Height of the Arc

(Originally published as ‘The Secret Self’ by Yellow Taxi Press, 2018)

I can’t keep my eyes off the tiny foil windmill. It’s surely spinning too fast for its little plastic spokes to cope. It’s only an object, but still, is it lonely sitting out there in one of those barren, terracotta troughs? My father's weed-riddled garden is crowded by similar containers of varying sizes. In the smoky autumn light, fronted by burgeoning rain clouds, the sibling troughs look like peat-filled stone coffins, suffocating the space.

For the umpteenth time in ten minutes, there’s that eddy of guilt for pressuring Dad to buy those troughs. Just last year, as his battle began, for a full summer it was the epitome of stylish in all the magazines to plant exotic kitchen herbs. How naïve was I to suggest it might take his mind off things? I bet inwardly he had scoffed, although outwardly he was all humouring smiles. No matter that he’d never shown any interest in gardening. No matter he was tired, and his north-facing, paved courtyard would unequivocally fail to support a kaffir lime tree. Not to mention, neither one of us had any idea what to do with the leaves.

Despite our optimistic plans, those troughs have always remained empty of life.

Levering down the bolt, I slide open the patio door a little, then poke my face out. The tiny windmill has shed half of its curved foil petals. Time has stirred it loose inside its base. The wind keeps throwing it off-balance: east, then west, and around in a circle. At the height of a particularly violent gust, it looks as though it might be about to fly off into the wall.

My knee twitches. Should I dart out there in my socks to rescue it?

Slick spats of rain freckle my nose as I do nothing. The rain thickens. Beyond the high stone wall, the buzz of a lawn mower shuts off. People must be out for a walk in the church fields; they shout to each other. Probably seeking shelter.

Finally, when I’m able to block out all the rest, the little whistles and whips of the windmill reach me in a stuttered pattern. It’s like the struggling propeller of an aeroplane—a malfunctioning aircraft blazing through fuel every few seconds, but still scarily, despite best efforts, nose-diving toward an unfamiliar sea.

Maybe best to just turn my back on it after all. It doesn’t belong inside, and what can I do anyway?

Not relishing the idea of breathing in the stagnant indoor air again, I don't shut the door immediately, despite my goose bumps. Inside, this once cheerful house is clouding over every day, taking on the vibe of an unpopulated museum. At least by standing out here, inwardly encouraging the windmill to hold steady, I can tell myself I’m doing something useful.

A shrill outcry sounds from the kitchen. So, the argument must’ve reached its inevitable peak, at last. How predictable that Tamira would have her heart set on the regal oak dresser that each one of us has fallen in love with over the years. I bet on the drive over here she was already imagining it housed in her own kitchen, seeing my nieces’ fussy Easter bonnets hanging off its drawer handles. As the oldest though, Fred believes it belongs to him by right. Tearfully on the fence, Lucy herself seems to have lost track of everything she’s earmarked with her set of designated round yellow stickers.

What would Dad have thought of the four of us being here, receiving compassionate leave pay to paw at his possessions? Maybe as a declaration of love I should refuse to take part any further. Maybe I should go out into the rain now after all and uproot the windmill. I could march with it into the kitchen, wave it high, grandly announce: “Well, this is the only thing I’m taking home.”

The rain drums against the corrugated roof of Dad's utility extension. The sound is almost like the soft roar inside a seashell. It’s nice that he bothered, but still, why did he keep this tired windmill all these years? The B and K in Blackpool are bleached to a pale dirty lemon now—the other letters are barely even there. Rainbow stripes have eroded to ugly pockmarked brass. If I squeezed a petal hard enough it would probably crumble to ash.

Actually, after all this time, it would probably be a sacrilege to uproot it, wouldn’t it? Blackpool. During that holiday I learned to fly my first ever kite. On the first day of our week-long stay, Tamira enjoyed her cheeseburger enough to be uncharacteristically quiet as we ate lunch in the lit-up Hollywood themed diner. Dad was appropriately dressed for the sea air snap in his comfortingly dad-smelling, turtleneck wool jumper. I loved the way the four of us kids were all turned fuzzy and cigarette-smudged inside his big bear hug beside the jukebox.

The best moment was sunset. Like excited puppies, and with ice-cream-cold bellies, the five of us scavenged the shore for plastic bottles and little bits of charred wood to write our secret wishes on sun-bleached labels. Pressing our fragile desert island hopes to our chests, we wished, wished, wished until we giggled with the pressure. The release―the high arc into the waves―was like a bell ringing inside my head.

“What message did you write inside yours, Dad?” Despite our rule of secrecy, we all were desperate to know by bedtime. We were far too hyper to sleep.

He never did tell.

Now as I watch the rickety windmill battling on, I struggle to dream up all the wishes that could have been his.