The Tender Land by Kathleen Finneran

Author:Kathleen Finneran
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Mariner Books

The next day, instead of taking the highway, I drove the long way home, going across northern Illinois and then following the Mississippi south to St. Louis. Sean’s green jersey was on the seat beside me. Every few miles, I picked it up and pressed it to my face. It didn’t smell like him. It didn’t smell like anyone or anything. But I held on to it. I would hold on to it all my life, taking it with me wherever I moved, keeping it in a drawer with the rest of my clothes.

The last time I saw Sean wearing it was a few months before he died. I had stopped by my parents’ house after supper. He was in the kitchen, washing the dishes. My mother was sitting at the table writing a letter. Sean turned from the sink when I walked in. He looked surprised to see me. “I was just thinking about you!” he said. “Just now, while I was washing this glass,” and he held it up as evidence, as if his thoughts were reflected on its surface. “I was hoping you’d come over,” he said, and he set the glass in the dishrack, put his arms around me, and hugged me more tightly than he ever had, sinking his head into my shoulder, his hands wet against my waist.

I caught my mother’s eye. She had looked up from her letter and was smiling at us, and I could tell that she was touched, as I was, by the tenderness of her teenage son. Sometimes, when I come across the green jersey, what I remember most strongly is Sean’s embrace; other times, I see my mother’s face.

I never found out why he was hoping I’d come over that night. When he hugged me, it felt as if he were relaxing into me, letting go of something, and I wondered for a long while what it was. After he finished the dishes, he snapped the towel against my leg before heading out to find his friends, and the evening went on like any other.

Driving home from Chicago, I stopped every few miles and cried in my car. By the time I reached St. Louis, it was after midnight, but despite the hour, I went back to my parents’ house instead of going to my apartment. When I got up the next day, I sat on the steps in the front hall and looked out the window while my mother said her prayers in the living room.

“He didn’t come yesterday,” she said, as if she knew I was waiting for the blond-haired boy. Shortly after, she put away her prayer book and walked past me up the stairs. I sat there for a long while, hoping to hear something, the slightest movement coming from the second story, any indication that she had not gone back to bed, but the whole house was silent. I tiptoed upstairs. Kelly was still asleep, and my mother was in Sean’s room, lying on his bed.

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