A Spark of Love

The Surprise Gift

I can't believe it.  This is the last day I'll walk home from high school.  A smile crosses my face.  It feels weird and good at the same time.  It almost doesn't feel real.  I have a feeling that when fall rolls around and I'm not going back to school in my hometown, it will finally seem real.

Thinking about school makes me sad.  Not leaving high school...that's whatever.  No, it's the fact that I'm not going to State with Kevin in the fall that has me in a funk.  Thankfully none of my friends said anything over the last few days of school.  I guess most of them just assumed I would be going, and I didn't feel like bringing it up.

Kevin has been sweet the last two days.  He asked if I made home OK and if I told my parents.  I didn't lie to him, but I didn't quite tell him the truth.  I didn't mention my parents busting me while trying to sneak back in and I didn't tell that my mom ran out when she found out about State.

My train of thought is broken when I hear several guys yelling.

"Yeahhhhhh!"

I look up.  I recognize the truck from school.  I'm not sure whose it is.  There are two guys standing in the bed, with their hands planted on top of the cab, yelling as they speed down the road and blow by me.

I shake my head.  Boys.  And I thought I was excited to be graduating.  The funny thing is that most of them will spend the rest of their lives in our little town, talking about how great high school had been.

My mom's car isn't in the driveway when I get home.  It was weird the first day and strange yesterday.  Today it is starting to bother me for some reason.  I can't explain why though.  I haven't talked to her since yesterday morning, but I wonder why she isn't home.  I guess I'm mostly just curious as to where she could possibly be.

I head inside, set my backpack down at the base of the stairs, for the last time, and head into the kitchen to grab a snack.  As I reach for the handle of the fridge, there is a knock on the front door.   I let out a sigh.  Of course, why wouldn't there be someone at the right when I'm feeling hypoglycemic.

When I swing the door open,  a large bouquet of lilies are thrust into my face by what I can only guess is another human being, but the flowers are blocking out my entire field of vision.

Without a word, the flower delivery person has left and I'm standing in the doorway, with what had to be the largest bouquet ever made.  I back into the house, doing my best to not damage any of the flowers and shut the front door.  I set it on the coffee table in the living room and take a step back.

There's something about lilies that I don't like.  They remind me too much of death.  My mom loves them though.  I could never understand why.  Every time I see lilies I think of my grandma's funeral, my mom's mom, who died when I was five.

As I stand looking at the flowers, trying to figure out what to do with them, the front door opens and my mom walks through.  She pushes past me and pulls a card out of the flowers.

"Who are they from?"

She doesn't answer.

"Mom, who sent the flowers?"

When she doesn't answer a second time, I know she heard me and is choosing to not answer me.  Whatever, I give up, grab my backpack and head up the stairs, and leave her standing in the living room.

I toss my backpack down on my bed and plop down next to it.  I'm just glad I don't have to carry it anymore.  It was particularly heavy today after cleaning out a years worth of junk that accumulated in my locker.  I pull the zipper, turn the bag upside down and dump it all out on my bed.  I might as well go through it all right now, seeing as Mom is in some sort of a weird mood.

Most of the stuff from my locker is set into a pile of stuff to save, that I need to find a place for, although most of it will probably end up sitting on my desk in a pile, even though it should be in the trash.  I just can't bear to throw out anything that I might regret.

A smile crosses my face, a real one, for what seems the first time in days as I took back at pictures of my friends and me from the year that I put up in my locker.  The smile fades when it sinks in that most of them will be heading off to college in just a couple of months and I will be here, stuck in our hometown, alone.

My cell chirps and I pull it out of my pocket.  A text from Kevin instantly improves my mood.

Hey.  How are you?

Better now.  Did you just get home from the gym?

I used to think he was crazy, when we first started dating, because he goes to the gym every day, but when he told me about his dreams to play football professional it made sense.  I'm proud of him.  He's worked so hard to get where he is and I know that he will do his best at State.

Yeah. Are you coming tomorrow?

If it was anyone else I wouldn't go.  I had been looking forward to his graduation party, as had most of the kids in school, but now.. now that I wan't going to State I almost didn't think anything was worth celebrating.

I am.  Should I bring anything?

I set my phone down and pick up the picture from the top of the stack.  It's of Kevin and me.  We look cute together.  A tear forms in my eye.  He told me everything is going to work out between us and with him going to college, but I don't know if it will.  I have some serious doubt in my mind.  My phone chirps, again.

Nah, I'm going to help my mom right now.  She's already started to cook.  It's going to be a lot of fun.  I can't wait to see you.

I can't wait either. XOXO

I want to believe that everything will work out.  I want to trust in what my dad has said and what Kevin had told me, but I just don't know anymore.  I get up from my bed to open my window.  I need some fresh air.

I see my mom walking through the yard with the massive bunch of lilies in her arms.  I wonder what she's doing.  She quickly glances over her shoulder and heads for the gate at the back of the yard.  She opens the gate and disappears into the grove of trees that starts just past our fence.  I watch until I see her come back.  The flowers are gone.  I move away from the window.  I don't really want her to know that I saw what she did, although I already know of the existence of the flowers.

It crosses my mind that she wouldn't throw away perfectly good flowers if they were from Dad, and I know things have been tight financially lately so I'm pretty sure he wouldn't have spent the kind of money on a bouquet that size.  My mind races as I try to figure out who sent them and why she didn't want them.

The only thing I could think of is that someone sent them to her and she doesn't want Dad to find out.  But who could they be from?

I don't know why I care.  She hasn't spoken to me for days and I feel more disconnected from her than I ever have.  I do my best to stop thinking about her and go back to sorting out through the pile of papers and half-used school supplies from my locker.  It's funny to think that I will never use that locker again, the same locker I had for four years, and someone else will get it in the fall and will have no idea how much of my life took place in and around that metal box.

With the rest of the stuff from my locker sorted, I get off my bed and toss the pile that is garbage in the can under my desk.  I look around the room.  It feels weird.  For the last few months, I imagined myself graduating and then slowly packing up my room--boxes that would be going to college with me and boxes that would be left behind and stored in the attic until I was ready to move into my house with Kevin and get married.

The idea of starting a new chapter in my life was so promising.  It's still hard to believe that it was so close, I could feel it, and then it was ripped away from me.

I finish putting away what I want to keep from the locker and lie down on my bed.  I wrap my arms around my pillow and close my eyes.  I have to be tough, I know that.  There's really no other way around it.  Life isn't going to get any easier and it's probably going to get harder before anything changes.