A Rocking Chair

1

A shell of a woman sits before me...a shadow of what she used to be.  (You can see it if you squint, the lines fade, her eyes look alive, her hair darker.)2

Rocking unconsciously but it's not a rocker3

Even though she creaks like one.4

I asked her when she sat down what she wanted to talk about.5

She started talking like a reasonable woman about her father; a pillar in the community and how much she loved him; how much everyone loved him.  The rehearsed words spouted dogma from early years spewed from her with a smile.6

I asked her what made her shake her head 'no' when she said she loved him.  she looked at me surprised; she didn't know she'd done it. "I do love him; what do you mean?"7

She'd done it again and this time she realized it.  She answered in a high voice not sounding like herself.  "Well, I don't know... I... don't know..." she trailed off shaking her head again.8

She began in just more than a whisper unraveling the details...  Her hand strayed covering areas of her body... Her words laying exposed in the air between us...  She would start a sentence but wouldn't finish it as if speaking the words irrevocably committed her to the truth.9

The chair continued to creak... The woman who began in that room as a shell, a shadow of what she used to be, became whole again... her eyes were brighter and the years melted away...10

The transformation didn't occur in just one day but it was the beginning where she had seen only the end before...  Sometimes all a person needs to see is a beginning.11