Sweet Little Jane
The cold wasn’t yet cold enough to freeze Jane so she kept walking. She figured if she walked far enough and long enough she would eventually tire and find a quiet place to lie down and wait for night to come and for the cold to freeze her. For years she had thought about how it would end. She wasn’t necessarily tired of life, just tired of doing the wrong thing. Most of her years had been spent doing the wrong thing. Since birth she had been a bother. A nuisance her parents were forced to endure. She watched and waited for them to do something, anything, to let her know they cared for her, felt something for her, loved and wanted her, but the silence grew until it became a great gray wad stuck in their throats. A wad they could neither swallow nor spit out. The quiet surrounded the rooms of the house where they lived like a snake searching for a place to rest until it gains enough strength to wrap itself around its prey and finish the job.
Jane didn’t know what had happened, what catalyst had shaped her life. She only knew that something had burned her. She couldn’t name the “something” she had unwillingly lugged around. No matter how hard she tried to shake it off, it was as much a part of her as her lungs. Many years passed before she learned what that dead weight was.
One sunny autumn afternoon, Jane was sitting across the room from her mother when she casually asked the question she had wanted to ask for years. “Why did you leave Saginaw and return to your husband?” Her mother didn’t say a word. She merely pointed to her daughter. In that moment Jane got her answer. “Why didn’t you throw me in the river?” she asked. “You could have gone back to the city and lived a happy life.” Sadie was silent for what seemed like forever but was most likely only a few seconds.
“Three days before your birth, the wind blew fierce off Lake Superior,” she said. “I knew it was an omen. You were a breech birth. I called you a devil-child. I wouldn’t look at you until they thrust you at my breast, but even then I looked away.”
“But why didn’t you get rid of me?”
“When I left the hospital, the ice on the river was thick,” Sadie said as calmly as if she were asking for another slice of walnut cake. “You wouldn’t have sunk. I couldn’t bear the thought of you lying there, waiting for the ice to break up before it swallowed you. I pictured you being eaten by wolves so I walked back to the house and put you in your crib.”
The silence hung heavy between mother and daughter. At first Jane was horrified that the mother she loved could utter such a monstrous admission, but as Sadie sat in her chair and Jane sat in hers, she knew her mother was capable of anything. After all, she was the reason Jane couldn’t get the hang of living but drifted like a feather on the wind, drifted until it was ugly and dirty and good for nothing. Jane was that feather, a mere collection of fluff that couldn’t adjust to living. Life to her had always been a burden. She was too intelligent to see the point of it and too scared to end it. Religion had taught her it was wrong to kill. She didn’t recall the priest mentioning anything about suicide. In her mind, suicide wasn’t killing. It was freeing her spirit from the flesh holding it captive.
The day waned as days do and the sitting ceased as sitting does. Jane prepared supper, washed the dishes, and readied Sadie for bed. The house was quiet. Jane took a book from the shelf but didn’t open it. Instead, she thought about what her mother had said—that the river was frozen. She wished the ice had broken up and her life had ended before it had begun. She would have been spared a lot of heartache and would never have known how cruel her mother could be or how much that cruelty would be passed to Jane.
She switched on a light. The glow from the lamp temporarily quieted her nerves. She looked at the room, at the grandfather clock ticking away the hours, at the orange and yellow flames in the fireplace. Jane had always loved this room. It was small and inviting. She felt safe here. This room was her haven. It held only sweet memories of hours spent reading her collection of Little Golden books. Suddenly and without warning, she understood why everything from her childhood had been destroyed. It all made sense now. Of course her mother wouldn’t want any reminders of the daughter she had not wanted. When Jane sat across the living room from Sadie, she finally understood. Perhaps now she could forgive her mother. Perhaps now she was at last free of the anger she had carried all her life. Perhaps, but no guarantee.
A few years later, Jane went for an evening walk. It was December and the river had not yet frozen over. Jane leaned across the bridge. She thought about finally achieving the goal her mother had desired. She had the courage to do it now. It was too late, of course, because Sadie had died two years ago, but in Jane’s mind if she leaned over far enough she might have finally pleased her mother. The more she thought about it, the more the idea grew like a wad in her throat that she could neither swallow nor spit out. Then from somewhere deep within her, a laugh broke through the great gray wad and found her lips. Jane threw back her head and laughed until the tears came. Then she turned and walked home. She lived the rest of her life in absolute bliss.
