Beginning's End

By Madeline McDowell

The grey sky hung oppressively low as I merged towards the off-ramp. The rhythmic clicking of the blinker kept beat above the soft hum of Christmas music while the SUV next to me and I negotiated, rather heatedly, the terms of my merger. With a rev of his engine and a single finger salute, my sparring partner was gone; sped off ahead and disappeared into the torrent of taillights continuing down the highway. This left me just enough room to take the ramp before ploughing head first into those orange garbage cans.  

   The ramp climbed slightly uphill and deposited me onto one of the several main-streets that funnel traffic towards the downtown shops, my destination. It was a wide road, four lanes, though it had not always been so. Before this town grew, or rather gentrified, this was a quiet two-way lane lined with picturesque houses, set back with respectable front lawns. Though after a fierce eminent domain battle, the houses now sat only feet from the road. Once idyllic and serene, now gloomy, spattered with mud and stained by car exhaust. Some of the residents tried to maintain what was left of their lawns, if you can call them lawns. Though it made for a comical sight, to see Santa and his eight reindeer crammed, what must have been uncomfortably close into a space the size of your car, or watch as an old man tried desperately to turn his push-mower while pinned against his house. These sights ultimately evoked more pangs of pity and depression. A lifetime of watching the places and people I love being compelled to change because of "progress." The efforts of those who hung on were a valiant act, though the reality of their inevitable defeat was too depressing to watch. It had only served to harden my spirit. It's why I left. It's why I had not seen my father in years. Not since mom died, and I didn't stick around long after the funeral then either. 

   The deep grey of the afternoon blanketed the world in a somberness that mirrored my mood. The slush squished under the tires of the cars as the slow procession of consumers wormed their way from stoplight to stoplight. Small mounds of dirty snow lined the road, giving way only to driveways and cross streets. Foot traffic along the sidewalk increased as I got closer to my destination. The old bespeckled houses gave way to newer constructions, multilevel modern apartment buildings. Each was painted a bold deep red or green or yellow, in keeping with the classic rustic "Mediterranean" aesthetic of most New England towns.   I turned right down the main avenue, a large two-lane road separated by a median. The median consisted of a center walkway flanked on each side by systemically spaced trees, unnatural in their uniformity. The afternoon was becoming late enough for the Christmas lights, strung fastidiously from each decorative lamp to become discernible against the sun's dying light. The walkway was abound with people. Happy manicured families snaked their ways through masses of identical copies, determined to enjoy their day while dragging two bored and tried children to the next store on the list. Adding to their enjoyment was the always exciting challenge of avoiding eye contact with the resident indigents and locals reduced to begging. As I gazed over the masses of people, I could have sworn there was a Patagonia Active-wear convention in town. 

   It was Black Friday. I didn't know what else I expected. This town had become a sort of Mecca for out of state bargain hunters ever since the outlets started moving in. It was dumb of me to wait until the last day, but the real estate company needed me to do a final walkthrough of my father's shop, the last of his affairs, before the Eddie Bauer outlet begins renovations in the morning. Arriving out front, I waited impatiently while a woman in a white Volvo SUV, that was much too large for her, negotiated the reversing out of the narrow slip of spot clearly marked "compact." Thus unmoored and with a final unexpected break check she was gone and I pulled in. 

   There it was, my father's shop or deli or grocery or whatever it was now, standing before me. Looming in a way. I felt as if my father stood before me, staring in his cold accusatory way. Shame overtook me, I was ten years old again and caught red-handed throwing rocks in my neighbor's pool. But this was a different shame, a deeper shame of forgetting. For forgetting my family, for forgetting my home, and for forgetting my history. But who could blame me? The dilapidated building in front of me stood out as a testament to what clinging to the past does in our age of progress. 

   The white one-floor wooden structure was one of the few relics of a past being quickly forgotten. To its right was a Starbucks situated on the ground floor of a recently constructed luxury apartment building. To its left stood one of the only other original structures of the downtown area. A beautiful two-story Victorian also painted white, though a crisper and brighter white than that of the run down shack adjacent. The house had originally belonged to a doctor of note from around the turn of the twentieth century, so the historical society was sure to preserve it as the developers descended upon the town. The Victorian's current resident was a Ralph Lauren outlet. They lost their fight to alter the original structure but the city council was quick to approve all their waivers for "general maintenance." Just to knock down a couple interior walls, this opened the floor plan, replace the lighting and plumbing system to support a commercial property, and tear up and replace the original floors. No such effort for preservation was made for my father's shop. All that kept that there was determination, stubbornness, and tact at ignoring the reality around you. Reality had to hit me though. It was staring back at me through two lifeless picture windows. Raised off the ground a foot or two by the foundation, they reflected back at me the grey lifeless sky.  

   It had been over 10 years since I had last gazed upon the store front. The previous time lit brightly against a dark night by fluorescent lighting and abuzz with the energy of the worst sight of my parents I ever had. To this day, the image of my mother's silhouette through the glass door as she faded in my rearview is a frequent inhabitant of my most poignant nightmares. Had I’d only known that would be the last time I would see her alive. 

   I exited my vehicle and searched my pockets for change. A meter now stood at the head of a spot we had perked freely in my whole life. Waiting patiently for a uniform pod of shoppers to pass between the Starbucks and Ralph Lauren, I then trod across the wet sidewalk and up the two wooden steps that lead to the entrance. They creaked and bowed a bit as I climbed them. It really was a place out of time, this store. The sore-thumb of this up and coming community and a blight the Downtown Association would be happy to be rid of.   

   Glancing at my watch, I saw that I had about twenty minutes to wait before the realtor would arrive. Cupping my eyes, I pressed my face against the glass door. The cold briefly stinging my nose, until an exhale warmed the glass. It was hard to make a lot out. Though there also wasn't a lot to make out regardless. The movers had come through and cleared it out. Everything of my father's professional life now set collecting dust in a storage unit off Interstate-90. I reached down and pushed the door instinctively. The thud of the deadbolt indicating that, of course, it was locked. Wondering if the key I had still worked, I reached into my jacket pocket and withdrew a hefty wad of keys. If there was anything I was neurotic about it, it was keys. Never able to will myself into throwing one away I had, over the years, amassed quite a collection becoming known affectionately to some as "the warden". I even had a key for a bike lock that disappeared along with the bike it was supposed to be locking twelve years ago. 

   Flipping through my key ring, I found what I thought could be one. The thick heavy key slide smoothly into place with a light click, just like it had countless times before. With two full turns to the left, the deadbolt slid open as the door released its tension and swayed loosely on its hinge. As I pushed the door forward, the soft jingle of a bell that hung about the door instantly released a deluge of suppressed memories. In not more than a moment an entire lifetime was restored to me. That dark, empty space in front of me was full now with the specters of a life lost to eternity. The energy of my family still filled this space. Its subconscious essence permeating from the walls and countertops. Though it had been many years, I was home.  

   I glanced up at the bell, its brass still bright apart from the dust, and began to feel the warm embrace of a pleasant memory. I had hung that bell. Well, at least I had held the drill. Propped upon my father's shoulder, I must have been seven or eight, he held the hook in place while I screwed the screws. We were a good team when I was young.  

   I spent most of my afternoons and weekends playing, and then working in the few aisles that ran long-ways towards the back. My father always behind the counter. The sporadic chime of the bell throughout the day became a distinct emotional trigger. To this day the ring of a small bell, such as one on a hotel check-in desk or floor ding of an elevator, will evoke in me an anxiety directly connected to this bell. Shortly after putting it up, some time during the early 90s, I was introduced to "Stranger Danger." The bell became a harbinger of each potential kidnapper come to scout out a new victim. With its slightest utterance I was off like a bolt, my heart racing, retreating behind the safety of the counter and my dad's legs. I would, with the clandestine nature of a MI-6 agent, observe the potential predator through glass refrigerators that lined the long counter. This position afforded me quite the view. By this time, the fridges lay mostly bare, it being the waning days of the shop operating as a deli. The fridge lay bare save for a few cuts for the regulars that still clung to the past. They refused to go to the new Shop & Stop. It'll destroy main street, they said. Regardless, it came and main street inched closer to death. 

   I remembered one of these regulars. A boney, gaunt old woman with bright, white hair like sheep's wool. She would come in every Sunday and buy a quarter pound of honey ham, taping her boney digit against the glass as she'd point. She must have been 100 and, boy did she creep me out. My father was always extra nice to her though; coming out from around the counter to help her out to her car. No matter how busy it was, nobody ever seemed to mind.   My memory of her is short though. I only remember her for a few years when I was young. That boney finger leaving its subconscious damage. Then one Sunday, she didn't come. Like that she was gone. I would have forgotten her all together, I believe, except for her being a fixture of my father's opining about the way things were. Stocking the shelves or pricing items I, being in my early twenties and not long before I left, would zone-out as my father waxed on and on about the early days of the store. How he had brought these people meats they had never even heard of, or only read about in magazines. How every Christmas he would have a line out the door, down the street and around the corner. The line growing longer with each retelling. Then he would get quiet, look slowly around the store, and sigh. 

   "Look at this place," he'd say. More to himself for I was no longer listening. "Do you remember that old woman who'd come in when you were real young?" 

   "Uh huh," I would grunt instinctively.

"She lived around here for a long time. Since before the world wars. She remembered taking a horse drawn carriage into town. Can you believe that?" 

   I would nod periodically as to avoid aggravating him more than he usually was.   

   "She was my first customer, you know? That's her dollar above the register."   I came back to myself then. The present quickly replaced the past and I stood once again in the empty store. The memory of that first dollar is what brought me back. I took a few steps to my left and leaned over a belly-button high bar that ran the length of the shop. The bar had been where the fridges sat. Now gone, I pressed my hands against the worn wood as I leaned over. The frame that held the dollar was gone but where it had hung was a distinct outline of where it sat. For almost fifty years the wall behind it was saved the daily wear and tear. This resulted in a particularly clean, perfectly rectangular area of wall. He was so proud of it. I was too, when I was younger. That changed during my teen years. It started to embarrass me. I would say it made us look like immigrants; an idea I may have picked up in a movie somewhere.  

   He had always planned to give me the store. My mother and him would retire in town, my family and I running the shop. As a young child, this idea thrilled me. Spending my younger years here, playing shop keep with my hero, but as I grew and my ideas and aspirations changed, his did not.  

   We fought a lot near the end. Mostly about this very issue. It was what we were fighting about when I left. The last thing I wanted to be doing at twenty-four was running a failing business in a town becoming unrecognizable and too expensive to live in. So one night, I left and didn't look back. I figured I would get in touch with my parents again after I had established myself. After I had proven I could survive, to them and to myself. No one warns you when you're younger how much can change in ten years.  

   The jingle of the entrance bell woke me from this round of reminiscing. In the doorway stood a middle-aged woman clad in a puffy lime-green Patagonia jacket that reached down past her knees.  

   "Oh," she exclaimed, surprised, "Was the door unlocked?"    

   I briefly explained who I was and that I had had a key. She smiled and after a quick introduction, we began our walk-through. With each step, another piece of my forgotten past was returned to me. Lost in memories, I ignored the blather of the agent as we opened the closets and toured the back office.   

   Satisfied that I saw the building empty, the agent directed me back towards the low counter, “So, if you just sign here, we can get you your money as soon as Tuesday." 

   I signed the paper, which the agent placed back into her Trader Joe's bag. 

   "You really made out well. That's a lot of money for a place in this condition."   I smiled politely in feigned acknowledgment and I returned her pen. It is a lot money, I thought, but will it cover everything? 

   This place had come to mean so much more to my existence, to who I was in this world. Could any amount of money ever cover that? 

   "I guess the Polo people will have a lot of work to do," I joked somberly. 

   "It's Eddie Bauer and they are going to start demolition in the morning," she smiled back. 

   Thus resigned to fate, I slowly followed the agent out back into the early evening air. The sun was almost completely set. Crowds continued to pass, oblivious to the endless dramas that constantly play out around them. I shook the agent's hand and she went off. I took one last look at a lifetime being swallowed by time. Forever lost are the people and the stories that occupied that space for its allotted time. Yet as such is the march of time. 

   The bittersweet experience I had just had was a much needed catharsis though I was ready to go. I had spent enough time in this imposture wearing the name and street signs of my hometown. Though I did just make a good amount of money, and I could use a winter coat, oh, and a peppermint mocha would be great for the ride home...

 Goodbye, dad.