In Sight of Stars(71)

“Here. You think I’m lying, but I’ll show you,” she says. She gets up from the bench and turns to face me, rolling up her sleeves. “I have a PhD and a double master’s. I have a loving husband and a good career. I’ve had friends and partners, successes and failures, and so far I’ve made it through. But there was a time—a brief moment in my early twenties—when I didn’t think I could.”

She holds her wrists out to me, undersides up, to show me where, on each, a faint pink scar runs vertically along the tender skin.

“You?” I ask. “But why?”

“For the same reasons many of us do. We feel hopeless or helpless or alone. The thing we learn if we make it through is that we’re not.”

My eyes fill with tears. They’re not sad tears, just grateful. Dr. Alvarez reaches into her pocket and hands a tissue to me, but I shake my head. I’m okay.

“Anyway, what you need to know,” she says, rolling her sleeves back down and buttoning them, “is that my life is happy, my days are good. Very good. Unbelievably lucky and good. But not all of them. Bad things happen, now and again, and some days are impossibly hard. And others still, mildly hard. But even on the worst days, I’m not in danger anymore.” She smiles gently, sitting beside me again on the white stone bench. “But all in all, if I had to average it out, most of them are happy, fulfilling, and good. Those far outweigh the bad days, and they do make it all worthwhile.”

I don’t know how to respond. It both surprises and comforts me to know that even Dr. Alvarez wasn’t always as sure and clear as she is now.

She gets up again and walks to the stump with the Buddhas resting on it, puts her hand on Green Tara, and says some mantra.

“It’s Green Tara’s,” she says. “I like the sound of it, even if I don’t fully know what it means or believe in it. I like the feel of it on my tongue, the lilt of it, you know? And sometimes it’s just good to have a mantra. Something to say when you’re anxious. Yours can be anything. A quote that you like, or a song lyric. Something you say to remind yourself. We can work on that.”

“Okay,” I say.

“Oh, and one more thing, Klee. This?” She holds her wrists out but doesn’t uncover the scars again. “It was a long time ago. I’ve lived a whole lifetime since then. Honestly, I barely remember what set me off back then. What made me feel so broken. But it seemed so very important at the time.”

“Like a postage stamp,” I say.

“Exactly.”

I look at my own hands, studying my fingers which held a paintbrush again this morning, feeling good and right when they did. It made me feel normal again, like me. Klee. Just that alone makes me feel all sorts of things I can’t fully express to Dr. Alvarez. I feel sad, and quiet, and grateful all at the same time.

“‘For my part, I know nothing with any certainty,’” she says, walking again. “‘Except that the sight of the stars makes me dream.’ It’s Van Gogh, right? The quote you left for me.”

“Yes.”

“You’ve really given me a whole new appreciation for him,” she continues. “What a gift it is to always be learning. There truly was no other artist like him. How sad that it wasn’t a life fully appreciated while he lived it.” I nod and she says, “But your father’s life, Klee, your father’s life wasn’t his. Nor is yours. And the sight of stars,” she says, reaching up to point through the trees, “is always right there. Right in your line of vision. Even on the cloudiest day. They don’t disappear, you know, just because the clouds are obscuring them. They’re always still there. Waiting.”





HOME





It’s weird to walk into the house after so many days gone.

It feels unfamiliar. But this place always has.

I wonder if it will ever feel like home.

Still, my mother is trying. I can even smell home-baked cookies.

In the hallway, I turn and give her a suspicious look.

“Don’t get excited. They’re slice and bake,” she says.

*

My room is just how I left it, except for a stack of clean laundry folded on my bed.

I drop my bags by my closet, pick up my cell phone, and stare at it. I have twenty-two missed messages.

I pile my books on my desk and put the rest of my clothing and supplies away. Finally, I sit at my desk and pull the folded sheet of paper from my pocket and add Martin’s and Sabrina’s numbers to my contacts. Only then do I press the message icon to read through all of the texts.

The most recent is from Cleto, saying he means it, that he’s there for me if I need him, and to let him know when I’m home again and can get to the city to see him. “Or we can come to you, Revenant. No problem. Who doesn’t want to waste a day trekking up to the boonies?”

I smile a little and decide to call. At least Cleto won’t treat me any different.

It rings through to voice mail.

“Hey, Cleto, it’s me. I’m home again, and wondering. Remember that place—I forget what it’s called—but the Ping-Pong place in midtown? We went there once, and you kicked my ass, remember? But, I’m thinking it’s time to up my game. Next weekend, maybe, if you’re not busy? Let me know.”