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Tuesday
By Andrew Price
Stopping for a moment, I stood squinting into the distance as the hot sand
blew across my face. I struggled to look down the dusty old road on which I
stood. Unable to see my destination, I soon realized it didn’t matter. It
was Tuesday, and I had been down this path before. The monotony of life had
become all too familiar. Looking behind me, I saw the darkness approaching
in all its fury. Small strokes of God flickered across the sky as a
deafening roar filled me with knowledge of the coming peril. “I had better
hurry”, I thought. The storm was going to be bad, and she was waiting on
me.
Unable to find the gait to run comfortably while holding my things, I ran
awkwardly down the path. As I ran, my thoughts slowly faded away from the
aches and pains of my body, and soon, my thoughts were only of her. I
imagined her; her reaction at my return. In my mind’s eye, I examined her
beauty. I thought of the way her hair would fall, slowly moving across her
face to reveal two shining hazel eyes staring back at me. Her tan skin lit
by the tiring sun would gleam across the room as she moved to be near me.
Moving in perfect harmony, she would put her arms around me and not remind
me that I was late but rather look into my eyes with the understanding look
that told me it was okay. I imagined our faces drawing near, and as our
lips touched, the roar of thunder jolted me back into reality, back into the
pain and suffering of the real.
Stopping for a moment to catch my breath, I realized I was closer than I
had thought. I was only a couple minutes away from my purpose, from the
place of my daydreams. With a wipe of the salty sweat from my brow and the
energetic hop of my new first step, I once again began to run. The pain in
my side was approaching unbearable, and without the knowledge of a quick
conclusion—of the end of my suffering, I doubt I would have been able to
continue. The storm drew closer by the second. I could hear it. I could
sense it moving with the seemingly inevitable precision of fate.
Then I saw it: my home, our house. Spurred by the sight, I ran even
faster, ignoring the pain from within; for pain from the body can be
ignored. As I drew closer, I had to smile as my gaze fell upon the
ridiculous pink door. The rest of the house from the outside was a dull,
drab brown with the obviousness of its old age showing at every rusting nail
and every rotting plank. I told her it would look funny, that our neighbors
would think we were crazy, but it was to no avail. With a pouting look on
her face and using the familiar girlish voice she would use when she wanted
something, she reminded me that we didn’t have any neighbors and that it was
the color she wanted. I had to give in, and at the sign of my resignation,
she jumped with glee and immediately began to paint it that absurd shade of
pink. It didn’t matter, I surmised, and after awhile, I had grown fond of
it, despite its unsightliness.
Finally reaching the porch, in near complete exhaustion, I opened the door.
Expecting to see everything from my visions—everything to the minutest
detail—I walked through the door looking up. I expected to see her worried
at my absence. I expected to see her every movement in my direction. I had
expected to see her. As I came in, though, I realized she wasn’t in the
seat by the window where she always waited on me. It was Tuesday. As I
walked in and sat my things on the floor, I could hear that the rain had
started. These storms, unlike the ones from where I was from, came with the
sudden randomness of a thought and a fury to which I was unaccustomed. The
sound of the heavy downpour against the tin roof consumed the house and my
calls out to her. Wondering where she might be, I looked for her first in
the kitchen, then in the bedroom and upstairs. In a moment of panic, I even
looked in the closet, and then, then I realized her clothes were gone.
Unable to tell if I was asleep or awake, I stumbled about the house. Near
madness consumed me as I pulled the pink door open and ran outside into the
pouring rain. Maybe I was hoping to catch her on her way down the road.
Maybe I was hoping that I would find her coming back from the laundry mat—I
don’t know.
Soon however, as I stood in the rain, I came upon the realization that she
wasn’t coming back. She was gone—gone without leaving a trace of ever being
a part of my life. There was no note, no explanation as to why, only the
memories of the time we spent and that damned pink door. There I stood in
the rain. My clothes and hair fully soaked, I didn’t shiver; for pain from
the body can be ignored. I felt the cold of the rain, the icy bitterness of
its touch. It seemed to enter me, to chill me to the core, that day. I
don’t know how long I stood there on that road, but it seemed like an
eternity, like the rest of my life. I stood there, unable to comprehend
what had happened because it was Tuesday and she was gone.
