The Living Room

"So get this, Owen, he said to her, 'Yeah if these walls could talk, I'd be nervous who could hear them!' And I thought, 'Carl, man, we love you, but we're not talking about you that often. We have a lot of other things going on.’" Repeating the story now, Tristan was still surprised at what he had heard and he laughed at the re-telling of it. "But anyway she smiled and hit his arm all flirty, so I guess it was a good line. Good for him."

"Tris, I know, I was right next to you, pal," Owen said as he looked at his neighbor with a touch of confusion.

"Oh. I thought you were facing towards the kitchen that night. Were you not in the kitchen that night?"

"No, I was there in the morning because Terry said something about a new carpet in the back hall he thought looked a bit, well, Classic Carl.”

"That's right. You know, I always forget Terry is kitchen and back hall. Hope Carl moves that carpet in here at some point, I'd love to see it."

For twenty-six years, Tristan stood as the stalwart western exterior at 27 Cherry Lane, providing the hardy backdrop for the well-used living room. In that time he had known three different families accounting for thirteen people (a number wildly skewed by the Aberdeens who lived there second), and he had to admit that Carl Burness, despite his nervous boisterousness and shall we say…unique…decorating style, was his favorite, as well as the most interesting and pleasant, of the baker's dozen. He had purchased 27 Cherry Lane three years earlier and this "Classic Carl" style quickly took over. What was at first a shock to Tristan and his companions turned into a morbid and delightful curiosity, at any point excited to see what strange new pattern would be introduced to the house next and nervous at the prospect of having their own wallpaper or paint changed to some garish glut of crisscrossing stripes.

For twenty-six years, Tristan shared an interior corner with Owen and they had become fast friends, both by design and by choice. On the outside, he was separated from Travis, the kitchen portion of the western exterior, by a large cedar tree that had been incorporated into the structure of the house at great expense because the original designers simply couldn't bear to cut it down. Though Tristan and Travis occasionally chatted around the tree, Travis had decided that really it was simply too much effort to maintain a relationship of any significant meaning if they always needed to shout and couldn't see each other face to face, so Tristan, through no choice of his own, would tell you that they were certainly friendly but not quite friends. This reality was made easier when Owen shared that Travis much preferred to spend his time looking out toward the lawn and the birds and didn't much enjoy the company of the other walls in the kitchen either, and though he turned around every now and then he spent far too little time looking inwards. Being an exterior himself, Tristan understood the draw of the world beyond their plot, of course, but he considered this a problem both for Travis's socializing and, metaphorically, for his well being.

At his other corner, Tristan had the unique pleasure of being next to six floor to ceiling windows. Though there was no conversation to be had (since for far too existential a reason for the walls, windows never gained the ability to communicate), it allowed for wonderful light and a view to the impeccably manicured hydrangea bushes in the front garden. Travis and Owen enjoyed sharing this view together immensely, but Owen took particular delight in it. He was the only interior in the house who could see such a scene and he knew what was happening outside on his own; so many other interiors needed to rely on what they heard from their exterior roommates. And while walls tend to be upstanding and trustworthy, all it would take was for one exterior to be in the mood for a prank to sow the seeds of confusion. As an interior, Owen spent his time between the kitchen on one side and the living room on the other, and if you were to poll the walls of both rooms individually (excluding Travis since he very likely would not have an interest in the question or very likely would respond, in all seriousness, with "who?"), they'd all say he was the most kind-hearted and interested wall of the bunch. He was proud of his role as the middle-man between living room and kitchen and his roommates loved the tales and news he shared.

The living room was one of the least populated rooms in the house; the original designers, having previously lived in a one bedroom apartment in the heart of the city (which also contributed to their new appreciation for greenery and the large cedar tree) were so concerned about having a lack of storage space that they insisted on a closet or pantry in every room except for the living room since it would be so visible from the street and the six floor to ceiling windows. Nearly every room in the house had a few additional walls as a result, but the living room remained a simple square. The only thing Tristan and Carl liked more than a day of sunshine flooding that simple square through those six floor to ceiling windows was a day of rain lashing against them, and that morning it was coming down hard. They enjoyed the sound together for a while, both a bit chilled from the draft that came in through the windows and warmed by the thought that they themselves remained airtight.

"I don't understand how the fireplace in the dining room doesn't get more use," Owen said after a large gust shifted the course of the raindrops. "This is the perfect kind of day for it."

Tristan shuddered a bit from the strong wind and a bit more from the preposterous notion. "Those things make me nervous," he told his friend. "Fire in a house is a recipe for disaster. And if someone cleans up, doesn't wipe their hands, and then touches you? Forget it. You'd have that stain for weeks."

"It'd come out."

"Maybe, but you'd be rubbed raw with the effort of it. Not worth the risk."

Owen chuckled to himself and shook his head, or at least the version of shaking one’s head that a wall is capable of.

"What?" asked Tristan.

"You've got a lot less food around you, " Owen reminded him. "Us in the kitchen need to be wiped down all the time. Carl likes to try new things, bless his heart, and food is always flying around in there."

Tristan shuddered again, this time entirely because of the preposterous notion. "How can you stand it?"

"It's a joy to watch, he really has fun with it. Last week, out of nowhere, a spoonful of tomato sauce launched at me and splattered my crown molding. But it smelled so good, and we all laughed. I couldn't be mad."

"I remember that smell reaching me, now that you mention it. It was nice."

"You must get your fair share of mud and dirt on your other side though, no? Especially in the rain?"

"Yes, on the outside. Where it belongs," Tristan said, matter-of-factly.

"Oh, excuse me then."

Though they hadn't confirmed with anyone else, the two were quite confident that the living room was the cleanest room in the house. Amongst walls, this was a particularly taboo topic and rarely discussed. It was agreed that far too much went into the state of a room that was outside of the sides’ control: the kitchen dealt with grease and spills, the bathroom had constant condensation, and the guest room wasn't actually used all that often, so the lack of foot traffic meant less scuffs but more dust. Yes, cleanliness of a room tended to be at Carl's discretion. That he made it a point to never wear shoes in the living room and cleaned its floor twice a week wasn't anything special on the part of Tristan or Owen. At least, that's what they would say if asked about it around other walls.

"The rain really doesn't bother you?" Owen asked Tristan when the sound of the raindrops indicated they were getting bigger. "Honestly, these windows look like they're being done in."

"No, it's like a massage. It's actually quite lovely."

"Strange that I'll never know," Owen said, trailing off. He gave a hum of contemplation, but moved on as quickly as the thought came to him. "And speaking of lovely, is that a new frame?"

"It is. Carl hung it up just this morning," said Tristan proudly.

"Ah, I thought I heard something. Did it hurt?"

"Not really. Believe it or not he got the nail right on the first try, so it was quick." Tristan felt that Carl had taken extra care when lining up the nail. He had even measured twice.

"Lucky for you! Do you remember when he needed to hang up the Christmas lights around my top corner? Honestly, he must've tried ten different places before he got it to go. It was ghastly."

"He really patched it up well. You'd never know." Tristan knew this was a sense of soreness for Owen. Not literally, of course, since the Christmas lights were hung up years ago, but Owen harbored an internal soreness at the idea of his disfigurement.

"I'll have to take your word for it."

"What'd he hang on me?” asked Tristan. “Does it look nice, I can't tell."

"Yeah, it's great!" Owen excitedly told his friend. "Very pretty. It's a painting of wildflowers. Looks like a Summerville."

"Who's Summerville?" Tristan asked, embarrassed at not being familiar with the name.

"Carl hasn't mentioned her in here before?" Owen was surprised. "Some artist he likes. I think they know each other from college. Lucy has been wearing one of her paintings in the kitchen for months, and Carl was going on and on about how much he loved it and how Summerville painted the piece specifically for him. Actually, this might be another in the series. They look similar."

"Oh, Lucy has one? Very fashionable then." Just two weeks into Carl's residency, Tristan heard him say to his aunt (or mother, honestly the two looked so similar and rarely visited that it was difficult to remember which was which) that the living room which Tristan anchored was his favorite place in the house and that he nearly bought it based on this one room alone. Tristan, as any of us would have upon hearing such praise, was immensely proud of himself and his roommates, and he resolved to earn this favorite room designation every day by standing up a bit straighter and creaking a bit less. Even still, Lucy had a well-earned reputation as the trendsetter amongst the walls, and having this type of connection to her style was worth feeling good about. "How is she?" Tristan asked, trying not to sound too hoity-toity.

"She's good. This is her favorite time of year, you know. The sun is up a bit higher and the way it comes through one of the windows in the kitchen, it makes for the most gorgeous glow. She basks in it for hours now, lightens up her whole face."

"A day like today might not be her favorite, then. But glad to hear it otherwise. Tell her I say hi."

Six weeks after moving in, Tristan heard Carl say to a group of friends "Welcome to Brunstone". This, naturally, confused the hell out of Tristan. Not once in twenty-six years had he heard the term Brunstone, and he was quite certain that this was not the name of their street (Cherry Lane, as established earlier), their neighborhood (The Cut, as established by the Aberdeens though he had never learned why), their town (Lower Midland, as established by the yard sign across the street congratulating a graduate of Lower Midland's Upper school), their county (actually, he wasn't sure of the name of their county, but he was confident no one in their right mind would welcome a guest to a county over a town or neighborhood, or at all really), or their state (Minnesota). Carl continued to use the term for weeks with guests and visitors, and Tristan, Owen, and others continued to be confused. It wasn't until one particularly late night in which Carl had finished a season of Peaky Blinders and an entire bottle of wine, an experience he described as "whoops", and upon getting up from the living room couch, patted Rosie's door frame as he left the living room and said "goodnight Brunstone" that Tristan realized "Aw hell, he named the house!" As any of us would have upon hearing such an abrupt and unexpected name change, many of the walls experienced an identity crisis. They worried that they would need to change their names as well or they they'd need to start referring to each other with some bureaucratic and drab system like Brunstone Wall 1 or Brunstone Wall 2 or, heavens, Brunstone Wall 3. Terry was one of the few thrilled with the news, and he was eager to be referred to as Terry, the third kitchen and second back hall wall of Brunstone, but needless to say, this didn't catch on.

Whenever he was asked about the name, Carl would explain that such a magnificent house needed an equally magnificent title, and that Brunstone simply came to him and felt right, and I mean just look at it. It just is Brunstone, isn't it? But this, also needless to say, was not the real reason. Carl loved England and their tradition of naming anything from a cottage to a castle. Deep down he knew he could never actually move to another country, despite how often he would it bring it up when he was uncomfortably asked if he planned to stay in Lower Midland, and perhaps having a name for his house would bring a bit of another country to him. And what better way to do so than by combining the names of his two favorite Englishmen: William Gladstone and Isambard Kingdom Brunel (at least, the two he decided were his favorite Englishmen after trying out a far too many name combinations before deciding this one would work).

Despite the initial identity crisis, the naming of Brunstone had a far more unifying effect than any of the walls could have imagined. Up until that point, they rarely referred to 27 Cherry Lane as a collective unit, and when they did, it was always with an impersonal mention of "the house". But after hearing Carl use it, they began to refer to themselves as Brunstone quite frequently. And then, soon after that, they found it a bit cumbersome and started simply saying "us" and "we". This led to a profound calming feeling that reached every corner, and they started to think that perhaps they just were Brunstone after all.

Though they didn't talk about Carl too often, the walls did think about him a lot. He was one thing they all had in common, and asking about his activity in another room was an easy way to start a conversation on days where nothing too interesting was happening within their own square footage. And though they did occasionally like to make fun of something silly he said or laugh at his dancing abilities (which he himself would describe as "too much elbow, not enough hip"), they much more frequently delighted in his successes and were always there to be a strong surface should he slip and need to catch himself.

The rain continued to fall like the orderly rat-a-tat of a military tattoo drummed out at Edinburgh Castle, presenting an early challenge for the delicate buds that ventured out on the hydrangea bush. Tristan and Owen watched the battle between wind, rain, and flower, and thought how a few weeks before they would've cheered for such weather as it meant more water for the plants. Now, they hoped it would lighten up to ensure the buds would hang on and the spring would be full of color. Owen looked away from the window and saw Tristan starting straight ahead.

"You know it'll be a year next week," Owen said, barely above a whisper.

"Really? A year. No calendar in here, so I can't keep track" Tristan responded as if coming out of a trance. "I had a feeling it was coming up. Is there one in the kitchen?" he asked in a weak attempt to change the subject.

"There is." Owen paused and the rain fell. "Feels like it could've been a decade ago, and feels like it could've been yesterday."

"It does." Tristan continued to look ahead.

"How're you doing?"

With a sigh that often accompanies a sad smile, Tristan looked at his longtime neighbor. "Right now or in general?"

"Both…either."

"I can feel as normal as can be, and then I look up a certain way and I get a bit lost. Today I've been fine. I mean really fine. But then I wondered if the hydrangeas would come up pink or blue this year, and I remember the bets we used to make on it. This is the first time we haven't made a bet."

"You'd almost always lose, so maybe that's for the best," Owen teased his friend.

Tristan gave a light laugh that similarly belied the sadness of remembering. He continued, "I don't feel guilty, so that's not really a part of it. I know I had nothing to do with it. But at the same time, I think if his plans had been a bit different, it could've been me too. So why am I still here and she's not. Is that supposed to mean something?"

Owen paused before replying. "If I started thinking that, I think I'd burst. Life gets away from being simple so fast and it takes a lot more work to get it back there."

Tristan nodded his head, or at least the version of nodding one’s head that a wall is capable of. "It's just hard knowing your life is in the hands of someone else. Carl is great, I love Carl, but everything can change on his whims like that. And of course, if he knew, he wouldn't have ever considered knocking her down. At least I hope. And this idea that an interior only blocks off and makes rooms where an exterior protects from the elements and supports the house…well, I don't need to tell you. You know. It's nonsense. But Rosie was there to bear my load. Who is holding me up?"

"She was for all of us."

"And you have everyone in the kitchen, which is great, I'm not saying you shouldn't and I am really happy you do, I'm not putting any pressure on you for that, but now in the living room, it's me and you, and that's it. And when you turn around, which again, you always should. I'm not saying you shouldn’t. But then it's just me and where Rosie used to be. I know we're combined with the study but really, those walls are so distant."

"And a bit dark."

"Hey your words not mine." Tristan sighed again and looked out the window. The rain was beginning to lighten up and it looked like the hydrangea buds had, for the most part, held on. "And the worst part…"

"I know the worst part, you don't have to say it," Owen tried to cut him off.

"I do. The worst part is that the open floor plan really does work. The flow is so…holistic now. It looks great. His pattern preference is terrible, but Carl has an eye for design."

"I guess if you're going to get knocked down, it should be worth it. What more can any of us ask for?"

Tristan agreed. They sat with that thought for a while before Tristan picked the conversation back up. "Every time someone new comes over to visit, Carl brings up the changes and how he opened up the space. He's proud of the fact Rosie is gone. I think he'd forget about her completely if he didn't want to talk about the before and after."

"Are you afraid he'll make more changes?" Owen asked. "If I go, you'll have the whole kitchen to look into, and that wouldn't be so bad!"

"Please," Tristan said "If he got rid of you, the whole place would riot." The two laughed at the thought of Brunstone organizing into a mob of walls and wainscoting. "The possibility of more changes is always in the back of my mind, but that's out of my control, so it is what it is. But what's going to happen when Carl leaves?"

"When he moves out you mean?"

"Yeah, when a new family moves in. They won't even know Rosie was here. They won't tell people she was knocked down, they'll just have the open space and that'll be that. No one will remember her. I don't want to forget her too."

"We made it twenty-six years in the house with no changes. You'll remember every time you look at the new view, which will be terrible some days and may make you smile on others,” Owen reassured his friend. "We couldn't possibly forget this first parting among us. You'll remember."

"It does make me smile sometimes. I'm looking right where she was but now I get to see the gift she left us. She did love a view"

"There you go! We'll do something next week to celebrate her."

"I'd like that." Though there had been moments in the past, never had Tristan and Owen both felt the need to reach out and put a hand on the other in reassurance so strongly. Most walls agreed that there were not many downsides to being a wall, but no hands was certainly one of the few.

As the rain finally moved on, a new layer of clouds came in behind them to keep the day gray. Despite the lack of sunshine, Tristan and Owen felt cozy, as if the clouds were wrapping around the town like a blanket or like the lid of a terrarium that was keeping everything inside and close. They chatted about this and that for a while longer before Owen said he was going to turn in towards the kitchen and see if anyone knows what the dinner plans were. Tristan took in the solitude and found peace in the fact that the chances of another wall in the house experiencing this type of quiet would have been very rare indeed. Shortly after, Carl opened the front door, returning from another day of work. He shivered and hung up his coat and took his boots off. He only took a few steps before his phone rang.

"Hey, mom!" Tristan heard him say. He watched Carl walk into the living room and right up to him, and Tristan realized he must be looking at the new painting he wore. "I hung up the other wildflower painting in the living room. It looks great in here. Gives the whole room an extra charm and warmth. I'm excited to show it to you." Carl leaned against Tristan as his mom filled him in on her end about some new recipe she baked or what her weekend plans in the garden were (at least, Tristan assumed this was the conversation. He couldn't hear the other line, but it felt like every time she called, Carl made reference to her baking and gardening, and he didn't think the woman had much else going on).

"That's great mom, it sounds like the garden is going to come in good this year." (Right again!) "I'm doing some landscaping this weekend as well, actually. I want to put a fence up along the side of the house.” This was the first Tristan had heard of any new plans, and he was interested to hear more. “I have all of the lumber from when I took that wall out last year and it's in great shape. It’s beautiful. I've been looking for a new project for it. Should work perfectly and I could have it up by the weekend."

Tristan was sure he misheard and wished Owen had been facing in to make sure he hadn't. He didn't know what to do with himself as a world of emotions crashed in at once. Could Rosie really be put back up? He'd heard of such things before, but only through stories from other rooms and he always doubted their truthfulness, but the prospect of Rosie coming back made the room seem brighter than it had all day. "Anyway, mom I gotta go make dinner but I'll talk to you later. Love you." Carl hung up and took another look at the painting, then Tristan thought, right at him. "This painting does look great on you," he said as he patted the wall. For the first time in twenty-six years, Tristan felt as though a human was actually talking to him. "And we'll see what happens with that fence. Right on the other side of you to make a nice, contained side lawn. Easier to manage, would make everything feel a bit more private. I'm picturing an outside room that'll be perfect for the spring once these hydrangeas bloom. We'll see." He walked out of the living room and stopped right where Rosie had been. "This is a good house," he said and clapped his hands and looked around and made his way into the kitchen.