Looking Through the Cracks

Chapter 12: The Yellow Wallpaper

Several minutes, possibly hours, passed before Ivy gained enough willpower to make her way to bed. After climbing up the stairs, Ivy couldn't resist the painful need to look in her father's room. She looked with a pathetic hope that she had imagined the whole thing. As Ivy pointlessly searched the room, she found herself drawn to his crumpled blankets on the bed. In denial that her father may not return, Ivy slowly began making the bed, savoring the familiar scent of her father that always brought to mind a golden amber. Ivy had barely remade the bed when she surrendered to her heartache and crawled into his bed. It was here that she finally fell asleep. Her tears smothered in the cocoon of blankets wrapping her in her father's memory. Throughout the night until Monday morning, Ivy faded between bouts of sleep and mindless gazing at the yellow paisley wallpaper that surrounded her father's bedroom.

It was due to Ivy's alarm for school that she managed to awaken from her depressive daze. Peeling her eyes apart, Ivy squinted through the crevice between the mattress and the covers engulfing her. Like a frog plucking a fly from the sky, Ivy snatched her ringing phone from the nightstand and burrowed it under the blankets with her. Her eyes watered as they adjusted to the sharp brightness of the screen. Ivy blindly searched her to silence her alarm. Successfully done, her phone pulled up Ivy's lock screen which displayed she had a missed call and three missed texts. Hopeful it might be her father, Ivy opened the unread texts.

Unknown Sender: That was you I saw at Wildcat wasn't it?

Unknown Sender: I think we need to talk, Honey. Let me call you.

Unknown Sender: You can't avoid me forever Ivy. We're going to have to talk eventually.

Feeling like the emotional equivalent of a pile of ashes, Ivy refused to let her brain process who the obvious sender of these texts was. If she were to get through her school day, she'd have to shut all of that out. Sluggishly sliding out of the bed, Ivy meandered down the hallway to her bedroom in search of clean clothes. She reached into her drawers and pulled out a pair of black yoga pants and a soft cotton T-shirt. Robotically going through the motions, Ivy changed into the new clothes, leaving her old ones carelessly in a pile on her gray shag rug.

Locked into auto-pilot, Ivy made her way down the staircase and into the kitchen. Every morning before school she would get up an hour before she had to leave so she could make breakfast for the two of them. She used to only need a half hour, but as time went on her dad's episodes began to occur in the morning. It was on days like that when Ivy needed the extra half hour to lure her father back into his room. It was only after she was sure she had left him enough food, and that he was all stocked up on toilet paper that I would lock him in his room. Even though she knew it was to protect him from hurting himself, Ivy couldn't ignore how barbaric it felt to lock her father away while she was at school. But it was her only option.

As she walked into the kitchen, Ivy hated the sense of relief she felt when she saw the empty kitchen. This morning the only person she had to worry about was herself. Ivy had heard of bittersweet moments, but that felt like an understatement for the intensity of the emotional tornado ripping through her heart. But just like with the texts she would not process, Ivy packaged the simultaneous emptiness and weightlessness of her father's absence away in the "Ignore It" box in the back of her head. As a result, Ivy opted to get coffee and breakfast from the local coffee shop considering she had extra time today.

Collecting her backpack by the front entrance, Ivy swung it over her shoulder and snagged her keys from the hook. She swung the door open and nearly tripped over a sparkly blue gift bag, its white woven handles tied together by curly green ribbon. Her curiosity driven by her desire to forget everything else, Ivy greedily opened the mysterious present. Ripping through the collection of glittery white tissue paper, she eventually discovered a green leather-bound journal. Tucked underneath the green elastic was an envelope with Ivy's name scrawled across its center. Nervous she already knew who this gift was from, Ivy took the envelope in her shaky hand and pulled out the card inside. On the front of it was a floral pattern of violets and daffodils. Centered on the front was the sentiment "thinking of you" written in a golden cursive font. Opening it, Ivy saw more of the same curly handwriting that had penned her name on the envelope. Too anxious to finish the letter, Ivy's eyes lept to the bottom of the card searching for the sender's name. Just like she suspected, but hoped she was wrong, Ivy found the bold lettering of "B" below the message. Before allowing herself to read the note, Ivy forced herself to take several deep calming breaths.