Thomas Hewitt: End Of The Line

Jump Mountain Blues

The thin glass stood tall before Thomas as he sat alone in the gallery. It was nearly spotless, he couldn't find a single smudge to study and if he hadn't known any better, he wouldn't have believed there was anything in that room to separate the innocent from the condemned. It was quiet, uncomfortably so as he waited. As he tapped his foot he thought his own impatience comical. It had taken ten years to get to that moment, ten years of waiting to see justice served and suddenly ten minutes felt like an eternity, an unreasonably long time to sit in that claustrophobic room with its dim, orange lights that took him right back to that night. It was strange to think that so much time had passed without her and yet, the wound still felt fresh. Time had a pair of hands, fingers even that with each second spent without her gave it room to wrench the cut open further. It would never truly heal, that hole losing her had left behind, but he'd managed to keep on living, even when it hurt. He often thought back to the basement, when he was so sure he'd lose her then, how he had worried his heart wouldn't beat the same, his lungs would be unable to function when hers failed. He hadn't been entirely correct, his lungs worked, but breathing felt forced, something he learned to ignore for Penny's sake. His heart still beat, but it's thrum lacked stability, balance. He'd been right about that, it never quite felt the same after her's stopped beating beside his. Though, at times when the wind was right, he felt her. He had made the decision to surrender her ashes to the breeze not long after they'd returned her to him in a pale white jar. He stood there in the living room for quite some time, unsure where she should rest. At first, she sat on the fireplace, then in the window where she had always loved to sit by in the morning, but neither place seemed fitting. It seemed wrong to keep her locked inside a house, even the one she called home. Ronnie was never meant to be caged, even in death. In life she had only known freedom for such a short while, it was only right to let that untamed spirit fly, never to be bound to one place. Penny had been with him to watch her go. It was early, the sun had only just begun it's ascent over the mountains. He stood with each of them in his arms, one wriggling to put her feet on the ground and the other silent, still. It wasn't until the breeze picked up that he heard her whisper, assuring him that she'd never be far from home. She would always be right there, even after he'd let her go. That had remained true and though he'd never shared those whispers with Penny, sometimes he wondered if she heard them too when she sat on the porch long before he woke up, smiling to herself when a gust brushed her hair back. But even Penny, as young as she'd been, hadn't quite escaped grief either. At first, Thomas had thought she was too small to feel the pain losing her mother would inevitably cause, but she mourned in her own ways. There was a certain way she would cry when she woke at night in the year that followed Ronnie's death, it was quiet, almost as if it wasn't meant for Thomas to hear and in truth, he knew it wasn't. It was her mother she cried for as she stared up at the pastel colored ceiling, knowing somewhere in her fragile mind that she wouldn't be heard, not by who she needed. It never stopped him from going to her, holding her through the pain he knew he couldn't fix. As time went on, her cries faded, or at least she'd taken to hiding them from him. It wasn't until she had turned eight that she began her endeavor to know her mother through Thomas' memory of her.

"What was she like?" She'd ask.

Thomas could tell she was fearful of the answer, frightened it would resurrect her father's agony that he'd fought so valiantly to hide from her. He knew she was surprised to see him smile, relief flooded her expression to see him do so. She hadn't caused him agony, not in the slightest. No one had ever asked that question, he'd never had to describe her before and he leapt at the opportunity. It was a chance to remember her in a different light and it had kept her alive in a way, their quiet conversations they'd share as he tucked her into bed. He still felt her rolling her eyes when he'd describe her like some warrior, clad in armor that shone the brighter than the sun itself, like a saint, but he was certain she had become one. It brought respite to see her story breathe life into Penny's. She memorized each detail he had shared and implemented it, whether it had been consciously or not, into her own story. Ronnie had a hand in helping her become who she was, even if it was simply through memory, she had defeated death in that way. She'd found a way to show Thomas his silver lining and it was Penny. It was a daughter who had broken the wheel that his family had let spin out of control in the simple fact that she was nothing like them, nothing like Hoyt. She'd known death, but not in the way Thomas had and she'd found a way to grow and live past it, even at a young age. Penny was only twelve and she had more wisdom that Thomas himself knew how to handle at times. He'd never reign it in, she like her mother had a need that stemmed from her core throughout her blood and her being to live freely, wild. Even if it made Thomas' breath hitch at times to watch her deny the easy road, he would see her through it. She was tenacious, hard-headed and yet, graceful in ways that most probably found confusing, because Penny was above all else, rugged in the most beautiful way a girl could be. She had lived a lifetime before the age of two and her life's journey thus far had been to navigate not only her pain, but her father's, even if he hadn't asked for her aid, she'd given it. Selfless, like someone else he once knew.