Ruth Schiffmann

Blink of an Eye

You hear stupid things come out of your mouth. "Has the mail come yet?" or "What should I make for dinner?" And your heart shrinks. What does it matter? Your father is alone at the hospital forgetting your name, your face, your love for him.

The daily routine of living has become unbearable and you fear that one more prick of emotion will kill you. So you start to disconnect things inside yourself to get through another day.

You rip out empathy, heavy and wet like beach sand. You dig handful by handful until your fingers are raw and you are hollow, fragile, ready to fall in on yourself.

You carve out a wedge-shaped corner of your heart like breakfast grapefruit: memories you can't bear to relive. Scraping them out with serrated teeth close to the membrane, you remove the delicate tissue of your life together, placing the soft, fleshy chunks of childhood laughter and adult conversations in a Tupperware container, preserving them for someday when you are stronger.

You grasp for regrets--scattered and buried deep like splinters. If onlys and should haves festering beyond the reach of ill-equipped, blunt-nosed instruments like your own weary fingers.

You tug at cords of harsh words and impatience, but they stretch and give like rubber bands refusing to let you unplug from the source. What you can't undo you cover up with music: your anesthetic. You lean your weight into huge blocks of it to wall up everything tender, raw, needing attention. You push lyrics and melodies against the bulk of a hundred ignored emotions or unchecked thoughts--damming up every crevice that threatens to let in remaining traces of pain.

When you're sure you've done all you can to protect yourself, you travel to the hospital
for a visit. Your father looks at you for an instant, indifferent, before he closes his eyes. Taking deep, silent breaths he sleeps through your time together. Finally, just before you leave, he shifts in the bed and opens his eyes. Registering your face, he smiles and lets his eyes stay with yours until the connection starts to fill the empty places in your heart, aching through every delicate tissue of your being. And you know that the connections you've struggled for so long to undo are the things he struggles most to hold onto. The only things that will get him through another day.

So you start to plug back in again, taking his hand, meeting his gaze, letting yourself continue to love him.

CP

Ruth Schiffmann puts pen to paper always hoping for that magical moment when the words take on a life of their own. Some days the magic happens. On others, she writes in hopeful anticipation. To read more of her work, visit www.RuthSchiffmann.com or follow her blog at http://outonalimbshywritergoessocial.blogspot.com.

Ruth Schiffmann

 

Tiny Flakes

Someone has left the window open. A restless breeze finds its way through the torn screen and blows my heart to pieces. I watch glistening bits flutter and turn, suspended on a wave of raw air and think about reaching out, gathering handfuls of the pieces of myself, kneeling on the cold floor to put them back together.

Instead, I watch them settle, close my eyes and wait for another strong gust to carry them away. It will be better this way, I think. It will hurt less in the end. But still, stray bits linger, so I begin to give them away. I tuck a hard corner into the envelope when I pay my electric bill, mix tiny flakes into bowls of cold cereal and serve them to my family for breakfast, place a ragged edge in the recycling bin with last week's junk mail.

My father forgot my sister's name today. I brought him photos and pressed out her name like a newly minted coin. "I don't know her," he said, his eyes still wide and bright.

The heat kicks on and stirs up lost scraps of myself from the baseboards. I pluck a kite-shaped fragment and turn it over in my hands, wonder if this is what it feels like for him to watch scattered pieces of himself drift away, float back, then drift farther still.

I smooth out the section before me, feeling it thaw with the heat of my fingertips and the fear in my breath. It becomes less brittle as I press. Fold. Turn. Press. Fold. Turn. Until it looks like an origami swan. I cut a length of string and tie it from the curtain rod, push open the window and wait for the wind to find its way through the tear again.

I suck in cold air and wonder when my father will forget me, how I will remain whole when he does as I watch the tiny piece of my heart that remains, floating on the wind.

CP

Ruth Schiffmann puts pen to paper always hoping for that magical moment when words take on a life of their own. Some days the magic happens. On others, she writes in hopeful anticipation, knowing it will visit her again soon. More of her work can be viewed at www.RuthSchiffmann.com

Ruth Schiffmann

Whispers and Laughter

Seven days ago I found out I was pregnant; I told Tony and he said he loved me. I said I needed to be alone.

Today, the bell rings and I push my way through a strange tangle of people in the stairwell. The air smells of sweat and Doritos. Hushed voices hiss my name.

My brother's knuckles break against Tony's jaw. His legs crumple beneath him and we all watch to see if he will get up. I am sure this is my punishment: to watch him come undone. The seconds go by mired in whispers and laughter. My brother reaches down and picks Tony up. Draping his arm over a shoulder, he leads him out of the storm we have created.

As they push through the door, Tony looks back and our eyes catch. I'm not laughing at him, but it's not enough.

The onlookers trail away. My eyes linger on the fresh red splattering on the floor and I know, as I knew yesterday when I felt the chill of the cold clinic corridors, he will never forgive me.

All I have inside me today is a diet coke and a heart made of stone.

CP

More than eighty of Ruth Schiffmann's stories and articles have been published, both online and in print.