The Leaving
– Fiction by Debra Kennedy –
Originally published in Flash Fiction Magazine
She waited until her husband was home, the boy in bed, asleep. Autumnal darkness had settled over the town like a blanket and now pressed against the bedroom window. With icy hands and racing heart, she threw underwear, jeans, and shirts into her battered vinyl suitcase. Darting into the tiny bathroom, she caught her reflection in the mirror. Dull strings of hair hung on either side of an ashen face with red-rimmed eyes, pupils large and dull. Slinking back to the bedroom, she stuffed the toothbrush and comb into the suitcase, zipped it closed, and lugged it out of the room.
At the archway between the kitchen and living room, she stopped, suitcase slumped against her legs, arms trembling at her sides. “I’m…” Her voice cracked. It was Saturday—hockey night—and the announcer’s voice filled the rooms, passionately rising and falling with the play. She cleared her throat and tried again, louder this time. “I’m leaving.”
Waiting, putting it off, was over. She couldn’t pretend anymore. Not after what she did.
Her husband slouched on the sagging couch, a can of beer in his hand, the front of his body illuminated by flashes from the television screen. He didn’t turn to her, didn’t ask why. They hadn’t had a real conversation in—did they ever? She looked at him, in jeans and wool socks shedding sawdust from the mill, trying to envision the young man who caught her attention in the crowded bar that night years ago. They didn’t need or want to talk then, simply sharing their bodies was enough. Eventually, they were forced to talk, but it usually ended in an argument. So, they stopped trying, stuck to subjects like groceries, the weather, appointments, and the only thing they both loved—their son.
He didn’t take his eyes off the television. “Yeah. Well, I told you before. Go if you want. I don’t care. Just don’t take the boy with you.”
She pressed her lips together, steadied herself against a wave of dizziness. Her insides clenched. “I’m not,” she managed to whisper.
He finally turned to look at her, expectantly, but her words were blocked. She didn’t confess what she did, but tamped it down, all the misery and guilt, the anguish of abandoning her child. And none of this could she articulate to her child’s father, who hated going to the mill with its whirring saws, relentlessly rolling chains and belts, body-crushing repetitive work, who didn’t understand her wasting time on frivolous activities like drawing and reading. He huffed in disgust as he turned back to the game.
The boy’s bedroom door was cracked open just slightly, the way he liked it. No. Don’t. You can’t look at him. Steeling her aching heart, she lurched toward the back door, opened it into the chill night, forced her feet outside. Her suitcase bumped behind her down the cracked concrete stairs to the old jalopy she drove to work and back. Put in the clutch, pump the gas, turn the key—three tries and it refused to start. Maybe she had flooded it. She pressed her forehead against the steering wheel and almost got out, almost went back.
Then she noticed her clammy hand and flinched, remembered recoiling in horror that afternoon, examining her offending hand as though it was foreign, with a mind of its own. How could she hit her son—like that? He was seven years old, just a child, but old enough to talk back, to tell her to shut up. She was screaming at him—for what she cannot remember. She was always on edge, tense, and ready to spring, like a coiled snake. There was never enough time to work at the restaurant, cook the meals, do the laundry, as well as find time for studying and her art. But his face—his beautiful, shocked, hurt face. Her hands shook as she led him to the sink to rinse his bloody nose. But she did not enfold him in her arms, did not cry and beg forgiveness, vowing to reform, to become a better mother. The blow had struck terror into her heart. And it was of herself that she was afraid.
She cranked the key again. It caught, and as the motor whirred to life, she hung her head.
It was a sign. Don’t cry, just leave. Shifting into first and then second gear, she let the car creep down the street through pools of illumination, over dung-brown leaves plastered to the pavement. At the bottom of the hill, she pulled the gearshift into neutral, opened the door, and threw up.
A huge tremor shook her body, and she sucked in air, sat up and examined the intersection before her. The highway led out of town, either left or right. Pulling down the indicator, she turned left. The yellow line, glowing in the headlights, caught and pulled her like a fish as she drove through the night, toward the coast, as far as she could go without falling off into the ocean.
About the Author – Debra Kennedy
Debra Kennedy is a retired teacher firmly rooted in the Kootenay region of British Columbia. She writes, dreams, and paints about family relationships and the environment within which they are enmeshed. Her writing has been published in Persimmon Tree, Quagmire, and Flash Fiction online magazines. She is currently working on a novel and a short story cycle.
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