Before reading, be sure to start at the first chapter of The Emerald Archivist: Chapter 0- The Fool
Ari couldn’t say what possessed her to bring the journal to work. Its weight in her bag was profound. Hunched in her bus seat she acquiesced, and her hungry fingers sped through the adolescent’s pages. There was an added anticipation in her steps through the front doors, she couldn’t wait to crack the cover again. Despite a fogging hangover, and at best a few hours of sleep, she was elated. The more she read the scattered scribbles of seven year old Iris, the more she caught herself smiling.
The night before had spiralled. Sleep evaded as Ari tossed and turned, eventually returning to the cold of her kitchen. Yawns harmonized with the hum of her refrigerator as she unearthed one musty object after another. Jumpers, journals, jewelry, vinyl records, letters, and cassettes. Connections to a woman who’d been a ghost in Ari’s life decades before her death. Tears rolled into endless glasses of wine and hours escaped.
The reverberated melting bends of Gilmore’s guitars echoed between the kitchen walls and her internal ones. Pink Floyd, a band that had never quite sunk their teeth in Ari, was the first of the worn records pulled from the clutches of the cardboard. The photograph gracing the cover brought pause, she couldn’t help but empathize with the man on fire. Despite feeling the band’s acclaim outweighed the quality of their songs, the infamous artwork had always resonated with Ari, and drew her in again. A quick cycle through her phone pulled up the album, and she gave it another chance, hoping its textures would help decipher a mother who’d long since abandoned her.
Amongst pulsating synthesizers answers remained elusive. Rather than discover any new truths, Ari relieved flashbacks from her childhood. Of Christmas morning, huddled around the living room television screening a VHS copy of The Wall with her brother. A gift from their Uncle Peter, inspired by voiced curiosity the boy had of their father’s prismed shirt in one of the few photos they had of him. Aunt Mary’s feeble protests of the R rating relented to their begging and the pair watched. At first Ari’d cowered from the complexity of the music. Perplexed by how such ostentatious, and pretentious playing could skewer songwriting. Despite the moments of brilliance amongst the madness, young Ari walked away from the film disturbed. Already a difficult time of year, the film coloured her holidays grey, bleak, and brutal, drowning away any hopes of connection or understanding.
Her brother made more efforts with the music, and the film. Perhaps it was his age. Perhaps the extra months with their father and years with their mother had crafted a deeper connection than poor Ari was privy too. As much as it hurt her to admit, she’d always suspected Seth shared more similarities than her with their parents. The rebel, the burn out, the outcast. Which made it all the more unbearable that the box should fall to her hands.
Rather than his distance, his reluctance to even engage with anything emotional, or any semblance of responsibility, it was his inability to respect her single wish, when she begged him not to burden her with the box, that hurt Ari the most. He’d gotten more passes than anyone. Coddled by Aunt Mary and Uncle Peter until their final days, more than their own children. Continuing to live in the home they’d all grown up in years after their passing. ‘Taking care’ of the property they’d generously inherited with their cousins on behalf of everyone. While it “increased in value for a larger sale for everyone’s benefit.” No one had the stamina to debate the blowhard in the midst of their own life’s currents and compounding grief. The effort it would take to highlight the financial aid for the young families, or Ari’s studies against the torrents of Seth’s narcissistic self serving nature too much for any mortal to traverse.
Why did this bastarding box have to arrive? After years of therapy, and acceptance, had finally begun to bring ease. When Ari had a bit of time to herself, to recover, to renew. Found forgotten in the attic amongst artifacts of their adolescence, the collected treasures from a woman who had no intentions of staying anywhere for any set amount of time. Kept safe by a beloved sister. Why couldn’t her older brother take on the responsibility of disposing of it instead of packing it up, and shipping it for her to deal with. Why couldn’t the crows let it rot on her doorstep?
With the record held up to the light Ari ran her hand over the artwork. Her fingers tapped over to the two figures, before she pulled out the well worn vinyl. Dislodged by the disc, a postcard fell and fluttered to the floor. A photograph of a surreal dreamworld, the heavens reflected across a pool surrounding a rock castle stared up at her. Ari’s heart pounded. It took a tremendous amount of effort before she was ready to reach. Yellowed by years, and creased from constant handling, the messy hand writing scribbled across the back of the relic was almost illegible.
My love, no matter the where or when,
whenever those heartwrench days arrive, and we’re apart,
you’ll find my heart singing along,
on the backside of the record, second song...
my one,
my only,
my love,
i miss you now even as i write this,
and it is only hours away from
when i’ll see you next.
My arms await you,
your’s, always,
-Nico
Guitars glimmered as Ari flipped the album over to read the track listing on the back of the record. Familiar acoustic chords washed over her, and sent tears pouring down her redded cheeks as her shoulders shook. Contradictory thoughts collided, a softening bled as she reread the note from a father she knew nothing of, save for scoffs, and biting remarks from her Aunt. There was a comfort, and awe, that, for no matter how long, her mother had not only been adored, but loved deeply. That Ari herself had been born of such love. The weeps blended with the pain of being torn from her parents. Cast away from a father and mother more fictionalized than known.
Vicious guilt bit back. The shame from her stirring, awoken care and pining for the mother she’d hardly met, couldn’t remember, over her sweet Aunt Mary returned. Her hand reached for tissues, and instead found the cool green glass of a near empty bottle. There was no hesitation before Ari painted her teeth purple, and rinsed the hurt back to bay. She choked on a sob, and brought her fingers to her stained lips for another slug before placing the emptied bottle down and reaching for her phone. A flash of good sense stopped her from dialling her cousin’s number. In the corner of the screen Ari saw the time, wiped her mouth, and marched upstairs.
A call could wait. Even though hours were irrelevant between the girls raised as sisters, she couldn’t in good conscience wake Lani outside of an extreme emergency. She scrubbed the sorrow from her face, the plaque from her gums, and crawled back to bed for sleep that still wouldn’t come.
Eye masks, binaural beats, guided meditations, and the sedative nature of the wine were all no match for Ari’s racing thoughts. It took a little over an hour before she surrendered back to the box for a third time, and continued retrieving artifacts.
Not ready for any further emotional escalation, the consummate, disciplined archivist took the wheel. Records, cassettes, diaries, letters, odd pieces of clothing, a pair of weathered tennis shoes, and photographs lined her dining room table in neat stacks. Careful to avoid reading any sentences, Ari sequenced the documents in order of any form of dating on the first and last entries. Post-its dotted notes across the covers. Satisfied that everything was accounted for and organized Ari retired to a couch, dizzed from the wine, and passed out the moment a throw blanket covered her shoulders.
Her alarm shattered sleep, erasing any mummers of dreams. Despite only laying for a few hours, and the dusting hangover, Ari felt more rested than she’d had in longer than she could remember. Her steps to the office were quick and with purpose. So fixated she didn’t notice the quiet of her journey. There was an absence of crows, save for one lone watcher, perched upon the street sign at the end of the drive.
A few stickers of cartoon animals, and her mother’s name written across the top corner decorated the basic blue school exercise book. Iris’s unbridled joys and misadventures gushed across the diary as Ari was taken from a Grade Three English assignment that spiralled into an obsession. Weekends, and field trips, bumps and bruises, books, and bicycle rides. Tears and food competed staining the excitable young girl’s work, peppering the paragraphs. Red pen marks graded the journalling assignment for the first month as the ritual took shape. Without a thought Ari’s well automated hand flagged passages of interest with florescent post it notes, as she devoured page after page. Entries became more coherent, lettering legible, grammatical errors, and spelling mistakes remedied, as the document progressed from one year to the next. So consumed with the innocent’s thoughts and discoveries, Ari almost missed her stop.
It wasn’t until the Autumn air splashed across her face that the obvious crystallized. The absence that had hollowed her had returned. Rather than some expected unholy terror, the enervating unknown had arrived as a child, growing before her eyes. She was learning as her mother learned herself. Before the thought could settle she shuffled from the cold into the firm. At her desk she spread her documents, compartmentalised herself as best she could, and dove back into the case load.
Meetings weaved in and out of the morning hours. Her thoughts kept circling the pages bundled in her bag below. Unable to help herself she opened the journal again, returning to the sticky marks. She kicked into gear, started a new folder, and tab on her browser and profiled her mother. The notes organized themselves. Teachers names, dates, locations, building a case towards what, she couldn’t say.
Appointments filled the day, and the diary got less attention than her nagging mind wanted to give it. Despite finishing the child’s journal with ease, Ari found herself in the tub for a second, then a third read later that evening. The pattern repeated itself over the next few nights. Each evening with the next book, and then back to the beginning over again. Reading about Iris’s excitement moving from elementary school to middle. Of new found friends, others lost to the whims of adolescent interest. Favourite films, and books. The irony of reading about Iris’s love for Harriet the Spy while she committed an invasive act of espionage was not lost on Ari. She convinced herself she was gleaning everything she could to colour in her mother’s profile. In truth, she enjoyed the indulging look into Iris.
Buying a record player that weekend was inevitable, she couldn’t wait to experience the flooding warmth of the inherited vinyl. Each day she became more and more invested in the contents. Ari found herself reading in chic cafes, by candlelight on her couch, stretching each morsel, reading slow, and meticulous. Choosing more and more special atmospheres to savour the sentences. Rich coffees, park benches under good weather, as opposed to the bus, and stolen minutes at work. Each passage cherished as an opportunity, as she had visiting Mary in the months before the disease took her. Mary was everywhere in the diaries. Seven years her mother’s senior, the older sister was idolized.
Slow sketches of a difficult household came into picture. Empty afternoons, latchkeys, the loud cracks from low incomes increased in volume between the lines day as the years progressed. Another mother never home. A cruel quiet in many ways preferable to the oppressive weight of her parent’s return late in the night. The whispers of the bottle’s tyrannical hand drowning Ari’s grandfather fluttered through the lettering like a chilled breeze through autumn leaves. Insult. Unease. Excessive placating precautions. Stark compared to Mary’s crowded home, her constant presence in front of the oven, like a fire keeper to the heath.
Mary, a liferaft to more than Ari and her brother, was a harbour for their mother. A wise guide, playful playmate, fierce guardian, and confidant. Appropriately idolized. Taught Iris to cook, tidy, how to ride a bike, cleaned her skinned knees, helped her through her homework. Raised the poor alienated girl more than her parents. She shielded her little sister like a mother. Protecting her from the things she only prayed she’d could be protected from. More than any teen would accept a tag along sibling, Mary was patient, and kind.
It was because of Mary’s sacrifices that little Iris flourished. Even managing to navigate the understanding that hers was an unplanned, and in many ways unwanted birth, without resentment. While Mary provided an unimposing path for love and growth, Iris still managed to find her own way. She discovered worlds within libraries, often staying from opening to close burrowed in books. Those sanctuaries became, and brought forth, other caretakers, alleviating the pressures on her older sister. Iris was quick to become a welcomed regular on first named bases with the librarians. Beyond literary recommendations, rides were given on days too rainy to cycle home, lunches shared, and friendships forged. The adoration for the child continued at school. Studious and sweet, she was a fast favourite. Cultivating extra assignments, and tutoring inside and outside the classroom. A community of women circled around the youth, foreseeing an exciting, prosperous future far away from their quite forgotten town.
As the household ebbing from deserted to hostile, the teen would circle from school to the library, friend’s houses, or to her sister’s work. Often spending the evening helping Mary tear tickets in the booth of their local cinema, working on her homework at her feet, or sitting in on the latest films, over and over. It took very little to churn the young romantic’s imagination. Silver screen romances sent her heart fluttering, while Science Fiction adventure epics skyrocketed her imagination to the stars. Like the novels she borrowed, Iris consumed as much as she could.
The two always found time to spend together. In the black of the cinema, around their stove, playing Hearts on their bedroom floors. Mary continued to open avenues. Always introducing Iris to her friends, the artists she met, making sure to include her sister as her world expanded. Records were shared, and space found for various pilgrimages to watch the Pixies, Husker Du, Naked Raygun, and Dinosaur Jr. playing in neighbouring college towns. Together they’d danced, washing in distortion. Though bookish compared to Mary’s increasingly angular haircuts, heavy makeup, leather jackets, and nose rings, Iris never looked, or felt, out of place beside her sister.
The entries leading to Mary’s inevitable exit were sweet. The absence of resentment, or self pity was loud. A level of emotional wisdom that shocked Ari’s understanding of her mother. Mary followed the winds north to their favourite city. Found an apartment, and started her life. Far enough away to rack up a fortune on phone calls the pair began corresponding pages and pages by post. While Iris’s were always longer, Mary’s included an open invitation folded around bus fare and a spare key.
Weekends, holidays, and any other opportunity, Iris chased her sister north. Snaking on the train lines exploring the city, indulging in the enormous magnificence of the libraries. Mary continued to tote Iris everywhere. Exploring galleries, and night life. Local shows, comedians, parties, and dinners. When Iris couldn’t tag along she slept on Mary’s lumpy couch, and pilfered her record collection. It wasn’t long before Iris finagled herself a new library card, and weighed down her rucksack lugging rare volumes back and forth across the state. Through all the long bus rides, and late nights, her school work never suffered. If anything, the expansion of her world benefited it. Her parent’s uninterested eyes a blessing of unperturbed questioning.
As Iris’s life continued to gain steam, so did Ari’s. The contents of the box organized across her kitchen table, and surrounding shelves, had become a welcome guest. Read journals, and letters littered in small sticker notations sat in labelled legal boxes borrowed from work. All filed by year, the colours corresponding to a codex high-lighted on a legal pad filled with meticulous notes. Exactly as she would treat discovery for any other important case. While she still felt uncertain of what she was trying to prove, untangling a villain, or finding a love that was never present, it did feel like she was on the verge of something. She’d uncovered so much about her mothers, Mary, and Iris. Where there had once been nothing, there was now everything. From nowhere, colour. The world of their dead and unspoken of grandparents understood. Mary’s temperaments, the generosity, the importance of her husband Peter’s family in their lives, the silence, the values, all made so much more sense.
As her understanding improved so did everything else. The box’s contents filled Ari’s hours but rather then continue to feel overwhelmed, she felt strangely soothed. Like a gentle palm on the small of her back. She found the cassettes that were sent back and forth between sisters, and spent a Saturday sourcing a vintage walkman. With fresh batteries Ari began taking late night walks through the neighbourhood listening to the same songs over and over, immersing in the lyrics and melodies that moved her mother decades before. The music the two shared was amazing. Moving at the speed of the letters, she refused to skip head, savouring each tape over and over before moving to the next. Like puzzle pieces her life fell into place. The exercise, and fresh air brought a needed quiet time with herself to reflect.
Sneaking improvements came in droves. Rest, purpose, and the comfort of connection. Lost in the songs of the past, when her guard was down in the midst of her walk’s Ari couldn’t help from seeing how much she had in common with the once loathed spectre. The passion for learning, reverence for libraries, and art, rang so deep. At first she fought against the thoughts, shutting down anything that tied the two of them together. But the pages kept turning. Then, the moment her defences dared to drop Ari saw her fathers name inked in her mother’s handwriting for the first time.
Thanks for Reading
Keep your eye out for the inevitable next chapter, coming soon!
-Mr. Write