The Choice (An ending to "Eveline" by James Joyce)

Lydia García Moreno

 

She stood gripped to the iron railing as she watched the boat walking away from the quay wall and becoming a small point in the distance. Although her body could not move, her heart said goodbye to Frank. Everything around her faded, she was about to faint and started to feel a light pain making its way through her hands. The world stopped for a minute and all she felt was her chest going up and down, hardly breathing, and her thoughts went faster and faster: she had lost the opportunity to escape, to get away from her life and to be happy. But maybe it was not like that, maybe she never had to go away from there, maybe she owed that to her mother and maybe her father was right. Maybe it was not about her parents, it was about her, she wanted to stay. Reality fell down onto her like a big bucket of cold water and this possibility rumbled in Eveline’s mind.

A loud boat beep got her out of her impasse and slowly she started to walk. Looking down at her feet, every step was a deeper feeling of relief, but Frank’s shouting was still in her ears like a hammer hitting again and again. Her mind had been crossed for so long with her father’s words and her mother’s words, everybody had had a word except her. Her suitcase crushed with a bike parked in the pavement and fell to the ground suddenly pulling her arm and forcing her to raise her eyes. The red colour of the brick houses did not bother her any more, she even found them pretty as she walked next to them. The noise of her bag hitting her hip stopped and she found herself right in front of her home door, praying for the house to be empty - she would give the relevant explanations later.

It was not difficult to find the house keys inside her bag, they were always in the same pocket for her to enter quickly and silently - her father hated hearing noise at night. The door opened carefully and Eveline looked around but nobody was inside. She took off her coat and left it in the rack behind the door, then carried her baggage upstairs as best as she could and looked at the time - one hour until her father came and started asking all the questions she would not be able to answer.

All the elements in the house were exactly the same as they were when she was gone. The children shoes were placed in the entrance corner behind the coats, just where she had left them. The living room and the kitchen were cleaned and the food in the fridge was intact. She had worked in the Stores and saved money to leave a full fridge and some sweets for the children – that was her way of fulfilling the promise made to her mother without having to stay.

A deadly silence reigned all over.

In front of her was that horrible curtain that always covered the window. Her mother bought that curtain when her parents arrived at the house for the first time and nobody was allowed to touch it, but she was sated. A stream of rage possessed her and she ran straight to the window shouting unintelligible sounds, took the curtain and tore it out so hard that she fell to the floor with that thing in her hands. As a small tear run down her cheek, she hug the curtain and inhaled the smell for the last time. A soft breeze entered through the window freezing her face and letting her breathe again, deeply and freely. Free. She felt free now. She had chosen.