Out Stealing Water by Roxanne Lynn Doty

Author:Roxanne Lynn Doty
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Regal House Publishing
Published: 2022-11-15T00:00:00+00:00

15

The white envelope, addressed to Emily, with no return address, is on the patio table with a stack of other mail and advertisement flyers. She picks it up, folds it several times until it fits in the palm of her hand. Aware that Marilee watches her, Emily walks to the sidewalk and heads to Tempe Town Lake.

Three construction workers sit on the back of a pickup. A few others mill about the frame of the towering structure. As Emily walks past, one of the guys in the pickup catcalls. She turns, and a guy with dark hair, cropped close to his scalp, grins at her. She gives him the finger and continues walking, ignores the laughter behind her.

At the lake she sits on one of the benches and gazes out over the water to the freeway beyond. It’s late morning; the air is filled with white noise from traffic, the city, and the light-rail moving over the bridge and headed to Phoenix. Emily opens the letter. Scraggly handwriting on stationery from the Clown Motel in Tonopah.

Dear Emily,

Seeing you all grown up but still so young made me think of things I haven’t thought about for a long time. Like myself when I had everything before me, like you do now. Before mistakes started piling up, one after the other, until there were so many it was just a way of life figuring out how to keep going in the midst of all I’d screwed up. And that’s just about everything for me. I’ve messed up just about everything I’ve touched in this world. I know that. Except for one thing. I realized that when you came up here and I saw how you turned out and I realized I’d done one perfect thing. I never knew it until you came up here to Tonopah. I had no right to call you sweetie, no right to call you anything, and I certainly don’t deserve good feelings from you, not one bit. And I know you wouldn’t believe it if I said I loved you, so I won’t say that. I don’t think I even know what that is anymore. If I ever did. But there must have been a teeny little good thing inside of me. There had to be. Just big enough to result in you, though god knows I can’t claim to have ever done anything at all for you. That’s all Grandma Marilee and Dwight and Ruth. What I mean is just being the one that gave you life, that must mean there was something worthwhile in me back then and I just wanted to tell you this, tell you that I know this now, tell you how glad I am that you came up here to see me. Tell you how perfect you are.

Love, Phyllis

At the bottom, a phone number. Shit. How you turned out. What the hell does she know about how Emily turned out? The lake water blurs before Emily. She crushes the letter in her hand and tosses it, then immediately gets up and retrieves it from the grass near the bench.

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