After Tabitha had put everything away, making certain that the cash and checks were in her purse to take to the bank the next morning, she brought the diaries up to her bedroom and stacked them on her nightstand. They looked so uniform and tidy, reminding her so much of her mother, and Tabitha smiled as she went over to her vanity, taking off the necklace her father had given her earlier that morning and placed it in the jewelry box next to the cameo pin from Dave.
Though the colours didn't really mesh well, the pieces still felt like they belonged together. Tabitha felt like the necklace wasn't a piece that her mother had chosen for herself, or that her father would have purchased for her. It was a mystery that she wondered if she would ever solve, but she knew that it would give her a good mystery in the months to come. After she'd undressed and changed into pyjamas, Tabitha braided her hair and padded over to her bed, climbing beneath the covers and turning onto her side to look at the diaries once more. A part of her wanted to just stare and stare at the volumes, to not open them and continue to wonder about their contents, since once she started reading, she knew that her mother would lose some of her mystique.
Another, louder, part of her heart was screaming to pick up the first volume and devour it as quickly as she could. And that was the part of her heart that eventually won out, and she grabbed the first diary off the stack and opened to the first page. Her mother had inscribed the front page with her name, and the script was younger looking. That made sense, since she had been eighteen that year, and she smiled to herself as she traced the signature with her fingertip. Letting out a little sigh, she turned the page to look at the first entry. It was dated for the first day of January, and Tabitha sighed as she snuggled into the mattress and flipped onto her back.
There was something so comforting in reading about the ways her mother had been preparing for her own graduation, since it mirrored some of her own insecurities about facing the future beyond high school and everything that she had ever known. During the first few months of the year, she also found out more about her grandmother, and how much she and Mum had butted heads. In May, she read with excitement how her mother had been accepted to not only Yale, but also Harvard and Georgetown, and how the decision to choose Yale had been carefully made over the span of two weeks.
Tabitha had almost made it to when her mother had moved in to her dorm when her father appeared in her open doorway. "I see that you've dove right in," he said with a chuckle as he entered the room and took a seat on the edge of her bed, reaching out to pat her knee tenderly.
"I couldn't wait, Daddy. There's so much to learn about her. Though I am going to try to hold back and only read one a night. I mean, there isn't a lot of dense writing here, Mum's handwriting was never crabbed like yours is!"
Her father laughed as he nodded. "Yes, Erin always had an elegant hand when it came to writing. That's why she always wrote our Christmas cards, even though she hated it. And try to remember, as you read those, that your mother was insanely driven, and determined to prove herself. You're not her, for how much you look like her, and can take life at your own pace. I know that your grandmother doesn't understand your desire to take a gap year, but I do, and I will always support you, whatever you choose to do in the future."
Those words made her tear up a little, and she nodded as she placed the ribbon bookmark where she had ended that volume. "And I am so grateful for that support, Daddy. Is it weird that I can hear her voice in these words? It's like she's still with me, even though she's in Heaven with Grandpa."
Her father nodded as he gazed at her, love in his eyes. "I believe that she'll always be with us, Tabitha. Though I don't ever want you to feel like you can't talk about her around me, just because we divorced. There are so many good memories that I would love to share with you, when you feel like talking about her with me. That's why I included the pictures in the box. I have stories about each one of them."
"Really?"
He nodded, and she laid the diary atop the pile before clambering out of bed and jogging over to the box of photos, plucking out the top one and then coming back to bed and plopping down next to her father, resting her head against his upper arm. "There's a story you want already, princess?"
"Yes. This woman looks so familiar to me, but I can't place her. Tell me about her, about this picture?"
Tabitha showed him the picture of her mother and the dark haired woman, and her father took it from her hands, his smile turning sad as he ran his thumb over her mother's face. "I don't know if Erin wrote about this moment in her diaries, I never read them. But I do think that the other woman's name will show up there quite frequently, at least in the beginning."
Tabitha frowned as she looked from the picture in his hand to his face, trying to figure out what he meant. "I'm sorry?"
"I don't want to make you sadder tonight, you'll figure out where the story of your mother's life goes quickly enough in her diaries, so I'll just tell you about this moment in time." She nodded, though she still felt horribly confused, and then her father dropped a soft kiss to the crown of her head before taking a deep breath. "I don't know if I told you, but I was supposed to go to Yale, too. That was our plan, because your mother and I were best friends in high school. And then, my father lost his job, and I had to scale back my dreams. I was smart, but not like your mother, or you children, so I didn't have scholarships to help with the costs. So I went to school around here, and your mother took off for Yale.
"There, she was assigned a roommate, an Alex Miller, and they were fast friends. Our phone calls to each other gradually became filled with her name and all the adventures that they had together as they spurred each other on for better and better grades in their shared classes. That picture? Was taken during Thanksgiving break, when she convinced Alex to come home with her, since Kansas City was so far away. Alex didn't protest, and your grandmother was glad to have another kid in the house. I was besotted with her, too, the moment I met her, and knew that your mother had found a wonderful friend."
There was something about the way her father said the word friend in relation to Alex Miller that made Tabitha think that there was something more going on there, but she also knew enough not to interrupt his story. There was a good chance that he wouldn't finish if she did that, after all. "Did you take this picture, then?"
Her father nodded, another sad smile flitting across his lips as he looked back at the picture in his hand. "I did. We had just returned from the seaside, since Alex had never seen it in the autumn before."
"But Yale is super close to the coast! They didn't head to the beach after classes or anything like that?"
Her father shrugged a little as he continued to stare at the picture. "They might have, but your mother never told me anything like that. The story always was that this was the first time that Alex had seen the ocean in the fall. That afternoon was spent watching the waves and getting to know your mother's best friend in person. It had felt so weird to know so much about Alex before I met her, but knowing her in person told me so much about their friendship, and I was so grateful that Erin had Alex in her life. We had Thanksgiving dinner together, since Erin insisted, and it was a great weekend."
"I wish that I could go back in time and see them like this."
"If wishes were horses, princess."
She nodded and let out a deep sigh. "But why does she look familiar? I've never seen this picture before."
"But you have met Alex, Tabby. At your mother's funeral."
She wracked her brain, trying to place the woman, but coming up blank. "I'll have to think about that more, Daddy. But thank you for telling me the story behind this picture. Maybe we can do another one tomorrow night?"
He nodded and handed the picture back to Tabitha, stroking her hair lightly. "I think that I would like that, princess. Sleep well."
She nodded as she set the picture on her nightstand before contorting her body and slipping beneath the covers once more, pulling them up to her chest as she watched her father get to his feet and head over to the door, pausing to give her one last look. "Sleep well, Daddy." She smiled as he stepped out of the room and quietly closed the door behind him, before turning onto her side and staring at the diaries, wondering what she had yet to learn about her mother.
