Dried Roses
“You ready to talk about it?” His voice was as calm as ever. This time, it was tinged with hope.
“I dunno why we need to.” The words meekly crawled out of me.
“You’re picking at your scar again.” He always noticed my little quirks. Maybe that is the perk of seeing a therapist for so long. They get to know you.
“It’s itching.”
“You know, sometimes, the body has a way of manifesting pain and discomfort as a way to bring your attention to something. Something that is bothering you. You don’t think that scar maybe bothers you more than just a little itch?” If he was the type of person to write things down during a session he probably would have been jotting down how once again his petulant patient was avoiding the topic.
“What are you saying?”
“What I am saying is, maybe if you talked about how you got the scar it wouldn’t itch as much. Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to truly scratch that itch? It might make you feel better both physically and mentally.” He leaned back offering me more space.
“You know how I got it.” Stubbornness leaked through my teeth.
“I know. We both know. But, you’ve been seeing me for a year now and there’s only so much I can do for you before I have to refer you to someone else. It’s not easy for me to watch someone suffer and you have been spending an hour in this room every week for the past year. That is 52 hours of skirting around why you’re here.” His words wrapped around my arm gently tugging unsuccessfully looking for heartstrings.
“So, you’re saying you’ll fire me? Can a shrink really do that?”
“First of all, the term ‘shrink’ is pretty passe. But yes, anyone can fire anyone. Typically it is the client firing the person of service but there is nobody stopping anyone from severing a dead relationship.” Something flickered in his eyes. Was it hope? Irritation?
“What do you know about dead relationships? You’re not mourning the death of your spouse.” The sharpness of my words wasn’t intended.
“You’re right, but I have experienced loss. Talking about it helps. I promise you.” Sometimes, these sessions felt like visiting a wise friend but never telling them my deepest secrets. For the first time since we met, our eyes locked.
The contact shattered every glass wall separating us.
“I shouldn’t be here. Not with your stupid grey walls. Not with this dumb fucking couch. This isn’t a living room you know.” Tears were beginning to press against the dam I created in the crevices of my eyes.
“No, nobody should be anywhere. But you’re here. Please, I only know what I read in the papers and that only told one side of the story.” He ignored the petty comments.
“I shouldn’t be here! It was a mix up. And because some idiot didn’t think to check that ‘hey maybe this generic ass name could have multiple people’. Now I am a widow. With a small child. We were supposed to have our whole fucking life!” Snot began to drip which only antagonized the pressure of anger welling up inside.
“Careful, you’re digging in your scar. Don’t hurt yourself.” His voice was as calm as ever.
“Fuck off. Can’t anyone just fuck off?! I wasn’t supposed to have this scar. If everything went as planned I would be dead too!” The dam broke. Tears sprung out like a fire hydrant- explosive and unrelenting.
“Can you tell me what happened?” He repeated himself, lowering his voice to almost a whisper.
“That’s the golden question isn’t it? If I had a dime for every time someone asked me-”
“You’d be rich. But if you just answer the question, maybe less people will ask you.” Check mate. My white flag rose.
“Money was tight. Molly had gotten sick the month before. Nothing crazy. The flu or something like it. I dunno. But it didn’t matter. I was on a final write up for tending to her illnesses.” The words crashed out of my mouth between sobs. “I lost my job. Again. It was always me losing my job because I always made less. That whole ‘women get paid less’ really is a thing.”
“So you guys were broke?”
“Yeah. But Oliver was able to keep his job. He said he knew it wasn’t easy on me and told me he would do everything he could to make it so that I could be home more and not worry about the bills. At least Molly wouldn’t have to go to daycare anymore and be constantly sick. Anyways, I had been looking for a job for like a month. It was honestly pointless at that point. My resume easily could have been three pages long for all I knew because of how many jobs I had been fired from. All of them said the same thing- great worker but totally unreliable because of chronic absences. Nobody bothered to mention the absences were because of a sick kid.” Sam nodded along with every word that spilled out of my mouth.
“So yeah, it was tough. Nothing we hadn’t experienced before though. It’s not like maternity leave was paid for. Six weeks without a paycheck can do a number on an already measly bank account.” Now that the river had started, it felt almost impossible to stop it again. He gulped in every syllable and patiently waited for the next set of words.
“Anyways, we needed groceries. Like, bad. Molly observed we ‘had ingredients’. She said ‘ingrdints. Mommy, ingridents. Hungry?’ It was like she knew our food bank box was empty. She knew our ramen had run out. She knew there was very little to feed her. My heart had broken into a billion pieces knowing I was failing her.” The tears stopped long enough to begin spewing this unrevealed history. Not even our family knew how broke we were.
“Oliver came home to me sobbing. I had managed to feed Molly a microwaved cake in a mug or whatever bullshit. She thought it was the best thing ever. If there was a trophy for ‘failure’ it would have been sitting on the bare kitchen counter. He-”
“Hold up, you figured out how to finagle a cake for your kid as a meal and you’re calling yourself a failure?” Sam reached over for the box of tissues. His words barely touched my ears.
“Oliver had this grin on his face, I couldn’t quite make out. It had been a while since either of us could smile like that. He insisted we go to the grocery store despite my protests. ‘Let’s go to the store, buy us some food. We deserve it’ he just kept repeating himself until finally, all three of us were in the car.”
“Go on.” Sam seemed intrigued despite literally being paid to be.
“I was.” His direction and coaxing was irritating at best.
“What happened next?” Sam tried to recover. He knew it would stop as quickly as it started if pushed too hard.
“I don’t know, we went shopping. Molly was so excited. Trips to the grocery store were a big deal to her. She is so little and her expectations were already so low. It was hard to feel happy knowing a trip to the grocery store was another kid’s trip to Disneyland.” A new tissue was granted to me.
“Comparison is the thief to joy, don’t forget that Danielle.” Just like when my parents would reprimand me, my full name was flung into the room.
“Yeah. Ok. So, we were putting some things into the cart. Oliver just kep fucking grinning. Like he was on something ya know? He just seemed so… so… giddy. The cart began to fill with good food. Not the boxed mashed potatoes or store brand mac n cheese. He took us into the freezer aisle and got us the good potato skins, grabbed a bottle of wine for me.
“Just trying to play along, I grabbed fresh produce. Like real fresh. You could smell the life in it. Molly hadn’t had fresh produce in so long she looked at it as if it was a toy. We easily had a week’s worth of food, real food with us. It was exciting to think of all the cool recipes we could make. That was actually the nice thing about relying on donations- Oliver and I became wizards in the kitchen.” A small smile dared to poke out at the memory.
“Like what?” A hint of curiosity from Sam.
“Oh God, well, Molly’s favorite meal was fried spam and rice with peanut sauce. The rice vinegar was gifted to us at one point and we were able to make some cool stuff with it. Oliver’s favorite was loaded cornbread. Basically, you make the cornbread and you put whatever canned veggie and beans you can find in it.” The memories of pure joy in their faces began to calm me down.
“And you?” It shouldn’t have surprised me that Sam asked.
“Nothing. It all tasted like failure to me.”
“I see. Well, this trip didn’t sound like it was setting up to be a failure. Please, stop clenching your arm.” His tone was sincere enough to send me back into those moments. My grip didn’t budge.
“Well, we were getting ready to check out. We began waltzing through the floral aisle. And Oliver went rogue on me and actually picked up a bouquet. My favorite.” It began to hurt. The scar from digging, the pain in my chest from what was coming.
“A dozen yellow roses with pink tips. I guess it’s ombre? I don’t know. But they were, are, my favorite. Oliver began to bow in front of me. His Vans buckled on the sides from over use and his jeans barely allowed him to move but it was still a bow. ‘My lady of the hour, of the night and day, of my life’ he began. ‘May I present to you, with the deepest honor, these roses. May you enjoy them for the length of their lifetime and then you may preserve them on the wall like you have been dreaming of.’ His flannel shirt hung from his sides, it was open and flowing. He was so beautiful in that moment. But I had to stop it. Just like I always do. Always ruin everything.” I took a breath and mulled around my reaction for a minute. Sam realized the quieter he was the more he would learn about that day.
“Instead of being grateful, I began grilling him. I wanted to know how he could afford the flowers, the food, the gas to even get to the store. His grin never went anywhere.” My head was hung low at the thought of my inability to accept kindness.
“He knew he needed to let my slurry of questions escape before I could listen. That’s when he told me he had been promoted. He was officially a manager at the local diner. The owners knew him well and knew we were literally going hungry. They gave him a raise and a signing bonus. They even told him going forward, we were to dine in the restaurant as a family at least once a week. I was so shocked I didn’t know how to respond.” Sam had an unreadable look on his face.
“Did you at least accept the flowers?” He asked.
“Uhm yeah I did. We were both crying and we did the passionate dip in public kiss thing and the moment was so beautiful. Everything was supposed to be okay. It was supposed to be okay.” Heartbreak reared its head again.
“Before I knew it we were walking our paid for groceries to the car. It had been a while since we legally left a grocery store. Oliver could have easily been cast as Aladdin- he was already skilled in feeding his family in less than lawful ways. We were loading the groceries into the trunk in a daze. Molly wanted to count the bags so we didn’t put her in the car right away. And. And that’s when. Fuck. That’s when.” Another meek cry broke out from me fumbling for a place to rest.
“When what Danielle?” Sam knew what.
“When she asked if he was Oliver Smith.” This time, the cry was harsh, threatening to break through the ribs holding whatever was left of my heart in place. “She asked so nicely, we didn’t see her either. Assumed she was the cashier and we left something. Now looking back, I don’t know how a cashier would know our names. We weren’t regulars.”
Sam sat straighter realizing we were getting to the point.
“He said ‘yes’.” It hurt. It hurt worse than the constant picking of the scar.
“Oh.” Sam knew to tread his words lightly.
“She was wearing a hoodie, it wasn’t completely black but it was dark, baggy, hood up. She was on a God damn mission.
“She pulled a knife and just started stabbing him. It was brutal. Shit you see in the movies doesn’t cut it. His face immediately changed and it was a look of pure horror. Flesh and blood. His flesh and blood sprayed everywhere. She just kept going. Three times wasn’t enough. He was- he was doubled over. Knees on the ground. Everything turned into a blur. But nobody believes me.” It was too much. The memory. Watching the love of my life bleed to death knowing I couldn’t do anything to stop it. There was no amount of screaming that would rewind time. No matter how much Molly and I screamed, there was no stopping her.
“So, did you fight her or did she come after you?” Sam asked.
“Both. I don’t know. At that moment there were so many choices to be made.”
“That’s okay. Sometimes, we find ourselves in a mode we can’t comprehend when we are placed in extreme situations.” He calmly explained.
“I chose Molly. Well, I chose her after shoving the bitch off my husband. She then shouted a name I didn’t recognize. Sally or something. Without thinking I said ‘Who?’. Our pause gave me a second to secure Molly from the situation. That’s when the monster bitch stepped closer to me. Called me a filthy liar and went to stab me. She got my arm. And then she got a good look at my face. I think she realized we were the wrong people. She realized she was literally trying to kill a kid’s parents in front of her. The coward ran away.” A sob emanated throughout the room.
“Molly was screaming. She was making a sound I will never get out of my head. I held Oliver as he died. Promised him we would be okay. Promised him he would be okay. It was all a lie. The last thing I did was lie to him. ” My body doubled over in pain from remembering.
“In your files, it says Oliver might have been mixed up with the wrong crowd? It said you were trying to talk about a misunderstanding. Do you remember any of this?” He was skimming the files in his mind.
“No. I really don’t remember anything else. They told me when the ambulance got there I was sitting in a pool of his blood. Screaming. He was gone.” The finality of it all stung worse than the scar’s itch.
“Danny, you’re bleeding. Here, let me get you a bandaid.” He got up.
“Wait, don’t leave me. I’ll make sure not to drip on your sofa. I’m sorry.” Suddenly, there was nothing I wanted more than to have the person who knew my darkest memory close.
“Well, I am proud of you. It isn’t easy talking about these things. Have you ever searched for other Oliver Smiths?” Sam asked.
“Yep.”
“And?”
“There is another one. Disappeared mysteriously three months ago. Associated with the Cartel.” A chuckle popped out of me unexpectedly from the amount of discomfort of this session.
“Hmm.” He breathed. “Sometimes, you can’t make shit up. Sorry for the language but not sure how else to put it. I would implore you to share this information with the police.”
“What’s that song called again? Fuck the Police? Yeah, I’m sticking with that. They didn’t even help me clean the blood off my hands. Acted as if it was a traffic stop. What would they do except tell me once again they can’t do anything?” Anger replaced grief.
“Well then, if anything, when we meet again next week I would like to hear about where you put the roses.” The calmness in his voice felt like a scratchy sweater being put on.
“So I’m not fired?” I said meekly not wanting to walk away from the one person who has heard the full story.
“No, now the work can begin.” He uncrossed his legs and stood up getting ready to sweep up the particles of my soul from the floor. My session was over.