The girl with the seashell couch.

On the eve of my 30th birthday, I drive 87 miles south of Los Angeles in a Uhaul van to pick-up a couch I found on Craigslist. My brother tells me on the way down I’m crazy. He’s not wrong. 

“We’re basically going to San Diego!” He throws up his hands from the passenger side of the van. I may have lied just a little about the distance to wrangle his help. “For a couch! A couch!” 

“It’s a good deal!” I exclaim, keeping my eyes on the road. I’ve never driven anything that sits this high, and it makes me feel like the queen of the highway. Out of my way, I imagine shouting out the window to the little cars I pass by. I’m on a mission. 

“You could get a new one for the same price when you account for the rental van,” he points out. I roll my eyes. Shake my head. I resist starting my sentence with, you don’t understand–I don’t want to sound like our father. 

“Yeah but it wouldn’t have good bones,” I insist. “This one’s vintage. Down-filled. Reupholstered. And, the seashells!” 

The couch I found on Craigslist is the most beautiful couch I’ve ever seen in my life. It is ivory and cream, with a textured, quilted shell pattern, a slight shine to the woven threads. It is in pristine condition. Near perfection, with just enough character to make you wonder about its previous owners. 

I imagine it’s really not that special, but for some reason, it feels special to me. I guess that’s the way special things work, isn’t it? The specialness is not inherent, but subjective. In any case, it feels momentous–the couch, and the journey I have taken to claim ownership of it.  

I found the couch on New Year’s Eve. It was late, well past midnight, and I was unable to sleep, tossing and turning before I gave up, letting the glow of my smartphone overwhelm me as I scrolled endless pages of Craigslist. Decorating a new home is a good distraction from the pain of losing one, perhaps.

And then I spotted it. My couch. I knew it was mine the moment I saw it. Only, it was in Temecula. And I didn’t yet have an apartment. And I certainly didn’t have a truck.

So I did a silly thing, and told the woman the truth. I didn’t attempt to negotiate the price. I didn’t ask for more photos, or other proof of its existence. I didn’t play any of the games you’re supposed to play. Instead, I told her it was beautiful and perfect and I was in love with it, that I was turning thirty and was single again after a decade of relationships and had just moved across the country to start my life over in Los Angeles and I didn’t have a truck, but that I needed this couch and I would find a way to get it. I asked her if she would be so kind as to hold it. 

She said yes. She took the listing off Craigslist, and she waited 17 days for me to find a way.

I found a way.

Halfway through the drive, I suddenly have trouble concentrating on the road; the mountains surrounding the highway seem like they’re enveloping and expanding around me at the same time. It is unlike anything I’ve witnessed before. My chest aches with the heavy, important feeling of growing. 

I have spent far too long writing about my life instead of living it. Far too long underestimating my own abilities to take care of myself, on my own. I need this couch because I need to prove to myself I can do this. I can drive a foreign, notorious highway 87 miles south in a huge rental vehicle and buy a couch and build a home for myself here in Los Angeles. 

Home. It sounds strange in my mouth now; I don’t know what home is anymore. I haven’t felt at home in a few years. This is my attempt at teaching myself what it means again, not just spatially but physically, in my body. I want to be safe for myself. I want to trust myself. 

Nearly two hours after we leave Los Angeles, we pull up to a sweet suburban home, where a woman named Sherry is waiting, garage door open. Inside, my beloved couch sits, covered in a pink fitted sheet. She removes it so I can inspect; as if I’d change my mind now.

“It was in my parents’ formal sitting room for years,” Sherry explains as my brother and I circle the couch. My hands tingle just slightly when I touch the pillows. “My mother picked out the fabric. It was custom. They barely used it.”

She shuffles around the garage, which is packed with furniture and knick knacks and other treasures. It’s as if she’s about to have a yard sale. I want to ask, but I can’t speak. I am in awe of the couch. When I finally break my gaze and look up at her, her eyes are brimming with tears.

“My mother passed away a few years ago, and my dad–” she gets choked up for a second. My brother and I struggle to hold back our own tears. I feel the urge to hug her. “My dad recently passed too, and I’ve been reluctant to part with all of this.” She gestures to the couches, the paintings, the lamps. “I wanted to find the right home. That’s why I waited for you.” 

“Thank you,” I manage to say. Because I don’t know how to say, I love you to this stranger without it sounding ridiculous. I don’t know how to say, this couch is saving me. Instead, I tell her I’ll take good care of it. I’ll send photos of it in its new home. I tell her I will never part with it. She smiles and nods, wipes her eyes.

The drive back to Los Angeles doesn’t feel nearly as long, and I have no trouble driving the Uhaul now; it feels almost second nature. Somehow, it’s dusk when we make it to my apartment. I double park out front and my brother helps me lug the eight foot couch up the winding staircases–it barely fits through my apartment door, but we manage, and then he sprawls out on it, and I take his picture. 

“Nice job, sis,” he says.

After he leaves, I light a candle and sit on my couch to write. Outside, someone sets off fireworks. It feels like a sign. Maybe.