Lost and Found

Maria sat slouched in an old armchair, with headphones in her ears, drowning out the sounds of construction with her music.  She was waiting for her boyfriend to come out of his meeting, and then they would go get something to eat.  She had been waiting for over an hour already, but that didn’t seem to perturb her.  Maria never did mind waiting. 
Maria was of medium height, and extremely skinny.  Though she had put on 20 pounds since moving to Seattle, she still looked almost anorexic.  She was wearing a pair of faded jeans that probably needed to be washed and a baggy, gray sweatshirt.  Although Maria had an excellent figure (curves in all the right places and none in wrong ones), she never showed it off.  Her dress seemed to say, I don’t care what I look like, so you shouldn’t either!  Her hair was short and thin, her natural brown color streaked with blonde.  Her overall appearance gave off an air of incredible independence of any fashion or ideas about looks that the world might come up with.
  Her heart, however, screamed otherwise.  Four months ago, Maria had left home, family, and amazing friends to move to Seattle.  She left the city of her birth, where she had lived, grown, and nurtured friendships for the past 19 years.  She left all of this because her boyfriend lived in Seattle, and he needed her.  Oh, she said she moved to get a better education, she claimed the schools in Seattle were better and it would be beneficial for her to go to school there, but no one believed her.  Everyone knew the real reason why she moved.
So here she was, alone and estranged, in a new city, in a new life.  Maria was not the kind of person who adapted easily, and she most certainly did not make friends quickly.  She rented a grungy-looking room in an apartment near her university, and every day after classes came to her boyfriend’s studio.  He was a genius, she always reminded herself, he wrote amazing music, and one day he was going to make enough money to marry her and she would at last be happy.
But for now, she waited.  She tried so hard to cover up her loneliness that she succeeded in covering up herself as well.  No one in Seattle knew that back home, Maria had been the life of every party, that she had been nominated for home-coming queen, that she was one of the “popular girls”.  In Seattle, Maria became silent, inactive, and estranged.  At her university, she never said a word, never even turned in her assignments (her grades barely scraping by).  Maria consistently and successfully ignored anyone that tried to get close to her.  She was afraid of relationships, afraid to stretch out and make the jump to friendships again. She never wanted to be lonely again.  So, she figured, the secret to not being lonely is to be self-sufficient.  The only person she would talk to was her boyfriend, and he, she would remind herself, was more than enough to make up for all her other friends. 
The door of the studio creaked open, and out walked Maria’s idol.
“You ready, babe?” it asked.
Maria looked up, a smile breaking across her face.  “Always, darling.” 

Dinner, like always, was a packet of Chinese quick-serve Raman noodles, eaten in the back room of the studio.  Maria somehow loved the grunginess of the place, loved the repetitiveness and simplicity of the food.  Secretly, she dreamed of the day when Elijah would come home after work to a steaming dinner, which Maria would have worked on all evening.
Maria ran a finger around the rim of her now-empty bowl.  “What kind of dishes do you like?” she asked Elijah.
He looked at her, a look saying, I don’t understand.
“These bowls are nice, sure,” Maria continued, explaining, “But in my house, I’d like to have more decorative dishes.”  She looked up, a half-smile on her face.  “But of course, that depends on what you think.”
Elijah grunted.
Maria continued probing.  It was not often that she touched the subject of their future, and she wanted to get some answers out of her strangely reticent boyfriend.  “My dream house is somewhere far away from the city, small and cozy.  We could start out with an apartment, just big enough for the two of us.  We wouldn’t need much, just a kitchen, bedroom, and a studio room for you.  As long as it was far enough away from the city, I think we could afford it.  You can work at home, and I wouldn’t mind the commute.”  She reached over a placed her hand on his.  “Not if I knew you were waiting for me to come home every afternoon.”
“Nice dreams,” Elijah said shortly.  He removed her hand from his.  “I used to have lots of dreams when I was a kid too.”
“And you don’t now?” Maria asked.
He shrugged.  “Not so much.”
“But you do…” Maria paused, unsure of how to continue.  “You do have some plans for your- our- future… don’t you?”
“Listen, it’s getting late.”  Elijah stood, almost knocking the bowls off the table in his haste.  “We’d better going.”

After dropping her off at the apartment she rented, Elijah said, “I’ll call you later this evening.”  Maria smiled.  Tomorrow was their one-and-a-half year anniversary since they had started dating, and she was positive that Elijah had some marvelous surprise planned for her.
At 11:35, the phone rang.  Maria, who had been hawking over the phone all evening, picked it up immediately.  “Hello?” she said, her voice tinged with happiness.
“I have something to tell you.”  The voice on the other end was that of her beloved, but something was dreadfully wrong.  “I… I’ve needed to tell you for a long time.  I didn’t realize you were taking our relationship so seriously.”
Maria’s breath froze in her throat.  Taking our relationship seriously? she thought.
“Crap, Maria,” Elijah sounded almost angry, “I can’t marry you!  You’ve gotten too serious.  I think it’s time to end everything.”
The world was spinning, crashing, the walls were caving in.  Maria swayed, her hands ice cold. “What?” she choked out.
“Yes.”  Elijah somehow had gotten his manliness back.  “I’m sorry, it’s been great, and I won’t forget you.  But… you’ve gotten way too serious for me.”

Two hours later, Maria was still sitting in the same place, her hand near the phone.  She had always thought that, when something terrible in life happened, that her thoughts would be all jumbled together, that she would be unable to think clearly, that she would be panicky.  But now… she was merely frozen.  She had only one thought and it was as clear as glass.  My life is over.

The next day, Maria didn’t show up at university.  She lay in bed, not eating, not doing anything, just lying there.  Amelia Borders, the lady who Maria rented a room from came in to be sure she was ok.
“Are you sick?” she asked.
Maria gazed at her with heart broken eyes.  She shook her head, and rolled over, facing the wall, hoping the woman would go away.  She couldn’t bear anyone to care for her, not now.  But Amelia would not be discouraged so easily.  She knew about love, about heartbreak, about the end of lives.
“I’ll bring you some soup.” 
When Amelia walked in with the soup, Maria pretended to be asleep.  The older woman left the soup on the bed-stand, and silently exited the room.  Maria rolled over again and looked at the soup.  Her eyes filled with tears.  The neatness with which the lady had arranged the soup on a tray, the small flower that she had put next to the bowl, the decorative dishes- they all spoke of kindness, of grace, of love: things which Maria couldn’t bear to think about.  Then she shook herself.  She, Maria, who hadn’t cried since first grade, was crying over a bowl of soup. 
My life really must be over, she thought.

After lying in bed all day, Maria got restless.  She wrapped herself in a blanket and wandered into the kitchen, looking for something to eat. Amelia was there, stirring something in a pot over the stove.
“Can I get you something, dearie?” she asked kindly.
Maria looked into the wrinkled face of the older woman.  She had never shared anything with anyone- except with Elijah.  She had always been popular, funny, but always closed.  She didn’t believe in deep, meaningful friendships- except with Elijah.  She couldn’t bear having anyone know her secrets, know what was really going on inside of her- except Elijah.
Maybe it was time to open the door to her heart.
Smiling sadly, Maria said, “A new life would be nice.”
Silently, the old lady rejoiced.  Her closed, reticent guest was opening up.  “Why don’t I pour some tea, and you can tell me all about it,” she suggested.
Maria shrugged, and sat down, tugging her blanket around her.  “Well you see,” she murmured, “There was this guy.”
Telling her story to the old woman, Maria began to understand how pathetic her life really was.  Here she had dumped everything in her life, friends, family, status, home, and come to live in a new, unfamiliar city because of a boy she loved.  But once here, she hadn’t put down any roots, hadn’t tried to adjust.  She had somehow held back, giving one person her entire self.  Now that person was gone, and she had no self.  When Elijah had left, he hadn’t just broken off her relationship with him.  He had broken off her relationship with herself, with the real Maria, the Maria with a heart, who could feel, love, and grow.  And now she was left… as nothing.
“And so,” she concluded, “Now I’m nobody.  Nothing.  I have no life, no friends, nothing to do.  I can’t even go home because I’m stuck in this stupid university.”
“You really think that boy took all of you with him?”  Her voice soft, the older lady tried to help Maria to see the truth.  “No person can do that.  The real you cannot be given away to someone, even if you love him more than life itself.  It’s there,” she pointed at Maria’s heart, “inside of you.  And you can never give it away.”
Maria smoothed the blanket on her lap.  “I look inside of me, and I see nothing- nothing!  I have given myself away, utterly and completely.  There is none of me left.”  She looked at the woman, her agony shining out through her gray eyes.  “How do you know there is still a Maria left in me?”
Amelia put her hand on Maria’s.  “Believe it or not, I was once young, like you.  And, believe it or not, you are not the first to experience heart ache.”  She smiled.  “I know sometimes it must seem like no one else has ever felt the way you’re feeling, but that’s not true.  I loved once too.  And, just like you, I got my heart broken.”
Maria gazed up at the kindly old lady sitting across from her.  Somehow, she could see resilience built up over years of loneliness shining out from Amelia’s eyes. 
Amelia continued, slowly, quietly, as if she hadn’t had to think about this for a long time.  “I was eighteen and beautiful.  He was twenty-five and, in my eyes, perfect.  We dated for three years and then… I got pregnant.”  Amelia stood, and walked to the other side of the kitchen.  Shaking her head, she turned and walked back.  “I never thought it would end that way.  Never thought…”
“You don’t have to go on if you don’t want to.”  Maria felt forty-year-old pain ripping through her. 
“It’s not important,” murmured Amelia, “The important thing is that he left.  I never knew where he went.  And then… the baby didn’t come.  I miscarried.  I was left alone, all alone, in the whole wide world there was no one to care for me.”
Tears welled in Maria’s eyes.  Sympathy for the strong, patient woman filled every inch of her being.  She started to feel as if her own situation was, perhaps, bearable.
“I didn’t mean to trouble you, child,” Amelia said, seeming to recollect herself.  “I just wanted to let you know that I do have some understanding about what you’re going through.”
“What did you do?” asked Maria, “After he left?”
“What did I do?” repeated Amelia.  “Well, I cried for a while.  I walked around for a few weeks feeling as if the sky had fallen down on me.  I hated the birds for singing and the sun for rising every morning.  But then… something changed.  Somehow I started waking up the morning and not crying.  I was able to wear my old clothes again and not think of him.  My fake smiles somehow started to feel more real.  I moved on.”
“So what should I do?” whispered Maria.
Amelia smiled, a genuine, heart-warming smile, happy to feel the love and trust emanating from her younger guest.  “Let everyone see the real Maria.  Be yourself, and those who love you will love you for you.  You don’t seem like the kind of person who can be conquered so easily, by some boy!”
Slowly, Maria began to smile.
Amelia continued, “Maybe you feel like your life has been shattered, that your heart is scattered in pieces on the floor.  But that doesn’t mean you need to give up!  You can pick yourself off, brush off your heart, put it back in place.  You can conquer him, my dear, I believe in you.  You are a survivor; I can see it in your eyes.”
Maria felt herself filled with new hope.  She would go on, she would win, she would have a new, a better, and a fuller life.

The next day, Maria walked into class, her eyes flashing, chin held high.  Girls poked each other and whispered as she walked up to the front of the room and handed in a research paper that was due that day.  Not only had Maria never handed anything in on time before, but this project was one of the harder ones and many of the students had asked for- and been granted- extensions. 
But Maria was through with extensions, she was through with not trying.  She had stayed up all night writing that paper, and she was pleased with it.  Everything about her emanated confidence, from her stride to her smile, from her posture to the way she held her shoulders, every single thing about her said, I am my own person.  I am happy.  The world is mine!
Maria had her own back.  She was ready to live, to love, to win, to lose, to fall down and get right back up again.  No longer a slave to love, afraid to live her own life and have her own opinions, no longer forced to act or be a certain way, she was free to be who she was meant to be and look life straight in the face.  She knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that she was capable of defeating anything and anyone. 
After all, she was Maria Grekalo!