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I am standing in the kitchen of the Tavern washing dishes, definitely not my speciality. I hate how I cannot be here without thinking of Percy and all our shared shifts. This place should be dedicated to a place in my mind only for my mom and dad, and maybe Charlie. But even then my mind strays to happier times, simpler times, where we went skinny dipping after the hottest shifts. I am a grown man for Christ sake, with much more current griefs than the girl next door I pushed away and right into my brother’s waiting arms. Maybe if Taylor knew the thoughts going through my head while being here she wouldn’t be so insisting on us being back together being a good idea. I don’t even know why I agreed on bringing her here, we both know it is over. There is a sound by the door and I am expecting it to be Taylor, complaining why I can’t get someone else to the dishes.
But it’s not Taylor’s voice, which says my name. “Sam?”
I turn and I must be more tired than I realized, that’s what this little sleep will do to you. Because in the door I see Percy. Well, not my Percy, an older version. Her face looks more mature, slightly sharper edges, a few freckles over her nose, a new set of bangs and her body... I swallow, she is truly an all grown up woman. And though everything about is so familiar and exquisite it hurts, it’s also a dimmed version. Like the light sparkling in those deep dark eyes have been extinct long ago. I pinch my lips together in the turmoil following her appearance. She takes a step closer and suddenly it dawns on me: She is real. She is here. She came back.
I don’t even hesitate a second, in three long strides I have her tightly wrapped in my arms. With my next inhale, my nostrils are again filled with her familiar smell – clean, coconutty, and something sweet and spicy I could never put my finger on – completely intoxicating, and just so Percy. In that instance I want to tell her everything, everything that has happened to me since her. I want to yell at her and cry because the heartbreak feels completely fresh with her right here wrapped in my arms. But most of all I am just fucking thankful that I might finally be given the chance to do any of it.
“You came home.”
And even with the fresh grief of my mom’s death, one wound on my damaged heart feels like it is finally being put back together, like a missing piece has finally been returned home to me.
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I pull back and she looks up at me her hair in a disarray and I can’t help but smile. The bangs fit her adult face very well, framing her beautiful features and her dark stunning eyes. I feel the familiar summersault of my stomach just being near her again. With a cautiousness very unlike the Percy I knew, she inhales and says a singular “Hi.” I can feel the smile stretching on my face as I reply “Hi Percy”.
Suddenly her smile breaks and two fat tears start running down her cheeks. “Sam, I am so sorry,” she starts crying in honest and I instinctively draw her into my arms again. “Shh” I try while soothingly running my hands up and down her back. “It’s okay, Percy”. She takes a step back and my arm feels empty, “I should be comforting you.” Tears well in her eyes again, “I’m sorry,” she says again. I run my hands through my hair, “Don’t worry about that,” I say. It has been difficult dealing with everybody else’s grief on top of my own, I haven’t even wanted to. But with Percy I feel like she needs to understand the circumstances, after all my mom loved her like she was her own daughter too. The last year she had brought Percy up a couple of times, like she couldn’t quite stand the thought that she would never see her again, or maybe it was just that I would never see her again. I start with the simplest version, the version I can handle for now: “She was sick for years. We had a long time to come to terms with it.” I can see Percy is trying to get a grip of herself again as she say, “I can’t imagine any amount of time being long enough. She was so young.” Like my dad, too young. “Fifty-two,” I say.
“I hope it’s okay that I came”, Percy bursts and then adds, “I wasn’t sure you would want me here.” Honestly, I hadn’t even considered it, I still thought her sometimes, often, too often. But I had come to terms with never seeing her again, that she would never come home. Even if I had come to terms with her never returning, I never truly moved on, I couldn’t, maybe a small part of me wouldn’t. I don’t know how to answer her, there is so much baggage, so much heart ache that I hadn’t anticipated dealing with in that sentence. I can feel my eyes stinging so I turn towards the dishwasher starting the cleaning again. I answer the only way I can, with honesty, “Yeah, of course.” Setting my own feelings aside, Percy’s presence is what my mom would have wanted, she will rest in peace knowing Percy gets to say goodbye too. That leads me to the next association of how Percy even came to be here today. “How did you know?” I ask. The silence stretches just seconds too long, and I just know. I glance at her confirming my growing suspicion. Charlie. Of course. I let out a small sound. He could never keep his nose (or other body parts my brain adds acidly) in his own business when it came to Percy. Percy fiddles nervously, before confirming, “Charlie called me.” And though I forgave them both and myself a long time ago, hearing his name on her lips still makes my bones ache and rumbling through my bloodstream like a distant thunder. “Of course he did.” I bit out.
Percy side-tracks my mind as she starts filling the dishwasher with dusty cutlery and gesturing to the serving trays, “So what’s all this for?”. I stop and leans against the counter, letting the dark thoughts empty from my mind. She looks completely at ease, doing her old chores. I feel a pressure on my chest of lightness in her movements, her return to her routine. “What are you doing?” I ask, not quite sure where she is going with this. I can almost see how the Percy I knew and loved is rising beneath her surface as she lifts her chin and put her hand on her hip. Her hand is soapy and wet and the water instantly stains her red dress, my mind replays a thousand memories of how that hip felt in my hands, beneath my body. And Percy, it’s like something has been turned on inside her, sparkles starting to return to her eyes. I can’t help it, my eyes flash to her mouth. I can’t remember anything I have wanted as much the last twelve years, I want so badly to put my mouth on hers and see if we can still fit together like we did. I swallow, hard. Percy is trying hard to keep a smile from showing, but I can tell. “I am helping you out, genius.” She teases, and I think she is more than aware of the effect she has on me still. She continues, “You were always a shit dishwasher.” And the laugh that bubbles out of me is unexpected. “I see your trash talk hasn’t improved,” I reply her. I start the cleaning again as I answer her earlier question: “Mom wanted to have everyone here for a party after she passed. The idea of everyone standing around with crustless egg salad sandwiches in the church basement after her funeral horrified her. She want us to eat and drink and have fun. She was very specific.” I feel warmth and a certain safety in sharing this with Percy, so I continue: “She even made the pierogies and cabbage rolls she wanted served months ago, when she was still well enough, and put them in the freezer.” Percy looks at me with a small smile of recognition, “That sounds like your mom. Organized and thoughtful and ..”She stops and I continue her thoughts by saying, “Always stuffing people full of carbs?” To which Percy softly interjects, “I was going to say ‘feeding the people she loves.’” Though my heart is breaking for my mom, I feel love and recognition of her person from this gorgeous woman. With a small smile, but nonetheless a real smile I pull the tea towel of my shoulder and place it on it’s hanger and gesture towards the door, “Let’s get out of here,” I say. I need more time with Percy, I need to get to know her again, and at some point this weekend I should probably tell her what have been weighing heavy on my heart the last twelve years.
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We are sitting on the same bench we used to all those years ago, before everything happened, before we happened, before we broke. We are even eating the same ice creams we used to, right down to the flavours. She is squinting in the sun and I can almost smell the sunscreen she used to lather on to avoid the freckles I used to count when she wasn’t paying attention. She is clearly far away in her own mind, she is not even noticing how her ice cream cone is melting faster and faster. The pink and blue melting together and running down her hand. I have an urgent longing to lick the ice cream of her hand and put her fingers in my mouth. But as she doesn’t seem to notice at all I interrupt her, “Percy?” “Yeah?” She answers. “You might want to eat that a little faster.” My voice sounds strained to my own ears. As she lifts the ice cream to lick of the rivulets running down her hand she manages to drip some right onto her chest. I try to not stare at the ice cream on the swell of her breast, right above the neckline of the dress. Try not to think about the perfect small and perky breasts beneath that neckline and whether they have changed with the rest of her. If the yearning to lick her skin was bad before it is nothing compared to now. She mutters something under her breath and look at her out the corner of my eye. I feel like a clumsy teenager around her again, stupid with wanting and not having, denying myself. “I can’t believe you still eat cotton candy. How old are you?” I ask her teasingly to break the tension in myself. She scoffs, “You’re one to talk.” I lift my eyebrows in mock offense, “Vanilla, caramel, peanut butter cups? Moose tracks is classic.” She is looking directly at me now, mischievously glinting eyes. “No way. Cotton candy is the best you just never learned to appreciate it.” She licks her ice cream with a satisfied slurp like it was the finest champagne. And I can’t help it, I feel like we are us again, even with this many years apart so I do what I used to when I wanted to make her flustered. I lean in and run my tongue over her ice cream and bites a chunk off. She gasps bewildered just as she used to and I can see the blood rising to the surface of her neck in the most fascinating blush. “That always freaked you out,” I chuckle. “Menace,” she replies with narrowed eyes.
“I will give you a taste of mine to be fair,” I grin. I can almost see the thought swirling around her beautiful brain and the heat rises from her neck to her cheeks solidifying in a small bead of sweat on her upper lip. That small bead of sweat gives me a rush of adrenaline, she still reacts to me. I learned long ago the subtle signs her body gave off, and as a teenager this was one of my favourites. She is turned on. The grin on my face stretches in victory. “I promise it’s good,” I say. However, I am not expecting her to actually take me up on the offer so when she leans and her warmth radiates over my arm, I am startled. Her tongue flicks out savouring my ice cream just a few inches from my face. “You’re right. It’s pretty good.” She says, regaining her composure a small feat of victory in her shining eyes and as she licks her lower lip, I can’t help looking down and follow the movement. There is a long silence, in which I am considering where to start.
“So how have you been, Percy?” I finally ask her. She holds up her hands in an unsure gesture. “I am not sure where to start” she adds and laughs nervously. I nudge her gently in the side, I don’t like her being nervous around me, I just want to get to know some part of her again. Figure out where her life is at now, if she ever thinks of me. “How about three updates?” I suggest. She considers a second: “Umm ..” – “I still live in Toronto. Mom and dad are well – they’re travelling around Europe. And I’m a journalist, an editor, actually – I work at Shelter, the lifestyle magazine.”
“A journalist? Huh. That’s great Percy. I am happy you are writing.” I say genuinely happy that she also get to do what she always wanted. She looks like she is about to correct me but instead asks: “What about you?” It’s not difficult, I know what updates to tell her: “One, I am a doctor now.” I start, she interrupts before I can get to the next one. “Wow. That’s .. that’s incredible, Sam. Not that I’m surprised.” She looks happy for me, but I find myself wondering if she also thinks about the start of my career and how my choices in that regard let to our eventual demise. I shake myself out of my gloomy thoughts and try to continue on a ligther note: “Predictable, right? And two, I specialized in cardiology. Another shocker.” She gives me a small smile and says “Exactly where you wanted to be.” But I am not. My job is fulfilling and challenging, and I save people like I couldn’t save my dad. Career-wise I got exactly what I wanted through hard work and dedication, but the cost of that dedication is sitting here, right in front of me, and I am not sure it was completely worth it. I continue: “And three. I am living here. In Barry’s Bay,” she gives me a puzzled look. “I stayed in Kingston for my residency. But I’ve been here for the last year to help mom. She was sick a year before that. We were hopeful at first…” My thoughts return to the last year and watching my mom’s declining state from walking around watering the flowerbeds to being tied to a bed covered in tubes in the hospital. “I’m sorry,” Percy interrupts my thoughts. I continue aloud, giving her an insight to my thoughts. “After a while it didn’t seem like things were going to get any better. I had been driving back and forth between here and Kingston, but I wanted to come home. You know. Go to the treatments and all of the appointments. Help out around the house and the restaurant… It was to much for her even when she was healthy. The tavern was always meant to be her and dad.” And though it hurts to think about both my parents being gone, I want to share with her, like I did the year I met her still looming in the shadow of the loss of my dad. “What about your work?” She asks. “I have been working at the hospital here. A few shifts a week.” Though by the end I mostly stayed at my mom’s side. I feel the tiredness creeping in again. I don’t remember the last time I slept properly. It is different from the residency where I could atleast crash between shifts, the exhaustion incomparable. The insomnia of grief is inescapable and disabling in its’ constance.
“Your mom mum must really have appreciated you coming back, she knew you didn’t want to stay here” Percy pulls me out of my head once again with her soft voice. “It’s not so bad” I say, she looks absolutely shocked by my declaration, I can’t help but grin. “I’m serious. I know I ragged on Barry’s Bay when I was a kid, but I missed it a lot when I was away at school.” I look over the lake, my hometown. I didn’t appreciate it growing up, I couldn’t wait to get out of here. My biggest flaw again showing its’ ugly head and reminds me of the cost it took on both relationships to the most important women in my life. Time with my mother. Time that always felt infinite, time that would surely give me a new option to go home to see my mum, when I again cancelled a weekend to study or just to party and forget. And with Percy.
“I’m lucky to have this” I sigh.
“Who are you and what have you done with Sam Florek?“ Percy looks flabbergasted and it couldn’t look cuter on anyone. I always loved surprising her, looking at her gorgeous eyes widening. “But no that’s great, it’s so amazing you came here to help your mom. And that you don’t hate it here.” She says and I can feel the smile still stretched on my face as I look at her. She looks wistful as she adds: ”I have missed this place so much. Every summer I get cabin fever in the city. All that concrete – feels so hot and itchy. I’d do anything to jump into the lake.” Is it just this place she missed I wonder? For me, the summers here have been painful without her, everything from the smells and sounds to the tourists a constant reminder of our summers together. That first summer I was so broken I ended up leaving early. I couldn’t stand sleeping in my room filled of reminders, but I didn’t want to get rid of them either. I couldn’t swim in the lake or be in the boat. I was furious with Charlie and he was uncharacteristically remorseful. And when I found myself by the lake I would look towards her cottage and search for her even though I wasn’t even sure I wanted to see her. I haul myself out of my memories, she is here now. ”Well, we’ll have to make that happen,” I say. Her gaze becomes distant and she breathing becomes shallow, she looks uncomfortable in her skin. “I can’t believe you were here all that time,” she says quietly. I study her and with a grin I finally voice one of my first observations: “I can’t believe you got bangs again.”