The Shattered Pieces We Call Memories

Leti let her eyes rake over the abandoned cabin. It had been awhile since she’d been there. Too long. She had meant to come back years ago, but whenever she packed, got in her car, she found herself turning back. 

There wasn’t much left in the old cabin in the woods. No wolves prowling the deep stretch of trees, no angry birds flapping their wings, shouting at Leti to feed them. What had once been a world of wilderness had changed, evolved. No trees, less nature, and more people. Leti had to drive through some residential areas that hadn’t been there before to get to the old cabin. There wasn’t anything there that ought to have scared her. Just memories, but perhaps those were more fatal afterall. 

If she closed her eyes, Leti could almost hear the faint calls of her little sister. They had played along the very space she stood in now, screaming and laughing like little girls do. Their little bubble held, most days. But every once in a while, Leti would see a glimpse of the other side. The place outside of her bubble. 

Those were the days when her father couldn’t get out of bed, when it seemed like a dark cloud would cloak his every move. But on all the other days, all she knew was happiness. She, her sister, and her father were content to jump around in the snowdrifts, chanting children’s songs and making hot chicken soup. 

Leti had dreamed about getting out of the cabin, of course. Her father had ferried her out, along with her little sister, Daniella, only a few days after her mother had died. He wanted to escape the grief, although Leti often wondered if he succeeded. Those days where he was barely lucid, where all he could say was the mumbled name of a woman Leti had barely known, she wondered if he had really outran his memories. Leti didn’t know, then, didn’t understand, about how memories haunted a person. How they broke that person apart until they were all but a husk of their former self. She would know, as she got older. 

Memories are the sharpest things, even worse than knives. They dive into you, splintering into a million pieces until you can barely talk without hearing their horrid echo. They dig out your heart, hollowing out a piece in your soul that can never be replaced. Grief, horrible as it is, goes away. It diminishes until it’s just a speck of pain maring your scorched heart. But memories, however, never leave. They hound you until you have to fully transform to escape them. 

That’s what Leti had done. She had shed the skin she had loved and worn, even as a child, and built up her new persona brick by brick. She was someone else, now.

 Nearly twenty years had passed since it had happened. Since her little sister had plunged into the lake, never to be seen again. Leti still refused to use pools, or even a bathtub. She wouldn’t let herself be lost, like Danny had. Leti, now twenty eight, could still remember the day it had happened. 

The other memories of her little sister had faded with time, although they never fully left. Every once in a while, during a random little moment, Danny’s giggle, or the way she toddled in her father’s shoes, would slam into Leti like a truck. But most days, the memories were dim enough to be ignored. But that one day had never dimmed. If memories had a light, this one would be a beacon. Calling Leti home, to the one place she had ever been truly happy. The place where she had lost the only family worth keeping. 

Leti walked to the steps of the cabin. Even after all these years, nobody had lived in the cabin except her ailing father. He wasn’t there anymore. His sickness had finally caught up to him maybe two years ago, although for Leti, he had died the same day Danny did. 

Leti placed a foot on the first step, but didn’t go into the cabin. She could remember just fine from outside. Besides, the wood groaned worse than a shed in a tornado, and Leti didn’t want to risk ruining her only good pair of boots. 

It had started like any other day, really. Danny had woken her up, jumping up and down on the small mattress they shared. She hadn’t been in a good mood, right from the start. It had been one of her father’s bad days, and so Leti had tried, and failed, at making breakfast. Her pancakes always seemed to come out burnt and crumbling, and Danny had refused to eat them. She was only six, but she already had an attitude. 

Danny was a rebel at heart, with a fierce smile and a resilience that made you want to follow her every move. Even though Leti had been two years older, Danny had always been the leader. Leti was good at following, at supporting. Her father used to bounce Leti on his knee and tweak her nose, calling her his little robin. Danny had always been batman, the saver of the cities. Leti was a robin, a supporter, a sidekick. It hurt later in life, when she had understood what it meant. But back then, in her happy little bubble, Leti would have flapped her arms, thinking her father meant a bird.

 Danny had been restless, even after finishing her chores. Wispy blonde hair spread out over sun kissed skin, she had begged, whimpered, and howled until Leti had agreed to let her go outside. Their father didn’t like it when they were outside during the last bits of spring. He often said that the snow melted and the animals came out, which made it dangerous. But Danny didn’t care, and by then, she had projected part of her bad mood upon Leti. 

So Leti had pulled her little sister to the wooden door and grabbed the coats and mittens off of the hanger where her father had left them. They were supposed to be out of reach, but Leti had already begun her most recent growth spurt, and she could unhook the clothing with ease. She had draped the coat over Danny’s shoulders, pulled the mittens onto her hands, even as the little girl grumbled about them being ugly. 

Leti hadn’t been able to find Danny’s favorite gloves. The pink ones, with the fur border and the sparkling finger pads. So instead, she pushed her old worn brown ones onto her sister’s hands, and handed her the hat.

 Leti had been fed up. She hadn’t waited to make sure Leti was well dressed, hadn’t reminded her to stay off the lake, for the ice was melting. She hadn’t even told Danny goodbye. She hadn’t told her sister that she loved her. Instead, Leti had pushed Danny out the door. 

It had happened twenty years ago, but Leti still felt the dull pang in her heart when she thought of it. Maybe if she hadn’t rushed her little sister, maybe if she would have had more care, more love, Danny would have stayed. Maybe she wouldn’t have tried, in her daring way, something she hadn’t tried before. She had been too young to know when she crossed the line from audacious to dangerous.

 Leti pulled her eyes away from the cabin. She could practically smell burnt pancakes. The memories that she had suppressed and pressed down were resurfacing, bobbing up above the water faster than Leti could push them down. She was already seeing so many ruined shards of memories, and there were more to come. 

Leti pushed against the wooden railing, hearing the creak as the wood shifted in its place. Leti turned her back to the cabin. She faced the lake. It was winter, earlier than when Danny had begun her fated walk down the slippery surface, so the ice was still strong and deep. The trees that outlined it were scraggly and worn, years of outrage carved upon their waving branches. 

Leti wasn’t sure if she wanted to remember anything at all. But some part of her had always been drawn back to the cabin. To the last place she had seen her sister alive. 

Leti trudged down the small hill to the lake’s edge. She hadn’t been watching when Danny had gone out, hadn’t bothered to look out for her little sister as she walked along the same beaten path Leti did now. But she could still imagine it. Even after all those years, Leti knew her little sister well enough to know how it would have played out.

 Danny would have sulked down those front steps, angry at being pushed out of the house. Her mood would have only soured when she realized she didn’t have any toys. Her father and Leti always took all the toys and brought them inside when the snow began to melt. Sometimes the water ruined the electronic ones, and it was better to be safe than sorry. 

Danny would have been too angry at Leti to face going inside, so she would have instead set out. If Danny didn’t want their yard, or the space around the house, the only other place to go was the lake. 

During the summer, it was a beautiful thing. The trees grew shiny green leaves, the tall branches becoming them to come and play. The shine on the lake would have disappeared, revealing deep blue waters and an abundance of fish. The sun beat on their backs as they screamed and played in the water. Danny would have raced Leti to jump off the water, and their combined splashes would have soaked their watching father. During the summer, the lake meant happiness. 

But during the winter, Leti had always thought the lake looked awful. The branches were more ominous, hanging, without their leaves. The lake was shiny, left alone, and every once in a while when she skated on the surface with her boots, Leti would see a dead fish. No longer alive, stopped in time inside the wintery jail. Danny hadn’t shared her big sister’s worries. She hadn’t minded the fish. Or maybe she was too young to think of anything like that. All she saw was a rink, ready to be played with. Fun. So during the winter, she always dragged Leti onto the lake. And, because Leti was a robin, she didn’t complain or even voice her concerns. Maybe if she had, Danny would still be alive, having taken caution when it mattered. 

During the winter, the sisters had slipped and slided on the ice. Their father allowed it, as long as they stayed close to the edges of the lake. The edges of the lake were shallow while the middle was deep. Even Danny, in all her daring courage, had stayed away from the middle of the lake, careful not to incur her father’s wrath. But that day, her last day, would have been different. 

Danny would have known her father was in no shape to reprimand her. Leti was, but Danny would have been angry at her. She would have climbed onto the side of the lake. Maybe Danny tested it, at first, and maybe it held firm. Even if it hadn’t, Danny would have still climbed onto the lake. She was just a kid. Death, danger, all of that was just a far away concept. 

She had never been taught about what happened when the ice was thin. Their father hadn’t thought it necessary, as long as Danny stayed on the sides of the lake. He had told Leti, though. 

After a few moments had passed, Leti, having calmed down, decided to check on her little sister. She had opened the door, expecting to see Danny sitting in the hurriedly melting snow, or maybe pouting on the steps. What she saw was much worse. Leti could still remember the shock at seeing her six year old sister, wobbling on her snow boots, only a few feet away from the middle of the lake. She wasn’t even being careful. Every few steps, Danny jumped, feet landing on the dissolving ice. 

“Danny! Get back here!” Leti had cried. 

She had thrown herself forwards, running to the edge of the lake. She hadn’t stepped on it, however, her father’s warning still echoing in her mind. Maybe if she had, Danny would have been okay. 

“Why?” her sister had called, her voice clear in the spring air. 

She jumped on the ice again, and Leti could see a small crack beginning to form. 

“C’mon, Let! This is fun!” 

Danny jumped again, and the crack spread. Leti had tried to fasten some sense of authority into her voice. Perhaps that had been her most fatal mistake. 

“Come here! Now!” she had ordered. 

Danny’s face had screwed up, her freckles upon freckles scrunching. Her eyes had flashed, the fury sharp and detrimental. And, for her very last time, Danny had jumped. The ice had shattered beneath her feet, breaking apart like fine china. Danny’s feet had tumbled into the water. 

The EMTs said that it was cold enough to instantly knock her out. That Danny wouldn’t have felt anything. But Leti knew better. Her sister was nothing if not a fighter. Danny’s mouth had stretched open, and for the first time in all her life, Leti had seen something on her sister’s face that she had never seen before. Fear. So much horror that Leti herself was struck with the sheer size of it. 

Danny had begun to call Leti’s name. She wanted help. She wanted her big sister to rescue her. Before sound could come out, her mouth had been plunged beneath the water. She wouldn’t have blacked out, not immediately. Danny would have fought against the current, her little fists hitting the bars of her ice jail. She would have screamed, even though her throat held no air. Even though, only on the barest outskirts of the ice, Leti couldn’t hear. Until her last breath, Danny would have fought. 

Leti hadn’t been able to move when she heard the ice break. She should have. Should have charged onto the ice herself, dove into the water, pulled her sister out. But she hadn’t. Leti had frozen, as if she was the one buried in the ice grave, not her little sister. By the time Leti had ran to get her father, and by the time her father was lucid enough to give commands, Danny was gone. 

They called 911. They had managed to recover a body. Danny’s lips were blue, the entire color drained from her face, her mouth open in a silent scream. The brown mittens hung haphazardly at her wrists, her knuckles bleeding, maybe from punching the ice. And all Leti could think about was that Danny had hated those mittens. Lord help her, how she had loathed them. She shouldn’t have had them on. Danny shouldn’t have had to go in those mittens she despised so. 

In the end, her father had decided to let her out to the lake. Like a viking burial. He had ignored Leti’s cries, her begs, her screams that her sister shouldn’t have to do that again. He had decided himself, and nothing could sway him. 

They had put her on a raft, gave her candles and flowers, and let her float. Leti had left to live with her aunt, but her father had stayed. Even though Danny was dead, even though he was the one who had set her out to the lake, to drown again, he refused to leave. Refused to leave his daughter, even if that meant leaving the living one behind. 

Now, Leti lowered herself onto the ice. The surface was slippery, but smooth. Leti didn’t dare go out to the middle of the lake, but she thought she didn’t have to. This would do. She dug in her pockets, feeling the assortment of toys and trinkets that had taken her years to find. 

“Hey, Danny,” she spoke in a whisper, letting the air charter her words off to the ice and the lake beneath. 

“I’m sorry it took so long.” 

Tears stung her eyes, leaving red trails down Leti’s cheeks.

 “I brought your gloves,” Leti set the pair of gloves onto the ice. The fur of the pink gloves made her own hands tingle, even as she set them down.

 “I know how you hated those brown ones. I finally got you your own, though. I hope it isn’t too late.”

Leti brought out a handful of small erasers and doll tiaras.

“Got you a few toys, too. I know you never got to have many.” 

Leti took out the final item. It was a picture of the two of them. One of the only ones Leti had, actually. Two young and girlish faces stared back at her. Eight year old Leti was lean and skinny, yellow blonde hair framing her eyes. She had one arm draped around Danny, and the other holding the camera. Danny looked up at the camera with her signature grin. Her eyes were sparkling and wide, her grin cocky and childlike. One of her hands hung on Leti’s back, while the other fisted around some sort of sugary treat. Danny looked happy, in the photo. They both did. Leti had another copy back home, but that picture was the original. 

Leti was sobbing now. She could barely talk, but she forced the words from her throat. 

“I’m sorry I didn’t save you,” she cried. “I’m sorry you died alone. I’m sorry, Danny. So, so, so very sorry.” She set the photo down.

“I’m sorry.” 

Leti stood up on the ice. She tentatively took a step back to land on the frozen surface, and for a moment, she could have sworn she saw her little sister’s smiling face in the lake, finally at peace.