Greenbriar Manor

The Plan and The Pain of Recognition

Jeffrey woke up from his stupor in an 8x8 cell. He immediately realized something was wrong. They had the wrong man. What was he accused of anyway? Where was Salem and Brittany. He asked the stocky built warden what his charges were...the man mumbled at him: Obtaining property by false pretense, check fraud, identity theft,public intoxication, child neglect, kidnapping and manslaughter. Jeffrey thought about his time at the Manor. The conversation with uncle Daniel. How his mother had walked him through the process of getting the estate drawn up in his name for Brittany using her rightful place in Vera's will. He had used the last check in her register. She assured him that it was good so had Daniel's accountant. He always trusted his mother's money to be available. Identity theft was a strange concept. He had not been himself in so long he had started to believe every story his mother told him and embrace all the nuances of each place and person he became. The governement name they rattled at him sounded like it belonged to some one else. He had not been that person since boyhood. He had no doubt been on a bender he barely remembered anything from the night before. He kept telling them that Brittany had gone with his mother as she often did to Nova Scotia. It did not matter if he blew her ruse at this point he was in jail and with no family to bail him out. Mother would disappear again and likely so would Daniel. They had disowned him long before he came begging ancient favors. He had never meant to neglect Brittany although he knew that she should have better schooling but with her mother gone it was hard to keep his head straight most of the time. Salem was always about herself even when he was small. He did not see how traveling with his own daughter could possibly constitute as kidnapping. These cops were delusional. Manslaughter? He thought of that man who had worked on the house. The man he had found in the yard and seen go to the hospital all before he could get there. That strange lady in an apron like a bad dream following him with her bad turns. Like a nightmare he was supposed to decode. Somehow he knew if they located that woman everything else would start to take shape. But how could he get anyone to believe him no one ever really had except Brittany's mom and even she could not vet him now. He rolled over against the wall and cried. Calling his mother was useless he knew wherever she was that he was alone now. 

Vera got off the bus at the local cemetary. She had never much liked to go here but this was important. She hoped that she did not see anyone she knew. She went through the tombstones carefully appologizing like a child shuffling through pews in a church. She came to a large granite headstone and stood there as if something would appear. Nothing ever did. Her cousin only ever came calling when she wanted to be seen and they both knew she was not here anyway. Still she hoped one day she would rest from her tired revenge schemes. If not for herself for her granddaughter. Every step she had ever made was a dagger. She spoke to a monument about duty and honor and love. She warned anyone who may listen that Brittany was going to go home. If not for her own right for Bridgette's. It was time for them all to stop trying to rearrange their fates. She laid a single yellow lily against the headstone said goodbye to her cousin's long dead husband and went back to her old house. She had longed to stay in that apartment. But today she had to get Brittany and stand up to her volatile and insistent mother. She has spent her entire life covering up secrets and all she really wanted to do was get back home to Bridgette and rest. No more wandering. No more redirections. When Daniel left the Manor this time he would need her to return. She was ready. Brittany would never have to carry the same fears she did. Salem may have left directions but she would rewrite them. Chessie had schooled them all in the way to change an ending. She walked to the tree and pulled a fern from underneath it as red as blood. Fern and Mabel were key. She walked into the house as if she still owned it. She did not need a key. Her mother was slamming her rolling pin on the counter redoing another batch of her almond dough. An everyday task as predictable as Salem's sullen moods. She cleared her throat. Her mother dropped the wooden rolling pin on the floor when she turned to see Vera. She stuttered, "I...I didn't expect you back so soon." Vera smiled a cunning smile. She had surprised her afterall no more looming and lurking. "I have come for something that belongs to Salem".  Myrna's eyes flashed red. The same old ire lurking behind them. "She is going to learn the ways her grandma wants her...that child is an orphan same as her mom was..same as that maid...same as she could not finish the sentence... Vera spoke her name for the first time in the house with her mother present above a whisper...BRIDGETTE, you mean?  Brittany has friends and a family that love her. Brittany is not the same as her grandma. None of us but you have that same dark bent. That little girl is alone in the world now you saw to that when the handiman went away. Your blind rage costs us all the same price. It is time for you to stop stalking and sulking over how I turned out. Did you ever realize they were afraid of me? Afraid of this house in its plastic shroud of memory? Did you ever think about that little maid and her own family? How they had it better than we did? Salem was a runaway from the beginning she was a success only because she could not face herself and yet she still fell and it cost her everything. You could not live through me as a pianist anymore than she can live through Brittany being a dancer. She deserves better than a dark and cold secluded upbringing. Let her go back to her family. LEAVE MY HOUSE!!" Myrna looked around for a moment clutching at her rolling pin as the carefully constructed facade of a beautiful house showed the true ruins she was standing in: dirty floors, cracked cabinetry, a shell of a place. She looked for the piano now realizing that the sitting room was not just disarrayed it was destroyed. Brittany was in a tiny room upstairs furnished in dingy and dusty furniture Vera had kept because she could not give heirlooms away. Myrna screamed at the site of the destruction. For tonight at least she would not be welcome here. As all Greene houses when one returns the other leaves and being asked to leave was harsher than just going away. That came with consequences. Myrna would wander but she could not light here. Not until Vera left again. When she returned she knew that Brittany would be gone and if she went against Salem there was nowhere on this land she would be safe. She trembled at the thought no longer angry. She faced the tree where so long ago the first red ferns had bloomed and she cried deep tears of sorrow. There was no where for her to go but the one place she most feared. She wandered down the road to the cemetary and walked into the wake of a man she had known in life. A little boy with a dream and a crush on a little girl with dark ringlet hair and eyes as deep as emeralds. No one noticed her standing there. She was alone and she knew what she had done. There was no magic tree and no family promise to fix this indiscretion. Salem would come. Jeffrey would make sure of that.