Rewriting Jo

Dawn's light came creeping across my quilt in warm beams, yet I resisted its coax to open my eyes. With a heavy sigh, I contemptuously yanked my pillow from beneath my head and slapped it across my face. My body wriggled down further into my blankets. Eventually, it was the aroma of Hannah's simmering applesauce, combined with the hoot of a tea kettle, that drew me from the haven of my bed.

Downstairs, the house seemed insensitively cheery. At my appearance, Hannah smiled and ladled applesauce into a bowl for me, adding a small pat of butter and an extra sprinkle of cinnamon on top the way she knew I liked it, and set the bowl at my place at the table while muttering about the state of my tangled hair. Marmee sat with a pleasant expression at the end of the table penning letters, her hand moving in graceful, unhurried strokes across the middle of a page. Beth and Amy lounged across from each other on the front window seat, outlined in the hazy glow that poured in through the window, sipping tea and murmuring to one another about an incident that had happened the week before at Amy's school. The rumple of frustration already in my spirit was further offended by everyone's blissful oblivion. I took up my dish of applesauce, clattering my spoon crossly against the side of my bowl, and headed toward the side door without a word of greeting to anyone.

"I'm taking my breakfast out onto the hills," I called hastily over my shoulder before anyone could object, and purposely allowed the door to slam behind me so I could have the satisfaction of its bang.

It was a fine day, fair golden sunlight shining through the morning fog upon the green grass like a painting. I looked at it, and tears blurred the scene. As I headed toward the spot of yesterday's fateful meeting with Laurie, a breeze lifted my tousled hair, and I felt compelled to scoop up the hem of my dress with my free hand and run full speed into the face of the wind. It whipped into my face, purging me, drying my eyes, and flung my hair and skirts streaming behind me until I arrived panting at the top of the hill. Onto the grass I dropped, and sat staring into my bowl of applesauce.

In my mind rang the greeting that had met me at this spot yesterday. "Where's the Jew's-harp, Jo?*" Laurie had called out to me jauntily then. I lifted my head now to look in the direction from which he had come the morning before, recalling the figure's dark mop of curls and eager, almost feverishly hopeful expression.

'I love you,' I thought wildly now. 'I love you, I love you, I love you, and you shall never, ever know it!' A wet cry choked out of me, and then I doubled over toward the vibrant grass, a hunched puddle of linen and wool and windswept hair, and my fists pounded the ground as untold longing racketed my body. I would never belong to that slender dark-headed figure whose swinging gait and cajoling voice were as familiar to me as my own skin, and nearly as integral. For the last time, Laurie had met me with open arms, clear eyes and and an all-encompassing invitation into his heart and soul and future. Yesterday, we'd been two halves that made a whole, and today, the hillside and sky with all their space and color were not large enough to hold the void I felt.

"I've loved you ever since I've known you, Jo, couldn't help it!*" Laurie had declared earnestly to me at this very spot the day before, and my mind had replied silently, 'So have we! We both! Amy and me! She couldn't help it any more than I could! But I cannot say so! Do not drive me to it!' Laurie had wept, had later buried his head of curls vehemently in his arms atop that mossy fencepost down the hill that I could see now from today's perch, and had stormed piteously, "I can't love anyone else, and I'll never forget you, Jo!*" and I'd steeled myself into the role of consoler, entreating, "You'll get over this after awhile, and find some lovely accomplished girl, who will adore you, and make a fine mistress for your fine house. I shouldn't. You'd be ashamed of me, and we should quarrel...*" In the privacy of my mind I'd finished my thoughts, somewhat bitterly, but with steadfast resolve, 'Amy! It will be Amy! Amy will make you a fine wife. She loves you! She's not like me, she'd never vex you, and she could not bear to lose you, and so it must be Amy. It must be Amy for you, and not me.'

At the last, after begging and pleading with him, I'd allowed myself to tell Laurie one final truth: that I didn't expect to ever marry. Indignant, he'd argued with this, too, desperate to change my mind, eyes accusatory and ablaze with disappointment. I could still hear his hurt voice in my mind, assuring me, "There'll come a time when you will care for somebody, and you'll love him tremendously, and live and die for him, and I shall have to stand by and see it.*" I had nearly grabbed him by the shoulders, had longed to shout fiercely into his face, 'You are seeing it! You're right! You know me well. And I'm living and dying for you now. I love you, I love you...'

But I could not. Because my sister, my golden-haired, lofty-minded, dainty-fingered artist of a younger sister, loved him, too.

Swallowing the last of my tears, I turned away now from the path leading down the hillside where we'd walked together the morning before -- away from the fence we'd sat atop side-by-side many a sunny afternoon and joked of running away to join a pirate ship -- away from the shady grove where we'd murmured secrets and echoed dreams and dashed helter-skelter racing to be the first one to his front door -- away from him. Chores beckoned me. Floors needed to be swept, and dishes dried. And I, beneath the risen sun and with all the birds of the hillside as my witnesses, determined within my spirit never again to wallow in my own sorrow over this.

*direct quotations from 'Little Women' 1868, Louisa May Alcott