A Cage Left Open

Picture Frame

Stoic? Scornful? Stern? Meredith couldn't quite peg the look that had settled on her grandmother's face in the picture. The polaroid looked nothing like the woman she knew: the unfeeling green eyes, the way her pale pink lips stretched into what was too practiced to be a smile. Her skin looked smooth like porcelain and her silky blonde hair was pinned back, only a few stray strands haphazardly framing her nymph-like features. She looked put together in the navy cap-sleeved dress, her long legs crossed one over the other, and hands clasped together in her lap. The only thing that proved to Meredith that the woman in the photograph was her grandmother was the small, kidney-bean shaped birthmark on her collarbone, just above her heart.

She had studied the picture over and over again, ever since she was a little kid. Her grandmother had what seemed like a million photographs lying around her home. They sat on shelves in glossy black frames, decorated the walls from the kitchen to the basement, sat in boxes in the attic, and filled more albums than the girl could count. The entire house was like a shoebox hiding underneath a bed, overflowing with memories. Most of the photos were of Meredith and her brother, her mother when she was a child, and her nieces and nephews; her grandmother surrounded herself with the people she loved. Only one picture, a small Polaroid in a rustic oak frame, was unlike the rest; the picture of her grandmother.

Meredith carefully slid the photo out of its frame, tracing the sprawling cursive on the back with her fingertip:

Josephine

New York City, New York

May 3, 1964

The handwriting was similar to her own; it belonged to her great aunt, who had taken the photo on their trip to New York, not long before Meredith's mother was born. She was almost three months along in the picture, not that anyone could tell; all the women in her family had been stick thin until nearly five months along in their pregnancies, when suddenly, as if overnight, their stomachs would balloon.

The sisters had run off together the weekend before Josephine was supposed to be wed, spending her last few days of freedom as an unmarried woman in the big city. They were from a mundane town in New Hampshire called Dorchester; the small town of less than a thousand had never offered much to them, and both girls couldn't wait to leave. Meredith's great aunt left almost immediately after Josephine's wedding for the University of California-Berkeley on a scholarship. Eventually she became a successful psychologist. She left her sister behind with a baby on the way and a new husband; though she would never admit it, Josephine was sick with jealousy. They both had dreamed of making a new life in a big city someday, but only one of them ever made it out of Dorchester.

Meredith jumped as the church bells chimed down the street. As the third ring sounded, she took a final glance around the room. The photos on the wall, photos of her mother, her brother, herself... the photos documenting her entire life: joyful faces and cherub cheeks and playful grins, they all stared back at her. She ran her fingers over each of the familiar faces in the frames, until, finally, she fell upon the knotted, rough oak wood. She picked it up, sliding the photo back into the frame. The sound of footsteps echoed down the hall as she tucked the frame into her purse.

She took a shaky breath before turning so her eyes could finally land on the glossy oak casket on the opposite side of the room. Meredith took a few steps forward and peered in.

The woman inside had her eyes closed. Her lips were set in a line, but unlike the in the photo, they were soft. Her skin was no longer smooth; it was nearly translucent, with deep wrinkles on her cheeks and finer lines spidering her hands. Her hair was white and rested atop her head, reminding Meredith of a dandelion. She wore a navy cap-sleeved dress. On her collarbone, barely visible, was a kidney-bean shaped birthmark just above her heart.