Amaranth
By
Kassandra Alvarado
Copyright 2014
A mirror reflects my empty expression
If I am filled with sadness, won’t you stay with me?
Under a starry sky, the waxing moon illuminates your face
Are you alone in the darkness…wait for me.
- Original composition by author ©2007
I was in my sixth year when my maternal grandfather died. He had never approved of mother marrying a foreigner even one as prosperous as my father had been. Still, he had been deathly ill for some time and the remainder of the family had gathered at the old family estate of Stonebridge for the last time. I was there in a bright red pinafore, crisp white stockings; neatly polished black patent kid shoes. I had ribbons in my hair.
Mother held my hand tightly, her voice high-pitched. Her voice was only pitched high when she was nervous. “Now, don’t stare,” she chided sternly. “Papa’s been like this for as long as I remember. You’re his granddaughter, Susie, remember that.”
“But, mummy -”
The rooms nearing the old man’s inner sanctum had begun to smell of liniments, poppies. My nose prickled; the smell distasteful, choking. Mother pulled me resisting through one set of doors into a dimmed large room full of old paintings. The light was diffuse, scattered over the shriveled form lying beneath ivory rugs.
“Papa,” mother called softly.
The form stirred.
She gave me a light push toward the edge of the bed where it rose below my chin.
“Who?” The creaking, groaning old voice full of bellows and hollows of age rolled over me. I trembled in my new shoes, courage failing.
“Susan’s here.”
“I know that name,” said the voice, its owner stirring with great effort.
“You should,” mother said, staying at a respectful distance. “I’ve been writing to you about her for years. I thought you should finally meet her.”
A hand appeared first, gnarled, spotted with dark liver spots. Transfixed, I watched the cuff of striped cotton recede over a bony wrist followed by a sunken shoulder and at last a face curiously carved of all human features peered down at me. The face with its thinning silver hair and thin brows over dark intelligent eyes stared back at me from folds of flesh gathered together as if a giant had scooped away all discernible human characteristics leaving only the sockets of those burning eyes behind.
“Susana?” The apparition choked on the name my mother had given me at birth. The name which had seemed so comforting to my six year old ears suddenly seemed monstrous when spoken by the withered, wizened old man. That man who stretched that claw-like hand out to clasp my face -
“You came for me.”
I screamed, falling back. Mother rushed to grab my shoulders, to propel me forward.
For an instant, for a single moment of sheer panic overcoming my rational big girl self, I thought I saw something else in the old man’s eyes. Pain so vast, the oceans could never drown it within the depths.
When I was suitably brought around from unreasoning terror hours later, we were told he had passed without another sigh.
***
When I was thirty-six, I returned there. The previous heirs had squandered the fortune. Nothing was left but a few trappings of elegance, the sunken gardens in the back with trailing weeds choking Grecian pools. I was working freelance, with a company hired out by mortgage-holding banks. We were sent out to clean abandoned houses, bring them back from dilapidated states ready for the market.
I hadn’t remembered the address for many years. Vaguely surprised that memory stirred as the van rattled up the cobbled driveway. I leaned my head out, sunlight dazzling my eyes through the thick shrouded trees. For an instant I was six years old again in mother’s car. Father had recently passed in a boating accident; mother had been left penniless.
But, that was before.
“I’ve been here,” I said hollowly, first from the vehicle. Snatches of colors, faces came back. Voices, sounds, smells. The porch step creaked under my worn tennis shoes. I had the dull silver keys in my pocket; they’d given them to me in the office. I rubbed my thumb over the key to the door that opened into a once-grand foyer. The sweeping stairs, carved balustrade, gilt paintings…and a darkened room from childhood. The crew gathered behind me, solemnly wondering over my lack of garrulousness.
This was different, I wanted to say.
I wanted to be alone, away from prying eyes.
I wanted to know why that feeling persisted deep down that I had been here many times. Many years ago. Not once on a forgotten Sunday when the bells rang for the death of one of the church’s most giving members.
“Susie?” Alma said hesitantly.
Susana, the wind seemed to call.
I shrugged off the feeling that lay heavily over my heart and turned the key in the lock.
“I’ve been here before.” I said again hollowly.
Once.
No…many times.
My head doesn’t know which one is the truth. I feel as though I’ve forgotten something.
“Susana…,”
I stepped inside through the dust and webs of long-dead spiders.
Through the faded grandeur into a parlor of sagging velvet and trailing dust-covers; Alma lingered at a small table lifting a frame from the multitude. “Hey, he was handsome.”
I wandered from the fireplace to where she stood, studying the face through the grime.
“He is.”
Was.
I felt strange with such an admission.
“Who was he?” Alma didn’t seem to notice my slip.
“My grandfather.”
We walked around the room, she and I; the family photos were abundant in antiquated frames, hidden in dark corners. The photos stopped after a family barbecue celebrating the engagement of my grandparents. Looking upon the photo on the mantle, I lifted my hand, dashing the frame against the hearth. The glass shattered in a starburst pattern at our feet.
“What’s wrong with you?” Alma asked, shocked.
“I don’t know. Isn’t it strange? I haven’t seemed to have felt myself since we came here,” I made light of it, forcing a smile. “I hardly knew them to tell the truth. My grandparents never approved of my father and by the time I came along only one of them was still alive.”
She nodded, half-convinced. “It was him, right? Your grandpa?”
“Yes, I met him the same day he died.” I felt like talking if only to stop the strange buzzing in my head. “He was wounded in World War I. Shrapnel carved half his face away. The doctors said he was lucky to have made it. He married my grandmother and became a recluse here at Stonebridge after the armistice.” I had pieced together bits and pieces of the story through faded newspaper clippings, old photographs taken in field hospitals. Among the box sent with my mother to our flat in Piccadilly, were old medical records thought to be useless but otherwise a last memento of a man who had aged well before his time.
“They called it neurasthenia when he returned. It was a fancy term for a nervous breakdown.”
“Gosh, I never knew. Does it bother you? That this…and this…is all that remains of your family’s house?”
I shrugged wandering through the doors. A cool breeze rustled dying roses bordering the edges of the crumbling stone walk. “It all happened before I was born…the tragedy I mean.”
Alma glanced around, waving at one of our guys. They were spreading out through the thick underbrush of the grounds, discussing tree-hauling services. I plucked the deadened end of a Honeysuckle bush, lifting the broken twig to my nose. It still smelt of fragrant sweetness.
“There was someone else here once. A woman with a smile as beautiful as the wild ro
ses and as effervescent as the bubbles of fine champagne, she was a newcomer from Scotland. I was never able to find out her name from grandmother’s diaries.”
Alma studied me critically, “what’re you talking about?” She moved closer, placing her hand on my brow. “Are you sure you’re feeling alright?”
“Perfectly. I was only thinking of the past, that’s all.”
“Hmm, sure.” She clapped my shoulder gruffly, “let’s get to work on those piled up newspapers in the hall. You’ll feel better getting some work done. This place needs a lot of it.”
Somewhat reluctantly, I let myself be led away from the cool shadows of the garden fringes. From the darkness lingering on the edges of my vision. We set to work on the yellowed paper, broom and dustpan in hand we combated spider’s web and neglect. It was midafternoon when Alma set down the thermos of cold tea on the floor beside her hip and leaned back. “So what happened then? Between your grandparents and that woman?”
I thought she had forgotten, but my memory was as sharp and clear as ever. “They say my grandfather lost his heart on a summer evening. War had broken out. He was to enlist as an officer in the Royal Flying Corps. He intended on breaking the engagement to my grandmother…she had come between them, the woman his family had always meant for him to marry. Trapped between duty and the heart, I suppose the romantic side of me wonders what it would’ve been like had their lives been different?”
My throat unexpectedly showed weakness, closing up. I suppressed the urge to cry, averting my face to the fading sunlight of the window. “She had promised to wait for him despite the open scandal in the small village. The one we passed on the drive over. She promised to wait on pain of death and even after…,” the words wouldn’t come. I lapsed into a pained silence, recognizing the faint scent of honeysuckle filling the room.
“What happened to her?”
“No one knows. She disappeared one day, no one saw her again.”
Alma sipped tea then looked to me. “We should start packing up. It’ll be dark soon.”
“Okay.”
The rest of the crew had done better than our feeble attempts. I blamed myself for laxity. It was this place there was something about it that disturbed my peace. Stonebridge made me want to remember things…, things I shouldn’t know. Memories I couldn’t possibly have. We had nearly finished when I remembered leaving my sweater in one of the rooms on the ground floor.
“I’ll be right back,” I called, hurrying back toward the house.
Alma started after me, but couldn’t find any reason to follow. I was glad of that. I wanted to be alone once more in the house of my forefathers. In the house where he had lived. I hadn’t wanted to admit to any living soul I had been possessed by the memory of my grandfather as he had been, not what he had become. I had delved deep into family records in my twenties, finding him to be far from the romantic picture perpetrated by my northern relatives. He was a solitary man, someone with his whole life ahead of him when the effects of the war and something far worse devastated his steady constitution.
Love.
Lost.
As I retraced my steps through the house, I felt a part of the fabric of history woven by my ancestors.
I wasn’t Susan any-more; I was Susie walking through the knot of mourners. Led by the hand of another, clad in my bright crimson, with ribbons in my hair; it felt an outing to church.
I was wide-eyed, unafraid now, entering that room at the end of the hallway.
“Grandfather?”
I only saw the tall figure striding from the room through the doors that opened onto the veranda.
“Wait-!”
I ran after the figure of the man, my child’s legs propelled me forward through the doors.
I was farther back to the distant reaches of memory, I was Susana.
Susana dropping the telegram that had been sent to her and her alone. Devastation became mine, plummeting her heart and mine into the blackest abysses of despair. I relived it all in a searing flash as I streaked past the startled eyes of the crew.
“Susie!” Alma shouted after me, “Susie!”
They didn’t see or feel as I did. Feel the coldness of the water sinking around my legs, entangling my diaphanous skirts. They didn’t know how I was falling into the depths willingly, shattered by a simple message stated in the impersonal style of a telegram sent to her door. He had been killed in action, the knowledge filled me.
“Susana.”
Through the undergrowth I crashed, into wood and stone where the shadows grew thick and deep…welcoming me with a familiar icy embrace. Into the coldness and wet where the reeds sheltered ourselves forever from prying eyes.
“…in this life…or the next.”
- Finis
AN: Written while I was sick in bed and inspired by my WWI class, special thanks to Lead Educator Annika Mombauer!