A short story by Marisa Coltabaugh
“I’m sorry for your loss.”
The man in front of me was lanky, wearing half-moon spectacles in front of his brown eyes, and his hair was thinning at the top. He did not seem all that sorry, the words more perfunctory than true.
“Thank you.” What else was there to say?
“Regarding the last will of Mr. Paul Brooks, he has left you, one Ms. Joanna Brooks, $20,000 cash and his diary, a single volume spanning from 1996-2000. I wish you all the best.” He gave a small nod, handing over a small black book.
“Thank you.” I showed the attorney to the door, he bowed his head and gave a half-smile as he left. Twenty-thousand dollars...from my uncle Paul. And his diary from when my family had lived with him in the city. It was...perplexing to say the least.
I thought it strange, that he would leave me anything at all, let alone a large sum of money. Because to me $20,000 was a large sum of money. Working at a grocery store in the country certainly didn’t have its advantages. Plus the diary? What the heck was I going to do with a diary? Did I really want to know what my uncle thought of me as a bratty child? Probably not.
But still, he had left it to me, he obviously intended for me to read it. The money I would save, to pay for bills each month that way I could save up enough “rainy day” money, because when it rains it pours, and start up a little nest egg for security. Grocery store associates were essential but we weren’t exactly paid a living wage. I looked at the diary in my hands. It was a small, black notebook that had been well kept over the years. There were no dog markings or signs of age. Flipping through it I could see that each page was filled up with the meticulous handwriting of someone who had thought out carefully what was going to be written down in ink on the page.
I had heard the news of Uncle Paul passing from my brother, Kenny. He’d died of a heart attack. Kenny was a year younger than me, he worked as a mechanic. He made a living, had two beautiful girls, and a kind wife who looked after them all. I was 23 and I was already tired of the world. I felt as though I had been born tired of the world. It would certainly explain why I had daydreamed so much as a child. I had failed out of college after two years of reading every word of every textbook and reference texts I could find. But effort doesn’t equal grades. Now I lived in a small trailer, alone, down a few doors from the one I grew up in. I had a few succulents for company and the many, many books I had accumulated over a lifelong passion for reading. It wasn’t much, but it was home.
Uncle Paul had had a vast library, being a college professor it had made sense, I think it went to a museum or something. Lucky them, not that I had the space. When we had lived with him in the city, I had spent whole afternoons reading the different books on Paul’s shelf. Life had been good when we’d lived with Uncle Paul; mom, Kenny, and I. That was until he’d kicked us out, of course.
After that, we had lived in a trailer a few doors down from where I lived now. Mom could only work part-time at the grocery store and there was never enough to live on, just enough to keep the roof over our heads. Keeping a car in the driveway was sometimes too much to ask for and eventually, all the bills and late fees got to be too much for Mom. She started using, showing up late and high to work. She was eventually fired and I had to drop out of school and to get a job. I was old enough then, sixteen. And I always found my own way to work. A year later she overdosed, I found her in the living room. Her head had been resting on her chest, her arms limp on either side of the chair, needle still in her skin. I guess Kenny and I weren’t enough for her to keep it together.
Paul had reached out, once, after the funeral. Telling me if I ever needed anything, all I needed to do was call him. Same stuff everyone always says, but they never really mean it, not for people like me.
And now I was holding his diary.
I sat back down on the couch and flipped the black cover open, thinking I’d nonchalantly skim a few entries just to see if they mattered to me or not. I didn’t think when I’d die I would leave my diary for someone else to read but hey, maybe that’s just me.
June 10th, 1996
Doreen has agreed to move in with me here in the city. I think it will be good for her and the kids. She can go to rehab while the kids are in school. Not to mention it will be nice to have family around. Joanna and Kenneth are such bright little creatures.
Tomorrow after the movers bring their stuff, the kids, Doreen, and I are going to the park. I promised them we could get ice cream afterwards.
I remembered that day at the park and the ice cream parlor after. The grass had been so green. Uncle Paul and I had thrown a softball back and forth to each other. Practicing grounders and fly balls. I had loved the sound the ball made when it hit the glove. The walls had been light blue and the ice cream had been sticky, sweet vanilla with rainbow sprinkles. I smiled at the memory.
August 16th, 1996
The kids go back to school on Monday, it’s Friday now. We’ve planned to go up to the cabin upstate for the weekend. One final break before the start of the school year. Doreen starts rehab on Monday as well. We’ve told the kids she has to travel for work but that she’ll be back after a few months. It’s a good thing they’re little or that lie wouldn’t work so well given Doreen’s occupation doesn’t require any travel. In the meantime, I think I can handle the two rugrats. What’s the worst that can happen?
While I’m glad I never ‘found someone’ to settle down with, Joanna and Kenneth have brought me so much happiness in their time here. We build Lego cities and spaceships together and go on adventures against zombies and vampires. Before bed, I have each of them either read or tell me a story and they both have such a vivid imagination. Joanna can tell a story just as well as any college essay I’ve read. Kenneth likes to include wildly unrealistic plot twists in his story but he does always find a way to justify them.
I have been busy this week preparing for the new semester….
The memories I had of staying with Uncle Paul matched up with what he had written. I could remember thinking it was a lot of fun, living with him, but I had never thought about what we might have meant to him. My passion for reading had started with Uncle Paul. When we had lived with him he had promised me that if there was a book I wanted, he would buy it for me. It had been such a kind gesture to me as a child, even now I could only imagine the sort of promise he knew he was making. Books were my lifeblood and he had given me exposure to them. I was indebted to him, no matter what, for that. I flipped through the diary, picking another at random. It was an entry towards the end of the small, black book.
January 1st, 2000
Doreen has moved out, she took the children with her of course. I wish she hadn’t, she is only going to give them more grief than they deserve in their lives. She has slipped back into her old ways, I told her that she would give me no choice but to call DSS on her if she didn’t get her act together. She had said she refuses to accept my help any longer, claiming she doesn’t take charity. I told her it was never charity, that we are family. She is my sister for crying out loud and the children are my niece and nephew for god's sake. But she wouldn’t listen. I don’t know what else to do.
I felt a punch in my stomach, nearly knocking the wind from me. Guilt crawled through every crevice of my psyche that it could find. Here I had been blaming my Uncle Paul my whole life for kicking us out to fend for ourselves. I had always known my mother was not a good mother, but it had never occurred to me that she might sabotage Kenny and I’s future just so she could get high. Not until after she lost her job anyway.
I felt betrayed and naïve. After we’d moved out I had done everything in my power to never need help from anybody again, to never need help from him again. I never let anyone know the real me, not even family. I thought of my brother and his family and how happy they were; how little I knew about his life now or his wife or their kids. All the life I had read in the pages before me told me to wake up. Family was right down the road and all I had to do was pick up the phone.
I had decided to take the $20,000 Uncle Paul had left me to take out a loan and buy a house closer to the city. I had a job interview lined up for a small bookshop in the city tomorrow. Kenny and I had scheduled a dinner for the Sunday after Paul’s passing. We had all enjoyed it so much that we had decided to make it a regular thing; Sunday dinner together switching off location each weekend. There were usually card or board games, adult drinks, and desserts for everybody.
The house I’d bought was a bit of a fixer-upper but that was fine with me. Kenny’s two girls had full control over decorating their own guest bed. The walls were bright pink and there was quite a bit of tulle and twinkly lights hanging from the ceiling. I had decided to start with the living room walls. I had picked out a nice, light blue for the paint. It reminded me of a happy memory and that was what I needed more of in my life. There was a small end table in the center of the room with a little black notebook on top. It was there to remind me of what family really means and all the adventures I might have in this blue living room.
