Shelbourne & Mattingly: Part 6
Part 6: The Bed
Part 6 of Shelbourne & Mattingly invites us into Seth's transformed bedroom, where childhood memories meet present reality in a space that speaks volumes about love's many forms. From comic panels to professionally framed paintings, from Yoda posters to medical supply carts, we see how Maggie's careful curation reflects a mother's desperate hope—and how the ancient four-poster bed remains unchanged, still holding all their stories of blanket forts and Tolkien-inspired adventures.
Pull up a chair beside Seth's dresser (mind the faded Pink Panther from that long-ago county fair) as Erie discovers that sometimes the bravest thing we can do is dare to love someone exactly as they are...
PART 6: THE BED
December 21, 1992
Seth stretched out on his bed, crossing his legs at the ankles. “Welcome to my updated habitat. Mom’s vision of ‘healing aesthetics,’ courtesy of Louisville’s finest decorator. What do you think?”
I wandered around the room, attempting to reconcile my childhood memories with this magazine-worthy makeover. Gone were our half-finished comic panels tacked up with Band-Aids—our beloved raccoon space detective and his possum sidekick, my words and Seth’s colored pencils bringing them to life. In their place were his paintings from art school, each professionally framed and mounted over the new forest-green pinstripe wallpaper—Kentucky landscapes rendered in fever-dream colors, family portraits that reimagined John Singer Sargent’s elegant brushstrokes through Seth’s wit. Granny Ray posed like Lady Agnew of Lochnaw, but with a Pepsi can and her favorite quilted housecoat covered in faded daisies, that infamous gleam in her eye suggesting she might have bourbon in that Pepsi.
“Very nice, but I miss your Yoda poster.”
I touched the straw silk drapes that now dressed the diamond-paned windows. The gas fireplace flickered beneath the marble mantelpiece, the television tucked above looking almost apologetic amid the Gothic splendor. Pink roses in a crystal vase caught the firelight.
When did Maggie find time to buy and arrange flowers?
Gone was the cluttered desk with its explosion of charcoal sketches, dog-eared Impressionism books, dried-out Sharpies, and broken oil pastels. All replaced with a pristine Eastlake console serving as medical supply cart. The attached sitting room had evolved from a treacherous obstacle course of Breyer horses and LEGOs to Maggie’s watch station, complete with a daybed, mini-fridge, and coffee maker.
But the bed? It was the same imposing four-poster where we’d built blanket forts, its mahogany posts twisting toward the ceiling like ancient, spindly trees—the perfect place to pretend to be Bilbo Baggins stealing the precious golden cup from Smaug’s mountain lair. I was the clever hobbit and Seth the impossibly dramatic dragon, competing to break each other up with inside jokes that definitely weren’t in Tolkien’s version.
My eyes landed on the oil painting that had won him a full ride to art school: A massive thoroughbred in impossible cobalt, wild against Shelbourne and Mattingly warehouses burning in a bourbon-colored sunset. I remembered watching him paint it in art class—his hair falling across his forehead, his body moving with each brushstroke like he was conducting an orchestra only he could hear. The horse seemed to say: I refuse to be what you expect me to be. It was the painting that made the locals whisper about “the artistic Mattingly boy” with mixed concern and pride.
Something shifted that day. Other girls noticed him too. Kelly Whitaker started shortening her skirt by rolling it up at the waistband before art class, hovering near his easel like she belonged there. I ignored the sharp twist in my chest, pretending it didn’t matter that my best friend was turning other girls’ worlds beautiful too. But I remember thinking: whoever ends up with Seth Mattingly would have to be extraordinary—someone who could match his magic with her own. Not the girl with copper hair that refused to stay braided, who’d grown up exploring rickhouses with him, who knew every secret passage and forbidden door. Who’d dared him to eat bourbon snow cones until he puked, who knew every embarrassing detail of his life, and who’d shared all of hers in return.
“You’re awfully quiet,” he said.
“Just remembering. You were kind of insufferable in high school.”
“Kind of? I was going for completely insufferable. Clearly I failed.”
On top of his dresser was the faded Pink Panther I’d won for him at the county fair ring-toss. Beside it was another Tolkien-inspired kingdom map, this one from our graduation night—so like the one he’d just drawn for Riley and Macy, but wilder. A sea serpent swimming in a vat of bourbon, a griffin teaching chemistry at Sacred Heart, two suspiciously familiar pixies running through the woods. He’d drawn it the night we’d snuck into Warehouse Eight, tapping an experimental batch, declaring we were destined for bigger and better things.
Seth got up, stood behind me. I could feel his warmth, hear the catch in his breath. “We had big plans, didn’t we?”
“You were going to shock the New York art scene with your warped Kentucky upbringing.”
“While you were going to work in a Chicago museum to erase yours. But first, college.”
“I went north. You went south.”
“But the summers were ours,” he murmured. His fingers found my hair, loose now from its braid. He’d never touched me like this. Every nerve ending woke up, hungry for something I’d denied myself for so long.
“Those summers,” I whispered, my heart pounding. “After your shift you’d pick me up at Aunt Leo’s, then we’d go hide out at the springhouse.”
“Just me and you in the woods.” I could feel his breath on my neck. “It was glorious.”
Everything went fuzzy at the edges, too intense to be real. I retreated into safer territory.
“We’d eat abbey fudge and make stupid jokes while you drew.”
“Yes.” His fingers tangled gently in my hair. “I have a secret portfolio full of ‘Erie Shelbourne: The Reluctant Bourbon Princess’ sketches. Probably shouldn’t leave those behind—too mortifying. The boy pining after the girl next door like some kind of awful country song.”
My whole body rebelled at once—lungs forgetting to breathe, heart hammering, hands trembling. I thought of my careful distances, the way I’d trained myself not to stare, how I’d convinced myself he’d never see me that way. All this time, we’d been drawing our own maps, marking the places we couldn’t go. What a waste of good colored pencils.
“And last summer?” His fingers left my hair and traced down my spine. “You graduated, got your dream job at The Art Institute. That’s when it hit me—no more summers with you. Worst summer of my life. Absolute fucking hell.”
“Seth…” I started to turn toward him, but his hand stilled on my back.
“C’mon.” His voice gentled as he gestured toward his bed. “I’m tired of standing up.” He climbed onto the covers, settling back against the pillows, and patted the space beside him. I placed my bag on the nightstand, and somehow, there I was: Little Erie Shelbourne, all grown up, back in Seth Mattingly’s bed—but this time without hiding beneath a blanket fort. We sat side by side, not touching—legs extended, his feet bare, mine in white socks.
I stared at our feet, trying to find comfort. But my eyes fixed on the bruise marking his foot, dark as spilled paint. Once, his injuries had been proof of dares accepted, heights conquered. Now they appeared without warning or glory, blooming like winter roses under his skin.
My fingers clutched at the sky-blue quilt—a double Irish chain that Granny Ray had pieced together from old distillery work shirts. I looked away, but my eyes landed on my worn leather bag. Inside was another secret ready to burst. I’d found the ring in August, that same hateful weekend when Gabe called to tell me about Seth’s diagnosis. I had been living my post-college dream—a job as a junior archivist at The Art Institute of Chicago, surrounded every day by masterpieces.
Erie, Seth has cancer. It’s…not good.
When Gabe hung up, I pressed the phone harder against my ear, listening to the dial tone pulse across three hundred miles of distance. Then I moved like someone else was controlling my body. I took the red line to Thorndale. Walked to the beach. I took off my sneakers and socks and stepped into Lake Michigan, up to my knees. I stared out to the horizon, crying angry tears into the lake that had once felt like freedom. When I couldn’t cry any more, I crossed the beach to the Chicago streets, barefoot, walking to anywhere and nowhere, not caring about the burning pavement beneath my feet.
I found myself at an antique market in Edgewater. A place that gave me comfort—history preserved with care, each object a story. I pulled my shoes back on, not bothering to brush off the sand. As I gazed into a glass case, my eye landed on a man’s ring—a silver band set with a round, velvety blue stone. I asked the shop owner to unlock the case.
“This ring is from 1950,” he said, carefully lifting it from the case. “Pretty unusual to see a man’s wedding band with a gemstone, especially a star sapphire.” He held it up to the light streaming through the shop’s dusty windows. “Want to see something magical?”
I nodded, and he placed it in my palm. “Tilt it slowly.”
What I saw took my breath. A delicate six-pointed star floated in the dome-shaped blue stone, shifting and dancing as I moved the ring. It didn’t make sense.
“How is it doing that?” I whispered, still tilting the stone.
He smiled like he was sharing a secret. “There are crystals inside the stone that create what’s called an asterism. See how it’s dome-shaped instead of faceted?” His finger traced the air above the stone. “That’s the magic of star sapphires—they’re most beautiful when their flaws are allowed to shine. Cut it into fancy facets like other gems and…” He shook his head. “The star disappears completely.”
As the star danced, all I could think was: I want Seth to see this.
It cost way more than I could comfortably afford, but I didn’t care. I bought it. Kept it close like a dare I hadn’t spoken aloud.
On Monday, I took the train to work. Spent my lunch break crying in the Egyptian wing. Every day for two weeks straight.
Then I quit.
“You’re throwing away everything you worked for,” Seth had said, his voice tight on the phone. “I won’t let you do this.” But it was too late. I’d already given notice on my apartment. Asked Aunt Leo for my job back. When he realized he couldn’t stop me, he’d gone quiet. Finally: “Just don’t regret this, Shelbourne.”
“They say I have a year. Tops.”
Seth had fallen asleep beside me, his breathing soft but with that quiet rasp that made my heart stutter. I reached for my bag, took out the black velvet box, placed it on my lap. Waited. Minutes passed. An hour. Finally, I heard him yawn. There was still a whisper of space between us.
“Hey, you.” He turned to me with a drowsy smile. “What day is it?”
“Still December 21. The first day of winter. Shortest day of the year.”
“What year is it?”
“Still good old 1992.”
He pointed to the box in my lap. “What’s that curious object?”
“You really have a lot of questions.”
He picked up the box and opened it.
“I wasn’t exactly planning to do this tonight,” I said, not meeting his eyes. “Or ever.”
He lifted the ring from its velvet nest, held it close to his eyes. The star revealed its secret in the soft lamplight, just like I’d hoped it would that day in Chicago.
“Don’t answer yet,” I said.
“You didn’t ask me a question.”
“I assumed you could read my mind.”
“Usually I can.” He turned the ring, coaxing another flash from the star. “But this is an unfamiliar experience. Explain yourself.”
“You are Rockland Springs’ most eligible bachelor. I call dibs.”
“Is this another one of your ill-advised dares, Shelbourne?”
“Likely the most ill-advised one yet. Though this time we might skip the ER visit.”
“Didn’t Mom make you promise to stop daring me to do dangerous things?”
“I believe her instructions were ‘help keep my youngest son alive past age ten.’” The lightness in my voice cracked. “I guess I’m still trying.”
He ran his hand through his hair. “Erie.” His fingers lingered on the thinning spot above his temple. “This won’t be pretty. I’m sure ‘watch boyfriend slowly die’ wasn’t on your list of romantic dreams in high school.”
I pushed past the tightness in my throat. “Please. I’ve been handling your disasters forever. I have an honorary PhD in your catastrophes.”
He took the box from my lap, placed the ring back into its nest, set it on the nightstand. “I know you aren’t making this proposal lightly. But I need to think about this, okay? And you do too.” His fingers twisted in the quilt. “You’re twenty-two, Erie. You should be planning your future, not watching mine fade away.”
My face burned. Twenty-two. Like that number meant anything. Like we hadn’t grown up side by side, sharing every stupid decision, every celebration, every failure. Like he wasn’t barely twenty-three himself, suddenly playing wise old man with his gentle rejections.
I turned away. “Do you still have contraband bourbon in here?”
“In the top drawer. Under the Rolling Stone magazines.”
I found the flask, took a drink. The bourbon burned sweet and familiar, warming me from the inside out. Like every stolen sip we’d ever shared. I handed him the flask and he drank.
I turned back to him. “Well? What’s your answer?”
He smiled. “You gave me four, maybe five, minutes.”
“You know I suck at waiting.”
“Speaking of waiting, why have we never kissed?”
TO BE CONTINUED IN PART 7: THE BED
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