Book One In The Ahh-Ness Of Things Series: April & Donnie were once inseparable, but now almost six years have passed since she left NYC. What if April O'Neil could set the record straight, once & for all! The only girl down enough to chill with the...
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I made my way out into the great room & sat on the sofa, looking over the water of the cistern pool. I watched the sunlight move slowly across the paper windows along the dojo wall. I could see the shadow of the great kusunoki pointing its branches like lovely fingers, holding this family in its hands. I wondered how many lives it had watched us. How many times had we grown together & then apart. Thin beams of light illuminated around them as they swayed gently over where my dearest friend slept, beneath it. I couldn't see him, but I could feel him everywhere, even in this room, as if he sat beside me. I had to make a choice; could I live here & let him go. How would I react to this girl he was turning everything over to. Surely I would meet her someday soon & I would have to look her in the eye. How would I keep myself together, as I was falling apart, & stand aside watching their life move forward; as mine receded away from him. She didn't want him to leave his world behind, & did he really want to? He wanted momentum. He wanted his life to progress, not to abandon it.
I would stay & watch dumbly as she lived out the things I had left behind. She would pick up the pieces & I would fall into bitter regrets, as I fell more & more ill. I would have to tell them all how bad it really was. He would care for me, because that's just the way he is, & it would eventually bring resentment. Because that's just how life is. I had to leave. I may not have been a good partner, but I knew how to be a good friend. That was where my love for him was stronger than I had known it was. I would leave this time, not out of the fear of losing love, but just love. I was lying to myself. It was all fear. I never should have left. I should have just told him what I had seen that night, with Renet in my car.
I let my eyes fall to the reflections in the water. The little pane windows of the dojo were no longer shoji panels but old panes of glass. Rippled, thick glass separated by metal rods, & the ripples in the water began to form their reflections in the glass of her front window.
He was standing in her living room. She was trying not to cry. She worried about her brother, how would she raise him to be able to take care of himself. What would his life look like. She had become a young mother of sorts. She had all of the fears I had, knowing that their future was so uncertain.
"He's basically disabled! I can't ever leave, I can't even go get things we need. He can't be alone."
"He's more capable than you think, Noni."
"He can't run, he can't play with other kids. What kind of life will he have. I don't know what I'm doing. I'm trying to figure out how to take care of myself."
"It's not fair what happened to you both, you have to give yourself space to figure out how you're dealing with that. It's ok."
He reached for her hand but she was already storming into her room.
