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The white oak that stands at the end of our road has a soul like mine. Momma says it’s blasphemy to say such things. I don’t think Momma’s ever seen the tree — not really.
We walk under its sprawling branches burdened with snow all winter long on our way to the market. And in the heat of a summer’s day we rest in its shade before continuing home with our bundles. But that’s all the tree is to her — a moment of relief from a tiresome day. I believe that the tree sees through me.
When I was eight I walked home from Mildred Spooner’s birthday party after she doused a glass of fancy red punch on the dress Momma had made for me. I thought I’d burst from holding in the tears. When I got to the tree I felt my heart turn inside out, leaned my forehead against her bark and let my teardrops water her roots.
The day Danny Kebold tried to steal a kiss as he walked me home from school, the leaves on my tree were the same fiery red as my face, and I wasn’t ashamed at all to dance under her branches.
When Pa got sick, Momma became bitter with the work of caring for him. I stayed longer at the tree each night before walking the final mile home. One night I hung from the y-shaped branch by my knees and heard the shudder of thunder in the distance. I brought my feet down and curled my toes around a heavy root, watching for flashes in the sky. My toes touched something cool beneath the dirt and I hoped to find a smooth stone or a lost coin, but instead I uncovered a rusted clasp. Crouching down, I dug my fingertips into the soil, scooping the dirt aside until I uncovered a tiny, tattered purse. I opened the clasp and touched each coin as I counted one, two, three, four, five. The sky turned an eerie, rose-dyed blue and a chill ran across my skin. This wasn’t like finding a lost coin spilled from someone’s pocket. I’d uncovered a secret and I wasn’t sure what to do with it. The wind picked up and I watched the tree’s branches shake and sway. I’d always been good at keeping secrets. I dug the hole deeper, placed the purse back in the earth and covered it up good, packing the dirt with my heels.
Every once in a while I’d dig the purse up, and I wasn’t the only one. The second time I unearthed it and counted the coins it held seven. Then ten. One time I waited a whole month before checking and when I dug it up it bulged with twelve heavy coins.
Some days Danny found me at the tree hanging from my knees or whistling a tune we’d sung in church on Sunday. He’d sit next to me and hold my hand and he’d always try to steal a kiss before he left. I thought about telling him the secret, but it felt more exciting to keep it to myself. Instead, I tapped my foot over the patch of earth that I knew held the purse — someone’s secret, someone’s treasure, someone’s dream.
“I’m tired of you coming home filthy from playing at that tree,” Momma said one evening, and it became my own personal forbidden tree like in the Garden of Eden. But Momma didn’t understand that it was my tree of life, too. It seemed to hold my world together.
Things went on like that for a long while: Momma forbidding me to do things and me not understanding how I could live in the world without them. First it was the tree, then it was Danny. When I saw my tree for the first time in autumn, having lost all of her leaves, I knew how she felt.
One cold day before winter set in, I came home after school but Momma wasn’t there. I searched the house and the yard, looked at Pa with that empty look on his face and wished he could speak. Finally, I laid the supper dishes out on the table and headed back down the road. I’d just spend a few minutes under the familiar wide branches before continuing on to meet her at the market to help her home with the dinner packages. The sun dipped behind the trees before I began worrying. I went on to the market, but by then a feeling inside told me that she wasn’t there. I ran back to my tree and pushed away the dry leaves by the heavy root where the purse had laid for months. The earth was turned up, the purse was gone, and so was Momma.
I couldn’t help but feel betrayed, not only by Momma, but also by my tree, who’d been a silent witness to the secret my mother and I had unknowingly shared. Still, I go there now to run my fingertips over the heart that Danny carved into its bark with our initials. I go to smell the damp earth after it’s rained. My tree reminds me to keep my roots anchored in the ground and my head lifted to the sky, and each time before I leave I tap my foot over that patch of earth that held my mother’s dream.
Ruth Schiffmann shares the trials and triumphs of freelance writing with her husband and their two daughters. More than eighty of her stories, articles, and poems have appeared in publications both in print and online. After homeschooling her daughters K-12 (and loving it) she is now enjoying living a writing life, following her heart, and discovering where it will lead her. To read more of her work, visit www.RuthSchiffmann.com.
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23 Responses to “SILENT WITNESS • by Ruth Schiffmann”
Comments
« MUM • by Cecilia Ryan | Home | A DANCE TO END OUR FINAL DAY • by Beth Cato »
May 7th, 2011 at 12:26 am
A very nice and wholesome story. Reminds me of growing up in the Midwest. Thank you for sharing.
May 7th, 2011 at 4:24 am
I liked this unusual piece a lot. I think the tree perhaps needed a bit more description to make it more individual.
May 7th, 2011 at 5:21 am
Lovely story Ruth, lovely tree.
May 7th, 2011 at 5:35 am
Loved this – absolutely brilliant. I felt like something magical was happening and then felt betrayed right along with the narrator. Beautifully told and effective.
May 7th, 2011 at 5:50 am
I’ve read some of this author’s other work, will have to go back and read again. This story didn’t quite work for me, after reading it through. Why would the mother bury her coin purse at the tree? Especially if, as the N says, the mother has “never really seen the tree?” Why didn’t the mother notice that the coin purse was being tampered with and move it somewhere else? Also, there seemed to be no real connection to the boy, he just drops in and out of the picture, as if a love interest is expected to be there. I think I also felt disconnected to the tree having a soul like the N’s — how? And if the tree betrays her at the end, what does that signify? I had thought of the girl as a simple storyteller, but it turns out she is an unreliable narrator, something I find out too late — as a reader, I felt betrayed.
May 7th, 2011 at 6:47 am
Sorry fishlovesca, the story left me depressed, so I guess the story worked.
May 7th, 2011 at 7:29 am
A great story, loved how it connected the magic of tress with coming of age.
Fishlovsca, I don’t think the coin purse was the mothers, it seemed like a magic coin purse the tree had made for the girl. I think the mother went to the tree, found it and stole it. Hopes this helps.
May 7th, 2011 at 8:11 am
I think Momma was unhappy with her chosen life, skimmed some of the “market” money every week and stashed it at the tree where they always stopped (perhaps, hiding it while the little girl played). When her husband took ill, she found the chance to leave, and did. The whole event, viewed from the girl’s POV, was the story.
Depressing for sure (especially with Mother’s Day around the corner. Some mother she was), but told so well I was hooked. Four stars from me….
May 7th, 2011 at 11:30 am
In general this story has an enticing atmosphere, and a lovely, misty feel. I did sympathize for the girl, and can appreciate her love of the tree.
But still, I also have to agree with some of what fishlovesca says (#5). I don’t necessarily feel betrayed, but I do feel that much of the story seems missing. Like the tree’s roots, some of the motivation and understanding of the actions of the characters remains buried.
Finally, I echo Seattle Jim (#8) comments: I do lean towards his interpretation of where the purse and money came from, and also — kind of a depressing story for Mother’s Day Eve.
May 7th, 2011 at 12:25 pm
I had a problem caring about the main character, mainly cause there wasn’t enough description of or information about her. I was surprised when I got to the third paragraph and found out our narrator was a girl.
Incidentally, releasing this story the day before Mothers Day is quite classless.
May 7th, 2011 at 12:42 pm
I like the writing style, except for some missing punctuation. Have to agree with fishlovesca, though, in that it seems illogical for the mother to leave the purse there. She had to know someone found it because the narrator says she “dug the hole deeper.”
May 7th, 2011 at 2:35 pm
The narrator seems to think of the tree as a kind of replacement mother. Its presence comforts her, it seems to provide for her future by “magically” building up a secret stash of coins (I interpreted the money’s source the same as Seattle Jim) etc.
I enjoyed the writing (especially the understated way the story handled the relationship between the narrator and Danny), but I came away feeling the ending fell flat.
One of those stories where the journey is more interesting than the final destination, in my opinion.
May 7th, 2011 at 2:40 pm
Unique and beautiful. Five stars from me.
May 7th, 2011 at 4:24 pm
Stunning. Achingly beautiful. * * * * *
May 7th, 2011 at 7:10 pm
Hope this is a FICTION, I’d hate to be the “momma” and find myself reading this.
A beautifully written and heartfelt story that captured my emotions.
Thank you for sharing this!
May 7th, 2011 at 7:52 pm
Solid. Well rounded. Good voice. A mystery solved in the end. Very human. Full marks from me.
May 8th, 2011 at 3:14 am
I really enjoyed reading this story, and found the ending very sad. As some other people have said, I also felt betrayed just like the little girl did. Beautifully written!
May 8th, 2011 at 6:18 am
Thank you to all who took the time to read and leave a comment. The reader feedback is part of the allure of publishing here at EDF.
May 9th, 2011 at 7:12 am
Great story as usual!
May 10th, 2011 at 4:10 pm
Didn’t quite do it for me, either. Was there a purpose in shifting from present tense in the first two paragraphs, to past tense in the rest? It would make the ending stronger and more believable if it was present tense all the way through.
The imagery is beautiful, but I would have liked – either the tree as more a comforting, mother-substitute, or “a soul like mine” perhaps more of a sense of sisterhood, the leaves dancing playfully when she was very young, whispering their secrets when she was a teen. You’ve got interaction, but I’m not seeing soul-connection.
May 10th, 2011 at 8:11 pm
great story
May 11th, 2011 at 7:37 am
I graduated from the University of Pittsburgh in 2006 with an MFA in fiction writing. The writing sample that I had to submit to get into the graduate program was fifty typed pages of flash fiction stories. Those stories won me a fellowship that not only paid for three years of schooling but also gave me a generous stipend for three years. I also had to teach composition and short story writing to undergraduates during my last two years in the graduate program. The reason I mention all of this is to show how invested I am in flash fiction, that I know something about it. I think your story is brilliant.
May 24th, 2011 at 3:57 pm
I loved it! It leaves you with a lot of different emotions and wanting to know more.