Chapter XIV, Evil Reaches Out - The Final Confrontation
With all the celebrations crossing widely over the campus, it went without conscious notice that Derek was enjoying his own special moment in the sun. Not only had he graduated from a prestigious national university with a degree in exercise physiology, he was a known baseball player across the country with several Major League Baseball scouts vying for his significant talents. Unlike a recent high school player being drafted into the baseball's farm system, Derek had competed at a sufficiently high level that the majors themselves were interested in his talents immediately and were willing to put that faith in him in the form of a contract, lucrative salary, and a tremendous signing bonus. Derek had finally reached a pinnacle in his own right that had seen him play thousands of games with the constant practice and years of investment that it takes to make an elite athlete.
His four years at UCLA molded and shaped him, doused his bricked-in personality, and had pulled him into the rarified air of the gifted. With the constant attention conferred on him by his fellow players over the years, coaches, family, and a following of diehard fans, Derek had come full circle in his own opinion of himself and began to think in terms of what life owed him instead of the opportunities that were bestowed upon him. He was moving towards a belief system where the world would pay homage to his desires and company. It was his understanding that now he could have anything that he wished, and that desire was fueled to an excess whenever he consumed alcohol. Derek would have whatever his heart wanted because society had told him that the world belonged to him alone and he assumed every word.
After what seemed to be days of festivities, with each close friend hosting their own version of merriment centered squarely over the relief that a process started without absolute assurance that the end would be one of successful conclusion, Ashley and I were able to begin the arduous task of listing our childhood home with the realtors and facing the long put-off efforts of examining, keeping, or tossing the collections of a lifetime of the four people that had resided together as a family for those incredible years and times of heart wrenching tragedy. We had not entered our parents' bedroom since the final night of our mother's life. The door had been sealed with what seemed to be a curse to keep the memories of the past from seeping out into the rest of the house.
Now, we faced the upending emotions that were determined to summon the bygone years once more. What ghosts would emerge through the dust and gloom that had been concealed from our view during the years of academia? Would we be able to complete the tasks set before us without being consumed in a spiraling sense of disaster that had taken away our previous incarnations? The thought that somehow we would be able to save some of the relics of our parents' in an attempt to keep the happier moments alive while moving from the senseless loss, insanity, and violence that were equally present within the inanimate belongings motivated us to focus on what was good and right of our younger years and forgive the actions that resulted in our family's loss.
In each of our minds, we whispered to them of our accomplishments, the love that we shared, and our hopes for the future as yet unfolding. Perhaps, their souls had found relief in the embrace of a heaven that was infinitely more forgiving that I was capable of experiencing. Their pains washed away with the brilliant light of love descending down to hold and embrace each one of them, to say that everything will be okay, that both of them are welcomed to the home of the Source. The door was opened, and the room revealed.
Strangely, there had been very little dust accumulated over the furnishings. The bed was still made and all the evidence of the violence that once rolled through this very room had been removed. The rays of the sun reached through the gauze-like fabric of the drapery and illuminated the room not in a dank and dismal sort of way but with a sort of hope and lightness that comes from the star at the center of our little edge in the universe. Ashley and I drifted from one corner of the room to the other, pulling information into the senses, feeling with our emotions, setting the direction and the initial steps that would be translated into movement and work. We settled with the walk-in closet first as it seemed that this rather feeble attempt to come to grips with enormity that befell us would compel an energy and purpose that would ultimately expand throughout the entire dwelling.
We had carried upstairs a few dozen cardboard boxes bought at the local U-Haul store along with the various tools and marking accessories needed to set upon the work at hand. It was determined that the clothes universally would be donated to the local Salvation Army along with most of the furniture keeping only what was necessary and needed to start our lives anew. At first, we sluggishly attempted to do what was at hand but slowly, the labor itself began to reinvigorate the both of us so that we found we were able to accomplish a great deal in not an inordinate amount of time. Still, these were our parents' possessions and we handled them with the reverence and respect that they deserved.
The smaller items, belongings of a very personal nature that had an emotional significance to our mother and father, these articles were more charged than something as humble as clothes or furnishings. Each one would have to be examined from our deepest recesses of our personal connection and determined if they move forward in time with us as kind remembrances of our parents' days on earth. Something like a set of earrings that were worn during a family night out, birthday, or attendance at an event brought back the whirlwind of memories and their associated distinctive emotional contexts. With each knick-knack, a conscious decision was brought to bear on its final fate. Nor did the actual resolution need a consensus between the two of us, just one whose view of a previous era made the article worthwhile in their own mind. We were finding with some relief that what we thought was precious and indispensable were just small tokens invoking sentiments of nostalgia and a desire to bring these imbedded feelings with us to New York. As we stepped transversely throughout the bedroom, we began to feel somewhat more at ease with the prospect of actually finishing what we had started emerged in our thoughts.
