the Dearest of Dears

the Dearest of Dears

J O H N  K.  H A R M O N

Benton, PA 1984
40 Miles Away from Centralia, PA

    She could never stop staring at the pictures on the wall in her office. They were pictures of her home that was, a home that used to be. A pied-à-terre where she was happy. Now, she lives in a house. But, the pictures on the wall; that was a home. She sat at a metal desk with magnets haphazardly placed around the drawers, faded, mildly funny innuendos on each one. She worked at a grocery store in Ashland, spending most of her days flipping pens between her fingers as an utterly bored receptionist, finding her job repetitive and tedious for the past six months she's been working there.
    She soon departed the dreary building and walked maybe a couple of miles to her house. It was still very sunny, as it always is in July, illuminating and casting a gentle glow around flowers, encompassing a habitual, flamboyant garden. She walked to her house, to find Ms. Harrison who was sitting on their porch, rocking in a chipped, white chair. A potted cactus gleaned from the speckles of its needles, a thicket of rose thorns bellowed in the wind around the foundation of the house. She lived in a duplex, a very happy duplex with Ms. Harrison, that half of the house was all she and Randy could afford. There was always a smile on Ms. Harrison's tethered face, mousey, gentle, gray hair sat atop her head. All she ever did was rock in that chair with a smile crevicing into her lips. Veronica had never known her to do anything else this entire year she has lived there. The porch was where the lady was happy.
    With a wave, Veronica ventured into her side of the house and threw down the keys on her couch. There was a knock on the door after an hour or two, and she zigzagged around the furniture. She was to meet Randy Payne, her current sweetheart. They greeted with a kiss, then he was walking in and setting his coat down. She asked him, "How was work?", then allowed herself to fall over the arm of the couch.
"Horrible," He would always say casually, then proceed to list all the synonyms for horrible just to emphasize how horrible it really was. "hideous, dreadful, awful, terrible,"
    Randy was a man who loved Veronica very passionately. He had a stubble of facial hair and was a hardworking man, working with all of his manly might and strength at a local flower shop, always coming home and smelling like roses which led to Veronica's infatuation with him. He had a keen sense of humor too, always taking just a second longer in speech to think of a more wittier thing to say. To Veronica, this was particularly annoying, subconsciously resenting him, only bound to him by the complication and exertion of actually leaving him.
Only an hour later, they found themselves terribly exhausted from their days at work, lying in bed to rest. The room was pale and cold, Randy looked over at her, sweetly, only to find her staring at the picture frame on the nightstand, Veronica lied still. Randy gave an unpleasant sigh of exasperation and he wanted to say something, but was it really his place? It's never been his place to tell her to stop crying, besides she would resent him like she always did. A dull, neglectful, ignoration that she does when she's angry, casting herself to the other side of the room, instead of talking about it, he hated that and he hated being uncomfortable around his own girlfriend, always hesitant and always careful not to step on her gigantic, soul-destroying toes.
"Veronica," He started, his smug voice barely above a whisper.
"Yes?" She replied, gently moving the covers up to her neck. He knew that even on opposite sides of the bed, she would remain reticent.
"I really think you should take down that picture," He insisted, stepping out of his soft and tender chrysalis of good-natured compassion.
"No," She immediately said and Randy found himself grimacing, he abhorred her impetuous answers, he detested the fact that she might not consider it. He took another deep breath, He was a good-hearted guy, that's why he hadn't said the demand (yes, demand, that picture was going to go) so indignantly. He gently caressed her arm; she responded awkwardly and unaffectionately.
"Listen, V," He began, switching positions to lie on his back, a hallowed spot sat between them. If he was going to get anywhere with her, he would have to talk to her about her melancholy. "how are you doing with-you know?" He asked, but received no response. "V?"
"I don't want to talk about this," She said with haste.
"Well, we need to," He snapped. It was never Veronica's intention for Randy to find out about her depression, she still has no clue how he found out. She never would have wanted to come off as problematic and whiny. You see, V was born approximately three years after it all started back in 1962. She grew up in Centralia, she loved it there. She was happy, spending her entire youth and adolescence growing up in the midst of the divine (needless to say she was beginning to lose her faith), she grew up in the heart of the minetown, in the kernel of satisfaction as long as it wasn't her who was going into the deep depths of grottos and caverns. She had Vincent, her dearest, her most ineffable dearest. They were highschool sweethearts, meeting during the fourth day of her sophomore year back in 1980. They lived very close, it was unbelievable that the inevitability of them meeting sooner was so in fact evitable. She took utter delight in his happiness and in his joy. They would often find themselves staring endlessly into each other's eyes, a vulnerable stare, a wordless gaze, a perpetual desire. They loved with so much soul and they loved with so much intensity, such intensity that it often left bruises on her skin. They were hysterically unfunny, often telling jokes that were so unfunny that they would laugh over how substandard it was, it was their trademark. They were supposed to last like the hell scorching beneath their feet in the mines. Their love, a boundless swithering gas, rocking the chambers, their conscious yet unknowing minds, not knowing why they do it, but doing what they do anyway because they loved what they did and they loved each other but now Vincent's body rots in the cemetery. He had died from carbon monoxide poisoning, rising from the inferno underneath. Veronica received a letter in the mail once, written by Vincent after he was hospitalized.
My Dearest Veronica,