Boxes

One Crawford Street. Another new address is not something I want to think about. The fact that I have dragged my daughter Joy with me in and out of a dozen different relationships and a dozen different places to live is something I want put out of my mind.

I have to get myself off this bed and get some unpacking done. I don’t know how I am going to fit everything. These new places keep getting smaller and smaller.

Bare floors and peeling wallpaper in every room. I never move forward. Stuck with my vintage consolation prizes, same old phone with the knicked up receiver packed again in the same old boxes. Its like I warp back to my early twenties every few years. Joy is my reminder of a life wasted. If I didn’t see her, I wouldn’t know where I was.

Poor Joy. She could do better on her own. I know she is only staying with me because she thinks I can’t manage myself. Hell, who am I kidding, I can’t. Just lost another job - another husband. What poor luck I have.

Joy says she is fine. She seems more concerned about me; she always is.

I am so sick of men. They run out over the smallest things. I shouldn’t have bothered with this last marriage. Divorce sucks, so much more involved in a divorce than with a regular split. I don’t want to think about this. I just need to put it out of my mind.

Look at this picture. The three of us look so happy. Like real, natural happy. I really thought Ben was the one. The one who would stay. I must be doing something wrong. But it doesn’t feel like I do. That last fight with Ben – why did he have to make up those horrible stories. I know my memory is bad, but I would definitely remember a scene like that. I have never even been to his office. Well he’s not the only one who’s made up nasty lies. They all do. May-be it’s a guy thing, so they don’t feel guilty.

I make my way upstairs to Joy’s room, the sound of my footsteps echo on the bare wood and look around. It’s a cute little area. She’ll fix it up nice, she always does. Damn this is coming at such a bad time for her. Ever since she dropped out of college last year, I have noticed how much she struggles to be happy. She also seems cursed in love. So many relationships. Some of her breaks have come as such a surprise to me. I guess I really am a poor judge of character. Even her friendships don’t seem to last. She went through five roommates during her three years away at college. Well I hope she has better luck with the rest of her life than I have.
Five times – I was fired five times. I find myself pacing and shaking my head. I must be so blind. I never see it coming. I never understand it. Why? Because of my headaches? That is the only thing that has ever kept me out. Ok, sometimes for days, but I couldn’t help that. I don’t want to think about that now.

Joy is the only blessing I have had in my life. Through all the troubles and heartache, my daughter has been my constant. Now she needs me. I can’t let this break-up bring me down. It is my turn to be the strong one. I need to be, for her.

I can’t think too much. I can’t think about why Ben said he “can’t do this anymore”. Do what? I don’t ever understand.

I miss him. I’ll never find someone who speaks so kindly, who asks me questions, who wants to know how I feel. Damn. If that last day I could have spoken in his way, gentle. But I couldn’t think -- all those damn questions – he has no idea how it feels.

I start to rip open boxes, with the idea of surprising Joy. I can have her room set up for her by the time she gets home from work. She’s asked me not to, but I know that’s because she feels it would be an added burden. But I want to; it will be nice.
I drag a large box to the small bookcase, and start to unpack Joy’s Psychology textbooks and arrange them on the tall bottom shelf. The next box is novels and I begin to arrange them on the top shelf: Fight Club, The Bell Jar, Sybil, The Tell Tale Heart, The Turn of the Screw, I continue until the shelf is full.
Last were her photo albums and journals. Opening a photo album, I come to a picture of Joy at age four. She’s in front of our Christmas tree holding the new doll her father gave her. She looks so happy. It was about a year after the divorce that Richy stopped his visits. Said he didn’t want to deal with me anymore and wished Joy luck. Crazy bastard, such horseshit. We both know it was because he found a new wife and wanted to start a whole new family. An early lesson for Joy that people are shit. I am so stupid - exposing her to all these bloody relationships. They all seemed so nice.

Stacking the photo albums on the shelf, I think about how fast my life has gone by. Fifty years. There are times I pass in front of a mirror and just stop, and stare. I always seem to see a stranger in myself. The changes in my face seem so sudden. But it’s not the age that bothers me so much; it’s that I don’t remember all of it. It’s a strange feeling, not remembering Joy switching schools or her middle-school graduation.

I reach into the bottom of the box and grab hold of some of Joy’s journals. One of them is her first diary. I had given it to her for her seventh birthday. It is white with tiny purple flowers and a picture of a pretty girl sitting on a windowsill gazing out at a night sky.

The keys are long lost but the lock is open and I turn to the first page where I had written an inscription seventeen years earlier.

Joy,
Fill these pages with wonderful memories.
I’ll try my best to help make as many as possible with you.
I LOVE YOU SO MUCH!
Mommie

Her entries are so cute: the large, heavy handwriting, the misspelled words, how she always signed-off by calling her diary her friend – sometimes her best friend. There were some large gaps in time but she always caught her diary up in her next entry. I couldn’t help but notice how concerned Joy was with how I was doing. There was also an entry repeated about her hoping I wasn’t mad at her. Why would she write that? Joy was a wonderful little girl: never disobeyed, always did her homework and cleaned her room. In fact, Joy was more organized then I was. She was very independent. From an early age, she took care of her own long curly hair, made her own breakfast and lunches, and sometimes even dinner. She said she liked to cook and do laundry. Most of the time it was just the two of us, and Joy just wanted to help. She liked playing grown-up. All kids like to do that.

I open the journal with the strawberry on the cover next and read the first page. It is about her eleventh birthday party. It was a sleep over. She writes about the fun she had. I hug the book to my chest. A truly happy memory, at last.

The rest of the journal talks about her having lots of tummy aches and monsters. Poor thing must have been going through nightmares or something.

Thumbing through the next journal, she is older and writes with more detail. There is an entry about Ben and me. She thinks he will be good for me, that he can bring balance to my life. Ha. All Ben did was make up stories and then run away.

Next, she’s talking about being afraid to go away to college, how she is afraid to leave me. I think I remember some of this. I remember telling her that living on campus would be a good experience for her. At first I thought she was afraid of being on her own, but she was afraid of me being on my own.
There is a lot of poetry. Joy is talented but dark. The poems are disturbing: Lick My Wrists, Thoughts Unexpressed, Ushers and Us. Is this when she stopped smiling?

I grab for the next book, it is filled with self-criticism. Why? I notice pages torn out of the middle and end of the book. Joy’s handwriting was sloppy with no regard for the lines. And then I see pages filled with the words:

crazy bitch crazy bitch crazy bitch crazy bitch crazy
crazy bitch crazy bitch crazy bitch crazy bitch crazy bitch
crazybitchcrazybitc crazybitchcrazybitchcrazybitchcrazybitch
crazybitchcrazybitc crazybitchcrazybitchcrazybitchcrazybitch
crazybitchcrazybitc crazybitchcrazybitchcrazybitchcrazybitch
crazybitchcrazybitc crazybitchcrazybitchcrazybitchcrazybitch


I feel panic inside as I continue to read.
11/20 - The weeks pass and I am quite isolated. I spend a lot of time staring at my fish.

12/2 - Experiencing things alone again. It seems what was put back inside is now lying scattered about.

12/13 - She wouldn’t leave her room again. She has been sitting on the edge of her bed for three days.


Three days! That’s impossible.

My heart quickens as I read the entry for January 16th. It starts:

dear diary, it happened again today …

I fall back, unable to breathe, as I continue to read. But I don’t understand.

I check the front inside cover where Joy always writes her name to make sure this journal belongs to her. It does. I flip back and forth looking for clues and all that I find shocks me.

I stand up and back myself into a corner. My mind begins to reach answers: twelve relationships, five lost jobs, the night time and Joy’s seventh and eighth grade years…

Because of me.

Joy is this way because of me. I’m the monster.

I repack the journals and photo albums, clear the bookcase of her textbooks and novels, try to put everything back the way she packed them. I can’t let her know that I remember. Remember what she remembers. She might ask me why. I just want to put it out, of my mind.




I don’t know how much time has passed when I realize I’m sitting on my bed. The sound of Joy’s car pulling into the driveway causes me to run into the bathroom and lock the door. I hear her key find its way in the front door lock.

“Hullo,” she calls out as she enters the house.

I turn the shower on full and slide down next to the tub, one hand still on the faucet, the other cupped over my mouth.

I hear her shuffle past the door a few times, then stop.

“Mom? …” Her voice is kind.

I can tell she is speaking into the crack between the door and the door jamb. She sounds so close it’s petrifying.

Finally, she gives up and I hear the sound of her footsteps echo as she climbs the stairs. I hear the sound of her emptying boxes.