Falling in the Garden

Chapter Fourteen - Autumn

Chapter Fourteen

Autumn

School passed like the non-melodic rush of a distorted television program on an old black and white television. Whenever I did try and concentrate, things moved away from me, hidden behind the white noise. I’m amazed how I ever got through that year in school, amazed I didn’t fail every class. For some strange reason, I did well enough for no one to notice my evident withdrawal. I knew my mother saw, though. Her concern increased as the weather cooled and the days lost their ability to warm, snuffing out earlier and with greater urgency toward winter.

I devoted every free minute to unraveling the mystery of the strange letter I’d found in my mailbox. I believed that this was my best lead, though there wasn’t much to go on, simply a list of companies and a dollar value after each of them. Most of the companies were real, but others simply did not exist. What really interested me was one particular entry on the list. Xeronix. After a week of searching, I discovered that Xeronix was the proposed name for a merger of three other corporations. This merger would bring a law firm, a pharmaceutical company and a major computer manufacturer together. According to the brief news piece I found, the proposed Xeronix was being held back by other heavyweight companies wanting in on the merger. The value of Xeronix was also the highest amount at just over eight billion dollars.

By the beginning of October, Ashley had begun to feel sick. Her mood had fallen as well, for her best friend, Sarah, had finally moved away to attend her private school.

The temperature in the evenings was now starting to dip into the low 40’s. I was layering clothes, keeping my winter jacket in reserve. We joked that we’d eventually have to build igloos to keep the elements from us. We wondered, in all seriousness, how we were going to manage our meetings once the snow began to pile and drift. I remembered a time last February when a storm had dropped nearly three feet in the space of two days. They cancelled school. Joe and I wanted to venture out to the trails, but had difficulty climbing past the eight-foot drifts thrown by the plows and even more of a hard time plodding through the thickness in the woods. I didn’t know how I would fare on my own.

There was one afternoon that first week of October when I missed Ashley more than any other time. I arrived home from school and was sitting on the back deck with an open world history book. My whole being ached to be with Ashley, but deep inside I knew that something was wrong. I had this awful feeling that there wasn’t much time left to us. Of course, this might be based on my writing with so many years behind me, but I definitely felt a sickening anticipation as the days grew colder. I also began to truly miss my lost friend Joe. All of our old antics in the neighborhood, our times in school, everything, seemed a lifetime ago. If only I could reach back and bring that feeling forward. If I could just tell Joe what was happening. So easy to simply pick up the phone…

Tired of rereading the same paragraph about the war in Grenada, I drank a final sip from a can of Dr. Pepper. The cool air smelled of hickory and other burning woods from hearth fires all over the county. It was a fine smell. Add to this the sweet decay of so many dying leaves, it was an aroma that grounded you to the Earth and sent your mind soaring through lands unspoiled by human tampering. I thought often of the other realities in which Ashley and I played out our “roles”. I kept thinking that these occurrences were in the past, each a finished thing. But no, they weren’t in the past. They were all happening at the same time, alongside me. Three thousand other Michaels wondering just what was going on. And only one who would ultimately be with Ashley. That is, if I was to believe the writing in the capsule. For all Ashley and I knew, we had been told only a very fragmented portion of the truth. Or, even worse, complete fiction.

I still waited expectantly for an email from Sarah Kasner, though was starting to lose hope. Each evening, when Ashley and I spoke, her resolve seemed to slip further. Her health seemed to worsen as well. Mr. Kasner had called a doctor in to come and look at her. She took medicine each morning and after dinner, but nothing seemed to help.