4 Chapter 3

The birthday revelation stuck around Elizabeth longer than her sobriety had expected and Maya's constant reminder, where she muttered the positivity of Elizabeth's birthday with a pinch of exaggeration, eventually made Elizabeth suppress her stubbornness and saddle up that horse.

Hence the following week, Elizabeth decided to attend the interview from Designer's Den for that position of a planning director. One thing Elizabeth excelled was at interior designing, and although ironically her room was the plainest of all, the vintage palette décor with a touch of chic modernism she had decorated for Maya's room was outstanding that Maya had been insisting that Elizabeth give Designers Den a chance.

Elizabeth donned up one of Maya's pantsuits and observed herself in the mirror, her wild brown curls tamed down with spray into a neat bun and her lips outlined with the coffee macchiato liner she never used- she never outlined her lips. she almost laughed. It was hard to picture her or see herself in Maya's appearance: creased, crispy suits and a don't-you-even-think-about-raining-on-my-parade vicious glow. Elizabeth's wardrobe had nothing suitable for an interview, unless sweaters, summer dresses, Doc martens and that usual shimmery lip gloss were preferable office wear.

Elizabeth smoothed over her beige pant suit and made a small pep talk for herself on how this time she was not going to walk over the interview, roll her eyes at the interviewee and instead stay put on her best attentive behaviour. After all it was the best interior design house of Manhattan that awaited her.

Minutes before Elizabeth was about to head out she gorged on her usual sugary cereal while peering over a dusty grey cardboard box left on the counter by Maya after she had cleaned out the storage room the night before. When Elizabeth moved into the apartment three years ago, it had been the last apartment on the list which was available and since the realtor let it out in a hurry the storage room had been a mystery room of dust and god knew what else, that both the girls procrastinated cleaning, until last night where Maya had flown into an impulsive rage after staring at the storage door during dinner. Elizabeth had watched in amazement how Maya stayed up half the night in there. Maya forbade Elizabeth from joining her, as cleaning was therapy for her, and she did not want anyone around during her therapy sessions.

Elizabeth kept her bowl aside and lifted the grey lid of the box and saw that that box had quite a few items in it. Her eyes caught a few wooden animals, like trinkets— a wooden horse, an elephant and a creepy looking octopus with distorted eyes. Apart from the odd animal farm, there were a few worn out books with leather padded covers. The topmost thick black leather covered book had golden letters scrawled across it. Elizabeth pulled out the book, the leather flaking slightly under her fingers, and turned the pages ever so lightly, and as she turned them her eyes shot up in excitement. That very moment Maya walked into the apartment from her morning jog.

"Well look at you all prepped to grow up," Maya laughed praising Elizabeth's attire. Elizabeth nodded her head distracted at the box and it was then Maya saw Elizabeth's eyes focused on the box.

"Oh, you found the box," she said unfazed.

"Maya, there's a first edition of Vanity Fair in here!" Elizabeth said in shock.

"Thought you might be interested," Maya smirked victoriously at her cleaning attempt and headed up to the fridge.

"How come none of the past tenants didn't notice this?" Elizabeth said her voice rising excitedly as she dug into the box and pulled out two more tattered first edition novels of The Rainbow and Age of Innocence.

"That storage room is smaller than a janitor's closet, Liz, all it had were some old dusty rugs, cobwebs and that box stashed in a corner." Maya stated pulling herself onto the counter beside the box.

"Wait. You found these all together in the box?" Elizabeth asked surprised, as she had thought these items were lying around the storage room carelessly, left by many tenants.

Maya slipped off the counter mysteriously.

"Just. Like. That." She whispered and twirled herself into the shower. Elizabeth rolled her eyes, but she could not help being intrigued by this mystery box. Maya knew how Elizabeth loved mysteries from a painful experience when she had got her a bunch of conspiracy theories and crime documentaries. Elizabeth had stayed up one whole night watching both the documentaries and crawled into Maya's bed two whole months at night as she had felt that people were watching her sleep.

Elizabeth reached the bottom of the box and picked out a thin blue leather covered book which had the words "Poetry for The Heart" stitched in a twirling silver thread onto the leather Cover. The book was so worn out that it had a dent in the middle of the book and the yellowed pages felt like the powdery wings of a butterfly under her fingertips. Elizabeth lifted the pages with her delicate fingers and curious sharp eyes focused. The first thing she saw was an age-old library code stamped on the first blank page. As her fingers examined the pages of the book, Elizabeth saw how sudden pen scribbles had survived under each poem.

It was somewhere in the middle of the book did Elizabeth's fingers struck a pointed edge, she turned to the middle and saw an old envelope, crumpled, and tattered around the edges. The firm seal on the cover indicated that the letter had never been opened. Elizabeth turned the envelope around and saw the letter address, it had ink blotches on it, but it was still readable:

Harrison Crawford

42 Oak street

Chelseaville, East Alabama

USA.

Chelseaville? Wondered Elizabeth quizzically. she could not stop smiling at the name of the town, which sounded almost like it was out of a fairy tale. Her mind involuntarily attempted to run a full scan of the towns she had heard in Alabama, but Chelseaville did not fall under her radar of knowledge. Elizabeth saw the clock hand tweaking towards 10.00am and before she could miss her first interview by attaching herself to this mysterious letter, she rushed out of the apartment and dropped the letter into a collection box, hoping it will go where it's supposed to. And when Elizabeth reached the building of Designers Den did she realise in a jerking halt that she had not thought whether that letter was meant to be sent or not by the unknown sender.

******

When Elizabeth came back home from her seemingly smooth interview, the grey storage box was still on the counter and Maya was not home. Being an avid lover of dead authors and last words, Elizabeth knew she could not let these first editions be taken away not after she had set her eyes on them anyways. Elizabeth carried the three novels and the poetry book to her room, but she halted halfway and peeped back into the box. The wooden trinkets and a dry lavender bunch, with shrivelled lavender wisps scattered, were crushed against a corner of the box, which her eyes had missed earlier. It didn't feel right to throw away the tokens as all her crime documentaries had repeated that one must never be quick to throw away evidence, even if she didn't know evidence of what exactly she was looking for. She knew she'd have some mystery to occupy her brain with until Designer's Den reached her, if they will. She put the lid back on the box and balanced them on her hands to her room.

That night Elizabeth engrossed herself in the old poetry book, where she noticed a couple of dog-eared pages and each of those pages had words or ideas scribbled beside verses and lines. Elizabeth could not make out the words as they looked blotted, too old. She frowned turning more pages wondering how old these discoveries were. As more poems unfolded before her, Elizabeth broke into a reminiscing smile she had forgotten, one with dreams, as she played Poe, Carroll and Cummings in her mind like a movie reel that had no end.

Back at NYU Elizabeth took a class in English Literature, after a relentless battle with her mother. It was the only class she had enjoyed that she almost retook the same class after she graduated, as it had been a comfort for Elizabeth— it was then Lorraine feared for her daughter even more, because she began to realise the bitter truth, that she would never settle down for anything else in the world, even if that "anything else" was the most promising choice she could have made in her life.

Gracing her eyes with these poems pulled Elizabeth back to a time when intricate words written by authors of another world seemed to make the most sense to her. This magical trance blocked out Elizabeth's senses that she did not hear Maya unlock the door and walk into the apartment, that when Maya rapped on Elizabeth's door she snapped out of her zone violently.

"WHAT?!" Screamed Elizabeth startled and clumsily slipped the poetry book under her pillow, which Maya pretended not to see, "do you have to walk up on me like that?"

"Sheesh sorry Miss Crazy," Maya murmured and eyed Elizabeth's room, which always looked emptier than yesterday every time she walked into it. Maya always made a comment on Elizabeth's room. For someone who had magically transformed hers into another dimension, she felt guilty seeing Elizabeth dwell in her plain Jane room which consisted of her plush queen bed, an oddly shimmery blue velvet arm chair that Lorraine had forced on Elizabeth, the closet, a pull out desk which Elizabeth had fixed on her wall for convenience and a tall book shelf in an awkward corner. Maya's skin crawled at the sight.

"I don't even know why I bother repeating this," murmured Maya to herself and then looked up at Elizabeth, "let me do your room one day Liz if you won't."

"Aw your enthusiasm almost makes me want to give in, but no," Elizabeth smiled flatly and jumped off her bed with a dramatic twirl, "I love the space and you know it."

Maya threw up her hands hopelessly and turned to leave when she stopped short and dug into her bag.

"Oh, there's a returned letter for you," she said handing out Elizabeth a crumpled envelope that had been straightened out smoothly by Maya with vain effort. "From...Chelseaville, Alabama?"

"Why is it back?" Elizabeth's face faltered at the sight of the mystery letter from the morning.

"The address does not exist anymore," Maya said her eyes on the letter and looked up at Elizabeth, "I'm sorry but what is this?"

"Nothing, just storage room stuff," Elizabeth said nonchalant.

"I guess it goes into the trash then," Maya shrugged and dropped the letter in Elizabeth's trash can by the door.

The night continued with Maya goading Elizabeth with questions about her interview and that night as Elizabeth lay in bed playing the possibilities of a perfect career and a chance to do right as Maya had instructed, for a split second a curious neuron sparked in Elizabeth's brain as she stared at her ceiling contemplating about the crumpled envelope that was lying in her trash can. She couldn't help but accept the truth of how she yearned to know what words were spilled within the papery walls of that envelope, but before she could investigate further, fatigue and weariness crawled in and all her thoughts lost themselves between a content slumber.

avataravatar
Next chapter