THE LAST PICTURE

Labeled box after carefully labeled box. Rifling through like a raccoon through trash.

How could I be so stupid! Think Trina-Think!

With each desperate rip of the sticky tape another defeat beating down on my slumped shoulders. Frantically, my eyes moved around the freshly painted room looking at the unpackaged mess I had created, the fumes from my nostrils mixing with the fumes from the paint. Nothing; nothing that truly mattered anyway. Pressure from my stomach began moving its way up, swallowing hard as the air restriction began consuming my chest; my whole body feeling dizzy, like the Verdugo I would feel when standing up after a hot bath. Everything beginning to blur with my chest rapidly rising and falling.

You’re too young for this. Breathe. Come back to yourself. You’re not going anywhere. It must be somewhere. You’re always so carful. Deep breathes, I remind myself, deep like the ocean that your lost necklace lays at the bottom of.

As the air forcefully filled my lungs I grasped at the little sanity, I knew I still had, calming my unnerving mind. With shaky fingers, shakier than my arthritis ridden fathers’ hands, I reached for my phone; thankfully in my pocket where I remembered I put it. Quickly, I put in my passcode; another thing I could easily recall. With the phone pressed tightly to my ear, I squeezed my eyes shut, in fear the pressure might escape from my tear ducts, listening to the rings that seemed so far away. Tears stinging but not escaping.

“Hey! What’s up-“

“Val—I..I can’t remember.”

“Can’t remember what?”

“I searched everywhere, in every stupid box. The party is in an hour. I can’t remember where I put it. I thought I put it in the photo box, but it’s not there Val—I can’t remember!”

“Whoa—Trina, Trina. Slow down. It’s okay. Take a deep breath TT.”

My head spun as I searched for the words, but I couldn’t find those either. Deeper breathes, deeper than before, deep into the pit of my core that ached so badly now. I needed to put my numbing feet back on the ground.

“I’m right here with you girl, it’s okay.”

With every exhale I expelled the negative energy that had a grip on my brain. The grip that was tighter than the final grip that still shadowed over my wrist from my dying mother.

“I helped you pack and label all those boxes, so whatever it is we can find it. Can you please tell me what you’re looking for?”

The image was so clear in my mind, yet I could not connect it to reality; like a foggy figment of my imagination that I was barely able to make out.

“The picture of my dad with his mom. I’m supposed to give it to my dad today for our birthday. I told him I would keep it safe and have it framed. It’s the only photo he has of her,” I tried to sound as calm as possible after the chaos I had just evoked.

“And you said it’s not in the box with all the photos?” Val seemed to be re telling a familiar phase to herself, like this was not something out of her ordinary.

“No Val. It’s not here! I’ve looked everywhere.”

“Hm, okay. Did you check that envelope in your safe?”

“Val, I can’t be forgetting already. My mom didn’t start showing signs until 50, this is too soon. I can’t remember—“

Heat started rising in my face, my chest beginning to shutter once again. My mother's fragile body being lifted into bed by dairy eyed nurses; her vacant stare into my unfamiliar eyes, on the tip of my memory.

“Just because you don’t remember what box you put one photo in, does not me you’re having early on set Alzheimer’s. We packed up your whole life in those boxes. I’m certain we didn’t forget anything. You’re only human’ and humans can’t remember everything. Don’t you keep a journal where you write stuff down you don’t want to forget..what’s it called, the remind-a-journal?”

As the calming words from Val drifted into my eardrums and started slowing my heart, I was snapped back into my weakened body. The worries that plagued me drifted away. A final deep breath letting the large exhalation float above my head. Val was right, it had to be here somewhere. This was as simple as forgetting the name to a song you heard once. It was just the fear of forgetting that constantly hung over me, consumed me even. Every small troupe seemed like a massive eruption into a small town, engulfing it and claiming it as its own. Finally, regaining my composer, straitening my back, and pulling back my shoulders like my mother had used to remind me from age 6. I looked toward the kitchen at the newly marbled counters to see my trusted remind-a-journal. With a sigh of relief, I walked toward it.

“Thanks Val, you always know what to say,” I smiled with great appreciation, feeling my lips curve to the tips of my earlobes.

“Of course, TT. You know you can always call me. If you can’t find it now, you’ll come across it later when unpacking. Now, just keep your head on, and I’ll see you soon?”

“You’re the best. I’ll see you soon. Love ya girl.”

With my once wobbly head fully gaining clarity, I hung up; placing the phone back in my pocket. The ease I felt with my fingers finally curled around my trusted, leather bound journal was immense. Even if the answer wasn’t written in here, I knew I could still gain some kind of clarity by reminding myself that this is a normal thing, this was just an ADHD scattered moment; this would not effect me. Finally flicking through the journal, I came across a mess of a list, equivalent to the one I had just created. I calmly scanned the chicken scratch of words that I must have written in the final moments of the move. With every incomprehensible entry I was growing more disappointed but continuing my composure while avoiding my previous panicked state. Frustrated, I clapped the journal shut and pressed my weight against it onto the counter like a boulder that desperately wanted to crumble to the earth.

Think and retrace. Right before we sealed the boxes… I put the photo in an envelope.

I looked to the box labeled photos and sauntered over to it as if I were casually entering a cafe. Staring down into the scattered frames and albums; I tried to place myself past it, back at the old house, and visualize the yellow envelope in my hand.

I decided I thought it might get crushed by the albums…so I went to put it in the safe.

Quickly gliding to the safe; I could feel myself getting closer. Knowing the photo did not lie behind the padlocked door was fine, but it was one move further into my retraced steps. I stared into the files that littered the inside, suddenly being struck with the thought of my hideaway book. The hideaway book my mother had made when I was a child. My heart rate rapidly spiked once again.

“Oh my god, of course!”

Leaping—no bounding, into the air like a gazelle who had just escaped near death; rushing outside to my cherry red Fiat; gracefully swinging the passenger door open. One final breath in the cool breeze greeting my dry lungs, my hand stopping on the glove compartment with a large dragon like exhale.

Please…

Ever so slowly, I lowered the glove compartment revealing my cherished hide away book with the deep green cover and the torn seam. Gaining speed, I snatched it from the compartment like an elderly woman might snatch a candy from her diabetic husband, simultaneously opening the cover.

“Yes!!!!”

As I clutched the book that contained the photo, I cried every ounce of myself out into it. It was here. The only photo of my dads mother was here. I couldn’t believe how incredibly absent minded I had been about it. Why would it have been anywhere else but right here. I touched the running mascara on my check and let a small smile flash across my mouth. All that worry, for what? Maybe this was a sign to really trust myself…to know that I’m here.

But for how much longer?

Burned into my brain, this thought constantly looming down on me.

How long until you end up like her?

Panic was attempting to take over my body once again, but what was there to panic over? I was holding the photo in my hands. I did remember.

But what if you hadn’t? What if the day comes when you can’t remember?

Staggered breathing reached it’s way inside my chest. My once joyous tears threatening to heat my checks with an unfortunately familiar despair.

“Are you all right, hun?” A melodic voice reached me, startling me alert like the alarm clock I used to smash into a wall as a teen. My neck snapped in the direction to see an middle aged woman tending to her garden next door. Feeling frantic, I gulped hard and mustered what I could out.

“Yes—thanks!”

Darting inside the house, not bothering to close my car, or even house door; I ran to the bed (the only item officially set up in this disastrous maze of boxes) and jumped onto it. The sound of my heart pounding inside my ears, my face wet with tears, my entire body trembling, thoughts screaming.

How much longer? How much longer? Do you remember when it started? Do you remember how it started? Your journal can’t help you now. Aren’t you supposed to leave soon? Do you have the photo? When will you unpack? Where’s Mom? Did Dad take his medicine? When did mom get that bruise? Why can’t I remember? Mom it’s me, TT. How much longer?

I tried grasping a hold of myself as my fear devoured me. I was no longer myself in this moment. The purity of fear was all that could remain. I could no longer control myself, which I had fought so hard to do like a soon to be retired boxer fighting his last match. Looking back at who I thought I was, I began to become still, somber, stone like. Glancing around at my surroundings, looking for any ounce of familiarity to bring me back inside this detached body.

Where am I?

Margretta Hutcheon has been a passionate creative since she first ad lib line at age three, “baa”, and it changed her world forever. Coming from a background of acting, she has since developed her skill for screenplays, documentaries, and discovered her love for writing short form and long form fiction. Margretta is a mother of an active little boy that gives her inspiration every day. Currently she is working on a pilot, novel, and card game.