The Healing

"I am the dragon who imprisons the maiden and also the victim trapped on an island in the sea of morose. I must rescue myself now." She recited these words to herself while sliding under the crumpled covers of her bed.

She woke the next morning at the crack of dawn. Actually, the clock read nine AM, early by her measure. “Arg,” she grumbled regretting her resolve to reform. Last night it had been so strong. Why, she actually turned off the TV and went to bed. Her usual habit had been to fall asleep on the couch and stumble to bed at daybreak.

"No," she said admonishing her lazy self, "today is the day. Step one is to get up early, make a healthy breakfast and do something useful."

Although she had promised herself a major change, she hadn’t quite gotten to the part about what to do after eating. "One step at a time," she whispered to herself.

So one slightly overweight middle aged woman unwrapped herself from the bed covers and went to the sink to slap water on her face. She looked into the mirror and saw droopy eyes still heavy with sleep peering tentatively back at her.

"Hmm," she thought, "not terrifying, even for this time of day. With a little bit of makeup and the right clothes, why I bet I could pull off a job interview. Of course, then I’d have to work." Looking at her mirror image, she addressed her phantom self.

“Do you want a job? Would that resolve the emptiness?” Through the looking glass the other image appeared just as puzzled. No answer there. She decided to shower and get dressed before breakfast. Perhaps my head will clear up in the shower.

She gathered some clothing from her messy closet carefully selecting the few items that weren’t too wrinkled. She never ironed and often left the clothes in the dryer for days. A pair of black slacks and a white blouse looked fairly presentable; not too wrinkled, coordinated well, and might even give her a slimming effect. Smiling at her choice, she grabbed some underwear from the dusty chest of drawers and went to the small bathroom. As she stepped into the shower, she noticed the hard water mineral deposits that crusted the tiles of the little shower cave. “I don’t think Suzie Housekeeper would approve,” she mumbled out loud. “Oh well, she doesn’t live here!” Twisting the knobs one way and then the other, she achieved a decent water temperature and immersed her body in the warm liquid stream.

She stood soaking herself turning this way and that to wet all of her body. She began to sing. The song came from a place in her memory folds from a time long ago when she lived with her family, Mom, Pop, and her little brother, Tommy. She remembered the feeling of being loved and cared for. Within the walls of their modest tract home, she wanted nothing. Her family completed her. As she sang, she found the resolve to turn her life around. Today really was day one of the search for her better self.

She rubbed some soap on the wash cloth that hung in her shower for three months. Its stiffness melted into pliancy as the thirsty fibers drank the water. She cleaned herself and twisted the knobs to off. An arm extended out of the water-heated shelter. She felt for a towel, found it, and dragged it into the shower stall. She dried off still humming her song. She remembered the CD of children’s music that she played over and over on her Fisher-Price CD player. Tommy and she often sat together and sang loudly while Raffi crooned his tunes for them. Sometimes she and Tommy danced together, not controlled simple dances, but wild heathen dances suggesting some tribal ritual or simply, the joyful abandon of two young children.

Suddenly, she popped to attention as if someone had called to her. “I know what I need to do first,” she sang to the tune of the song in her head. “I must call Tommy; arrange to visit him and his partner, Cooper. Yes, that would be a great beginning for my new adventure.”

She dressed and went into the kitchen. The little white cordless telephone stood in its dock like a soldier at attention. She reached for it. As she held the phone in her hand, she realized that Tommy and she hadn’t spoken for a couple of years. “I wonder why our lives became so distant” she mused. “ Oh well, never mind. It’ll be great to catch up with him.”

She searched through the old phone book pregnant with slips of paper and filled with notes scribbled over all the pages. Pushing pages with a moistened finger, she reached the one with Tommy’s numbers. He had moved often in his youth when they still spoke on a regular basis. Several numbers had been written and eventually crossed out. She located the most recent one. “I hope he still has this number,” she thought. “I’ll have to ask if he has a cell phone when we speak.” While thinking these thoughts, she pushed the buttons that would hopefully reconnect her to her sibling. One ring, two, then, “Hello?”

“Tommy, it’s me, Miriam.”

“Miri? I can’t believe it! How the Hell are you? And why are you calling? Is something wrong?”

“No, no, it’s not like that.” She hesitated. Why was she calling? Then she remembered. “It’s hard to explain, but this morning while I was taking a shower, I just remembered when we used to dance together to Raffi. Remember? I don’t know what made me think of that, but I knew I just had to connect with you.”

“Well, I’m glad you did, sis. There’s so much to talk about, but the best news of all; Coop and I have adopted a baby. You are going to be an auntie!”

“What” Wow! That’s big! Are you going to call Mom and Pop?”

“No!” While he spoke of his parents, his voice changed timber. “They said their piece when I came out to them. If they want to apologize, they need to come to me. I can’t do it.”

“I was going to call you, though. We just wanted to make sure that everything was settled first before announcing to anyone. We don’t have him yet, but little Eduardo is practically ours. We can’t wait to bring him home. We’ve decorated a whole nursery and stocked the house with bottles, baby wipes-you name it and we’ve got it ready and waiting for our new son.”

She could feel his smile through the phone. Its beam, so potent, infected her with his joy until she too smiled with unbridled happiness. “Well, Tommy, the first thing I’m going to do is find a copy of that old Raffi recording. I’m going to have some serious dancing to do with my nephew.”

“Let him walk first sis. So, are you going to come visit us?”

"You bet I am!" As she said this, another thought came into her head. She needed to speak with her parents. She didn’t know how yet, but she knew. Her next step in her personal revolution would be healing her family.

After hanging up the phone, Miriam cleaned the kitchen still singing the words to the song as she stacked plates into the dishwasher slots.