“I just realized, now that we’re talking about taking them down, I don’t even really look at them anymore.” I heard sadness in her voice and guilt. I knew that guilt. Sometimes, surviving came with the heaviest guilt and it came out of nowhere. You were just living your life, trying to move on, and suddenly you realized your wife would no longer be able to sit in the school pickup line and you crumble under a wave of guilt. Survivor’s guilt. I hated it, but I also knew it was part of grieving.
“You might not remember this, baby, but one of the things your mom was very adamant about was that you and your brother needed to be kids. She didn’t want you worrying about this kind of stuff. She wants you to be eleven and play outside with your friends. She wants you to stay up too late reading and not let boys pick on you in school. She doesn’t want you sitting in the living room staring at her photos. She wants you to be a kid and to be happy and playful and funny.” I felt Ruby turn her face in to my chest and I knew she was getting upset. “Baby, it’s okay to be sad sometimes, and to miss her, but you don’t have to feel bad for not missing her enough. There’s no such thing. However you feel, however often you think about her, that’s the exact right amount, sweetie.”
“I just don’t want her to think I don’t love her anymore.” She said the words on a sob and pressed her face even farther into me.
That was the part that sucked the most. I was constantly torn between wishing my kids didn’t have to deal with this grief, and being grateful they’d had Olivia for even a few years. It was a constant emotional battle and some days were harder than others.
“Your mother knows exactly how much you love her, Ruby. And photos in the living room don’t make you love her more or less, right? It doesn’t matter what’s on the mantle, it’s what’s in here.” I pressed my hand to her chest, still hugging her to me. “You carry her with you in here.”
I held her for a few minutes more while she cried quietly, grateful Jaxy had found something to occupy himself for a few moments. When she finally settled and pulled back, I tipped her face up to look at me, my hands around her still round, but thinning out, face.
“We don’t have to take them down if you don’t want to.”
“No,” she said, wiping her eyes. “It’s okay. But maybe….”
“What, baby?”
“Can we just leave one out? Just so that she isn’t gone completely.”
“Of course,” I said as I pressed a kiss against her forehead.
Ruby hopped off my lap and walked to the mantle, her eyes scanning over the photos. She grabbed a frame, held it to her chest, and walked back to her bedroom.
I didn’t have to see the photo to know which one it was. It was Ruby’s fifth birthday party, right before Olivia’s diagnosis. Olivia had just sung happy birthday and placed a big cake with five candles in front of Ruby. Everyone in the photo was looking at Ruby, including Olivia, but Ruby was looking up at her mother, smiling and laughing. It was one of the last moments we had as a family before everything changed. It was, quite possibly, the last untainted moment captured between the two of them.
That night while the kids slept, I packed the rest of the photos into boxes. I pulled down the huge print of Olivia on our wedding day that hung in the place of honor, wrapped it in newspaper, and stored it in the garage. I left the throw blanket Olivia had crocheted while pregnant with Jaxy on the couch, and one photo on the mantle of the four of us. Olivia would never fully be gone, and I didn’t want her to be. She would always be a part of our lives, even if it was always in the past. I didn’t want my kids to think I was throwing her away, or trying to erase her, so I left one photo up to remind us all of what we lost, but also to remind us to live a great life because Olivia couldn’t.
When I went to bed that evening, I took the wedding photo that I’d placed on my dresser when I moved in, wrapped it in one of Olivia’s scarves, and put it in the back of the closet.
A few nights later, the kids were in bed and Grace was on the couch with me. We’d had dinner then played a game of UNO with the kids that seemed to last forever, but once they were in bed, the house was quiet, and so was Grace. I was half sitting and half lying, my back propped up against the arm of the couch, legs sprawled out wide with one foot on the floor. Grace was lying on her chest, cheek resting against her hands, which were laced together and resting on my chest. My fingers were trailing mindlessly through her hair, gliding through without any effort, the motion soothing. Something was on the television, something she’d settled on, but I wasn’t paying attention and I wasn’t really sure she was either. Her breaths were even, her body relaxed.
Twenty minutes had passed and not a word was spoken.
When Grace lifted her head and met my eyes, hers were full of thought and worry.