up and walked back to my door.
“Mom? Mom, stop. Please. You can’t mean that,” I pleaded, jumping to my feet. Tears poured down my face as I rushed over to her side. “Please. Don’t do this to me.”
“I am not the one who is doing this. You are. I will not watch you throw your life away,” she continued to avoid making eye contact with me.
“Mom…Please!” I begged through my tears.
“I’m sorry, Jocelyn. I always thought you were going to be something when you grew up, make a difference in this world, accomplish something incredible. Not waste your life on a man who is going to turn you into a housewife and mother. I honestly believed you were better than that, that I had raised you better than that. I guess I was wrong. I am sorry I failed you.” She took a deep breath and exhaled slowly and walked out of my room.
I stood rooted in place. Her words ripped through my very soul. Endless tears poured down my cheeks, but I made no effort to brush them away. Something inside me died. I knew she was going to have a difficult time accepting my decision, but I never dreamed she would feel this extreme.
I blindly took a step forward, then another. I stumbled down the front stairs and sprinted out the door gathering momentum as my legs carried me blindly where my heart wanted to go. My mind was empty, screaming, numb. My breathing was rapid yet there was not enough oxygen to fill my aching lungs. My legs forced my body forward over my front lawn, across the street to Jackson’s front porch. I didn’t even hesitate as I threw open their front door unexpectedly.
Jackson and his parents were seated at the dining room table enjoying their peaceful breakfast when I came bursting through their front door. I could only imagine the sight I must have been to cause the three of them to leap from their seats and rush to my side. I collapsed into Jackson’s arms in hysterical sobs as he lifted me up into his arms and carried me over to their couch with Robert and Emily directly behind him.
Jackson sat down cradling me to him and trying to calm me down. My brain would not function properly for me to form words. He wiped the tears from my cheeks with a tissue his mother handed him and soothed my hair away from my face. But my body would not stop trembling uncontrollably. Words would not come. The tears would not relent. Nothing was ever going to be right again. Somewhere in the back of my mind I heard a door close and the sound of distant footsteps drew closer in on me.
“Is she all right?” My dad’s voice broke through my foggy consciousness. I scrambled off Jackson’s lap and rushed into the strong arms of my father. With my face buried in his chest like a small child, I cried endlessly.
He stroked my hair and rubbed my back as he did when I was much younger. “Jocelyn, baby, you have to calm down.”
His voice was soft and soothing. My breathing began to level out into a low rhythm. “That’s it…that’s my girl.”
He spoke to me like I was still four years old and for some reason, at this moment, it gave me great comfort and security. “Daddy, she said…”
I couldn’t get the words to come out. It was as if I knew if I said them aloud, it would make them more real and I knew I couldn’t handle the pain and rejection.
“I know, pumpkin. I know. She didn’t mean it. I promise. She’s only hurting and lashing out.” My father continued to comfort me while Jackson and his parents looked on at us baffled as to what could have happened or been said to warrant such a reaction.
I shook my head slightly with my face still buried in his chest. “No, no, not this time. She meant it, every word of it. She’s so disappointed in me. I let her down and she’s never going to forgive me!” I cried.
“Jocelyn, don’t be such a drama queen. You know how your mother can be. She’ll come around. She always does,” he whispered, still stroking my hair.
My dad looked over at the three faces staring back at him with confusion and wonder. “I apologize for the intrusion. I am afraid that Amy is not taking the news of the wedding very well. She is deeply upset and has refused to participate or attend any aspect of it.”
“My goodness, no wonder she’s so upset,” I heard Emily whisper from behind.
“Ethan is also pretty upset about it,” Jackson said in a low voice.
“I know my wife can be challenging at times. But I do believe that once she realizes this is what Jocelyn wants and that it is not going to affect her education, she will come around.” Dad’s voice sounded more wishful than reassuring.
“Hopefully, before the ceremony begins,” Jackson muttered.
“I hope so, too.” My dad patted my back again as if he had just remembered I was there.
“Dad.” I lifted my face up to his. “I know how important it is for her to see me graduate college, but can’t she at least realize that perhaps I can have both?”
“Give her some time pumpkin, show her you can. She’ll come around.”
“Shane, would you like some coffee? I just brewed a pot,” Emily offered.
“No thank you, Emily. I really must get back home. I’m trying to sort through some of the old things in the basement storage closet,” he left out a half chuckle. “Lord only knows what I’m going to find in there. I cannot even remember the last time I attempted to clean out that room and it’s probably going to take me all day.”
Emily nodded silently.
My father shifted his focus back to me. “Are you all right?”
I nodded numbly and wiped my cheeks off again as the tears began to come to an end. “I think I’m going to stay over here for a while if that’s okay.”
“Sure,” he squeezed me tightly. “And don’t worry, I’ll talk to her,” he whispered softly in my ear before he released me. “I’ll see you in a little while.” He smiled towards my new family and headed back home.
Robert disappeared into the kitchen and I took a seat beside Jackson back on the couch with Emily on the other side of me.
“I am so sorry about your mother’s reaction,” Emily said in a soft voice, placing her hands over mine. “I had no idea she would take it so hard.”
“I did. That’s why I wanted to wait until the last possible minute to tell her. Like the night before the wedding.” I tried to smile, but don’t believe I pulled it off so well.
“Well, that’s not going to happen,” Jackson chuckled and Emily gave him a look of disapproval.
“I’m sorry, this is my fault. I never should have let her push my buttons like that and throw a childish tantrum like I did.”
“It happens,” Robert spoke up as he walked back into the room carrying a tray with teacups and a pot.
“Coffee?”
“Thank you,” I answered.
Jackson placed his arm around my waist while his father poured each of us a cup of coffee. I couldn’t imagine joining a more loving supportive and closely-knit group of people. I would be so proud to call them my family.
I spent the day with Jackson and his family. The four of us watched movies together relaxing in the living room by a roaring fire. Emily made up some popcorn and it turned into a lazy afternoon.
Shortly before five, his parents excused themselves to start dinner. I offered my help, but they both politely declined. I wasn’t sure if whether it was because cooking together was something they both enjoyed or their lack of faith in my cooking abilities, which wasn’t completely unfounded.
The meal they created was as incredible as the conversation. We sat around the table and discussed more plans for the wedding along with various courses at the university and the beginning of our basketball season. The atmosphere was so relaxed and calm that I felt perfectly at ease. I was in no hurry to get back home. I hated the idea of getting into another altercation with my mother or worse, her silent treatment.
I arrived back at my house before eight. I could hear sounds of Sunday night football blaring from the family room and my father and Ethan shouting at the television. I smiled to myself and headed upstairs to hibernate in my room and catch up on some neglected homework that was due the next day.
***
I finished up my last calculus problem and shoved the book aside. I looked over at my psych book lying dormant on the corner of my nightstand and knew I should probably do some reading to prepare for my next exam but I really wasn’t in the mood. We were now covering research methods and I found it incredibly boring. I knew it would put me to sleep in a matter of minutes. Instead, I decided to work on some other research of my own.
I sat at my computer and began searching for more information on anything I could find from the 1870s, trying to learn as much as I could about the culture, traditions and lifestyle. I read several old newspaper articles from the Chicago Sun. Everything that I came across only offered a small glimpse of the life that I wanted so desperately to understand. The sites I found on customary clothing seemed so incredibly strange to me. Looking at them on a computer screen was so entirely different than how I viewed them first person. The styles were similar, yet on a computer they looked very out of place.
My dad knocked on my open doorframe interrupting my train of thought. “Working on school work?” he asked, glancing over at my monitor.
“Um…Something like that, yeah.” I turned around noticing something behind his back. “Whatcha got there?”
“You’ll never believe what I found in the basement today,” he waltzed in and took a seat on my bed.
“Okay…what?”
He held out a stack of old looking journals on his lap.
“I’m not sure if you remember my brother Monte, who passed away when you were really young.” Instantly I felt every muscle in my body tense up. “Well, I was going through some boxes of his things and came across these,” he patted the stack of journals. “At first I had no clue what they were, but then, when I started reading them, I couldn’t put them down. They’re really fascinating. I had no idea my brother was such a talented imaginative writer. In fact, if I didn’t know any better, I would swear he lived every word written.”
I slowly got up and joined my father on my bed. “What do they say?” I could hardly breathe as fear ripped through my body.
Could he have possibly written about EVE? Did my father now believe his brother to be insane, schizophrenic?
“They’re like the personal journals of a Union soldier that chronicles his life shortly before the Civil War erupts and then continues with his experiences during the war. Then they abruptly just stop about a year after the war ends. There really is no conclusion or anything, which is strange. It was like the man just dies, but it doesn’t say how or anything,” he shrugged.
“Really? Can I read them?”
“Well, I figured you’d be interested. I noticed lately you’ve been doing a lot of research on that time period for history class,” he nodded towards my computer. “So I thought I’d let you read them. Just please be careful with them.” He put the stack over on my lap. “Are you feeling any better?”
I looked down at the journals, dying to tear into them. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just feeling really tired.”
“Well, get a good night’s sleep,” he stood back up. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
He started to leave. “Hey, Dad?” I spoke up before he could escape. “Thanks for everything.”
He smiled back. “Love ya, pumpkin. Sweet dreams.”
“Love you too, Daddy.”
I sprawled out across my bed next to the stack of journals. Anticipation was nearly killing me. I could only imagine what my father must have thought reading through something so personal of his brother’s. However, for my own selfish gain, I truly desired some personal insight into a period that still felt so foreign to me. Perhaps my uncle’s journals would provide me with a foundation to their way of thinking that would help me in understanding my other world. Yet for some reason, I thought about the warnings that Robert had given me about writing things down—both past and future events that could be misinterpreted by others if they happened to fall into the wrong hands.
I cracked open the first journal. The pages were crinkled with age and were adorned with perfect letters scribed in black ink. In the top left hand corner was the name Montgomery Floyd Timmons with the date December 25, 1860. I held my breath almost scared to continue on.
I spent the day over at my brother Patrick’s house with him and his family. It was a delight to witness all four of my nephews opening their Christmas gifts. They were so excited and gleeful. His wife, Annabelle, has done an amazing job decorating their newly built house and shaping it into a home. She certainly has her hands full with the boys and the recent birth of their daughter, Jocelyn Alyssa, two months ago. Their sons are quite spirited and require near constant attention. Their little girl has a complete head of brownish hair that maintains a red tint in the light and her eyes are so prominent and such a dark brown they appear black. She will most certainly grow into the most stunning young lady. However, Jocelyn is very calm and easily contented. I do believe that this little girl is going to be quite smothered with love and protection from everyone in our family not only because of her being the only female, but because of her amazing appearance and features.
Yet the despite the joyous occasion, the elaborate meal, decorations and the comforts of family, the threat that we are all currently living with hung heavy in the air. The war! It is all everyone speaks of in these times. I know that Patrick and Annabelle are deeply afraid of what will happen if the war comes. He will most certainly be utilized for his talents as a gifted physician. While the threat of performing on the battlefield will not fall upon him, he will still be close to the front lines and traveling with the military troops, which will most certainly place him in the path of danger. I know that they are also deeply concerned about our younger brother Nicholas as well as my prospects. Since we made the decision not to follow in our father’s footsteps in the medical community, we will most certainly be drawn into the front lines.
However, I am not afraid. I will do as my country asks of me if that is the journey that I must take. My only regret is that I waited to wed Miss Vivian. I should have done it sooner. Now I am afraid that if the war does come and if I should die upon the field of battle, that she would be left without a husband to care for her. I should have married her last year. I wish that I had a family like Patrick’s to keep me strong and give me faith.
I closed up the notebook and flopped back on my pillows. I couldn’t read anymore. I felt like an intruder on his personal thoughts, the most sincerest form of invasion. A part of me wanted to continue, wanted to learn as much as I could. However, I wasn’t sure if this was the way to go about it.
I stacked the notebooks on my nightstand and crawled under the covers, flipping off my light. I considered telling Jackson and his parents about the journals, but didn’t know if it was the right thing to do before I’d had the chance to look through them. Surely, my uncle didn’t mention anything regarding EVE, but then again maybe he did. My father did say that his writing was imaginative. Just how imaginative, I didn’t know.