ed note: The following story by Shauna Kelley, was submitted to, accepted and won an award from the National Foundation for the Advancement of The Arts (NFAA). Shauna Kelley is a regular column contributor to The Inditer. See more of her work elswhere in this journal.
Max and Menna
.... © 1998 by Shauna Kelley
There are times when I wish more than anything in the world that I could remember it all; then, there are the times when I just want to purge my mind of every thought relating to my past. Right now I know that I can't tell you of her smile, her warmth, and her light, I can only hope to tell you of her life, starting with the day that mine began.
It was one of those June days when the sun's rays seemed to melt from the sky like butter, dripping warmth onto lethargic eyes. It was one of those days with a million possibilities that were never explored, one of those days when you simply had to lie on a grassy hill, alone with your thoughts.
The melty sun was high above my head when I set out for the hill I grew up on, my hill. I navigated the forest as I had in my childhood- down the dirt trail in the woods that barely constituted a path, all the while hearing the voice of my sister echo in my head: "Max, my brother, I need you." I had crossed this very path everyday I was a child, many times to rescue my sister from whatever fray she had found her way into at that moment, and though I hadn't been back for twelve years, I found my way down the scarcely distinguishable trail to my final act of chivalry. It took only a few moments of meandering through deserted places alive with memories and forgotten familiarity to stumble out of the protection of the trees and find myself face to face with my hill.
I stood for a moment on the fringes of the woods, watching as every memory I had of this place replayed before me. I recognized people I hadn't seen or thought of since I left until finally my eyes and thoughts settled on a little girl about five at this reminiscing with jet black hair, coal black eyes and idealism flowing from every pore, sitting beside a boy of eight with red hair ablaze like fire in the sunlight and piercing green eyes. I stood behind them, five at the time, staring at my twin sister Menna, her tattered dress and bare feet a shabby contrast tot he brightness of her face, and her soulmate, her best friend, Nick Reily.
That was the day we met Nick. He had been sitting alone on the hill when Menna and I cleared the forest. My instincts told me to retreat, but I watched as Menna charged forward. At the time I thought she was fearless, but I know now that wasn't it, she didn't even realize that she might have something to fear.
"I'm Menna" she explained, thrusting her hand forward. "This is my brother Max."
Nick regarded us thoughtfully for a moment, probably unsure of how to interpret this introduction. "Nick," he said, finally, gingerly taking her hand.
Menna immediately flung herself to the ground on her stomach, feet kicked up in the air exposing the dirt from the forest, and began to talk. She told Nick everything that a five year old had to tell, of our father whom we had never met, of our sister who didn't like us, and how are mother chased us out of the house everyday after she woke up so she could drink the stuff that looked like water and yet made her crazy. I paced behind them, listened as he listened, and saw his face gradually soften to the little leech that had so lovingly attached itself to him.
Standing in the woods many years later, I stared at the memory of the three as though they were foreign, alien, and then the conversation that we had been having came back to me so clearly, so painfully. I looked at my sister, alive, vibrant, and happy as she had been, and I recalled our life before. I saw Menna, as she was then, so young and so innocent. She believed in a world of possibilities. That was when she still had hope.
I was born at 11:57 p.m. on May 12, 1965, and Menna at 12:04 a.m. on May 13, 1965. We were the only identical twins I ever met with different birthdays. Not that it mattered, we never had parties, rarely got presents. In fact, save for each other, our birthdays were as foreign to the outside world as my mother was to sobriety. I never much cared. As a child, I never much cared about anything, least of all my mother. It always hurt Menna to be forgotten, though. Every year on her birthday she would rise early and race downstairs as though expecting a surprise party this year and every year she was disappointed. "I know it isn't that they forget us, Max," she would say softly that night in her bed, "they just don't remember is all." I could never quite understand how Menna could so blindly accept my mother's neglect. She loved my mother with a passion that unconditionally overlooked all the alcohol, all the abuse, all the pain we were subjected to as children. Every night as we made our beds on the tiny floor of the attic, Menna pretended that she couldn't hear my mother in the room below. It was a nightly occurrence, the loud and confused voice echoing through the house; my mother cursed, bumped into things and ominously referred to "all her damned mistakes". I don't remember exactly when it was that I realized that Menna, and I, along with my older sister Lily, were the mistakes.
Lily was ten years older than we were, and had a different father. She was ashamed of where we lived, who we were, and who had made her. Our town was tiny and so we all went to the same school, from kindergarten through graduation. When Menna and I strapped on our backpacks for the first day of school I had no idea where my mother was- she certainly wasn't standing proudly by the door to bid farewell to her little angels. Instead, Lily walked us to school. Menna and I were very confused, being that the town was so small we knew she was choosing an odd path to guide us along. Finally, the back of the school was in sight and she turned to face us. "If anyone asks you if we're related, you say no. Don't let me found out you told them we were," she warned. She stared at us both for a moment then grunted a noise of disgust before charging off. "You're on your own," she called over her shoulder as she went.
Only one of Lily's friends actually knew where she lived. Since she was twelve years old Montgomery Mason, called Emery by everyone, had been her friend, and a constant fixture at her side during the few moments she spent at home every night. For all I know, he might have been her only friend, but I never saw Lily enough to know if that was true or not.
It was probably a few weeks after we met Nick that we realized there was something more then friendship between Emery and Lily. Nick, Menna and I were on our way back from the hill one afternoon, the heat and hunger driving us home, when we saw Lily and Emery on the porch. Their faces were pressed so closely together that we couldn't tell where one of them stopped and the other started.
"What are they doing?" Menna whispered, knowing that interrupting would not be advisable. "Kissing," Nick told him, the wisdom of his eight years an awe to us. "It means that she's his girlfriend."
We stared for a moment longer and turned towards Nick's house, knowing that this meant something had changed.
Nick moved across the street from us to live with his aunt the day we met him. His mother had died, and he had never even known who his father was. Having also grown up fatherless, Menna soon discovered that as the first thing they had in common. At first, Nick really thought of Menna as an annoyance, but soon he realized she was to be his only friend. With the amount of attention Menna demanded from everyone, she was probably the only friend he could handle.
Nick would come to our house first thing in the morning and sit on the porch until Menna came out. Usually Lily left the house first. She would walk by his dormant figure and pause only long enough to deliver a terse and pernicious comment, such as "Did he forget which side of the street he belongs on again today?" Lily saw Nick as the one person in the entire town with a lower social standing then our entire family, and therefore used every excuse to make his lowliness known. Next, my mother would glance out the door, I presume to see how much time she had lost since her last moment of awareness. She usually failed to even notice Nick. For all I know she could have believed him to be one of her children and ignored him as she did us. As soon as my mother was aware of the time, the order to "get lost" was issued. Menna would emerge from the house, her eyes saturated with the brightness of her soul. "What shall we do today, Mr. Reily?" was always the question.
"Why, I don't know Miss Soother," he would reply, "perhaps we shall hunt the stars."
They would stand together dramatically and head off towards the hill. I always found this daily ritual a bit bizarre; I was unable to grasp the need for their formality in discussing what they would do that day when in fact they did the same thing everyday. It wasn't until I was much older that I realized that with their silly talk they were building a world each and every day, a world a little more beautiful and a lot more livable. Menna and Nick had nothing but each other, so they created everything else. When they were on the hill, they spoke only of the palace they had built there. Theirs was a palace I could never bring myself to see.
It was probably on her twelfth birthday when I started to notice the way she and Nick had changed, especially in the way they regarded each other. Nick, did all the odd-jobs he could get from the people in our town, which were scarce due to his "white-trash" reputation. In past years, Nick had always been the only person to give Menna a birthday gift, usually paper for drawing, but this year he proudly presented her with a tiny, gold-plated locket on a string of pearls; it must have taken him months to save the money for it. We were standing on the hill as he sheepishly pulled it from his pocket and handed it to her. Her eyes lit up and her cheeks flushed as she reached for it. Their hands brushed as she took it. Nick looked up, as though surprised, and then smiled faintly. Menna returned the smile and I suddenly felt as though they had a secret that I could ever know.
A little while later Menna took her locket home. She put in it a tiny picture of Nick she had cut from a newspaper article about how a group of students in our school had entered an essay contest. Nick had come in fourth, a place yielding a one-dollar cash reward and his picture in the paper. "It's the only picture I've ever seen of myself," he declared proudly as he saw her put it in her necklace.
"But my dear, it looks nothing like you," she teased.
After that day I didn't go to the hill with Menna and Nick anymore. Something in that smile they exchanged told me I simply wasn't welcome, I would never be a part of the palace that they had created. They relied too much on each other and I didn't fit anymore. Menna and Nick turned away from our world into each other. I chose from that day on to consume myself with apathy in order not to feel the effects of our surroundings.
Throughout our teen years, I often found Menna staring at the picture in her locket when she thought no one was looking. Lily, who lived at home throughout our teen years despite her ability to leave and her hatred of the place, often laughed at her for it. "Oh, the little wretch found a man," she would whisper. The only times I ever saw Menna angry were the times when Lily spoke to her of Nick. Mostly, Menna was protective of Nick and hated to hear him mocked, but there was something more in Lily's condemnation. Her voice was so full of scorn and unspoken allegations, and yet she spoke of the implied situation with Menna and Nick with a sort of familiarity. It was not that Menna minded being teased, it was as if she found in Lily's words a comparison between Nick and Emery, and that was unacceptable.
Though she and Emery had been together for over ten years, they never mentioned marriage, never spoke of her moving into his apartment with him, and they never acted as though they had any feelings for each other in our sight. If anything, the way Lily's hands shook whenever he was close to her, or the way she cast her eyes to the ground when he entered the room suggested she was afraid of him.
I was sixteen the day my mother started coughing. She was in the living room, and I in the kitchen doing dishes, and she coughed loudly for several minutes. "Are you okay, Mom?" I called out to her. Her answer was pounding feet on the stairs and a slamming door.
The next day she coughed louder and longer. I thought of taking her to a doctor, but she would refuse. I tried not to notice. Those days, I rarely noticed my mother. She was more of a tenant than she was a mother.
The next day Menna was out with Nick, Lily with Emery and I was reading when I heard the loud thump upstairs. I ran up to find my mother unconscious on the floor, blood mixing with the mouthful of vodka she had coughed onto the floor. I left a note for Menna and took my mother to the hospital in her car that I did not have the license to drive. I only waited thirty minutes before Nick and Menna arrived. Twenty minutes later a doctor I had never seen came to tell me my mother was dead.
The three of us went home, somberly. "What now?" Menna asked, sitting placidly on the couch. I wasn't sure if she was asking what would become of us or what we should do with the rest of this night. "Does Lily know?" Nick asked.
"I can't imagine how she would," I realized. "We have to tell her."
"She's out with Emery," Menna interjected from the couch.
"They probably went to the hill," Nick said. I looked at him oddly, having no idea why Lily and Emery would go there. "Sometimes we pass them headed there as we're leaving," he explained.
Thus, we set off for the hill. As we walked through the woods, approaching the place, we heard yelling, and then heard Lily softly crying. When we were close enough to see, what we saw was Emery hitting her. Nick angrily started towards them, but Menna grabbed his arm.
"It isn't your fight," she told him.
"The hell it isn't," he responded and ran past her, desperate to fix the wrong that was occurring dangerously close to the perfect world he built. He reached Emery and pushed him away from Lily. A struggled ensued, Emery much larger than Nick and hurting the boy terribly. Lily simply sat and watched them fight, but Menna went to stop them. She had just reached the top of the hill when the cry of pain rang out. We never even saw the knife.
The next three seconds seemed to take three years to pass. Menna stared wide-eyed and held her breath to see who would fall. All of us not involved in the struggle prayed it would be Emery. In the dark, we couldn't tell who it was until we heard Nick's final cry. With all his strength he managed to force a whisper, a cry to pass his lips. He said it so softly that it was a miracle we heard it, but we did. We heard his final word, "Menna." Then, he died.
Emery stood panting over the body for a long while before he turned, ran and disappeared into the woods. Lily stood looking terrified and confused, watching him go. I watched Menna as she sat gaping, gawking, her eyes fixated with her fallen angel.
For several minutes we didn't know what she would do. Finally, as the first tear trickled down her cheek, she rose and crossed to the body. She stood above him for a moment before lowering her head and lying on his heart, where the blade had struck. Her body began to quake as she wrapped her arms around him. Finally, relieving the exhaustingly expectant silence, she shrieked one word. With all of her might, she screamed "No!" four times before looking up into his still face. Then, she wiped a hair from his forehead with her bloody hand and said. "Nick," as though she were trying to revive him. After several minutes, she rose to her knees, brought his head into her lap, and cried out "Daddy."
Lily and I were shocked. At first we thought she was addressing Nick. It took several moments before we realized she was calling out for the father she had never known. She was crying for him to come and make it all right, for him to save her innocence, but it was no use. She was covered in Nick's blood, and as she washed it away many hours later, something fled from her eyes as well.
Menna did not move from her position until the police came to get a report and the coroner took the body. Then, she stood battered, tired, alone, and dreadfully old. She turned to face her sister, her torturer, and raised her hands. "I have his blood on my hands, Lily," she said, taking a step towards Lily who backed away.
"Menna, this isn't your fault," I protested, but she wouldn't look at me. She faced every which direction she could to avoid showing me her terribly grown-up eyes.
"Mom is dead, Lily," she whispered coldly as though it were revenge. "Your mother is dead.." She spat the words with hatred.
Lily took Menna that night. "You're responsible, Max" she explained. "You can take care of yourself, Menna can't. Taking care of one of you is going to be hard enough, I can't take both of you."
I never saw Lily again, and until three days ago I was sure Menna was also dead to me. Then, I picked up the phone in my Beverly Hills house, bought with the spoils of my books, and heard her voice on the other end. I agreed to come to the hill, to meet her. I didn't imagine that standing here would remind me of the part of my childhood, which I buried in the back of my mind as I tried so desperately to forget what made me.
Finding a spot in the sun, I sat to wait for Menna. She came from behind me, not the woods, and set her hand gently on my shoulder. "Max," she said gently, and our eyes met. All the vibrancy she had possessed through my memories of her had vanished, and only the exhaustion from living remained. She sat. "Thank you for coming."
"I haven't seen you in twelve years, I think I could spare a trip back home. Where's Lily?" I asked, noticing how beautiful Menna would be without the exhaustion.
"Lily left me nine years ago to raise her child, and I haven't heard from her since," Menna confided. "You have a twelve-year-old niece named Nicole."
I was so shocked by the news that it took me several minutes to respond. "Is she here?"
"We live here, Max," she said, never taking her eyes from the horizon, "I moved back many years ago to be near him."
I of course knew who she was talking about, and I knew from the age in her eyes that, like so many others, the memory of her first love had changed her for life. It seemed impossible that the vibrancy which saturated her when she was with Nick had ever been on this face. For long time I sat and wondered if I was better or worse for never knowing the pain of losing love. Finally, I broke the silence. "You look tired, Menn," I told her.
She smiled, as though it were a compliment. "I am tired. I am always tired, because since she was born I have been terrified to close my eyes on that kid for a second."
"Why?" I asked her, seeing the anger in her face.
"Because I'm always afraid that the second I look away, she'll become like her father, that bastard Emery," Menna confided.
"Does she know about him?" I asked her, suddenly aware of how difficult it must have been for Menna raising the child of the man that killed the person she loved the most in the world.
"No," Menna said, quickly. "I told her that Nick was her father, more for my sake then hers. She reminds me of Nick sometimes," she said, smiling and closing her eyes for a moment. "God, I love that kid, and if you will meet her, I think you will, too."
"Is that why you asked me to meet you?" I asked, suddenly curious again.
She looked away again. "I need help, Max." Her voice was full or defeat.
"Do you need money?" I asked, quickly, knowing that it wasn't that.
"No!" she looked at me as though I were a complete stranger. "No. I need your help. I'm sick, Max."
"How sick?"
"Pretty sick."
"And you wanted me here..." her words were flying at me so fast that I couldn't fathom the meaning. I just knew that the more she spoke, the more somber, the more painful, the more adult she sounded.
"Max, I need you to take care of Nicole," she begged. "I know it's a lot, that you don't know her, or me for that matter, but Max, I've got no one else."
"Are you saying that you're…you're…"
"Yes, I am," she explained. "I hate to do this to you Max, almost as much as I hate the thought of leaving Nicci, but I don't have any other options. Please, please, promise me you'll take care of her."
I stared at my sister in disbelief, all the while thinking how a child would change my life, and then I remembered her cry the night Nick died, how she had called for our father. The thought made me believe in the possibility of what she was suggested, made me put complete trust in the hope she had once had, a hope I had never felt. In that moment I desperately wanted to know how it felt to believe in goodness the way Menna once had. Somehow the words "I promise" escaped my lips, and I found myself hugging my sister. She had her eyes closed. At that moment, I knew that my apathy was no longer an option.
A few minutes later we stood. Menna handed me something. "After…" she said, uncomfortably, "give her this." I found a gold locket on a strand of pearls in my hand.
I've always believed that childhood dies the moment you loose your idealism. I believe that Menna's died the day Nick did, but looking back, remembering her face, I've realized that for me, the indifference I guarded myself with as a child was my way of refusing to admit that from birth I had felt no hope, until many months later when my angel breathed her last breath. I held the hand of my sister, whom I knew more in her last days then I did in our sixteen years together, as she realized that she had reached the end.
She stared at me from her sterile hospital bed, slowly closed her eyes, and breathed his name ever so quietly. Then, at last, her face was peaceful. For the first time in twelve years, Menna's face held hope. I knew at that moment that I would give everything I have for the chance of gong back to my youth and experiencing everything, the pain, the anger, but also the hope.
Now, on my hill with only a memory of my sister and the knowledge that not far away, she is lying next to the one person that made her happy, I've realized that she spent so much of her life trying to keep Nicole's idealism alive. I look into my niece's face, and I see the pain of loss, but I also see the brightness of innocence. Of all the things in the world to believe in, what could be more important than this?
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