The water started to wash away the salt from sweat and tears, along with the dust that had begun to mix with it. I breathed in deeply and did my best to release the lingering tension I felt. I told myself it was going to be okay, I’m doing the right thing. I thought about creating some excuse for us to go out to dinner tonight, but I knew it wouldn’t be easy to convince them at the last minute. I rinsed off the soap and shampoo, imagining I could somehow leave my doubts behind circling the drain before finally falling down into the terrifying Los Angeles sewage system. I stepped out of the shower and kneaded the bathroom rug with my feet as I dried myself off with a fresh white towel. I hung the towel and walked into the bedroom. I dressed in jeans and a t-shirt, and lay down on the bed. I looked up at the linen white ceiling and stared at the small bumps, ridges, and ravines that made up the texture of it. Since this house was the product of years of my mother in law’s considerations, obsessions, and moods I was certain there was a reason for this specific texture. For the most part it looked like any other ceiling, but at various family occasions during the years that Lauren’s mother, Elaine was alive, I would ask her about a particular nook or corner’s purpose or why the garden had been placed immediately upon the backdoor of the house. She would say, “Jonathan, I can’t just explain why there is a triangular corner behind the guest’s bathroom door. That decision is tied to everything else in this house. If you really are interested I can explain, but it has to do with the stairway and the particular steps I chose. I had also intended to have a fireplace, and the chimney would have needed a way to reach the roof, so it was designed to pass through that portion of the wall and lend the hallway character. I don’t like blank hallways and it seemed too much of an invasion of my privacy to put a large window at the end of the hall. You look bored! See? I told you that it was tied to everything else, and I haven’t even gotten started.” Usually around then someone would change the subject or Lauren would pull me away to help with the preparation of our meal. Despite the many holidays we shared in this home, before it was inherited and after, while Elaine was still alive but not healthy enough to live on her own and feeling like she was wasting the potential of her masterpiece, I still do not feel like I have any clear idea of why our home was made the way it was. It is a yellow-orange color, with a wavy chocolate fairytale of a roof, the floors are maple which has been well-maintained, and it has two stories. As a boy I had a fleeting interest in architecture, but remembered hardly enough to be able to identify who inspired her to make this home, or if there even was anything quite like it. It was a comfortable and Anna’s school friends loved it, calling it a gingerbread house. When guests visited they inevitably made some sort of comment, but at times their eyelids tightened and a cringe might flash momentarily betraying their judgment that the house was too playful or modern. I heard the sound of tires in the driveway and the familiar sound of Anne slamming the car door and running to our front door along the stone walkway, but then being called back to bring her violin inside too. I rubbed my eyes and stood up, just as Lauren opened the door and said, “We’re home!”
“Mommy since I played so well today can I have extra dessert? Please?”
“We will see. If you do the rest of your homework while Daddy and I make dinner, maybe you’ll have an extra scoop of ice cream.”
I walked downstairs and Anne ran to me, setting her violin case down carefully before wrapping her arms around me. “Dad! I played Adagio all of the way through. Even the hard parts!”
“Good for you. Go do your homework and we’ll talk about it at dinner,” I said.
Anne went upstairs to her room; I stood in the entryway looking at Lauren already at work in the kitchen. The kitchen had chessboard marble tiles, and very white cabinets accompanied by soft blue walls. The rapturous feeling of young love had been replaced by a calm, comfortable knowledge and trust in her, with spikes of intermittent desire. I was still in love with her, and she looked just as attractive as when we first met years ago when I was playing pool in a bar here in LA. She was wearing somewhat tight jeans that showed off her long legs and a black sweater of soft fabric of an origin unbeknownst to me. She was a tall woman with dark hair, and blue eyes that sparkled with intelligence and occasionally hurt.
She turned her head over her shoulder and said, “You going to help or stand in the hall?”
I walked over and kissed her cursorily and started to cut some vegetables for the salad. “How was your day?”
“It was good. She really is getting much better. What about yours, Jon?”
“Went for a run up at the canyon after work and then you guys came home, remember that house up there? The Spanish villa we wanted to own?”
“Of course. How could I forget, you said that if we ever lived there I would have to dress up as some sort of heroine. It’s far too big for us though, out of necessity with that kind of space we would have to have ten other kids.”
I stopped and turned to her doing my best to smile, “I was thinking about those walks we used to take up there.”
“Feeling nostalgic about me already, huh? I’m still here we can go for a walk this weekend.” She said as she walked over to me and nuzzled against my shoulder.
I didn’t reply at first and savored the slightly nutty but sweet smell of her skin. She smelled like her coconut moisturizer and the aroma that was distinctly hers. I have revisited this memory many times and I can’t wholly trust that I haven’t embellished or idealized portions of it, but truly throughout my life with Lauren I was happy with her.
“You sure you’re okay?”
“Yeah,” I said.
We finished preparing dinner, fusilli with meatballs and salad. I had worked as a line chef through college and she was something of a gourmet, we worked well together in the kitchen, she generally chose the menu and I helped prepare the food.
“Anne, come down and set the table for dinner. Before it gets cold!” I called from downstairs.
She rushed downstairs and began to set the table, I was told that she was still young enough to look forward to eating with us, but I also liked to think that it was a product of the functional family we had created. I sat at the head of the table, with Lauren to my right and Anne to the left. We passed the bread and salad around the table, asking politely for butter or dressing, and enjoyed a peaceful meal. I imagined what this scene would look like without me here. Would they sit alone together at the table, or would I be stealing even this simple ritual from them as well? Picturing the world without me in it was very difficult to do. Some nights I wasn’t home in time for dinner, work ran late, or I had some event to attend that I spared my family from, so I’m sure Anne and Lauren had a routine for when I was gone, I just had no way of knowing it what it was. Plus, that was different from dining alone together indefinitely. I sat and made routine conversation about Anne’s day in school, her violin lesson, Lauren’s day at work teaching, and my run.
At the mention of running Anne chimed in, “Daddy, you aren’t too tired to take Marlowe on a walk are you? I’ll even come with you too.” Marlowe was our golden Labrador that I had bought Anne two years ago for her birthday. He was energetic and as he had gotten older better behaved. I had replaced several pairs of shoes of Lauren’s in an attempt to conceal his puppy mischief since she wasn’t much for dogs, but I had failed to find a suitable replacement for the last pair and had had to confess. She wasn’t vain or terribly attached to shoes, but she didn’t like being inconvenienced and I had bought the dog without consulting her—so accordingly I did most of the dog-walking, but after she grew used to the idea I began catching her playing with him and quickly stopping when she noticed I was watching. So in the beginning, Anne and I did most of the walking, and I think this was time that she enjoyed spending with me. Dogs are an excellent way of being alone with someone without feeling alone. Instead of reminiscing about my family I should have been paying attention to them and carefully remembering that last dinner, but instead I went off deep in thoughts of what could have been, and what was, precious days that had been spent in familial bliss, and felt pride in my success doing what my family never could do; being a family. They deserved a fate better than being my accomplishment.
Lauren and I cleared the table, saving what was leftover for next day’s lunches. Anne helped by loading some of the dishes into the dishwasher and getting Marlowe excited.
“Daddy! Marlowe is ready to walk, let’s go.”
“Annie, we don’t run things on Marlowe’s schedule. If you do that you’ll have an impossible to handle dog, remember?”
“Daddy let’s just go walk and not talk about schedules, they’re borrring.”
I grabbed the leash from on top of the refrigerator and put it on the already jumping Marlowe. Anne started for the door, and we began our walk down the street on that hot autumn evening. Our particular stretch of Highland Ave. isn’t as busy as the rest of the street, but it isn’t an ideal dog-walking street, after a block or so, not that this unplanned city really has many blocks, the street merges with La Brea, a much busier, wider street populated by stores, gas-stations, and food chains that are uninviting and seem unlikely to attract any buyers, the quality of the neighborhood sharply drops off further down La Brea, so Anne and I took a left and walked down a quieter side street.
Marlowe could probably walk the route himself by memory. I handed Anne the leash and watched to make sure she wasn’t pulled around by our dog. She had dark shoulder length hair like her mother, that would likely be chopped off soon as she started to rebel against us. Despite my certainty that I was her father, she looked like a younger version of Lauren, with large green eyes that could focus for impossibly long or frustratingly short periods of time depending on Anne’s moods. She was wearing a summer dress, pink with flower imprints, and quite small black shoes. As was our habit we didn’t speak much during the walk, just enjoyed each other’s company and watched Marlowe strain against the leash for one last whiff of whatever imperceptible scent had caught his attention.
I didn’t have anything I could say. As a child my father burdened me with his confessions and that was the last thing I would do to my daughter. She had a mischievous side but was still completely innocent, her jokes were non sequiturs or predictable punch-line jokes she had heard, she could be stubborn but I saw no sign in her of my selfishness, or tendency to lie. Of course until that next morning, she really had no reason to be anything but our perfect little daughter, and here I was, quietly walking her dog with her before hurting her in a way it would take her years to even understand. These unseen wounds would linger on within her, unnoticed, or aggravated, like an undetected cancer which she would someday have to acknowledge or be destroyed by, that was the gift I was giving her. I hoped that I would be able somehow to write her after I left, and to explain things when they became clear to me. I wanted to spare her the confusion and hurt that may be inevitable parts of becoming a grown-up, but even as I reached out to touch her soft, relaxed hand and hold it, I knew there was nothing I could do to shelter her from the reality outside of our gingerbread home, that would be further encroaching upon her life as she grew older, inevitably suffering a thousand minor disappointments and heartbreaks, all without me to comfort her.
“Dad… Thanks for taking me and Marlowe on a walk.” She smiled eagerly at me, already trying to cheer me up without acknowledging that I was somewhere far away.
“Thank you for coming.” I squeezed her small hand that I was still grasping.
“Why can’t you see stars here? When we were at Joshua Tree we could see way more stars. I miss them.”
“The city lights are too bright, so we can’t see all of the way to the stars.”
“Can we go back sometime?”
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