It was winter and darkness came early. I picked up my key ring and marched laboriously up the steep staircase to the attic. I inserted the key into the keyhole and turned.
It had been years since I had allowed myself to enter this room, so I was surprised when the lock turned easily. I closed my eyes and braced myself for my first look inside.
I pushed the door open and stepped across the threshold. Boxes, labeled “Daddy’s things” and “Christmas decorations” and various other categories, were stacked in neat rows along the side of the room. To the left was an old library catalogue cabinet. You know the kind. Rows of little drawers full of index cards.
I walked over and pulling open the first drawer, I had to chuckle. My husband had been the neat freak to beat them all. He had listed every box and its contents and cross-referenced them so if you wanted to find your old baby book, you would look under “books/baby/your name” and it would say box A11 or some such thing. God help anyone who didn’t put something back in the appropriate box.
I dropped my arm to my side and turned to look at the far corner. It had been enclosed with those room dividers to keep the contents separate from the rest of storage. I knew what was behind the dividers, but still hesitated.
My daughter, Kaitlyn, only six years old, had been killed in a boating accident. Her father had taken her out on the lake to fish. He had put a life jacket on her, but when he turned to get in his tackle bag, she reached over and pushed the throttle on the motor. The thrust catapulted her into the water and her jacket strap got caught in the blades, pulling her under. Her daddy shut off the motor and jumped in but couldn’t free her to get her head up. He climbed back into the boat to get his knife but it took so much time with the boat tipping and threatening to turn over, it was wasted effort. By the time he got back and cut her loose, she was gone.
I demanded that all her things be removed to the attic. I couldn’t bear to look at them, so my husband constructed the mock bedroom in the corner.
I didn’t think I could ever forgive my husband, but time trudges on and we eventually resumed our life together. We had a son, Waggoner, who had married and recently presented us with a granddaughter, named Caitlin, after the sister he never knew.
I wanted desperately to treat this child the way a grandmother should and determined the only way to do it would be to face the demons of her namesake’s abandoned room.
I pulled aside the divider and my knees turned to quivering noodles. I rushed to the bed to sit before I fell. The corner of the attic looked exactly as Kaitlyn’s room had looked when she died. Straight ahead was her toy box, beside her dollhouse. The dollhouse was fully decorated with play people peeking out the windows.
I turned a little to my left and saw the bookcase. It was shaped like a house with each floor a different shelf, and each shelf on a different level, all jig jagged. No shelf went all the way across.
Kaitlyn had loved her book case. I loved it, as well. I glanced at the various books and stopped short at the Dr. Seuss books. The hours I had spent reading those books to her.
I kept looking for one in particular, but couldn’t find it. I started pulling the books out of the shelves in a haphazard fashion. Books lay everywhere in piles. I almost cried.
I ran to the catalogue and looked for the title.
It wasn’t there.
Fury rose in my breast. Not only did he kill my baby, but he didn’t keep our favorite book. I lowered myself to the floor and sobbed. I had wanted to introduce my new grandchild to Dr. Seuss.
“This what you’re looking for?”
I whirled to look at my husband. He stood there with “the book” in his hand. Oh, The Places You’ll Go, by Dr. Seuss.
“Why did you take it?”
“Honey,” he said, tears in his eyes. “I was afraid it would make you cry.”
“No, it gives me hope. He talks about all the roads we go down in life. Some good and some bad. The bad road was when Kaitlyn died. The good road is having Caitlin now. I want to share this book with her.”
He handed me the book. “Let’s go down all the roads together—good or bad.”
“That’s what I wish. Let’s be careful not to lose the works of Dr. Seuss.”
He propped it up on the top shelf of the bookcase and together we cleaned up the scattered books.
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It was winter and darkness came early. I picked up my key ring and marched laboriously up the steep staircase to the attic. I inserted the key into the keyhole and turned.
