𝑰𝑵𝑲 • 𝑻𝒆𝒘𝒌𝒆𝒔𝒃𝒖𝒓𝒚 / 𝑳𝒐𝒖𝒊𝒔 𝑷𝒂𝒓𝒕𝒓𝒊𝒅𝒈𝒆

Me For Me

Later that week, in the late evening, I decided to retreat. Revisiting the first home I'd ever known, the one that had become a mere shard of my memory. My life there was foggy, the world through my infantile eyes returning to me in clouded, blurry fragments. I hadn't been there for almost a decade, I couldn't expect to recall much.

I'd left the lodging house after dinner, having finished my bowl of warm, creamy soup; one of 4 meals that were rotated throughout the week. Ms Darby had all the girls dine with her downstairs, Monday to Friday, at precisely 6 o'clock in the evening. We'd all gather around the table and take the same seat we occupied each night.

Our places weren't assigned by any means, but an unspoken comfort was found in routine. And that's what most of the girls there, myself included, were searching for. Comfort.

In the form of carpeted floors and floral curtains; white, wooden, stair railing and fresh, countryside air; in amity and companionship, community and sisterhood. Only, none of us ever spoke to each other.

The lodging house was a place for privacy. Every girl kept to themselves and stalked the halls silently. Meals, disguised as social events, were in reality solitary endeavors. This was the way things were, because this is how we'd all silently agreed for them to be.

It was rare for someone to stay for more than a week at a time. Girls filtered in and out of the house as if it were a bridge or a tunnel; nothing more than a distance to travel, or a path to take.

Of everyone, I'd been there the longest. And approaching three weeks away from the life I'd so suddenly dropped, felt like drifting away from all the safety that land promises, further into the inhabitable emptiness that the ocean proves itself to be.

For half an hour, the room was filled with the delicate clinks of metal spoon against the inside of shallow bowls, some ceramic, others porcelain. And once I was done, I would place the spoon to the right of the bowl, its head atop my napkin to avoid staining the tablecloth, and return to my room.

We'd all file back through our doors, eager to shut ourselves away once again. I didn't know what they had to hide, and nor did they know what I did. It was mutual discretion, an invisible pact of minding one's own business. And everyone abided by it, no questions asked.

And so when I slipped out through the back of the house, with nothing more than a shawl draped over my nightdress, no one even batted an eye. The only acknowledgment of my departure, was a brief reminder from Ms Darby that I had yet to collect my mail.

I strolled out onto the field, under the night sky. It shone a dark hue against the grass, the trees, and the earth. I was walking on darkness, on the outskirts of the town. Just beyond the cobble streets and fire lit lanterns.

I could hear the distant singing of cicadas to my right, deep in the thick of the forest. To my right was the town, bursting with youth, with nightlife and sheer joy. I was smothered between the two, each side brushing against me, inviting me towards them with open arms.

But I continued on ahead, because for once, I wasn't headed nowhere. I knew where I was going, and I remembered the route as if I had never left. The path to my old estate, the place of my birth and the place I'd never imagined myself revisiting while I still lived.

The only comfort to me was the feeling of the ends of my hair scratching against my neck, reminding myself that I was no longer the person I had been when I left, and would therefore not be returning as that same person.

Reminding myself that that part of my life was in the past, and would remain there indefinitely. That I didn't have to worry about getting sucked back into that mindset. I knew better now.