Day 227 - Journal Story

Journal Story

Matthew Ryan Fischer

The housemaid hid the journal out of a sense of loyalty and a desire to protect a man that she loved more than herself. The elderly patriarch of the house had died in his sleep. His children and grandchildren were still in their beds, unaware, but the staff had been there. The staff existed as a twenty-four hour per day entity. Someone was always there; there was always some business to attend to. The housemaid had no business to conduct in the middle of the night, but she was there anyway. She knew the end was near. They all knew the end was near. So many family members wouldn’t have been there if they hadn’t all been aware the end was near. It was obvious and had been for some time. But she in particular knew the end being near meant in the next few hours. She had worked for him for over twenty years and seen him age rapidly in the last five, and knew him better than anyone else. She had seen the heart attack. She had seen the stroke. She had seen the late night coughing fits and the handkerchief that hid the blood. She heard the doctor’s reports and saw the medicine. She was there when the family wasn’t. She had been by his side. She knew him better than anyone.

She had her instructions. She was to take the journal and burn it. She had promised to destroy it, just as soon as it was gone. He would have done it himself, but he had been confined to a bed for so long and didn’t have the strength. He would have ordered her to destroy it sooner, but knew she wouldn’t. He would have told someone else about it, but couldn’t trust anyone else with his secrets. Not his servants. Not his family. No one else. He trusted her over everyone else because she had stayed by his side when no one else had, and he knew she loved him, even if he didn’t love her. He had never taken advantage of that, even though he so easily could have. That fact only made her love him more.

She sat by his side on his final night and waited. Mostly he slept. Then in the early morning before dawn his eyes opened. At first he seemed confused. Perhaps it was just his eyes adjusting to the darkened room. He gazed at her without a hint of recognition. She worried that his mind was finally gone. But then he smiled. It was a kind smile. She chose to believe it was a smile of recognition, even if it wasn’t. It was common for the confused and lost elderly to smile at strangers, similar to a child’s effort to win over some sympathy or concern. A smile was known to disarm a stranger or an enemy. She saw the smile and saw his former face, his former glory. She chose to believe she was looking at him.

He opened his mouth to speak, but words never came. They sat there and looked at each other. She cried. She wanted to tell him she loved him, but instead she cried. Then, after a bit he closed his eyes again and he was gone.

It was now her job to carry out his final wishes. She waited. She couldn’t bring herself to let go of his hand quite yet.

Later, when the body was discovered, the housemaid was back in her room, pretending to be asleep, the journal held close to her heart.

The journal held countless secrets. It told the truth of the patriarch’s youth and the things he had been willing to do to acquire wealth. It told the tales of his loves and his losses and his evil deeds. It told the story of a man. But it was a story he had never wanted told. It wasn’t the story he carefully constructed for himself. It wasn’t the story he wanted known or to be remembered by. He had written these things down, not because he wanted to, but because he needed to. He wasn’t a man of faith, but he knew the value of absolution. He compartmentalized and hid that part of his life, but he couldn’t bring himself to rid himself of the journal. He kept it, protected it, not as penance, but because he somehow thought the act of keeping it protected him from further sin. As long as the tale still existed, he knew he could stay strong and on a righteous path. The journal could not be destroyed, but he didn’t want his family to know the truth.

He trusted the one person he thought he could trust to carry out his final wish and destroy the only proof of his illicit past. She had sworn and made a promise, but when the time came, she was unable to let go. In a fit of love she betrayed him. She could not bear to let him go, or lose this one last little part of him.

He lay in bed, gone forevermore, and she lay with her deceit and betrayal. She rose and added a paragraph of her own to the final page of the journal and then hid it in a chest of possessions. She washed her face and fixed her makeup and prepared for the days to come. She wasn’t sure if the surviving family would keep any of the servants on, but until that time she would do her job. Stoically she went about her chores, her secrets locked and hidden away, free from guilt, free from sin, free from scrutiny. It only took one short passage to set her free, and that was protected away, at least for the time being.