The Stars in the Pages

I lived in a small town on the countryside. It was one of those places where everybody knew everybody. Where people did not worry too much about forgetting to lock their front doors or set the alarm for their cars. To anyone else, this town is nothing but another spec on a map, a town that people passed to get to another, but to me it was so much more. It was my home, my life even.

“Your head is in the clouds again, Mira.” A soft voice whispered to me.

In front of me lies my mother. Her wrinkled golden-brown skin hung loose around her eyes and jawline. Her brown eyes, much like mine were always soft, even now as she looked up towards me from where she lay. My mother had grown sick recently, and different members of my family have taken their turns saying goodbye. All except me.

I smile down at her. She is resting in a small bed with at least three quilts tucked around her body, and two small pillows behind her head for support.

“I’m sorry.” I respond, laying my hand onto hers.

My eyes dart to a small chest that was tucked away in the far corner of the room, I raise an eyebrow and bring my gaze back to her.

“Go ahead and open it.” She says as her eyes glisten at the words. She lets go of my hand and tugs at the silver pendant around her neck—a gift from my late grandfather.

I push myself from the floral cushioned armchair and make my way to the chest. I grab one of the rusted handles and pull it along side the wooden bed that my mother lay in as I pretend not to feel her eyes following my every movement. With more force than I thought I would need; I open the chest.

Inside was an array of comics. Most from years prior to my own birth.

“There are so many...” My voice trails off as I shuffle through the comics. They were each encased in a thin plastic covering and looked new. 

My eyes find a date scribbled in blue ink on the corner of the comics, on all of them.

“It wasn’t supposed to become a collection.” My mother says, a small smile creeps upon her face as she closes her eyelids slowly, “But each year, I got more and more.”

“Why do you write the dates on them?” I ask, still shuffling through the comics.

She was silent for a few moments before finally speaking, “My father would buy me a comic each day there was something to celebrate.”

She opens her eyes again and looks towards me, and one of the comics I held now in my hand, “He gave me that one the day he was let off work.”

“Doesn’t seem like something you should celebrate about.” I mutter to myself.

My mother laughs, “It doesn’t, doesn’t it?”

I hold up another for her to see.

“The day I lost my first tooth.”

And another.

“When I got my first job.”

And another.

“When I got married.”

This went on for a while, for longer than I anticipated for it to. Shuffling through the chest in front of me felt as if I was traveling through time. There was such a warm, comforting sensation that radiated from my core into every part of my body as each comic was a new memory.

My eyes catch two comics, one with the date written in black ink and the other in red. I hold the one in black up to her first.

For the first time in my life, I watched the brightness that resided in my mother’s eyes grow somber as she eyed the comic in my hand.

“That was the day my father died.”

The room goes quiet as I place the comic back into the chest. Should I bother asking about the other one I found?

“That day, I had a big interview with a writing company,” she starts, “I had visited my parents that morning for breakfast when he gave it to me, saying that I ‘have it in the bag.’”

I place my hand on hers as she continues.

“I had gotten the job”, she says, “But later that evening my mother called saying my father had died in an accident at work.”

“Mom I—”

She holds her hand up to stop me, “Don’t apologize, mija.”

My eyes find the purple ink once again, and I hold it up towards my mother, “And this one?”

Her eyes dart to the comic and a smile breaks across her face, “I got that the day you were born.”

“But how?” I ask.

“A couple of weeks after my father passed, I found out I was pregnant with you.” She begins, “I was heartbroken, but I felt like I had something to live for again.”

I give her a soft smile.

“After giving birth to you, my mother handed me this comic, and said that my father had it stored away for the day I would have my own child, and continue what he started with me.”

“But?”

“I couldn’t do it.” She whispers, “And that’s something I regret to this day.”

I had not even noticed the tears running down my face, they fell silently onto the pink quilt below me.

I look down at the comics that were in my hands, which had grown quite heavy. In one hand I held life, and the other death. In the palm of my mortal hands, I held onto something more enchanting than I had ever before.

“Open that drawer for me.” My mother says softly, as she pointed to the wooden nightstand by her bed. I stand silently, and open the single drawer, inside was something small and rectangular shaped, with a thin blue bow tied around it.

I look to my mom who now has her eyes closed, “It’s for you,” she says, “And for all the memories I won’t be here to see.”

I nod and remove the bow and carefully unwrap the brown paper.

    Inside is one single comic, and a blue pen.

I look to my mom whose eyes were still closed and whose body had gone still. I hold one of her cold hands in my own and give her a tearful smile before calling out to her, part of me still hanging onto the hope that she would respond.

“Mom?” My voice cracks as my eyes swell with tears. My eyes find my new treasure as I sit in the armchair next to her.

I scribble today’s date on the bottom corner and look towards my mom.

“Tell grandpa I said hello.” I whisper before placing the comic into the chest with the others.

---------------------------------------------------------------

“Mom?”

I unclench my hands from the steering wheel in front of me. I am stopped at a red light, just a block away from Miller High School. My eyes focus on the young girl sitting in the passenger’s side of my car. My daughter.

Her light brown eyes meet mine and then to the comic that was in her hand.

“Why are you giving me this?” She asks.

I give her a smile, “Just hold onto it for a while.”

With a shrug, she shoves the comic into her backpack, and returns her attention to her phone.

As the light turns green, and I head off towards her school, I cannot help but feel the gazes of the two angels above me, that shared their love and life through simple sheets of colored paper. I eye her backpack once more, before giving my salute to time and to the many more comics that my daughter will see in her lifetime, each a new memory.