Counterpoint

Chapter 68

Thomas

   "So are you going to stay for the wedding or are you going to go back to New York and then coming back home." Martha pesters as she sits beside me on the porch swing as fireflies dance through the evening air. I remain silent, pulling the blanket that is draped over my shoulders tightly against my form. She leans forward slightly to get a better glance at my face. There is a look of sorrow and pity in her face as she looks back at me. Somehow that expression makes this feeling all the more unbearable. "You didn't have to go if you weren't ready. Mama would have understood."

   "It isn't just about me all the time." I mutter. "I'm not the only one who is still grieving."

   "That isn't your cross to bear, Thomas." She replies softly. "You can't hold yourself responsible for how everyone in our family feels." Silence lapses between the two of us, the only sound being the singing of crickets as they call out to their potential loves. "No one wants you to try and be Dad."

   "That's not what I'm trying to do." I argue.

   "Then could you please just try living for yourself?" She pesters. "I know that you feel that you have to take care of us, but we have lived this long without you trying to carry our burdens, trust us to continue going on that way." Another lapse of silence hangs between the two of us, polluting the air with its tension. "Thomas, I don't want to pick a fight with you."

   "You have a funny way of showing that."

   "I'm only saying this because I care." Her body presses against me as she leans against my side. "No one wants to see you suffer anymore Thomas."

   "Would you believe me if I told you that I am getting better?" I can feel her gaze peering up at me through the darkness. "It hasn't hit me this hard for a while now. It finally feels like I'm waking up from a long nightmare."

   "That's good." She murmurs, I can hear the cogs turning inside of her head the longer she looks at me. "What inspired the change?"

   "You mean other than time?"

   "You know exactly what I mean. Who or what dragged you up out of the pit you threw yourself into?" I sink my teeth into my bottom lip as I look up towards the silver stars that twinkle like small flames. "You're hesitating."

   "I am."

   "Why?"

   "I am debating whether or not it is any of your business," I reply teasingly. She digs her nails into my arm lightly in response. "There are several factors that I need to consider before telling you anything." 

   "So it is a person." She muses. 

   "What makes you figure that?"

   "You only ever get tense or flustered like this when another person is involved. Again, no one wants you to feel alone or upset anymore. If this mystery person is somehow able to help you get through that then we will all be more than happy to thank them for their service." I rest my head atop of hers, relishing her warmth and presence. It has been far too long since I have last had the opportunity to sit like this with one of my siblings. "So, who are they?"

   "Martha," I sigh. "I can't tell you that." 

   "Do you not want me to know, or do they?"

   "Martha, I love you, but you don't need to know everything about what goes on in my life." 

   "I'm assuming that they are the person who was in your house with you when I had come to visit you." 

   "Uninvited." I remind. 

   "It was the only way to guarantee that you got the invitation and that you would even open it." She retorts quickly. "You weren't exactly the easiest person to get a hold of these past few years. Even you must know that you had isolated yourself rather completely. I only invaded your life because I wanted to make sure that you still had a life." 

   "I told you that I have been better." 

   "But you weren't when you had first left this place."

   "Alright, point received." 

   "Is it?" She questions, parting herself from me. "It doesn't seem that you understand at all."  The dark of the night veils her expression, only the tone of her voice alerts me of her tumultuous emotions. "You don't seem to see just how far this family would be willing to go to protect you. To take care of you."

   "Martha, yo-"

   "It is not your turn to speak. You may be my big brother and know a little more about the world than I do, but you also taught me to never let any man interrupt me." Her voice is hard as steel and I feel a small flame of pride ignite somewhere deep down in my chest. "You keep secrets and hide yourself from your family, burying yourself in grief and pain without any form of escape. You do all of these horrible things to yourself, yet you believe we have no real need to worry about you or that our love for you should just diminish now that you seem to be back in control again. Are you really back in control of your own life?"

   "You are pushing some boundaries here Martha."

   "I think you are putting yourself in a dangerous position. Your feet dangling just over the dead drop right back into where you were before." 

   "I've heard enough." 

   Pushing myself up from the swing I walk out into the darkness, trusting my memory to guide me through the garden. Martha doesn't follow me and that is when I am finally able to breathe easier. My body feels heavy, weighed down by the thoughts my sister has planted in my mind. None of them can be true. I refuse to believe that any of these ideas are true. Alexander helped to pull me out of the despair I had been in, but he couldn't also be the one to push me back in. 

   I refuse to believe it.