Eve

The lights were beautiful. Bright and colorful. Tiny fairy lights in purple and pink glimmered like shimmering pixies hovering in the dark, basking in the warm red and yellow glow of the paper lanterns strung about the crowded lawn. People mingled beneath them, joking, conversing, and feasting. The humid night air was filled with the sound of their cheer. It terrified the woman staring at what might have been a foreign world, body frozen, half in and half out of her car.

It was startling to her, this sight. The last party she had been to…she couldn’t remember. Even as she thought this, images rose to the surface of her mind, overlaying the present.

Her face ached from the effort it took to force her lips up for so long. She turned towards Richard’s boss, hoping the silent pleas she was repeating over and over again that nobody could see the sweat dripping down her neck and plastering her too-fancy, too-expensive, too-tight dress to her body were not splashed across her features. She felt stiff and awkward, a little girl playing dress-up, a chicken among elegant swans.

She swirled the wine in her long-stemmed glass around like she had seen people do on TV and sipped it. The unfamiliar flavor made her tongue curl up. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught Richard’s glare, knew she had not managed to hide her grimace of distaste.  

The woman shook her head as if the movement could shake the pictures right out of her head. That party had been nothing like this one, with its joyful, relaxed atmosphere. It had been a work party. And she had been…was…Mrs. Ruth. She had been the new Mrs. Richard Ruth, and she had needed to act like it. She had known that she absolutely could not embarrass him, not when the event was so important to him, to his career, to them. Because she had been Mrs. Evalyn Richard Ruth, part of a team, a unit, no longer just Evie.

She had failed then. Failed at her first task as a partner.

Richard never asked her to go to another professional event with him, and after Margaret, her first baby, had come there was never the time to go out just for fun. Richard might, he worked hard, deserved a bit of rest now and then. But not her. She was the stay-at-home mom. Her job was to tend to the house and kids, so at home she had stayed, doing her best to contribute.

A burst of laughter flooded the air, childish, sweet, tickling at her ears. Instinctively, a small smile crossed her face and her body moved as if of its own volition. The leg still in the car swung over the small lip, and she exited the vehicle fully and stood. She took the first step forward, drawn to the sound of children. She missed children. Missed her babies. They had not been her babies in so very long.

More laughter, little voices raised in glee, triggering another memory.

“Mom, mom! Look, a ladybug! Isn’t she pretty?”

Small hands outstretched, palms face up, a red circle on one.

“She is. But be careful, you don’t want to hurt her.”

Sudden dismay on that small, round face. Lips turned down. “Oh no, I don’t want to hurt her!”

Evalyn’s youngest child, her baby — no, not a baby anymore…her daughter had left to go to college across the country a week ago. Left to start her life. Left Evalyn behind, all alone, another hole in her heart.

She knew. She knew children had to grow up and seek their own, had always known. It didn’t hurt any less for the knowing. As she approached the party, a sudden wail followed by sobs hit her ears. Her heart immediately sped up.

“Mrs. Ruth, really, you are overreacting. You have no right —”

“I have every right! You’re the one who has no right, no right to treat my child like this!”

Evalyn faced down the principal, a tall, weedy man with thinning brown hair, a hawkish nose, and a pinched face. Strands of hair that had escaped her usually pristine bun were plastered to her sweaty face, cheeks burning with righteous indignation. Margaret clung to her, her face buried in her mother’s side as she struggled desperately to muffle her sobs. 

“Mrs. Ruth,” the man snapped, “We have a strict no-tolerance policy at this school. Your daughter was involved in a fight, and thus we have no choice —”

“No choice?” Evalyn interrupted, hand tightening on her purse strap. “No choice but to be unfair? No choice but to punish an innocent girl for defending herself? My daughter was verbally and physically assaulted by another, older, bigger girl!”

“And she chose to strike back instead of turning the other cheek or alerting a teacher —”

“She’s been turning the cheek for months! And tell the teachers? What teachers? The ones that stood by and watched and did nothing as she was bullied week after week? Those teachers?”

The principal’s face reddened. His mouth opened, no doubt to spew out an outraged response, but she refused to allow him to.

“Margaret told the teachers. She told her homeroom teacher and every other teacher she could think of, again and again. She told the counselor. She told the vice-principal. You know she did. She told you. And every single one of you has Done. Absolutely. Nothing.”

The color of the principal’s face deepened to a dark plum and discomfort crossed his features.

He cleared his throat and continued, “There were conflicting accounts. The other student claimed that it was harmless playing.”

             “Shoving a girl into the wall is not playing, Mr. Denton. Stealing her lunch and throwing it into the trash is not playing. Calling her names and encouraging other girls to call her names until she has a panic attack is not playing.”

“Well, the other girl has denied that things ever escalated that far.”

Of course she had. And being the daughter of the superintendent, nobody had doubted her word, Evalyn thought bitterly. And none of the teachers who highly favored the outgoing, vivacious girl and had witnessed the teasing and other bullying cared enough to do anything to stop their pet from bullying a shy, awkward girl who would rather hide her nose in a book than socialize. They certainly weren’t going to confess to being passive watchers now — no, they had to protect their own skins.

“She admits to harmless teasing, but says it was all in fun. Perhaps your daughter is exaggerating or being overly sensitive.”

Shaking. The world was shaking. Was it an earthquake? A tremor? No, Evalyn realized, it was her. She was the one shaking, shaking with pure rage.

“Are you calling my daughter a liar?”

“Perhaps Margaret wanted to stir up a little drama. Is that it, Margaret?”

Evalyn’s nostrils flared. The principal started, and she knew whatever she looked like now, it was not a pretty sight. She could not bring herself to care.

“You do not address my daughter while I am talking to you. You talk to me,” she gritted out between tightly clenched teeth as she felt Margaret’s trembling increase.

“Mrs. Ruth, Margaret needs to speak for herself —”

Something snapped inside of her. It snapped so sharply it was almost audible. “Margaret is six. She is a six-year-old little girl who has been harassed and pushed around for months while the adults who are supposed to protect and care for her stood by and let it happen. And you will not speak directly to her while I, her mother, am here. You will speak. To. Me.”

He looked at her. Cleared his throat again.

“Very well, Mrs. Ruth, I accede to your request.” He sounded as if he were granting her a great favor. “As I was saying, perhaps Margaret overreacted or perceived the situation incorrectly. Little girls do tend to do so. And the other children all say that it was not as serious as she says.”

 As quiet as Margaret was, she didn’t have many friends. Certainly not as many as her more popular tormentor, who was already developing into a mini queen bee and wielded such influence that even those not aligned with her would not speak out because of fear. It was strange thinking of little girls in such terms, but it was an accurate estimate of the situation and one that only deepened Evalyn’s anger.

Evalyn sucked in a deep breath, trying to force down her temper. She knew she must appear deranged, that she was possibly hurting her daughter’s case more. But the injustice of it all burned deep in her chest, a bitter fire that only grew hotter as she felt Margaret’s little body shudder so hard against her.

             “You caught her bullying Margaret today.”

“Several students and teachers witnessed both girls fighting, Mrs. Ruth. And who started the fight remains a question, though it doesn’t matter. Both will be suspended. And you really have no right to interfere in our school’s execution of its policies —"

At this all of the rage she had just managed to somewhat subdue erupted.

“I am Margaret’s mother! I have every right as her mother to see to her wellbeing, and you will not stop me from doing my job!”

Evalyn crossed from sidewalk to grass, about to go help up the small girl a boy had just pushed down, but another adult made it there before her, and she stopped, unsure now what to do.

A woman with ash-blond hair lopped into a chin-length bob, a few wrinkles the only sign that she was around Evalyn’s age, was heading her way, and she automatically lifted a hand in greeting.

Richard had been so angry with her, telling her she had acted like a madwoman and he was absolutely mortified to be associated with her. But Margaret had not been suspended.

             “Thank you, Mommy. You’re my hero. I love you Mommy.”

Holding her baby in her lap that night, seeing the adoration and unconditional love in her gaze, Evalyn had not felt like a hero. She had felt embarrassed, grateful her daughter was still young enough not to realize her beloved mother had goofed and acted like a crazy, unreasonable person, relieved that the principal had caved, alternately secretly defiant towards Richard and his disapproval and ashamed of behaving that way in front of her child, but like a hero? No, she had not felt like a hero. She had, after all, only been doing her job. Her job as a mother, Margaret’s mother. Margaret was gone now, along with the rest of Evalyn’s babies, all moved out with lives of their own. They didn’t need her anymore.

What do mothers do when there’s no one left to mother? Are they still mothers?

The thoughts popped into her head. Lingered.

“Evalyn! It is so wonderful to see you!” Lisa hugged her. The happiness in her bright blue eyes dimmed a little as sympathy edged in. “How are you doing?”

Unexpected tears burned at the corners of Evalyn’s eyes, caught her off guard. It was just such a surprise after the last couple of years to hear someone express concern about her. She was the strong one. She took care of Richard and the kids, worried about them. People didn’t worry about her. And mingled with that shock was the realization that “was” should be “had been” and the grief that had yet to subside. At that moment she could not see how it ever could.

“Damn it Evalyn! Can’t you do anything right?”

It hurt. It hurt to see her Richard like this. Face gaunt, hollows like gaping caverns of shadow swallowing up his cheeks and sagging beneath eyes shot through with red, impotent rage, and hopelessness. Clothes hanging limply off once broad shoulders. It hurt a lot more than the words she had long grown used to.

“Evalyn?”

She shook her head as the tentative word sliced through the memory.

“I’m fine Lisa.” It was a lie. They both knew it, but her friend did not call her out on it, only slipped a hand through the crook of her elbow and began to tug her in the direction of a table laden with picnic food.

Evalyn was not fine. She had not been fine since that call from the doctor confirming their worst fears, the one that had ended in Richard savagely throwing the phone against the wall then bursting into tears, head in her lap as he mourned the lost future.

“I’m glad you came,” Lisa said. “You haven’t been out of the house in so long. You need this.”

Again, the burning in her eyes, the tears she refused to let fall. She couldn’t. She wasn’t sure she could anymore. She had been strong for so long that she didn’t know how not to be. She was…had been, had had to be, the rock. The caretaker. The one everyone could lean on. She didn’t know what she was now. There was no one left to lean on her.

“He wouldn’t have liked to see you like this, sweetheart. You’re so thin and sad.”

Another clip of the past, the one that hurt the most. Because Lisa was right. Richard, in spite of his suffering and loss, had shown her in the end.

He looked so small, so weak lying crumpled up like a bag among the overwhelming sea of white sheets. His arms were like twigs, desiccated. His eyes peered back at her, clearer than they had been in a long time. Gentler.

“I’m sorry my sweet,” he whispered, even that effort visibly taxing him.

“Shhh. Don’t talk Richard. Save your strength.” Evalyn clutched his thin hand, wanting to squeeze it, as if doing so could hold him to life, but terrified she might crush the frail bones and paper-like skin.

“I love you. I’m so sorry, I…” A fit of coughing. “I haven’t showed it. But I do love you my sweet Evie. Remember that, I loved you to the end. My Evie.” His eyes fluttered shut on that last barely sighed out word.

He had passed away later that night, one minute there, the next…just gone. And she had died a little when he left. But there was also that little bit of relief and the guilt that accompanied it. It was over. But now she was adrift.

He had called her Evie though. He had not done that since their honeymoon. He had thought it too immature of a name for the wife of a lawyer. So, he had been Evalyn. Wife. Mother. Caretaker. Now she was…she didn’t know. There was no husband to support through his career and illness. No more children to raise. No one to take care of. And she was lost, bereft. Not anyone anymore.

He had called her Evie.

Lisa shoved a plate into her hand. Evalyn hadn’t even noticed when the other woman began to put food on it.

“I forgot to say,” Lisa went on, changing the subject, “Happy Birthday. It was last week, wasn’t it? I called, but you didn’t pick up. Totally understandable of course,” she hastily tacked on, the worry that she had messed up plain on her face.

“I’m sorry.” Evalyn forced herself to smile. “My phone broke.” She had smashed it against the coffee table. Again, and again, and again. Screaming wordlessly. Wishing the pain and the emptiness would go away. “Thank you.”

“The big four-oh, right? That’s a milestone.”

This startled a snicker and a genuine smile out of Evalyn. “Yes, a milestone marking my passage into old age.”

“Oh, come now, you’re hardly a doddering old woman. You’re forty! Everybody always talks about being forty like it signals the end of life. But I say it’s just the start of a new period. It’s your chance to do new things, be a different woman. You are officially in the next stage. Come on, there’s someone I want you to meet.”

The words stuck in Evalyn’s mind as Lisa steered her towards the porch and the woman waiting there.

             She could be a different woman. But how could she, when she didn’t even know who she was now?

My Evie.

She had met Richard a million years ago on a college campus. Back then she had been just Evie. She hadn’t quite known who she was yet, what she wanted, where she was going. But she had been on her way to finding the answers. She had thought she had at one point. Her life had been Richard and her kids. One was gone. The others didn’t need her anymore. And she found out that she didn’t have the answers after all.

“This is Mandy.” The woman Lisa introduced her to was tall, with a kind smile and soft brown eyes. “She runs a weekly knitting club. I remember you used to like knitting before…well, before. I thought you might like to join.”

She wasn’t Evalyn anymore, could not be. But she couldn’t go back to being young Evie.

My Evie.

She could never be Richard’s Evie again, that person was gone, fallen away with age and experience and struggle.

“Mandy, this is Evalyn Ruth.”

Mandy held out a hand. “It’s wonderful to meet you Evalyn. Lisa’s told me all about you and I’m excited to get to know you better.”

Evalyn took it. “Eve,” she said. She liked the sound of that. It was not too young. But it carried none of the weight of Evalyn.

“Pardon?”

She wasn’t Evalyn. She wasn’t Evie. But maybe, just maybe, she could figure out who Eve was.

“You can call me Eve.”