Harbinger

He's gone. I can't believe dad is gone. A whole month without him, without his voice... What am I supposed to do? I should have called him that day, no- I should have gone to see him. Oh, and I never did finish that painting for him. Why did I have to put it off? Why did I-

"Tabitha?", "Tabitha?", "Tabitha!"

"Huh?"

The sound of my friend Lucy's voice cut through the ringing in my ears as I obsessed over my brooding thoughts. I quickly looked around to reacquaint myself with the surroundings. "Hello? Earth to Tabitha! Did you hear me?" Lucy and I had just finished an impromptu shopping trip to help her find a dress for her date tomorrow. I used to walk through the different stores downtown eagerly; however, today, it felt like a tremendous chore. "No, sorry, what did you say?" I replied, still feeling like I was in a daze. "I said, are you up for dinner?" My honest response to her would have been no. I haven't had much of an appetite, and the thought of food made me nauseous. Truthfully, I just wanted to go home, crawl into my bed, and sleep, but Lucy looked like she was having fun, and I didn't want to worry her by isolating myself yet again. "Dinner sounds great!" I tried to respond enthusiastically, though she had a look on her face telling me that she saw right through my attempt.

She looked at me with a sympathetic smile and put her freakishly cold hand on my shoulder. "I'm happy you came with me today," She said softly, "I know it's been hard for you lately; I missed you." I warmly embraced her and told her I was happy I had come too, and truthfully, I was, but I didn't feel happy; I felt more guilty than anything. How could I possibly allow myself to have a good time knowing that the person I loved most is no longer here? I can no longer have happy moments with dad, so what is the point of having them with anyone else?

I put my keys into the ignition to start the car, and the keychain dad had bought me on his work trip to London many years ago caught the light of the sun just beginning to set, and also my attention for the sixth time today. It was a silver charm of a double-decker bus. Dad loved to bring me back little souvenirs from the places he would travel. It always made me feel special, knowing that he would still think of me even thousands of miles away. Though this time, on his most extended trip of all, I knew I wouldn't be receiving anything, and he wouldn't be coming back.

When we arrived at the restaurant, we were seated at a booth near the window. I focused on the cars passing and the many people going on with their day outside. Something didn't sit right with me in the fact that the world kept turning. People were still smiling and carrying on as usual. I know it's selfish, but it truly bothered me that when my father met his end, the world didn't end with him. The table next to us consisted of 12 clinking glasses and people obnoxiously giving toasts. Their celebration made me roll my eyes, like what possibly could be happening for them on a Tuesday night? The waiter suddenly interrupted my field of vision, and my annoyed and critical stare fell off as I listened to him take our order. After he left, Lucy began telling me all of the details of her date happening tomorrow. I tried to listen intently, but I felt like my body was on autopilot and that I was listening to me respond, but not truly knowing what either one of us was saying. We sat for about two hours while she caught me up on the things I'd missed, such as the latest work drama at her job and how Mrs. Thuman was giving her a hard time in science. I always let her copy my work and quizzed her right before tests, but I haven't been to school since I heard the news. Because of this, I felt partial to blame for her sudden academic troubles.

The food tasted bland to me, though Lucy swears it was the best alfredo she's ever eaten, and she let out a loud burp to let everyone around us know that too. As we got up to leave, snow began to fall to the ground gently. Dad always made a tremendous deal about snowfall. He liked seeing his breath materialize into a white fog and would pretend to be a dragon who lost his flame and could only blow smoke. When Lucy and I walked outside, we heard the sound of kids playing in the distance. I thought about how the neighbors would listen to a similar sound when dad and I had snowball fights in the backyard of my childhood home. The loser would mark their place of hypothetical death by making a snow angel; I chuckled at the irony. I would always win, and he'd always be the one moving his arms up and down in the snow. Who knew that we were creating a twisted scene of foreshadowing at the time.

After driving a few miles down the windy road, I pulled into Lucy's driveway and hugged her goodbye. Her perfume smelled of marigolds and cedarwood. It's the same one she has always used, yet I've never grown tired of it. "I'll see you soon; hang in there, okay?" I nodded in agreement to her request, but I couldn't be any further away from "hanging in there." She closed the car door and made her way towards her house. I stayed to ensure she got in safe and then pulled back onto the bumpy main road.

Pressure began to form around my eyes as I tried to suppress the welling of tears. I thought about the moments leading up to that tragic day. The three missed calls I had from him spread out a couple of weeks. It wasn't like him to leave a voicemail, so I have no idea what he would have wanted to say. We had a humorous conversation about how caterpillars turn to goo while stuck inside their cocoon and how weird it was that inside each one was a recipe for butterfly soup. You never seem to notice how important those little moments will be until there are no more little moments to be had. A routine and trivial conversation one day can become what you cling to for the rest of your life the next.

As I approach closer to my house, I begin to dread the idea of walking into the dark, messy rooms. The laundry has piled up for the last few weeks, and I'm down to wearing the clothes that I had shoved in the back of my closet, where they went untouched for years prior. What used to be a quaint, comfortable home has turned into a haunted house where ghosts of the former life you led haunt every hallway, and the memories of the times we spent together scream from the walls. Oh, dad, I wish you were here. I wish I had hugged you more, laughed at your jokes more, and that I could have been there to tell you I love you before, before..." I hastily pulled over to the side of the road and threw my head into my hands before letting out a wailing scream—the inside of the car filled with bitterness and suffering. You could hear the beating of my knuckles against the dashboard until they were bright red and the repetitive asking of the question, "Why?" Yet outside of the car, all that a passerby would be able to hear is the quiet whooshing of vehicles and the whistling of the wintry wind.

After a few moments, my breath began to steady, and a numbing calmness washed over me; it was that feeling you get after a good cry. My swollen eyes looked up to see the street I was on, and I realized I wasn't too far away from my dad's grave. I hadn't been there since the funeral. It just seemed like too much, but something was calling me to go tonight. I needed my dad's advice on how to live with this feeling of a crushing weight on my chest. Even if he was now six feet below the ground, I needed to be near him. I brushed the tears off my cheeks and put the car in drive.

Once I got there, I sat in the car for what felt like an eternity listening to the stillness of the world surrounding me. Cemeteries always seemed to have a somber quietness, blocking out the sounds and chaotic life of the world outside and the snow on the ground only made that quietness seem louder. I took a deep breath in and finally brought myself to get out of the warmth of the car. The snow made that crisp, crunchy sound I always liked. I smiled a bit, thinking about how dad would say that his back would sound just like that if you walked on it.

My heart started to race as I entered the cemetery gates. The trees were twisted up all around, almost as dead as the people lying underneath them. The light of the full moon guided my path to where he lay. It shouldn't be like this, I thought. I should be listening to you snore in the other room, not walking in the frigid cold to see a stupid slab of concrete in place of your presence. The anger inside me felt like it would boil over, and I began to take my anger out on an innocent rock lying next to my feet, kicking it along my path. Fifteen kicks in; I looked up to see the familiar flowers laid at the foot of the headstone, only they were decaying now. The snow coated the dried-out white petals making it hard to tell if they were even there.

My bodyweight collapsed under me as I fell to my hands and knees right before him, and I immediately began to dissolve into tears, the warmth of them stinging my cold face. My voice broke through the silence, "Dad, I miss you." I sat up and tried to make myself as comfy as possible on the brumal earth, and I began to fidget with the golden heart locket on my neck. "Do you remember when you got me this?" I asked, almost expecting a response. I unclasped the chain and held it tightly in my hand as I opened the heart revealing two pictures of him. The one on the left shows him holding me as a baby and a rough but entirely recognizable self-portrait on the right.

The images around me began to blur as the grieving drops of water stayed trapped in my eyes. I feel so much guilt, and I can't seem to stop thinking about what we didn't get to do yet. Dad always wanted to see Italy, and if I hadn't spent the summer with mom that year, we could've gone. I wiped my red nose with the sleeve of my sweater and laid the opened locket down next to me. "I need your advice, dad. Tell me what to do. Tell me how to overcome this pit in my chest-"

"Screech!"

I hastily jumped out of my self-pity and fell onto my back in terror at the sudden and ear curdling sound. I looked up to notice a barn owl sitting on top of my father's grave, looking down at me with its peering, dark eyes.

"Screech!"

It let out that sharp, awful sound again. "What do you want?" I sputtered angrily. I brought myself back to my feet moved towards it. "Shoo! get out of here!" I flapped my hands in its direction, trying to scare it away, but it seemed unbothered by my aggression. It tilted its heart-shaped head at me as if it were asking me a question. I began to admire its features, how it looked like it carried several lifetimes of wisdom. His cream-colored feathers looked extremely delicate and soft. I had never seen a wild animal this close before, yet something about this bird felt so familiar.

I stood back a couple of feet and began questioning if I was dreaming or not. The bird opened its wings, and I felt the air start to bounce off of them. It lifted its body off its stone perch, fanning the snow on top onto the flowers below. My inspired gaze quickly came to an end, though, as the barn owl swiftly swooped down and grabbed my locket I had laid on the ground. "Hey! Give that back!" I yelled. The owl, as quickly as it appeared, flew off, clutching onto my most prized possession. "Wait! Stop!" I began to chase after it screaming at the top of my lungs. No way this is happening, I thought as I jumped over the obstacles of headstones trying to catch up with the thief. "Come back here!" I shouted, crashing through the entrance gates; The owl had left the cemetery and was now flying towards the central part of town. I was running almost faster than my feet could keep up, and the harsh cold sent a sharp pain to my lungs as I heavily panted, but nothing was going to stop me from getting my necklace back.

I continued the chase down the side of the road, and the anger I felt from seeing my locket dangle in the sky from this owl's dumb feet made me push past the exhaustion I already felt. We turned a corner, and my pace slowed as I watched it land on the sign of a bakery, but this wasn't just a random building. The sign read Magnolia Bakery; my dad and I would come here to get breakfast every Saturday when I was younger. Our order consisted of two blueberry muffins with extra butter on the side. I begin to see the dark, closed-down pastry shop suddenly spring back to life and return to its bright blue state.

I look into the big front window where I see dad sipping his cup of dark-roasted coffee. One of those Saturdays, I felt curious enough to ask for a sip. I remember thinking the smell was bitter, but I wanted to see the big deal and why he was always indulging himself in a cup. I shyly put the mug to my mouth and slurped up a little, but the coffee burned my tongue before I had a chance to taste it. He saw me start to cry and didn't hesitate to take me into his arms and flag down the owner for a piece of ice. Even though he was my father, he always had strong motherly instincts. I could hear the sounds of spoons and forks clinking, and as I closed my eyes and took a deep breath in, the warm smell of cinnamon rolls and apple strudel filled my nose.

I hadn't thought of this place in a long time, and the happy memories associated with it hit me like a freight train. I was grinning from ear to ear, recalling all of the different happy memories that came from this place. I quickly snapped out of my daydream, though, as I heard the barn owl begin to fly off again. I bellowed out to it, hoping it'd listen to my pleas. I started to pick up rocks along the road to try and knock the bird out of the sky; I didn't want to hurt it, only stop it long enough to retrieve my locket. However, the attempt was in vain; I never had a strong arm or good aim. I took off sprinting past the patisserie, and we were now heading towards the town's square.

Buildings lined the street, and as I entered the cobblestone walkway, I could hear music playing from the karaoke bar nearby. The sound meant nothing to me at first, but in the midst of hurtling over piles of snow, I began to recognize the melody. "...however far away, I will always love you. However long I stay, I will always love you..." the lyrics resonated into the streets, and I was overcome with a flashback of dad and me in the car around the third week of fall.

Leaves covered our windshield as he cranked up the car, and the radio started playing. I remember him rubbing his hands together, trying to generate heat, and softly humming along to the music. "You know, this song makes me think of you," he said, interrupting the chorus. "How so?" I asked, still shivering from the cold. He turned his head towards me and softly smiled. "I wasn't too happy in life before you were born, and with your mother and I divorcing a month before you were due, I wasn't sure how close you and I would be," I looked down at my feet and reflected on that idea for a moment. I couldn't imagine a world where I grew up without him. After a moment, he continued his thought, "but the minute I held you in my arms, I loved you more than anything I've loved before, and all of my negative emotions towards the world faded away. I knew at that moment that no matter what, I would always, always, always love you." I saw his eyes start to water from emotion, and empathetically, mine did too.

Now, I was chasing a barn owl through the streets like a crazy person, but the thought of that conversation wasn't any less impactful. Not even death could diminish the amount of compassion and care he had for me. It was a comforting thought to know that even if he's gone, the love he had was still there. That song later became our go-to, queued up on every playlist, and never ever skipped.

Not fully paying attention to my surroundings, I tripped over a parking block and scuffed both of my knees. "Argh!" I exclaimed in frustration. The owl was still flying overhead, and I heard it let out that annoying screech again. It almost felt like it was in a mocking tone this time. I quickly got back up and continued racing towards it, wondering how far this epic chase would go. The owl could fly in two directions; one direction continued straight into the outskirts of town and the other into a thick brushing of trees and bushes. I pleaded for it to continue straight but staying true to its character; it chose the more annoying path.

As I stumbled into the woods, I trampled over fallen branches and struggled to push the dense vegetation out of my way. Worried I would lose the owl in the darkness, I pulled out my phone and turned on the flashlight to keep up with it. Though, my phone wasn't the only light source for long. The crackling of a campfire was heard nearby, and the smell of smoke floated down and filled my lungs. Campfire smoke always triggered a nostalgic feeling for me. Every summer, the family would go camping in one of the state forests. We'd roast marshmallows, sing songs, and see which one of us was brave enough to jump into the lake; these were some of my favorite moments. Here I was this whole time thinking about what we missed out on, but in doing that, I had inadvertently pushed away all of the memories that I cherish the most and the conversations that brought a smile to my face.

I shook off the snow that fell onto my coat from the trees and followed the owl up the wintery hill. I saw an old, rusted-up brown barn sitting in the distance, which didn't look like it would offer a lot of shelter from the cold. The owl began to fly in circles in the sky just above it, almost like it was waiting for me to catch up before finally gliding in. I pushed the splintery barn door to the left and shimmied my way inside. It smelled of old soot and wet hay, and the moonlight glimmered through the gaps between the aged wood. The barn owl was now resting in its nest, which was built in the corner of what used to be an upstairs nook.

I cautiously started to walk up the creaky wooden stairs, anxiously waiting for the feeling of relief that would come over me when I retrieved my necklace. I slowly approached the nest, causing the owl to take a defensive position. My locket sat open, nestled between its feet, and my dad's photograph was staring back at me. "shhh, it's okay." I stated softly, hoping to calm the bird down. I put my palms out and gingerly shuffled closer and closer. Determinedly, I grabbed the locket and clutched it tightly to my chest. The triumph caused me to falter back, and I fell onto the floor. I had planned out all of the mean words I would say to this owl when I finally caught up to it, but I didn't feel upset anymore; instead, I began to laugh. I no longer feel the painful guilt surrounding the words I didn't get to say and the things we didn't get to do. I could now see the beautiful gift of our time we spent together. I remembered the bakery where we had the tastiest pastries and bread, the music we danced to and sang out at the top of our lungs, the adventures we went on every summer break, and how much the time we spent together meant.

The locket was no longer a reminder that he was gone but instead a reminder that his love was still here.