A short story by Sarah Edwards

“He Waited”

He waited at the airport with regret clouding his mind and whiskey fogging his breath. It was early in the morning and the sun was just passing the horizon. He hadn’t slept these last three days of traveling. Wan face, wilted man, dark circles, dark curls.

He waited at the airport with her voice ringing sharp the last words she told him. Her face, once incomparably outlined, shaded, and explicit in his eyes, now only a soaked sketch. Three moments, just three tiny seemingly insignificant moments… drowned his dreams now.

He waited at the airport with his three deepest regrets drowning him where he sat in a line of chairs with hard plastic seats. His shaking hands shoved into the seams of his suit jacket pockets, one hand clutching the red card and the other clenching the red tie. Bloodshot, clouded, painfully dry yet swimming with memories were his baby blue eyes as they tried to shut everything out. One untied, the other scuffed beyond repair, his black and white sneakers hugged his throbbing feet too tight as his long legs stretched out and crossed over the top of his ragged brown suitcase. It was a rolling suitcase but one tiny black wheel missed its mate. The replacement was new, flashy, almost glittery, and red. It begged to remind him of something. Red and brown don’t mix, right?

He waited at the airport and thought. He thought and waited and dreamed. He dreamed those three melancholic moments. Ten, fifteen, and twenty three… ten again.

He waited at the airport where the first regretful moment met him in his stretched subconscious. He was ten, bright eyed and mortified. His mother, the beautiful blonde angel with a strong rule and a soft voice, was at his school. He was tall, tiny, and lanky. He was pale, freckled, and self conscious. He saw the way his “friends'' snickered at him as his sweet and obsessive mother straightened his new red tie, his lapel, and his hair. How she tightly tucked his pressed dress shirt into his pressed dress slacks. How she stooped from her mighty height of 5’9 and dragged a licked thumb across his dirt streaked forehead. He muttered weak objections until she went to kiss his cheek and he snagged himself out of her embrace feigning revulsion and protesting with theatrics. Dejected but amused, she blew him a kiss and sent him off to his recital. She called after his stomping figure “I love you, baby blue”. He walked into his school with his friends, silently.

He waited at the airport where the second regretful moment met him in his stretched senses. He was playing video games with his friends on his fifteenth birthday. It was Valentine’s Day. His father had convinced his mother to go on a date for Valentine’s just this once. His little sister Ruby came up to him wearing tiny red converses, a red tutu and leotard, and his red tie. He always hated how she helped herself to everything that was his, but he didn’t care as he hated that tie anyway; it was a gift from his mother. Ruby loved Valentine’s Day just as much as she loved her brother whose name was gained from being born on the very day. Ruby interrupted his friends talking about which girls at their school sent each of them Valentine’s. Ruby sang the message sweetly as she presented him with a big red card the size of a laptop which boasted a poorly written “Happee Valeetines Daee Val! + b-dae!” in a disgusting, glittery, bright pink paint. He heard the snickers of his friends and his face mirrored her card. He shoved it and her away, muttered a gruff “go away brat”, and rejoined his game, laughing with his friends about the annoying little red ballerina. His parents stumbled in late and his father went straight to bed with a slurry “Happy... -day”. His mother wished him a happy birthday and asked in the same breath where little red was hiding. He hadn’t seen her since… and he didn’t see her again. She drowned in embarrassment, confusion, and hurt… before she did in their pool. Then he drowned in guilt, loss, and the deepest sorrow and regret as he put on some red converses and the red tie and sat through the rainy black parade. He waited until no one could hear his broken “I love you Ruby”.

He waited at the airport, with the faded red card burning a hole in his front suit pocket while he fiddled with its tattered edges, where the third most regretful moment drowned him in his stretched sanity. He was twenty three. He was strong but headstrong, tall but short fused, handsome but hedged. He had just finished school and chosen to go far… far away from home. His father stayed home, sent him a short message whose sentiment was “If you come back, bring me something French”. His mother drove all night. He was embarrassed by his friends groaning as they were woken up in the dead of night by his mother pounding on the dorm door. He answered curtly and shoved her into the hall so he could talk to her away from his friends. She never stopped scolding him. “You haven’t been answering our calls or texts, I even emailed you…. We haven’t heard from you in almost a year since you told us… please help me understand…. Look at your mother, talk to me...” she said. He replied shortly after a lengthy time of awkward silence, “I’m going. I’m going far and fast, and I hope I never come back.” He made himself look at her, he didn’t know why then. Her sunny blonde hair like her daughter’s, now tousled and greying, her weary mossy green eyes so like Ruby’s just boring into his soul, and her thin wan lips quivering in spite of her resolute temper and stature. Dejected and heartbroken, she nodded once and walked down the hall. He opened his creaky red dorm door as she called back, “I love you, baby blue”. His bloodshot eyes narrowed in on his friends snickering sleepily and he shut the door on her sweet, soft, broken voice. He didn’t see her again. She never saw him again.

He waited at the airport for his father to pick him up. They were expected at a black parade. They were expected at St. Vincent’s. Was that planned? For her to rest at the graveyard of the saint who gave his name to his persistently preoccupied father? No brother or sister, aunt or uncle, niece, nephew, or cousin awaited them. He had worn a black blazer and red converses at his grandparents’ black parade. He had worn a nice suit, those red converses, and the red tie at his little sister’s black parade. He wondered if this parade would be rained on like the others.

He waited at the airport for the man he never really knew to take him to say goodbye to the woman that he never let himself know. His father was a perfect provider and a persistently preoccupied patriarch. His mother was either a helicopter or a guardian angel or a warden…. His father was silently supportive and his mother was proudly protective. They loved him. He knew that now. Ruby was six and sweet and supportive and seraphic. An ethereal beauty at such a young age. A beautiful soul with such tiny delicate hands. A wee angel scooped up too soon.

He waited at the airport and then his father came. He really looked at his father now. A lot can change in twelve years. He looked in a mirror: same disordered dark brown hair, baby blue eyes, sapped skin, desolate bearing, dark circles, dry lips, burning breath. It was a short reunion, a gruff greeting with a hurried hug, and a long ride, hushed and brooding.

He waited at the black parade… he waited for everyone to leave: her coworkers gossiping like the insipid people they were, and the long lost relatives coming from the wood works just to pay their respects… despite, not because of, the will reading later.

He waited at the black parade for his father to leave. He understood the hesitance and solemnity but not the watch. Why did he keep looking at his watch? He returned his father’s gruff parting and quiet “I love you”. His father left behind a ruby red rose on the fresh plot and another on the small plot next to it. His red roses were laid with each of their angels too: Ruby and Rose.

He waited at the black parade for the rain. God had rained on every black parade he’d attended in the past. Why was it a bright sunny day, with no cloud in the sky that mirrored his own blue eyes? Well, almost mirrored. Where was the comforting embrace of God’s tears, his condolences? He missed them as he shed his own on the freshly tousled dirt. He found himself brought to his knees, clutching the red tie loosened at his neck. He found himself lying Ruby’s card at her small stone. He found himself wanting his angels again... diminished and fragile, curling up like he was ten again. He found himself curled up on that freshly fluffed bed where she was laid to rest. The sheets were so cold, he shivered as he thought “it’s too cold for her”. His fingers brushed across the bed, reaching for her through the sheets, trying to keep her warm. He wept and mewled and clutched at her sheets until the sky delivered God’s condolences and he quieted and settled in for a deep sleep. He was home now, he’d come back to them finally. At last he slid his sleepy eyes shut to sights welcome and missed, and he whispered “I love you”.

He waited at the barrow for their reply.

Life is too short. Say and do what you want no matter who’s judging before it's too late. Life is too short. Cherish and delight in those little lives we love before they flicker out forever. Life is too short. Learn to love the people who treat you right and to forgive those who do not. Life is too short. So hold on tight to those you love before they are carried away home.