Heaven Adjacent

by Catherine Ryan Hyde

See, this is the problem with people like you. You don’t know what you don’t know.

Because I can. Because in my old life I never could. Or never felt I could, anyway. And now I can. It’s a freedom. I like freedoms.

hiding her anger in plain sight,

And I think the whole trouble with us is that we think we need so much more.”

A few centuries ago, there was work involved in everyday survival. And I can’t know this for a fact,

but I have a really strong suspicion that not too many people were neurotic back then. Who had the time for it? Now we spend our

spare time getting addicted. To drugs or alcohol, or our smartphones, or the internet, or checking our email, or shopping for all...

“What ploy?” “The one where you appeal to someone’s ego. I don’t care about that stuff anymore. Whether I’m looked upon as wise or not. I don’t need to be right at this point in my life. I don’t care what other people choose to do. I just know what I want to do now.”

It seemed to be a pattern setting up. One of many.

“You never gave me a chance to prove I would have been different.”

“Or I never gave you the chance to find out you were more like other boys than you thought you were.”

“I’m thinking it’ll be better if they figure out a new direction on their own. The problem will solve itself.”

“Think about what you’re saying,”

Why do we do work we hate all our lives?

Somewhere earlier on the road somebody must have made us feel that we didn’t have an option to do otherwise. I’m sure it gets psychologically complex.”

Then he said, “I guess I felt unwelcome. Like you’d rather live alone.” “Oh, there’s no doubt I would rather have lived alone. Still would. That’s just me, darling. I was hoping you wouldn’t take it personally.” “I didn’t.” “Then what’s the problem?” “Today I do. That’s the problem.”

You got to choose all over again. And now it seems like everything you said you wanted wasn’t true.

It either is or it isn’t, but whatever it is, it’s the way you feel. You can put any kind of judgment you want on the way you feel, but that won’t make it go away. Unfortunately you can’t insult your feelings out of existence. Trust me. People try all the time. If it worked, we’d know about it by now.”

“See, this is the problem with getting to know each other better,” he said. “It’s not that I don’t want to. I just never know where to start.”

You didn’t do anything, honey, you just were.

But life is still life, and it goes on.

Then again, it was so obvious—something that would have been so easy to know, had she been paying attention.

When had she begun making bargains with life to avoid extra trouble, and, with it, any joy whatsoever?

It’s hard to find a particular place when you don’t one hundred percent know you’re even looking for it,

“All my life I’ve been pretty good at defying assumptions. And now I’m about to get even better at it than I’ve ever been before.”

“That’s impossible.” “Impossible things happen every day. This one seems to be happening in spite of your thoughts on its impossibility.”

It struck her that she was experiencing the first moment in which she fully absorbed the gravity of this life change. The weight of it. The sheer scope. The implications. And she hadn’t seen all that coming, either.

No freedom,

I hope someday you know the freedom I found.

There’s a reason people will always let you down. It’s because they came to this weird planet to live their own lives. Not anybody else’s. Classic case of needs in conflict. You get what I’m saying?”

And Roseanna knew she would never see her again. She could. Arrangements could be made to stay in touch. But they wouldn’t be. And she knew it. And it was okay.

People come into our lives, she thought, and it’s not always a forever kind of thing, and not always meant to be. Not every deal is for keeps.

You couldn’t leave it alone. You had to mix in. Had to make it your problem, too. And now it’s a big problem, and you’re stuck in it.

“We can’t always just do what comes naturally.” “Why can’t we?”

It was a jacked-up four-wheel-drive pickup. It’s not supposed to be clean. It’s supposed to be driven in the dirt. So those are fighting words, if you accuse someone of having a truck that’s too clean. It’s about more than just the truck. It means the person is a big phony. Like if a Texan says you’re all hat and no cattle. You know what I mean?”

“I think so. You’re saying hearts are supposed to be broken. Not sure I agree, but . . .”

“Right. Otherwise you’re not really using them. Which is a very cowardly way to...

Life’s too short for all that fighting.

“Because they’re not happy,”

“I’m starting to see that we make choices at an early age,” Roseanna continued, “when we’re too young to know what will make us happy. But they’re more or less permanent choices. They don’t have to be, I guess. But somehow we end up thinking they have to be. It’s hard to make a change after so many years, and we don’t want to let people down by breaking our promises. But what we do to those poor people is worse. We blame them for the fact that we’re not happy. Because that’s easier than blaming ourselves. Because if we blame ourselves, then we have to fix it, and that’s a tricky thing.”

I guess I like it because it’s hard. I have to struggle for it. But then, when it’s done, I feel good about what I did. I feel gratified. And the fact that it was difficult makes it even better.”

“Everything in life is like that,” he said. “You think so?” “Everything worth having.

“We’re all going to die,” Nelson said, leaning forward over his knees and staring down the end of his fishing pole. “So it doesn’t pay to go through life

fearing death. Mind you, I realize as I say so . . . it’s one of those things that says easy and does hard.”

This is how it is, she now realized, when you’re fishing. Most of the time is spent fishing, not catching. It’s not the most scintillating process. So you’d best be prepared to pass the time some other way. Good conversation if you’re not alone. Worthwhile thoughts if you are.

“No. But why should it have to? I’m going to die. We all are. And we all know it. We like to think it’s eons in the future, but we could walk out in front of a truck tomorrow. Hell, today. And we all know that, too. But we waste our precious time. Why? Why do we live like we’re not going to die?”

“I know less than nothing about human nature. I feel like I’ve spent my whole life staring at the people around me and thinking, ‘What am I missing?’”

“You need to tell more people that story,” he said. “What story is that?” “About that friend of yours who died. Who thought she had time to live later. But she didn’t. I’m sorry, but I can’t think of her name now.” “Alice,” Roseanna said. Quietly.

“Right. You need to tell more people that story about Alice.” “Why do I need to do that?” “Because they’re not happy, miss. Haven’t you noticed that? Because hardly anybody is happy.”

“That’s not junk,” Roseanna said, her gorge rising. “That’s art. It was junk. But now it’s art.” “Make it into any shape you want,” the woman said. “It still is what it is.”