Cobwebs in the gaps of the gritty brick siding on Ellie’s house twitched in the chilly May morning breeze. There were tiny goose bumps between the blonde hairs on Dylan’s arms. He stood up against the side of the house, broken webs stuck to the back of his grey t-shirt. He watched Ellie as she gently dusted the surface of the old picnic table off with a white rag. Its rust colored paint was chipping off and the wood on the benches was slightly cracked. The rising sun painted their long, dark silhouettes on the black asphalt.
“Hey, wanna help me move this out onto the driveway?” she asked.
“Sure,” Dylan said, leaving his spot against the wall. His shaggy chestnut brown hair was not brushed and the hair on his face looked like it had been neglected for two or three days. He looked like a bug in his huge, white, plastic-framed sunglasses. They were smudged with dirty fingerprints.
Cardboard boxes were stacked in the garage next to Ellie’s Delta Eighty-Eight Oldsmobile. They moved the old picnic table out onto the driveway next to Dylan’s white F-150. Ellie took off her sweatshirt and tied it around her waist. Her tired sea-green eyes looked like they hadn’t seen sleep in days.
“I hope nobody thinks I’m selling my truck,” Dylan said. It had been his first ‘adult’ purchase six months earlier. Working for their Uncle Bill’s electric company fresh out of high school gave him that leisure. Ellie, on the other hand, was still driving the old beat-up hand-me-down from their parents. The right front headlight was bashed in and three of the four hubcaps were missing. The roof over the driver’s side also leaked. On rainy days, she would cover the seat with a large, black garbage bag and then carefully dump the pooled water onto the ground next to the car. Having to pay college tuition and rent humbled her.
“No one will. We’ll put a ‘Not for Sale’ sign on it, okay?” she said. They each grabbed a cardboard box from the stack inside the garage and set it down on the picnic table. Ellie’s box landed with a thud, freeing the dust that smothered its surface. She opened the box, displaying its contents.
“Jesus, El. Are we really going to sell all of that crap? Where did this stuff even come from? Looks like stuff from Mom’s house.”
“Yeah, I’m really not sure what some of this is,” she said, dumping the stuff onto the table. She began neatly lining up the items in rows. First she laid out a rusty old harmonica, a jewelry box, and a handful of Harlequin romance novels. She marked them ‘50 cents,’ ‘$1.00,’ and ’25 cents each,’ respectively. “Those must have been Mom’s. No one else would read that shit,” she said, laughing.
Dylan opened his box and found several of his dad’s old cardigan sweaters – the kind with the little alligator in the upper right hand corner. “We can’t sell these!” he said, snatching the green one that lay on top and holding it up in front of him. “That will never fit you,” Ellie said. Dylan, who apparently saw it as a challenge, pulled the sweater over his head. His grey t-shirt wrinkled underneath the small sweater and peeked out around the bottom. His body was stiff and his arms hung awkwardly away from his body. “See, you look ridiculous. Take it off, you idiot,” she said.
“No, I’m keeping this one. Dad would have wanted me to wear it,” he said. He left the sweater on and began folding the rest of the clothes that remained in the box.
“Dylan, no one will buy them if you leave them wadded up on the table like that.”
“Good, then maybe I can keep them all. Like this brown one. Isn’t argyle the cool thing to wear lately?”
“Sure, I guess,” Ellie said. She turned on the radio in the garage to the local oldies station. They sang along as they unpacked the rest of the boxes and hauled the larger items up from the basement.
Chipped antique tea cup set. Maternal grandma’s.
Exercise bike. Dad’s. Hardly used.
Orange, brown, and tan tweed couch. Vintage. For sale against Ellie’s will.
Pin-striped pants. Dad’s. Too short for any man taller than 5’6”.
Board games: Trouble, Operation, Sorry, Mancala. All free. Lots of missing pieces.
A huge bulletin board decorated with hundreds of tiny pinholes.
Disgusting hot pink prom dress. Sequined and poofy. Ellie’s identity mistake.
Limp stuffed teddy bear. Dylan’s childhood security blanket.
Mom’s old wooden rocking chair. Purchased at a garage sale fourteen years ago.
Barbie dolls and paraphernalia.
Transformers and Legos.
Old brass picture frames. And more brass picture frames.
Ice cream bucket of crap. Mystery trinkets. All free.
Ellie found an envelope at the bottom of the sixth box. It was stained yellow and still sealed. She opened it and found several photographs. They were pictures from their parents’ wedding.
“My god. Why would these be in a box of stuff for the garage sale?” she said. She looked at Dylan who just shrugged his shoulders. He opened the last box. Inside it were more pictures along with postcards, letters and pressed flowers.
“Wow. Look at all of this stuff,” Dylan said leafing through the pictures. “Maybe we should just box them all back up and I’ll take them back home with me to Mom’s house.” He packed everything back into the box and labeled it ‘Mom and Dad’s wedding stuff’ and set it down inside the garage.
It had been two years since their dad had passed away. Lung cancer. It was the same fall that Dylan broke his leg playing football and Ellie moved into the old brick house two cities away. When Dylan’s leg healed in the spring, he started working at the electric company for their Uncle Bill. They reminisced about Jack a lot. Uncle Bill would tell stories about his dad teaching Jack and him how to hunt and fish. He told Dylan about how they used to swipe whiskey from the liquor cabinet and hide the empty bottles in the woods. And he had endless stories about Jack and him playing practical jokes on their sister, Belle. Hiding her car keys, prank calling her boyfriends, making animal noises from her bedroom closet while she was sleeping, and generally just giving her hell.
Ellie, who was sitting on the picnic table bench in a daze, was jolted to reality when a blue Jeep pulled up alongside the road in front of her house. A thirty-something year old man and his daughter got out of the Jeep and made their way up the driveway.
“Hey there, good morning,” Dylan said, smiling at them. “Everything’s going. Well, except that truck.” Ellie rolled her eyes.
The young girl craned her neck over the picnic table, pointing at the Barbie dolls neatly lined up in a row. She picked up Disco Barbie by her hair and poked her dad’s leg with it. He handed Ellie two quarters. She thanked him and dropped the money into the empty fishing tackle box.
She and Dylan watched the blue Jeep drive away. She watched the ‘Garage Sale: 9-3’ sign sway backward and forward in sync with the sporadic gusts of wind. Old and young alike were out walking their dogs, jogging, and riding bikes through the city streets. The orange lilies neatly bordering the porch were in full bloom now and the summer humidity was creeping in. The sun continued its ascent into the sky as cars lined up in the street for the city block garage sales and other passer-bys slowed down only momentarily to see what was for sale at each house before continuing on down the street. The first Saturday in May was always like this.
“I really want to look through the stuff in that box. And I still wanna know how it ended up with all the other stuff to sell. Why would Mom want to get rid of it all?” Ellie said, eyeing the box again.
“I still don’t think it’s a good idea to go through that stuff. I’m sure it just ended up with everything else by accident. Besides, the stuff in there would probably just make you ask Mom a hundred questions. I think she’s kinda weird about talking about Dad now, ya know? Just promise me you won’t worry about it.” As Dylan tried to reason with her, four or five people browsed through the sale items on the picnic table. Before Ellie could respond with an argument, they both were quiet when they heard a familiar voice.
“Hi, kids.” They both turned to face their mother, who was walking up the driveway with their black lab, Zipper. Whether she had showered or changed clothes since she woke up was questionable. She wore a pair of old navy blue mesh basketball shorts and a baggy green t-shirt. Her curly hair was pulled back with a purple bandana and her baby blue flip-flops and toes were covered in dirt.
“What’s up, Mom,” Dylan said, casually giving her a hug.
“Oh, nothing. I just thought I’d stop by to see how things have been going. Need any help?” she asked, tugging on Zipper’s leash. He stretched his neck out toward the young couple testing out the plaid couch and sniffed.
“We’re doing all right so far. Are you okay Mom, you look tired,” Ellie said. She sounded concerned.
“Yeah, I’m fine. I’ve been working in the vegetable garden since 6 o’clock. I didn’t get much done though because Zipper ran off into the stream after a rabbit again and I had to chase him four blocks – in my flip-flops. Then I had to give him a bath. It’s just been a rough morning,” she said, sighing. “Oh. And the coffee maker broke, too.” She made a pouty face for a minute as if begging for sympathy.
“I think you’ll live,” Dylan said, putting an arm around her. She laughed.
“Anyway, are you still coming for dinner tonight, El? Dylan, don’t forget to call Uncle Bill. He left me a message earlier to see if you wanted to work overtime next weekend. He has a side project and asked –“ Mom stopped mid-sentence. She leaned to the side and squinted. She put her hand up to her chest. “Oh dear. What’s that?” she said, finally noticing the box sitting on the garage floor. “Where did you get that?”
Dylan and Ellie exchanged worried glances as they watched their mom make a beeline toward the box. They watched as she opened the box and began rummaging through it. Her eyes turned glassy. Ellie shot Dylan a glance, gesturing for him to talk, but he shook his head no at her, giving her a nudge toward Mom.
“Uh, well, we found it in with the garage sale stuff. We didn’t know how it got there or what to do with it, so we just set it aside. Dylan was gonna bring it home with him later,” she said, waiting for a reaction.
“Say somethin,” Dylan said, biting his lip. “Do you want me to put it in my truck and take it back to the house now?” he asked. Ellie just stood frozen, not knowing what to say or do.
“No,” Mom said, sounding a little bit irritated at her own response. “Now probably isn’t the best time to talk about it anyway. Just keep it here until you guys finish with the garage sale. I’ll figure out what to do with it later.” She swallowed hard. “So I’ll see you guys for dinner?”
“Yeah, we’ll be there, definitely,” Dylan said. His voice sounded reassuring.
“Okay. I’ll see you guys soon. Come on, Zipper,” Mom said. Her words sounded choked. She yanked Zipper toward her and headed back down the driveway scuffing her flip-flops along the way.
Ellie nudged Dylan in the side with her elbow. “Don’t you think you should go after her?” she asked, her sea-green eyes pleading. “Something about that box obviously upset her. Why else would she act like that?”
“Yeah, but I can’t see her wanting to talk about it either.”
“Okay, but think about what’s in there. That isn’t unimportant stuff. Sounds like it could be a big deal to me,” Ellie said.
“I don’t know, maybe you’re right,” Dylan said. He took a deep breath and sighed, blowing chestnut brown strands of hair away from his eyes. “I’ll go see what’s up,” he said, taking off after her down the street.
“Mom!” he called after her. Once he caught up to her, he grabbed her shoulder and faced her. “You okay? We’ll do whatever you want with the box of stuff.” She stared at him blanket with innocent confusion. “Mom, talk to me, please.”
“Oh, hell Dylan.” She leaned her head up against his chest and started to cry, leaving a circle of damp tears on his green sweater. Suddenly recognizing the sweater, she backed away from him. “Oh my god, where did you get that sweater?”
“Well, it was in one of the boxes. I assumed it was Dad’s,” he said. Her face turned a pale combination of green and yellow.
“Oh my god,” she said again. She cupped her right hand over her mouth and her brown eyes grew wide.
“What?” Dylan said, staring her in the eyes.
“I’m so sorry.” That was all she said before she turned around and continued walking away from Ellie’s house. Dylan, dumbfounded by what had just happened, could only stand there and watch her disappear as other pedestrians traveled in both directions past him. Defeated, he headed back toward the house.
Dylan took off the green sweater on the way up the driveway. Ellie’s eyes were inquisitive but all Dylan could do was shrug and say, “I tried.”
For the past two years, their mom’s behavior had been fairly unpredictable. Some days, she was fine. But as soon as anything reminded her of Jack, she was as good as a teenage girl going through her first break-up. She had gone mad trying to keep herself busy since Jack’s death. In addition to her day job at the art museum, she picked up weekend shifts at the local flower shop and waitressed at a Mexican restaurant three nights a week. She had begun calling up her friends and relatives to see if they needed a cleaning lady. Most of them, knowing what she had been going through, told her she didn’t need to offer. She always insisted anyway. Dylan and Ellie had made themselves available to talk hundreds of times but were usually left feeling helpless and excluded.
“Hey, do you think you can hold down the fort for a while I go get us some sandwiches for lunch?” Dylan asked, checking his watch. “It’s almost noon.” The sidewalk was crawling with garage sale browsers now. Pedestrians filtered through the streets like ants making their way through a maze.
“Yeah, that’s fine. Just get me the regular,” she said. As he drove away, she brought her attention back to being an efficient salesperson. When Dylan returned with lunch, about half of what they had originally started with was still there.
“Let’s just mark everything that’s left for half price so we can wrap it up soon. I’m worried about Mom,” Dylan said.
“Hey, I have an idea,” Ellie said. Her eyes lit up. “Let’s not sell the picture frames and the bulletin board. We could make a collage for Mom with the stuff in the box.” She looked at Dylan for approval.
“I dunno, El. What if she doesn’t want us lookin’ through all that stuff?”
“Oh c’mon. She loves it when we give her hand-made projects. Let’s just work on it at 3 o’clock. That way, we’ll be done in time to go over there for dinner. It can be a Mother’s Day gift.” She looked at him with pleading eyes.
“Yeah, maybe it’ll cheer her up. For today anyway.”
* * *
“Pass me the tacks,” Dylan said. He and Ellie had the pictures, postcards, and letters sprawled out on the living room floor. They cut and framed some of the wedding pictures and tacked the letters and postcards to the bulletin board. Ellie outlined the bulletin board with red, pink, and white ribbons. She attached the pressed flowers around the edges. At the bottom she wrote: ‘We Love You, Mom’ in silver glitter.
* * *
Dylan’s white truck pulled into the driveway. Ellie’s Oldsmobile followed. They let themselves inside. Dylan carried the picture frames in the original box and Ellie followed, carrying the collage in a black, plastic garbage bag she found lying in the back seat of her car.
“Mom, we’re home,” Dylan said. Ellie put her purse and keys on the kitchen table. Zipper greeted them with slobbery licking. “Mom?” Dylan called, wandering down the hallway. He walked into the bedroom and found her lying on the bed. She was still wearing the bandana and her dirty flip-flops. “Hey, c’mon we’ll help you make dinner.”
She rubbed her eyes and slowly sat up. Her eyes were bloodshot and puffy, as if she had been crying. Ellie appeared in the doorway. Zipper nudged his way between them, jumped up onto the bed and started licking Mom’s face.
“Okay. Lasagna or something on the grill?” she asked standing up and stretching.
“Ooo, let’s do burgers on the grill,” Dylan said.
“Burgers it is,” Mom said, escorting them back into the kitchen.
“Hey, before we start the grill up, we have something we wanna give you. Sit down,” Ellie said, pulling out the chair at the kitchen table. “I know it’s early, but we,” she looked at Dylan, “I mean I, couldn’t wait until next weekend to give it to you,” she said. She set the plastic bag on the table. Dylan set the cardboard box in front of Mom. He had taped a card over the words ‘Mom and Dad’s wedding stuff’ that read ‘Happy Mother’s Day.’
Mom took the first picture frame out of the box. The 5x7” brass frame, slightly tarnished, held a black and white photo of Jack feeding her a piece of wedding cake. Ellie and Dylan looked at her waiting for a reaction. At first she said nothing. She held it in her small, fragile hands and stared at it for what seemed like minutes. Just as Dylan opened his mouth as if he were about to say something, she lifted the frame above her head and slammed it hard down against the table. The glass shattered and Ellie tried to stifle a shriek.
Mom buried her head in her palms and began sobbing. “No!” she said, sniffling. “It wasn’t supposed to be like this.” Ellie and Dylan stared in horror.
“Mom, what’s wrong? Why can’t you tell us? We want to help you,” Ellie said, rubbing her back. Mom took a few deep breaths and tried to calm herself.
“It’s all my fault,” Mom said, wiping tears away from her puffy eyes. “That green sweater…” she trailed off.
“What about it?” Dylan said, prompting her for more.
“Well, remember six days before Dad died, you two had to take him to the hospital because he had a heart attack?”
“Yeah, the night you were working at the restaurant, right?” Ellie said. Tears started streaming down mom’s rosy cheeks again.
“Oh you guys are going to hate me. I can’t say it,” she said, burying her head in her palms again.
“No, Mom. Not this time. Tell us,” Dylan said, firmly.
She bit her lip and looked at him with apologetic eyes. “I never worked as a waitress at the restaurant. That sweater isn’t Dad’s.” She swallowed hard. “I had an affair.”
Ellie and Dylan were quiet for a minute. They tried to hide their shock. “Why didn’t you tell us before?” Dylan asked, finally.
“How could I? I wanted to tell your dad so many times, but I couldn’t, especially after the heart attack. Everything was so complicated then. And then after he died…” She started to tear up again.
“Mom, it’s okay,” Ellie said. Her eyes were forgiving.
“I couldn’t sit around and do nothing while I lived with such a horrible lie. So I tried to do whatever I could to keep my mind occupied. I loved Jack. I did. And I was so stupid. I’m so sorry. I can’t believe this is happening. What if you hadn’t found the box? I might have never told you,” she said. “You guys must hate me.”
“Mom, that’s ridiculous,” Dylan said. “We just wanted to know what’s been eating away at you. Now we do. And oddly enough, I’m not mad,” he said. His voice was gentle. She squeezed his hand tightly.
“We’ll get through this, Mom,” Ellie said, hugging her. A tear rolled down Ellie’s cheek.
“I’m so, so sorry,” she said, closing her eyes and resting her head on Ellie’s shoulder.
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