IT'S NOT OKAY

Recent writing sample from UW writing class (scene triggered by object):

IT’S NOT OKAY

He knew something was wrong as he and Beth pushed open the white-framed screen door, which banged shut behind them.  He’d sensed it during the goodbyes and confirmed it by her cold silence and her stiff determined walk. 

He squinted in the bright afternoon sunlight, and barely noticed the cars on the farmhouse lawn, along the graveled driveway.  He sort of heard the chittering sparrows around the faded barn, and the soft rustle of corntalks in the fields, pushed by the warm autumn breeze.  Mostly he waited for her to speak.

“I hate this” she hissed as they entered the shade of the huge old  cottonwood.  He stopped and looked at her, startled by her intensity.   

“You hate what?”

“This.”  She pulled a creased 5x7 photo from her pocket, which she shoved at him, almost against his face; he took it from her and studied  it.  A younger version of himself, smiling, beside a tall dark-haired woman.  His ex-wife.  One of the photos his mother kept in a tattered box in the bottom bureau drawer, an unsorted jumble of memories, Dad’s black-and-white 3x5s from the Second World War, snapshots from the 1950s, class pictures and family photos, obscure ancestors, and God knows who.

“What about it?”

She grabbed the photo back. “You know what I mean.  Everybody acts like this was the best time, when she was here.”  She shook the photo at him.  Or perhaps her hand trembled.  She tossed the photo into the air and it fluttered to the ground.  “She thinks it’s my fault.  They all do.”

As he reached down to pick it up he considered what to say, knowing – or rather presuming – that whatever he said would be wrong.  “It’s just a picture.  They’re just pictures.  What’s the big deal?”

“She pulled them out on purpose, to make me feel left out.”

Now he knows.  She is Emma, his 12-year old daughter from that first marriage, who had sorted through the photos, “who’s that?” and “I remember this,” and so on.  He and Grandma had identified the photos, while aunts and uncles and cousins had paid polite attention.  Even Beth had laughed and smiled with the rest.  Or so he remembered.  He was no longer sure.

 “C’mon, Beth, she’s a kid, it’s okay that she remembers what things were like.  Doesn’t mean she doesn’t like you.”  She started walking again.  He followed.

Silence until they reached the car.  “No, it’s not okay.”  She climbed in and he stepped around to his side, slammed his door, started the car, and headed down the dusty lane toward the highway.   He put on the turn signal even though there was no traffic for miles.  Out of habit, maybe out of anxiety.  He pulled onto the two-lane asphalt, and focused on driving.

She sat with her arms crossed, looked out the window, breathing shallowly.  It would be a long drive home.