The Guard To My Sanctuary

Chapter 3

It was hard to keep my breathing under control as I lay in bed. I had only managed a few hours of sleep throughout the night, and instead, I found myself recounting my money, which was now hidden under my pillow. The hum of the air conditioning unit was the only sound besides dollar bills rubbing against skin.

As I lay with a sheet covering me, I thought of hugging my father again. I wondered if my brothers had their own families by now. I hoped my absence didn't stop them from going after their dreams and thriving. My life was fucked, but that didn't mean that their lives should be.

I found my mind drifting back to the grocery store as I tried to recall my brothers' faces. I could hear my dad calling for me as we parked. I could remember the vibrations faltering as the engine died. We had parked at the far end of the parking lot as usual. Despite my age, I was still too short to see my surroundings without lifting myself. I didn't remember the parking lot being jam-packed.

"Elm," my dad called for me again over the sound of the Gameboy. I liked playing Pokemon back then.

"Yes, Daddy," I replied.

"Come on, we have to get the ingredients for your mother's dinner," he said, unlocking the doors to the sedan. We used to have a van, but our five-person household had become a four-person household. My dad figured we could stand to be closer, at least when we rode together.

My older brother sucked his teeth from the front seat, "I don't see why we have to do this every year. She's dead, and none of us even like Sambar. We're wasting money that could go to something else."

"Alder, I've told you a hundred times that we do this to remember her; we have to have at least one thing we do every year to keep her memory alive. None of us are fond of lentils, so I'm not making you eat them. I just want us all to cook it together while listening to your mother's favorite music. Can you just do it for me?" He said, rubbing Alder's head.

I always thought it was funny how, as an officer, he was all business when we would visit him at work but so gentle with us at home. He never raised a hand to us but always found the patience to deal with us.

"Come on, Uncle Kunaal is coming over. He needs this; you know mom was like his second mother growing up," Pine, the middle child, said, unbuckling my seatbelt and reaching over to open my door. He was not nearly as patient as my father.

I climbed out of the car, my shoes hitting the hot pavement, before turning to my dad. He got out, holding his wallet tightly in his hand. As he walked over to me, a picture fell out of his grip as he tried to close my door and place it back in the picture slot simultaneously, which wasn't practical. The photo fell to the pavement, and I immediately went for it and turned it around and saw a picture of my mother before her diagnosis and the doctor visits.

Even at the end, she looked beautiful when her cheeks were more hollow and the bags under her eyes more pronounced. Her cheeks were fuller in the picture, and her hair was done so that it covered a little bit of her face. She proudly presented her dee, coppery skin that contrasted beautifully with the silver bangles over one of her forearms. Her eyes were just as captivating as I could remember; they were dark but vibrant, like they contained universes.

From what I could recall, the picture had been taken when my oldest brother Alder was maybe three, just before she got pregnant with Pine, so she was about twenty-three. She hadn't survived much longer before cancer took hold of her body.

"Isn't she beautiful? That was taken in '93; Aazo was so happy to be pregnant again. It might seem old-fashioned, but she always wanted to be the stay-at-home mom and make a beautiful home for you boys. She enjoyed waking up to feed you and watch you all learn to speak and walk. I always thought that she would open a daycare one day," My dad said as he took the picture from my hand and placed it back in his wallet.