No memory was safe from my scrutiny. I went through photo albums, studying Greg’s face, his expressions, running my hands over the plastic-protected pictures. When he scowled at the camera last year on the Outer Banks because I insisted on taking a picture of him covered in zinc oxide, was that disdain in his eyes? I had waved off his protests, showing him the picture. You just look so ridiculous! Like one of those old men with the white noses! He picked me up, threw me over his shoulder, and marched down to the ocean. It’s not white, it’s blue! he yelled, mockingly shaking his fist from the shore after he tossed me into the water. When I came up for air, he stood with Hannah and Leah, all three of them laughing. Had he been genuine that day, or had I missed the signs all along? Those were my fears, that I’d missed the signs all along. That our happily ever after was a sham was the fear that would settle in my stomach, twisting my insides.
I felt sick all the time and even trudged into the CVS one day while the girls were at Mom and Dad’s to buy a pregnancy test. Wouldn’t that be a bitch? It had been a few months, but stranger things had happened. The nausea was so reminiscent of my pregnancy with Hannah. When I studied the readout, my hands shaking, and saw the one pink line instead of two, I collapsed on the toilet with relief. And then, inexplicably, overwhelming sadness.
I began to think of my life as divided: my before life, with Greg, and my after life, without him. The deep chasm that separated those two lives was my current purgatory, as deep and dark as it was wide. I didn’t believe I’d feel so lost forever, and I frequently hoped that my life afterward would be sunnier, and maybe I’d legitimately laugh again one day. But Leah, Hannah, and I passed our days at the bottom of a black gorge, blindly feeling for the rope that would save us.
My parents called every day. My mom came over at least three times a week, sometimes more. She would come in the door, a flurry of movement, such a stark contrast to the stillness of our lives that I would cringe. She had bags of activities, small toys, or stickers for the girls and always a bottle of wine for me. She had apparently skipped the chapter in the grief book on the dangers of self-medication. Some days, she would take the kids to the park if it wasn’t too cold, or to the aquarium or on some other outing where they could be the loud, unruly kids they should be, but selfishly, I limited those days. I needed Leah and Hannah. Without them, I was alone with my despair and had no reason to get off the couch or out of bed.
At night, after my mom would bring the kids home and help me put them to bed, I would drink wine until my vision wavered. I’d call Sarah, drunk and rambling, and day or night, she’d stay on the phone as long as I needed. She lived in California and asked more than once if she could come visit, but I kept denying her. She had a life—dating, drinking, single—a life I longed for some nights. I loved my girls; they were my life’s meaning, especially now. But the anonymity of a single life, of meeting men in bars and not knowing their names or their secrets, of not carrying someone else’s burden, sounded heavenly. But I couldn’t have Sarah with me, another person to witness my sorrow, to look at me with pitying eyes. I didn’t want her to ask if she could do something, maybe some laundry. She didn’t need to witness the dishes that piled in the sink or the long stretches between vacuumings. She might actually notice and cringe when Leah found Goldfish crackers on the floor and ate one.
Chapter 13
Ten days before Christmas, the house was still not decorated. I hadn’t put up a tree or done any Christmas shopping. I couldn’t seem to find the motivation to face the crowds, the malls with their hauntingly happy music, or the laughter of families as they waited in line for their children to sit on Santa’s lap.
Dad showed up with a small four-foot Christmas tree in tow. The tree was the smallest we’d ever had, and my first instinct was to scorn the gesture.
“Your mother said you needed a tree,” he grunted. He carefully laid out a piece of plywood and set up the tree stand. The tree looked silly in the usual corner, like a pretend tree. For a make-believe Christmas. Before he left, he stood in front of me, shifting from one foot to the other and finally reached out, putting his large hand on my head, as though I were Cody. “The girls need a Christmas, is all.”
“I know, Dad.”
“You’re on your own to decorate it.” He looked over at the wilting, skinny tree and then back at me. His eyes looked wet and sad. We’d never had much conversation outside of how’s the car running, and the sudden reaching out felt stridently out of place.
I kissed his cheek. “Thanks.”
He left with a final grunt and another pat on my head, hunched and lumbering down the walk to his car.
My mother came later and picked up the girls. She took them back to her house to bake cookies like “everyone else.” “You are going to get them presents, right?” Mom asked.
I gave her a withering glare. “What am I? A terrible person? Of course. That’s a stupid question.”
“Please wear something normal and go to the mall. Spend this on presents.” Mom countered my spitefulness with patience, and I felt a small pang of guilt.