What Never Happened

by Rachel Howzell Hall

There is nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to find the ways in which you yourself have altered. —Nelson Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom

All Colette wanted was to be kissed at the end of the pier, to hold hands sticky from cotton candy, to have a guy with pretty eyes and great hair win her a stuffed unicorn after knocking over all the milk jars. All she’d wanted was to hear that guy say, “You complete me,” or . . . something.

They never let her live, they never let her just be.

She’d listened to him intently, without interruption, and hoped that he noticed her deep interest in his desire to run with the bulls, to climb Everest and fly to the moon.

Because promises are potato chips. They’re cheap. Easy to break. Too many hurt your heart.

“You have to stop and face your demons before you can win the game. You may get a little bloody, even lose a limb—or a few fingers—but know this.” At a stop sign, he looks over to me. “Running ain’t gonna make it go away.”

Moving forward. Like a snail with a broken shell.

‘Don’t bite the visitors—they feed the locals.’”

Guilt is irrational, Dr. Tamaguchi has told me several times. Guilt demands ransom even though you’re broke, and it demands that you keep it company even though it’s fused to every molecule in your body. Guilt makes you scream, “What more do you want?” even though it’s already taken everything, including your happily ever after.

My life right now resembles Paula Paulsen’s house—junky and speckled with treasures lost in piles of useless and priceless crap.

The old woman also experienced great loss; then she’d started collecting everything, throwing nothing away so that she could fill those empty spaces in her heart.

“Don’t ever take a fence down until you know why it was put up.”

“You’re not a president. You don’t run nothing except your mouth. So . . .”