Dear Delia:
Thanks for trying this out with me. I know we’ve had our battles, but I feel strongly that if we’re going to stay out of each other’s way as we’ve agreed to try, then it’s best we at least stay in touch. So you can know where I am and I can know where you are. Also (and I’m sure you’ll hate like hell my saying this) but I like talking to you. I know things are difficult for you, and I know it’s not really the same for me, but I also feel like you understand me more than anyone on earth might, whether we like it or not. In a strange way we are sisters, and if we can find a way to make this idea of mine work…communicating rather than fighting each other, maybe we will, hell, I don’t know…maybe we can live some version of normal that doesn’t eat us up inside quite so much. I know it’s a revolutionary idea, maybe even a stupid one, certainly one our mothers, and especially our grandmothers would not approve of, but we’re not our damn mothers, right?
How is your Lola? I can’t pretend that she is not the primary reason that you agreed to this, and for that I’m thankful, even if on some level I have to view her as the enemy. Please write back soon so that I will know you’ve not changed your mind.
Scarlett
I hold the letter out in front of me for a full minute. “What the fuck?!” I say to the empty room. I skip a dozen or so letters and pick another one, same return address, somewhere in Pennsylvania.
September 3rd
Dear Delia:
I’m glad to hear that you and Lola are well. If she’s as headstrong as you say, she sounds like she’s going to be a lot like your mother Aveline, or maybe even Hedy. Crap, if she’s like Hedy, the whole damn world is in trouble, yeah? My Bonnie is so much like my mother Jean, so quiet and serious, and strong in a way I never was, and she looks so much like pictures I saw of my grandmother Audra it still shocks me sometimes, the sight of her. I hope you are well. Your last letter sounded…fraught. Anything I can do?
S
This time I ball the letter up and throw it across the room. “WHAT THE FUCK!?!” I kick a hole in the wall and toss the furniture around the room until it no longer resembles a bedroom. This woman Scarlett knows more about my life and my family than I do. I’d heard Delia speak about her dead mother Aveline, usually in a drunken stupor, rambling incoherently, and of course I had that one short letter from Aveline to my mother…but who the hell is Hedy? Once I calm down I find the stack of letters again, pinned under the broken bed frame and I flip to the last letter. The tone is decidedly different.
June 29th
Delia:
Can you feel it coming for me? I didn’t think I’d be so afraid. But it has edged closer to me all day. I can feel it in the air crackling around me. It’s funny, I would have thought I wouldn’t be afraid, knowing it was coming all this time, and feeling so weak in so many different ways since Bonnie came, but I’m still surprised by it. I find myself lost in thought imagining what it will be. It’s too gruesome though and when I catch myself I have to push it out of my mind. I wonder, are you frustrated with me? Perhaps even angry? We agreed to this whole insane plan because I convinced us both that we could be with our daughters longer, that we would have longer to teach them, a chance to give them something different than the short time we had with our mothers, and yet here Bonnie is only six and my time is up regardless of our plans. The mysteries of this life we lead will never cease to amaze and frustrate me. I often wish for a roadmap. I never know enough. I’m counting on you though, counting on you to be good, once I’m gone. You made that promise, and I will hold you to it, even in death. In some way you have become my friend over these years, the only person who truly understands me, and I’m grateful for it.
May your daughter grow strong, but be rational, as I know that you are.
Scarlett
This is the last of the letters. I’m filled with impotent rage. This woman Scarlett knew my mother in a way I never did, and never will. I can’t decide if I’m angrier with Delia for keeping herself from me, or myself for killing her before I could understand the larger picture that obviously lives here. I tear the rest of the trailer apart, half-in-rage, half-hoping to find more information. I throw the trunk and as it collides with the wall it splinters into pieces. Through the shattered bits something pokes out from part of the broken lid. I wade through the crap strewn about the floor and pick the top up. There’s a yellowed newspaper article wedged inside a false wall in the lid. I break it in half carefully and remove the paper. It’s a news article, but the date is torn off.