As I Lay Dying

Thirty nine

1919

The cottage is smaller than I remembered it. My feet almost hang from the bottom of the bed and I have to stoop when I pass between the upstairs doorways. The estate itself is different to my memories. It seems to hold less magic than the enchanted place of my memories.

But perhaps it's all just Evie. She has changed so much that I can recognise nothing within her. She's thin to the point of illness, there is no trace of her full, rounded curves. In the past, when she laughed she had a deep dimple nestled in her left cheek, but one glance at her is enough to tell me that no one sees it anymore. Everything about her is dull and listless, the only spark of life in her is reserved for the child, the poor boy that the cook was eager to inform me isn't Evie's child at all, but a product of Roberts affair. Evie seems to love him regardless of his parentage.

There was a moment, the night before last when I knew I was going to stay on the estate. I was home, where I always wanted to be. Lord Ashbury greeted me like a returning son, even Lady Ashbury gave a rare smile. After an impromptu dinner- to my disbelief they insisted that I ate with them for the first time in my life- Evelyn walked me to my old cottage.

Earlier in the day, when we had first met, she had flung herself into my arms. I expected our walk back to the cottage to be a chance to talk freely, but it seemed to me that she was eager to be away from me. We talked of the estate, the servants... Buy I sensed that she was uncomfortable around me. Every time I unthinkingly stepped within any distance of her, she quickly moved away from me.

It's Darlington's doing, surely? But he is dead, she cannot be afraid of him. As we talked I watched her, how she chattered nervously, avoiding any of the topics I would have wanted to talk to her about and I realised that she was nervous because of me. Maybe she is afraid that I will tell her family that I fathered her child... Perhaps she is embarrassed to see someone who knew her so well when she has gone to great lengths to become a lady.

She seemed distressed when I told her I was to go to America. I sought her out the next day but I realised with a sense of foreboding that she was avoiding me. She did this once before. That time ended with her leaving the estate.. This time it's my departure that will be the end result.

Last night I woke in the early hours, covered in sweat and twisted bedsheets. The dream, the sea of dead faces that my mind had produced for me to witness was so vivid that I sobbed into my pillow until I was hoarse.

There was to be no sleep for me. There never is these days.

I noticed that the door to my mothers room was ajar. It was the only room I hadn't entered since I arrived back. As I stood up and moved towards it, the soft breeze curled across my damp skin. I was still hiccoughing, crying in a way that I haven't since I was a child.

The emptiness of my mothers room was like a sudden blow. She has been dead so long that my childish memories of her have almost diminished to nostalgia, but in that moment I had such a longing for her that it felt like a physical ache in my stomach.

I curled up on her bed, as I did as a toddler after a bad dream. A faded cushion she embroidered lay beside me and I pulled it to my chest, fancying that I caught a whiff of her soaped scent on it.

I am alone. Other men, like Jimmy, have returned with their memories but they have someone to unburden too. I am alone in the world. A fresh wave of tears well at this thought and I'm so overcome by the urge to speak to someone who loves me that I begin to speak into the dark room. I speak to my mother, I tell her everything. All of my secrets, all of my burdens and sadnesses. All of my loneliness.

My tears have dried on my face as I watch the dawn beginning to blossom outside the window. I don't move until the sun is creeping across the lawn, but when I stand, I take the small cushion with me.