Painting Greys

I sank deeper into my aging office chair. I’ve been in this position for about an hour now, and I haven’t been able to move ever since. Or at least I think it’s an hour. Time means little to me, and most of the time, I can’t keep up with it.

I fought hard to look away, but I can’t stop staring at the rose bushes outside my office window.

There was something odd about them. Something unfamiliar. I knew why. I was too afraid to admit it. Too scared to tell someone. I don’t want them to think I am odd.

"Eden." A rough voice barked at me.

"Eden." It rang again, and this time it was more menacing.

I froze. I couldn't turn around to see her face, but I could picture how it must have looked. I was afraid to turn back and face it.

"Have you gone deaf, or have you forgotten your name?!"

One of those was true.

"I... I..." I stumbled on my words as I removed my gaze from the window and looked at the large, sweaty woman that stood before me. She reeked of cheap cigarettes and failure.

"Are you stoned at work?!" Roberta asked, her chin moving so vigorously it could break a table in half.

"No, I was just..."

"I've had it with you. This is your last warning. You've been messing up orders, and I've been getting calls..."

Her speech trailed off in my ears. I couldn't care less about her productivity tracker and pointless Excel sheets. Scented candles? Did you not have anything else to sell?

As she berated me like she always did, my mind jumped straight into an oncoming train of thoughts. I’ve been losing myself. My senses are starting to fool me, and I didn’t know what to believe anymore.

It’s been ten years since I lost him. Last week, I was cleaning the attic and found a box of his old things. I found his favorite red sweater. It felt new. He never wore it much because he was saving it for his birthday. That’s when I first noticed that colors in my world had started to fade.

I looked hard at the weave of the sweater, tried my very best to hold on to the fleeing red hues that disappeared faster than I could yell, “No!” Much like the memory of him wearing it, red started to disappear. It turned grey like a piece of paper caught on fire.

"...This is your last warning, Eden. Do not make me come to your desk again."

Roberta finally had her daily fill of yelling at me. She'd be back, but I’d be the same. Nothing would change.

Was it my fault? Everything usually is my fault. That’s how it goes. “Eden, you didn't do this.” “Eden, you forgot this.” “Eden, he is not the right man for you.” People always saw the mistakes, but I never could. Is that why God took him away from me? Is that why God is taking away the colors from my world? It wasn’t enough for God to take the person I loved the most—now he must take the meaning away from his creation. What is paradise without color?

The clock struck. It rang loud. It must be quitting time. Office chairs reeled away from desks. Troublesome Excel sheets froze in time till next time. Everyone seemed to be in a rush to get home. I, too, pretended that everything was normal. My fake smile had become a permanent decoration on my face. Sometimes I got fooled by it, too, and thought I was happy. Am I? Maybe not? I moseyed down a pavement, letting my feet go where they wanted to go.

I took the train card out of my wallet. It used to be orange. But now it’s grey and reads Port Washington Metro. The grey bled into my eyes and made them water. I remembered how excited he was to get on a train with me. Slurping orange popsicles at the pier. Watching pink, red, and orange clouds hug the horizon as the sun went down. He’d look at the orange hues of the sky, and his eyes would glint.

I’ve never felt such love in my life. I drifted far into that memory—his eyes, his playful curls, him. My world. My everything.

“Watch where you are going!” Another stranger barked at me.

I must have bumped into him. I wished I knew where I was going. I stuttered to say, “I am sorry,” but I ate my words halfway through. They wouldn’t hear it. Everyone is sorry. That’s what everyone told me.

I must have wandered too far and let my feet take me to his favorite place in the city. The newsstand by the park that sells tulips and sunflowers. The old lady behind the counter recognized me. She had aged. So had I.

“Some flowers for you today?”

I squinted my eyes and tried to smile so the levee behind my lower eyelid wouldn’t fail me.

“Yellow tulips are ten dollars a dozen today.” She persisted.

“Yellow? Those look grey to me. Those look fake to me! Those look ugly! Keep your filthy flowers! I don’t want them! I just want him!”

I wanted to scream at her. I wanted to yell until my throat bled. I wanted to smash those ugly grey flowers. Stomp on them until they were mush. But that’s not how he handled things. Full of love, like those sunflowers. Full of grace, like those tulips. But much like these flowers, he too is now grey.

I wondered where my feet would take me next. I felt a quickening in my step, yet I felt as if my soul pulled my body back. I think I am going to a place where I vowed not to go. But it was too late. I was already at the iron gates. They looked tall, ornate, and old. I wonder why they never shut these gates. What’s there to steal in a cemetery? Memories?

How many times must we say goodbye to people? Why do some people fade, and some of us stay behind and long for them? Mourn them. Wonder what could have been. Like this grass I am stepping on. When I was here for my father’s burial, it was verdant. So lush, full of life. Just like my father’s life. Lived to the fullest. But these blades have nothing left to be proud of.

Their essence is stripped. Maybe only for me. Maybe the groundskeeper steps in gleefully, in awe of his hard work. But for me, it's all grey. Matching those tombstones with faded names and grey moss and dust. One whole heap of grey. Much like my world. Much like how I feel in the core of my soul.

I walked to my son's grave.

A two-minute walk that lasted a decade. I felt older, weaker, and even more lonely. Over a grey carpet of grass, the bluebells that dotted around and near his grave had become thick with grey. They were weeping for my boy. And me? I could hear the coarse cry of those bluebells. Withering, screaming, and decaying like all of us. I thought of his blue eyes.

My memories bled into my eyes, and they streamed down to cradle my boy who was six feet below me. To hold him once more, to pick him up from school once more, to listen to the way he mispronounced words once more.

I sat by the little concrete border around his rest. I remembered how much he hated the baby-proofing fence.

“Indigo, it’s for your protection,” I’d try to be stern. But his playful blue eyes would twinkle, and I’d break character.

“Momma, come catch me.”

His face lost color, and his voice echoed hard in my head. It rattled the very edges of me. I could feel my skin come undone, and I unraveled so much so that my blood and sinew burned in the evening sky.

I laid the palms of my wrinkled hands on the grave of my son. I kept them where his head should be and lay next to him. The dusty, tattered violet soft toy I left years ago had seen better days. It was older than him. We bought it for him three months into the pregnancy. It, too, had started to turn grey.

I turned on my back and stared at the sky. The purple hues of the sunset slowly became grey. Everywhere I turned, the world was slowly becoming grey. I stared at the white clouds that roamed above me.

I wished rain would come down and drown me so I wouldn’t have to walk this colorless world by myself. I kept looking at the sky.

I kept wondering if he was up there and if we could have one last playdate. So I could catch him once more, so I could have one more train ride, one more popsicle, one more “Momma, come catch me.”

I closed my eyes and kept them shut. Grey, turned into black.