Complex by Caspar Ambrose (english novels for beginners .TXT) 📕

“Of course darling anytime,” Sarah moved aside to let Rebeca in. “For you, my door is always open.”

Rebecca liked talking with Sarah. About both the good and bad times. She found the elderly woman’s wisdom to be comforting. And right now she needed an ear and some good advice.

“Take a seat over there Becca,” said Sarah.

Rebecca took the seat offered to her as Sarah was sitting in the seat opposite her. The entire apartment looked like it hadn’t changed in over thirty years. Just stayed the same since the 1970’s. There was something comforting about that, Rebecca found. Something wholesome that was like a breath of fresh air from the graffiti filled halls outside.

She had once asked Sarah why she still lived here. And for the response a simple, ‘I have lived here for fifty years and this is where I will die’ was what she received. Rebecca liked that. A sliver of stability in what otherwise seemed like a chaotic world that was ever changing around her.

“So dear,” Sarah began. “What ails you so?”

“It’s Jenna,” Rebecca started. She didn’t know how to say it. In fact didn’t want to say it. Because she didn’t want to believe it herself. “She has HIV. We just found out this morning.”

“That’s terrible,” in Sarah’s face was chiseled an expression of disbelief. “The poor thing.”

“She brought it upon herself,” Rebecca was shocked as she spat out the words. “She never quit using heroin. She never stopped in spite of all the promises and all the help I’ve given her.”

“Don’t be so hard on her dear,” Sarah said in a soothing manner. “We all make mistakes. And the mistakes we make vary in degrees and magnitudes. But we all make them all throughout our lives right up until the end. Even I falter in my old age.”

“It’s just, how could she do this to me?” a few tears rolled down Rebecca’s cheeks as she said this. “How could she do this to us?”

Sarah picked up a packet of cigarettes from the end table next to her chair and pulled one out for both herself and for Rebecca. A pause in the conversation occurred during this while each of the women lit her cigarette and took a few puffs. Ashing in the large green glass ashtray sitting on the oak coffee table which separated the two.

“In the end,” began Sarah after a few moments. “In the end, each of us has to live with our own mistakes as well as our own successes. We each have enough to worry about committing our own errors, it doesn’t do to take on other people's. The best we can hope for is to work ourselves to be better people, with the knowledge that we will inevitably fail on some level. And help others to be the best they can through support and love. Especially those we love.”

Sarah paused to take a drag from her cigarette.

“I know after my son killed himself, and my husband left me for another woman, I spent over a decade blaming others for their mistakes. But it was only when I realized their mistakes were their own, that I was able to find piece. If you love Jenna, and I know you do, you will accept her for the mistake she has made. And if you love yourself, then you will not take on her mistake as your own. Simply try to navigate the muddy waters that we call life.”

Rebecca thought about this for a moment. What she was saying made sense. But at the current moment, she just didn’t want to accept it.

“It’s just,  I thought things would be different,” Rebecca finally said. “I expected my life to be different. I never thought I would be in this place when I was younger. And I dread to think where I will be when I am older.”

“Come now child,” Sarah said. “What is this life but a long series of failed expectations filled with intense bursts of unexpected joy in between. If life was as we expected it to be all the time, then we would all be quite bored now wouldn’t we?”

“I suppose you’re right,” Rebecca admitted.

“What you have to do is be there for Jenna,” Sarah advised. “And in the process be there for yourself. It may be a long hard road, but if it is what is meant to be, then it is what will be child.”

Both cigarettes were finished at around the same moment. Rebecca took a final puff and stubbed the stick out in the ashtray. She had received the wisdom she had come for. And had plenty to think on. Now she needed some time to think about it and figure out how she was going to proceed. So she got up and hugged the old woman.

“Thank you as always Sarah,” Rebecca said.

“Of course dear,” Sarah spoke sweetly as she arose from her seat to let Rebecca out. “You know my door is always open for you.”

Sarah walked with the young girl to the door and let her out. Giving her one last hug before the girl disappeared around the corner on the way back to her apartment. She then closed the door and looked at the antique wall clock which hung in her kitchen. It was getting close to her supper. Time for her daily walk. The sun would be starting to go down, cooling the temperature. So she slowly made her way to her bedroom to fetch her walking slippers. And after she put them on and put on her bonnet, twenty minutes later she was at the door ready to go. She grabbed her walking cane from the umbrella holder which was to the left of the door and then opened and locked it behind her.

In the apartment across from hers, there seemed to be a commotion going on. A man was distressed standing at the door. Tears were coming down his face. She had to reach into her memory but finally retrieved the man's name, Steven. She had met him on a few occasions but only in passing.

Sarah walked across to where he was standing by the open door to his unit to see what the trouble was. And as she stood in front of him her heart sank and a heaviness came over her. Inside of the unit, in the living room, a woman lay on the floor with slit wrists in a pool of blood. The cries of a child came from another room within the unit.

“No, no, no, no,” was all Steven could mumble through the tears. “No, no, no, no, no.”

‘Oh, the poor child’ Sarah thought to herself internally. ‘Oh, how cruel this beautiful world can be’.

Publication Date: 03-11-2017

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