overgrown

Olivia Brcan

When air bites and dark clouds swarm, I hide in the layers of my scarf. It’s loosely tied around my neck so when I bow my head, warm breaths melt a layer of numbness from my nose. But an icy breeze washes through me, coating my face with another layer of frost. I strain my legs to walk faster across the bridge, fighting against the never-ending cycle of finding that second of warmth, to feeling it disappear with the wind. I want to grasp it, but shivers rattle through my ribs and my only escape is shelter, and artificial heat.

I check the map in my frozen hand to see I’m five minutes away. I check the time. I’ll be half an hour early.

I don’t slow down.

I always walk faster than I need to. Speeding down the street and waiting at the corner for my friends to catch up. Rushing to the gallery even though I’m half an hour early. I blame my sisters. I usually need to jog to catch up with them and I ask them why they’re in such a hurry. Grace and Mia are punctual and determined no matter what they need to do, or where they need to be. When I’m with them, I don’t understand why.

I suppose I could ask myself the same question.

When I see the gallery, I put my phone away and hide my hands in the sleeves of my jumper to gain their feeling back. When I see the water wall decorating the entrance, I hurry through the doors and begin to slow down.

My legs are aching, and my heart is pounding as I stand by the doors catching my breath and trying to hide that I lost it.

I scan over the foyer, at least fifty people are scattered in small groups, and none of them look familiar. I’m supposed to meet my friend here, but even if she’s standing right in front of me, I can’t see her.

I move through the people and keep walking straight until I enter a large space with stone walls and a stained-glass roof.

My hands feel warm, my legs aren’t burning, and my breathing is steady when I see her sitting in the middle of the room. I smile and sit beside her.

I’m glad I’m not waiting alone.

I never feel so lonely, compared to when I’m with all my friends. 

I wish it wasn’t like this. I wish I could accept how things are and be happy for them. I wish I could forget how things used to be. But I can’t.

 Am I selfish for wishing things would go back to the way they were? When it was just us. When boys had cooties and were so ridiculous we couldn’t imagine associating with them. When everything was easier.

We sat in a circle on the fake grass at school every day. Our lunch and snacks were piled like a bonfire in the middle, but it would turn into a pile of rubbish in ten minutes. Blossom trees bloomed above us when sunlight shone through a clear blue sky. We took our jackets off and soaked up the sun after hours stuck inside a classroom. We complained about schoolwork and planned the movie we were going to see after school because we didn’t have anything better to do.

But when high school ended and they met new people, we were sitting inside at night watching a movie instead. I sat on one end of the couch while my friend was huddled with her boyfriend on the other. The couch was small, but the distance between us was infinite. I tucked up closer to the armrest and focussed on watching the movie to ignore the looming silence. If I said something to her, would she answer me? Or if I left, would she even notice?

Whether it be a place where I get my friends back or a place where someone sits huddled on the couch next to me, I wish there was somewhere I didn’t need to worry about being alone.

Time seems to slow down between these white walls. Moments are frozen in time and encased in golden frames, and I too, am slowly freezing. My steps are gradual as I follow each painting, and I wonder why I’ve been moving so quickly. Silence falls over the room, but I can hear water splashing onto the shore, leaves rustling in the breeze, and birds chirping just above me.

My mind relaxes as I stroll, observing each artwork and knowing that even though these moments aren’t moving, they will always belong to a place in time.

I bring my steps to a pause.

There’s a yellow brick house with open blue shutters and a peach trimming along the roof. Vines weave up the tree in the middle of an overgrown garden, and a curving concrete path bathes in filtered sunlight. Red flowers sprout between the greenery, but grass, vines, and bushes overpower everything else.

I’ve seen this garden before. This concrete path has led me, and I have wandered past these vibrant green plants more times than I can remember, but it’s been years since I have.

Her letterbox looked like a house I would have drawn when I was younger. It had stone walls, a wooden roof, and an old pipe through the top for newspapers. I don’t think I ever sent her letters; she lived so close to my house I could walk less than ten minutes down the road and hand it to her myself. I was too young to go alone then, but I imagine I would visit her every day if she still lived there.

Her front door was usually unlocked. I think she expected, or hoped, that we would run through the door after school. We’d turn into the living room to find her sitting in a large, emerald-green armchair every time. Her smile brightened the room as she stood to hug us and demanded a kiss on the cheek. We’d sit around on the matching couches and Grace or Mia would sit on the armrest of Grandma’s chair because was just as wide and comfortable as one.

By this time, Mum would have opened the two-litre jar of chocolates in the middle of the coffee table. It was always full. When I took one, I’d ask Grandma if I could eat it now. She’d tell me, ‘No. You have to hang it on the wall and stare at it’, and she’d point to the spot behind her. She was so sincere when she said it – until she started laughing.

Every few weeks, Mum worked nights at the pub and would leave us with Grandma until she got home. We’d eat Mum’s pre-cooked dinner at five o’clock and the second we put our forks down, Grandma would hand us bowls of ice cream. Sometimes, Mia would still be eating her dinner, and dessert would be next to her. Mum thought she should wait a few minutes for our food to digest before feeding us dessert, but we never had a problem with it.

Eventually, we’d stopped eating at Grandma’s house, and she’d stopped looking after us altogether. It wasn’t long after that she moved into a nursing home. My face fell when I saw hers. She was sitting on the edge of the bed in her new room beside Mum. Her green armchair was squeezed into the corner, the wardrobe was full of her clothes, and the Japanese paintings from her old bedroom took their places on these walls, but this room wasn’t hers, and she knew it.

‘When can I go home?’

We rarely made it through a visit without this question.

Mum reassured her that her sons would sort something out when the three of them visited next. She would forget by the time we saw her next, so Mum would respond with the same thing. She never knew she had been told the same answer for years.

Her door was always unlocked for staff to drift in and out, she never had chocolates because she couldn’t buy her own food, and sometimes she wasn’t sitting in her armchair. The front of her tiny home was a corridor to hundreds of rooms just like hers, and the only garden was a small tree outside her window.

I wanted to take her back home. I wanted to believe everything would be okay once she was back, once she was herself again. 

I didn’t want to lose the woman I knew.

Closing my eyes, I’m standing on a concrete path. Sunlight filters through leaves and dances on the ground in a gentle breeze. My sundress flows around my knees and warm air soaks into my skin like an embrace. The yellow brick house stands in front of me, and I’m surrounded by swaying gold-tipped grass. Everything is warm, everything is golden.

A voice calls out behind me, and I turn around to see a similar brick house across the street. A boy stands on the concrete path. His smile beams as he waves like we’ve known each other for years, and maybe we have. A matching smile breaks across my face, and I wave back. I wonder when he will meet my friends.

I follow the curving path toward the front door as it swings open, and I stop when I see her. She knew I was coming.

I rush up the stairs and hug her, afraid she’ll disappear if I move too slowly. I close my eyes and sigh; I’ve missed everything about her. I pull away and grasp her hands. I want to tell her everything that’s happened in the time she’s been away, I want to tell her I graduated high school, I’ve gone on road trips and I’m reading as many books as I have time to, like she always encouraged. But I can’t bring myself to say anything.

When I turn around, the concrete path is empty. Grace and Mia haven’t followed me inside, and Mum's car isn’t parked in the driveway. They should be here too. 

They will want to tell her everything from the moment she left, like Grace buying her first car and Mia graduating high school next year. I want to enjoy this moment with them, like all the moments before this.

I remember her house with the overgrown garden and stone letterbox, where the girls and I would sit on the bed in the spare room, watching a spider on the wall. We’d call out to Grandma, and she’d click down the hallway with her walking stick and a smile. She’d flick the spider onto the floor and squash it with her stick before turning around to show us. Squealing, we’d scramble off the bed and push past each other to escape the room as Grandma chased after us. We’d hurry around the kitchen table, and she’d follow us, walking stick outstretched as if she never needed it in the first place.

She would sit down in her green armchair and we’d warily stand on the other side of the coffee table as she still held her walking stick close. She’d wipe what was left of the spider on the rug near her feet and we wouldn’t hesitate to sit beside her on the armrests of her chair after that.

When she stopped sitting on her armchair, she would sit on a different chair in a small living room at the nursing home. The afternoon sun would shine in through the wide glass windows and warm the carpet where we stood with bare feet. We’d still be in our school uniforms, and our hair would be falling out of our ponytails.

We’d shout, ‘Watch me!’ and suddenly we’re all upside-down doing cartwheels or other tricks learnt in dance class. We’d later perform our routines for her. We didn’t have music to play, but Grandma watched as though we were on a stage, wearing glittery costumes with our hair and make-up done. When we bowed, she would clap and cheer, telling us we performed beautifully.

It was the only time she didn’t ask when she could go home, and when I was there with her and the girls, I didn’t want to leave either.

When I open my eyes, I’m standing in front of a painting of a yellow house with an overgrown garden. She is not standing in the doorway, because this garden isn’t hers, and there is no boy across the street because he isn’t real. 

I know I will see her, and meet him, when the time is right. 

I turn away from the painting and make my way home.