Her desk, the one she bought for me as a teenager, sensuous feminine dark wood antique that seemed to be made for a young girl, held two small thick paperback books, one a collection of novels, the other a Bible. Next to them was a picture of her two impossibly dear daughters when they were in early grade school. The picture, black and white of their bright eyes and awkward smiles had been propped up there for thirty years. Now it is lying face up beneath the window. The window screen was leaning against the wall near and perpendicular to the window. The wall was soft antique rose pink. So was the carpet. The chair that mom found to go with the desk was as feminine and strong, antique and youthful, as the desk. I sat on the chair at the desk every day of my adolescence. Now it was turned a quarter and placed gently, carefully against the desk so that the carved dark wood roses on the back were perpendicular to the long curved drawer beneath the desk top. The soft colored cushion was as pert and shapely as it was forty years ago. The soft ivory and colors of the cushion were exposed. It looked like a pillow inviting rest. When I approached the open door of the room after climbing the stairs with the intent to know, I saw the chair turned into a step, then the screen, soft gray mesh against the soft rose pink wall. Then the desk top, the second step. And then the open, screenless window. The window was full, abundantly, with shiny green magnolia leaves and lush, ivory magnolia petals. A bouquet of tree to receive her. I walked straight to the window and looked into the leaves and flowers, shiny and soft, bright and gentle, youthful and wise, robust and ephemeral and as brilliant and opulent as a magnolia has ever been. My view turned a slight right and followed the path to the sky following her.
I spin around. "Skydiving!" in whisper.
"I just wanted to tell you what I told dad about skydiving. The jump is the hard part. The fall is really quite peaceful." on the eve of her leaving.
In this room, on her birthday, the day of her memorial, two of her nieces and a nephew listen to me. Stephen's horror is in his face as I share with them in front of the window.
"We'll see what happens next, won't we?"
I say it the way she said it. musically. sweetly. reaching for cheer. forlorn.
In a vanishing, the horror disappears from Stephen's face, his eyes smile and fill with tears.
victory
"I don't know what I would do without you."
"I don't know what I'll do if you ever leave."
"I am afraid of what I'll do if you go away."
Below, a pool of crimson oil paint in the shape of a paisley, only round on each end. A strain of dark blue curving through the center. Sensual. Sculptural. Shining. Beauty.