I mulled over my options, wondered if the girls were better off where they were, wondered if I was worthy of them, wondered if I’d be able to meet their needs. I wasn’t afraid of the responsibility, but I was unsure of what I was capable of. I didn’t have the best examples growing up. I could recognize dysfunction, knew it so, so well, but I didn’t know how to approach function.
I cried myself to sleep, overwhelmed with loss, overwhelmed with the maze I was caught in. The maze of what was right. Every turn I made seemed to be a dead end. I was caught in the myriad twists and turns of the labyrinth of what we all need, but only a few know how to achieve.
I woke to someone sitting on my bed. I shot up, my hand reaching for the figure sitting beside me, but the person caught it, held my wrist, and didn’t let go.
“Lily,” Salinger said, calming me, “are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” I lied.
“You didn’t show up to work and we were all worried. Danny sent me.”
“I’m sorry,” I whispered.
“What’s going on?” he asked.
I fell back against the wall. “Nothing,” I lied.
The quiet felt deafening. “Don’t lie,” he whispered into the dark.
He still held my wrist.
“What do you want?” I asked him.
“I want action.” He breathed deeply through his nose. “I’m tired of idle, tired of those who blow their smoke, tired of doubt. Get up,” he whispered. “You don’t have to be perfect. You don’t have to be the best at everything you do, don’t have to be flawless, but you do have to try. Just try. Even if trying yields you nothing, keep moving before you petrify, Lily.”
“I don’t know if I have the strength,” I told him. My voice cracked with emotion.
“But you do. The world is heavy and I can’t imagine the weight you feel on your shoulders, but you’re going to do it.”
“How do you know?” I asked him. “No one can know that.”
“I know this. I just know it. I feel it in my gut,” he whispered, bringing my hand to his belly, then dropped my hand. “Let me help you lighten the load.”
“I can’t let you do that. I have to do this all on my own.”
“Why?” he asked.
“Because I caused all this.”
“There is no way you could have known what would happen.”
“If I’d done what I was supposed to, she’d be alive; she’d be with the girls right now.”
He stood up and flipped on the light. It took my eyes a moment to adjust, but in an instant, he picked me up and held me against him.
“Wrong,” he whispered into my hair. “It was an accident. Just that.”
“If it was only an accident, why do I feel such guilt?”
“Most people make mistakes and nothing happens. Most people have the opportunity to mess up and learn from it. Your mistake has the cruel and unusual punishment of an accident attached to it, but it was only that. It was only an accident.”
“I can’t navigate this,” I admitted.
“You can and you will.”
“Maybe,” I told him.
He nodded once then looked around my room. “We’ll need to fix so much.”
“You mean me.”
He looked at me. “No, us. We. I’ll help you with this. We’ll get everything sorted, get it repaired and cleaned. They won’t even recognize it when we’re done with it.”
Tears started to stream down my face. “Sorry,” I said, wiping my face.
“No worries, kid,” he said.
“Let’s go to the market,” I said.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
Salinger drove me in to work and we stayed the remainder of our shift. All the guys were quiet but cool toward me. Danny waved when we showed up, and I smiled back.
The next morning, while Salinger took me back home, I got an email from the county. They were to cremate my mama at nine a.m. the following morning and her ashes would be interred the day after at eleven.
“The county will cremate my mom tomorrow,” I told him. “Funeral’s the day after.”
I emailed Sylvia and let her know so the girls could go, if they were able, then texted Ansen and Katie and let them know as well.
“I’m not ready for this,” I told the passenger-side window.
“You’re not supposed to be, Lily. You’re normal.”
When he said that, it brought me strange relief. I took a deep breath and steadied my nerves. Instead of turning into the little country road I lived on, though, we kept going toward Smithfield. I didn’t bother asking where we were going. I didn’t care. I didn’t want to go back home, and I think he sensed that in me.
I couldn’t tell whether Salinger was becoming my friend. He was selfless, yes. He took care of me when I needed it, but I couldn’t tell if he was doing that because he felt an obligation to do it or because he actually wanted to be my friend and we just started off on a really strange footing, where all hell broke loose and he was only prodding me along until I could find some stability.
Katie texted me back and let me know she and Ansen would be there and that she had a dress for me. I sent her a thank you but not much more than that. I didn’t—no, couldn’t—say anything else.
“When I was little,” I told him, “before she met Sterling, my mama would take us to church. There was an old priest there. Really nice guy. He would let us shop in the little church’s pantry even after hours because he knew my mama worked during the times they were open. At Christmas, he gave us gift cards to Wal-Mart and we had a decent meal because of him. I even got a little doll.”
“That’s amazing.”
“He was. I-I wonder if he’s still alive.”
He shrugged his shoulders. “What made you think of him?”
“I wonder if he’d be able to make the funeral. If he could give her a proper burial?”
“You should call the church,” he prodded.
“Should I?”
“Go on,” he said, turning onto the highway toward Smithfield.
I searched for the church on the phone and found their website. I saw pictures of the old building and it looked a little worn out, but stood tall, for the most part. I called their published number and a little voice, a woman’s voice, answered. She let me know that Father Robinson was there and put me on hold. When he answered, his voice sounded exactly the same to me, and it made me happy to know he hadn’t. I told him all about me, and he remembered us immediately, which made me tear up a little. He said he could make the funeral, that he could push some things around, but he would definitely be there. At the end, I tearfully thanked him, not just for offering to be at the funeral, but for what he’d done for us when I was young.
“He’s coming?” Salinger asked.
“Yes,” I answered with the first genuine smile I’d had in a long time.
We pulled into a hardware store, which I hadn’t been expecting. “I think getting some stuff done on your house will help you feel some progress toward bringing your sisters home.”
I nodded. “I think it would.”
Inside, he took me to the back of the store where he knew they kept all their clearance stuff. We found a bunch of boxes of outdated tile. It was plain and white, but I thought a black grout with it would look okay and he agreed. There was a new showerhead someone had returned and a standard white bathtub with apron, as well as some returned buckets of paint. We rummaged through and found a pedestal sink really cheap. I added it all up and found I could afford everything but the sink.
“I’ll have to get the sink later,” I told him.
“It’s only thirty-five,” he said.
I shook my head. “I literally don’t have the cash. I’ll have to wait until next week.”
“No, we get it today. I’ll pay for it.”
“Dude, you’re helping me so much as it is, I can’t let you do that.”
He smiled at me. “We’ll never find a deal this cheap again. I’d rather just get it now.”
“Okay, I, uh, I can pay you back when we get paid.”
“Don’t worry about it. I won some cash in that tournament. If you’d come, it would have been yours anyway, so—”
My mouth fell open a little. I swallowed back tears.
“Oh shit, Lily, no, don’t cry. Jesus, I hate it when girls cry. I can’t take it. Please, don’t worry about that stupid tournament. I just meant you definitely would have won, so I don’t really even consider that cash mine. Please,” he begged me.