(read part one: In the Closet)
Back on solid ground, I took the box over to the kitchen counter so I could inspect it in the light. It was plain wood, basic but well-made. It was certainly no box I had ever bought, and I couldn't recall anyone building it for me. I didn't exactly choose men that were handy around the house.
The lid took three tries to open. At first, I thought it was a user error, my fingers fumbling uselessly, but then I recognized the feel of resistance. It was how my feet felt as I struggled to step onto the stepladder. It was almost enough to make me turn back, but I knew I would be wondering about that box forever. Isn't that how it always goes? Curiosity kills the cat.
Kills. Yet I pushed on. I got the lid loose and opened it wide. My confusion became even more pronounced when I saw what was inside.
Snapshots from my childhood, from my teenage years, from my last relationship. Pictures I had never seen before, but vividly remembered the moments depicted.
I shuffled through some of the most embarrassing moments of my childhood. I stared into the face of bad boyfriend after bad boyfriend, trying to ignore my own face in each photo. I knew what I looked like, and I didn't need to see it again; staring adoringly into each dumb face as if he were the one who hung the moon.
I started feeling nauseous. Ok, ok, I thought to myself as I kept cycling through the pictures. I get it, I was dumb, I made mistakes. Why are you shoving it in my face?
Who is shoving it in my face?
The last picture was me on the day I moved out of townhouse I shared with my ex. We had never been happy, I knew that now, but I felt the need to pretend we were. I wanted him to be what I needed. I wanted to be what he wanted. But we never were. And we both wasted time trying. You could read all of that on my tear-streaked face in the picture. I was carrying a box out to my car but you could tell the tears were those of humiliation, not sadness.
No more. Now I understood the closed door, the difficulty in lifting my feet, the overall resistance. It was as if I had opened Pandora's Box of memories, and now I was stuck with them. But I didn't have to repeat them.
419 words
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