It’s all the same, and yet, somehow, nothing’s the same.
On a balmy September evening, Janet cowers in the shadows cast by a parked BMW in Thornhill Crescent. Her white Nikes scrunch the orange and brown leaves from a nearby chestnut tree, releasing a musky, earthy smell.
Decay.
Janet feels hollow and desolate, as if her insides had been gutted and left in darkness. She’s a sight that makes those who know her wince. Slumped shoulders, limp, greasy hair, and fingernails bitten to the quick. Deep lines carved by sorrow and perpetual exhaustion etch her face.
She stares across the road at the row of identical four-story terraced London townhouses, with stucco white facades and iron-railed patios at the entrance. The buildings’ original exteriors⎯sash windows, half visible basements, and tiled roofs⎯have not changed since the 1860s. However, with special permission from the Islington Council, the interiors, bathrooms, toilets, kitchens, plumbing, and wiring, have been updated, remodeled, and renovated. Not that you’d know unless you’d been inside.
The sky deepens into dusk, and the cast-iron fluted Victorian streetlights flicker into life. Every front door on the street is painted black—except for one—theirs. Janet blinks, and blinks again, hypnotized by the dust motes in various hues of grey that hover and twirl in front of number twenty-four. She pulls a Kleenex out of her backpack, dabs her eyes, blows her nose, and lets out an audible grunt. Or is it a sob?
The front door, her front door, is no longer buttercup yellow. Someone painted it red. A dirty, brownish-blood red. The shiny brass knocker in the shape of a lion’s head has been replaced by a dull black horseshoe.
Trying to compose herself, Janet pulls her greying auburn curls back into a ponytail, takes in a deep breath, swallows, and looks up to the heavens. For a brief moment, she sees Mary Poppins and her black umbrella, silhouetted by pink and navy striped clouds, flying across a nearby roof. She even hears the famous nanny plop onto the pavement. That’s when Janet realizes she’s in the I’m going crazy phase of grief—the phase no one ever mentions. Her laughter, soft at first, quickly escalates into a cackle, as if she were about to cast an evil spell.
Janet wipes her sweaty palms against her Levi’s and turns around to stare at the church in the square on the other side of the road. The high arches and stained-glass windows glower at the silent cypress trees framing the small cemetery, as if defying God the right to come and blow hot and cold over her heart.
How come, God, if cypress trees live for hundreds of years, did David die only a few months after turning forty?
As if admonishing Janet for her audacity, the church bell tolls five times, protesting that Mot, the Angel of Death, has a job to do. But how did they know that David had died at five in the evening?
Janet begins to weep, oblivious to the tears running down her cheeks and onto her shoulders. She takes a step closer to the house—her house—and trips over a pair of pigeons fighting over a discarded carton of chips. Wings flap. Polystyrene particles flutter near a black rubbish bin, but she doesn’t notice the smell of rotting food or the sharp tang of bird droppings wafting through the air. The pigeons shriek and tug at the moldy morsel, drowning out the sound of Janet’s iPhone clicking as she takes a photo of the offensive red door.
An invisible stalker, Janet crouches down, hoping to get a better shot of what was once her door, just as a tall, broad-shouldered woman wearing a beige trench coat and knee-high black boots steps out. The woman looks around, scans the street as if she were expecting danger, then shuts and locks the door behind her. She slips the keys into her handbag and runs her fingers through her bobbed copper-colored hair.
Involuntarily, Janet’s fingers flex and stretch. She feels a scream forming in her throat. All she has to do is push her palms into this woman’s chest, slam her into the door, wrap her fingers around her neck, and squeeze. Hard. Then life could return to what it was two years ago, when their door was a welcoming yellow. When the brass lion’s head invited visitors to knock, and when mauve and white geraniums bloomed in the window box.
Even though the murderous thought is only a momentary impulse, Janet shocks herself with the very idea of it. She hiccups, suddenly aware that grief is suffocating her, leaving invisible bruises on her soul. Whenever she probes the black-blue emotion, her mind unleashes a torrent of unhinged thoughts. A sour taste rises in her mouth, causing her to burp. Startled by her own repulsive irrational behavior, she quickly switches gears to then.
Then, in the evenings, passersby could listen to the Bee Gees singing Staying Alive, hear champagne corks pop and glasses clink, and slow their stride to breathe in the aromas of roast chicken or grilled sole. Then, when her husband, David, would slide one hand across her back while the other ladled tomato soup into a bowl before sprinkling grated Parmigiano cheese on the top.
Then.
Before the bus’s brakes failed and the vehicle rammed into his Audi. “Death was instant,” according to the EMT, as if this was a good thing.
Once a svelte yoga teacher, Janet found herself pausing mid-step to lean against a tree or wall for support. Even dim 25-watt lightbulbs seared her eyes, and the gentle chants in her studio felt like thunderclaps in her ears. She was unable to shove her sorrow into a secure shelter, lock
the door, and throw away the key. Clients canceled. She sold her studio.
“You need closure,” her therapist, Peter, had said a week earlier, straightening up in his leather chair.
He crossed his legs and stretched his arms above his head as if to insist that his tassel moccasins, chinos, and black Paul Smith t-shirts knew best.
“But how? What do I need to do?” Janet slouched in the sofa, took off her glasses, and pinched the bridge of her nose.
“You moved house ten months ago because you complained that it held too many memories of David. That you saw him brushing his teeth next to you. That you heard him singing in the shower. That you tasted his lips on yours.” He uncrossed his legs and leaned toward her. “Maybe a visit to the old neighborhood, or a walk by your old home to say your proper goodbyes?” He shrugged as if he were giving up on her and took a sip of coffee. “Give it a try.”
The woman who now resides in her house opens the Tesla door, slings her tote onto the back seat, and, after checking the rear-view mirror, slams the door shut. Tires shrieking, she drives off.
A gust of wind stirs the cypress trees. Fresh pine fragrance embraces her. Hunkering in the shadows, Janet is momentarily distracted by the pigeons pecking at the chips scattered on the pavement and almost forgets why she’s there.
Her thighs cramp. Janet eases up from her squatting position, shakes her legs, and pulls her backpack over her shoulders. Now she’s glad the door is that awful muddy-red color. It makes it easier to turn around and walk away, back to the tube station and her modern flat on the canal near Camden, which holds no David memories.
She wipes the tears off her cheeks with the back of one hand and looks around for the road that will take her back to Upper Street. Her vision is blurry, as if the weight of her loss has scrambled her sense of direction. Nothing looks familiar. She looks south and walks to Richmond Avenue where Tony Blair used to live. But that street isn’t there either. Nothing is making sense.
She’d lived here for fifteen years, yet now she can’t even find her way to the tube, despite walking there almost daily when they lived on the Crescent. Does it have to be now that Google Maps can’t connect to the internet? Just as she reboots her phone, she hears footsteps and spots a stocky man holding a briefcase crossing the street. She takes a deep breath and rushes toward him.
“Excuse me,” Janet splutters, trying to string the words together, “do you know the way to Upper Street?” Her voice is high and tight.
He glances at her, frowns, and steps sideways as if hoping to avoid her. He buttons up his blazer and points in the opposite direction. “You’re going the wrong way,” he snaps. Before Janet can thank him, he strides off, leaving her to stumble into a privet hedge. The sharp branches press into her back as she struggles to regain her footing. She flicks a few leaves from her shoulders.
Janet turns a corner and laughs. A ghostly guffaw like that of Captain Hook. Shocked at her own reaction, she realizes she has to shift out of this crazy phase. It is getting her nowhere. When she’d made the decision to visit her old home, she’d hoped it would help her “move on.” Instead, she’d lost both her physical and emotional balance. Caught between two worlds, she had drifted off course. How had her emotional compass so thoroughly betrayed her, sending her the wrong way?
As she walks in what she hopes is the direction of the tube, she sees a familiar sight. The Hemingford Arms, the pub that she and David had frequented for cod and chips and a Guinness. At the familiar strains of Lionel Richie’s All Night Long, Janet covers her mouth with the palm of her right hand and feels her lips stretch into a wide smile.
On the pavement outside the pub, the sounds of laughter and shouts of “Oh my God” and “Cheers” reach her, drawing her in like an ant to a honeypot. Confused as to what’s happening to her, she pulls off her hair tie, releasing a cascade of curls that tumble onto her shoulders. She unzips her backpack, scrambles for, and eventually finds, a tube of scarlet lipstick, and runs the caked color over her lips. Only a few months ago she wouldn’t have dared enter a pub on her own in the evening, especially one she and David had visited together.
Janet walks up the stairs, pushes the door open, and takes a deep breath. Aromas of calamari fried in garlic butter, smoked almonds, and roasted chili chickpeas have replaced the familiar smell of oily, yet seductive, fish and chips. At the billiard table in the back, cues crack against balls, players cheer, bump fists, and pull each other into hearty hugs.
Then she and David had licked the salt off the other’s fingers, finished their drinks, and joined in the game. Once, leaning forward to tap the ball, Janet lost her balance and almost knocked his teeth out on the cue. David had laughed and wrapped his arms around her.
Longing for her old world, Janet buys a pint of Guinness and moves over to watch the game. After the second, or was it the third? sip, the beer tastes bitter. She shuffles back, places the glass on the bar, and nods at a barman she doesn’t recognize.
“Is Jim around?”
“Jim retired about a year ago,” the barman says, pulling a pint of Heineken and handing it to a plump middle-aged woman with a long blonde braid slung over one shoulder. “Met a French woman and now lives in the Loire Valley tending vines. If you’d like a taster, we have some of his wine here.”
“Another time,” she croaks, taken aback by the burning sensation in her chest. The world is moving on without her, and for the first time in months she doesn’t want to be left behind.
“When you speak with him, please tell him Janet Cameron sends her best wishes.” Without answering, he turns away to serve another customer. Unsure as to whether he heard her, ignored her, or simply had nothing more to say, Janet swivels from left to right on the wooden barstool, looks around, and tries to force a smile. The kind of smile that attempts to hide pain. She should leave, but she remains stuck as if glued to her seat. From behind her she hears David whispering, “Go and show them how good you are at darts.”
Courage pushes her from behind, and she steps down onto the worn paisley carpet. Grabbing a handful of cashews from a bowl on the bar, she strolls toward the side wall, munching a little too loudly as her eyes lock onto the dartboard.
“Fancy a game?” She swallows and looks up to find a tall, forty-something man with a neatly trimmed beard and a deep resonant voice towering over her. She nods, her head dipping in a quick, unsure bob. She tries not to cough on the nuts.
“It’s been a while, but I’ll give it a go.”
With feigned confidence, Janet steps back, aims, closes one eye, throws, and misses the bullseye by a couple of millimeters. The stranger’s dart hits the outer rim. Her next dart bounces off the board and falls to the floor.
“Bend your knees,” David’s voice tells her. On her third turn, she surprises herself. One eye closed, Janet lunges and her dart flies straight into the bullseye. She waves her arms into the air and whoops.
Grief’s tentacles are beginning to ease.
The stranger, who introduces himself as Philip, offers to buy her a drink.
“We should try the wine from Jim’s vineyard,” he says to the barman, and taps his phone on the screen to pay.
Then, with a firm grip on her forearm, he guides her outside. Under the glow of the canopy lights, they join a circle of strangers whose laughter and chatter about Brexit drift into the cool night air. Her tongue tingles at the first sip of Chenin Blanc.
Artwork by: Edvard Munch
