Chapter 30

After weeks of self-reflection, one of the things I’ve come to terms with is my tendency to make snap judgments about people. It’s not one of my better qualities, and I’m working to curtail that, even if my judgments are not always wrong. For instance, I knew when Paul Sandino escorted me to the nurse’s office in first grade, after I fell during recess, that he’d end up helping the world, and, lo, social media tells me he’s working in some special lab for HIV medication.

I also knew the first time I met Shayna that her personality was as fake as her eyelashes. In hindsight, it’s probably why my brother was attracted to her, two lost souls trying to find an anchor. Unfortunately, they couldn’t help each other, and now that Ray’s gone, Shayna’s out there waving in the wind, attaching herself to any post she thinks is steady. That means Todd is out, and Bryson is in. I’m tempted to leave a comment on the picture of the four of them at Thanksgiving dinner together, but I don’t want to hurt her. Not really. I only want her to stop doing what she’s doing. In the end, she’ll only hurt Lucy and Lara.

My judgment about Nell, however, was totally wrong. I tap the heart button underneath the picture she posted of the two of us shopping at six in the morning on Black Friday. After I admitted that I’d never gone, she somehow convinced me to tag along with her. Why we had to go so early, though, I don’t know. No one actually shops in stores anymore. We weren’t beating a crowd for Furbies or laughing Elmos.

But I had a lot of fun with her. With an understated sense of humor, she’s considerate and thoughtful, not the horrible person I assumed she was for having an affair with a married man. One late night over a pitcher of sangria, she explained how much she loved my brother. She believed he was the one. She said she tried to ignore it, forget about him, but couldn’t. Not like he tried very hard either.

“Should I force myself to let him go and be miserable, or should I fight to make it right, as best I can, for the man I love?” she said, and I couldn’t argue otherwise.

She showed me the timeline she’d made with Ray, saved on her computer in an orderly table. It outlined months of events they could accomplish with the best interest of the twins in mind: when he would move out of the house, when he would introduce Nell to the twins, when and what family counselor they would all see, when Ray and Nell would get married. It was hopeful then, but now it’s a digital reminder of a future left unlived.

Nell, for her part, does the best she can, loving a ghost. “It’s what we have in common,” she told me over coffee the day we ran into each other at the cemetery. “Ghosts are perfect in their absence. They remain faultless in our minds. That’s the hard part. I’ll compare every guy I meet to him, and you’ll constantly compare yourself to him. Hard to compete with someone who can’t fail.”

She was exactly right.

It took me months to get there, but I finally stopped making Raymond an excuse not to move forward with my life.

With a good word from Aunt Joanie, I found a job. It’s a terribly boring administrative position, where I mostly file papers and answer phones, but it’s a salary and benefits. I even opened a retirement account. Nell let me sleep on her couch for a few nights until I found a little apartment, the third floor of a townhouse. It’s covered in old yellow wallpaper and the stove only works half of the time, but it’s a step in the right direction. I also found a counselor to talk to, Maryanne, and I go every two weeks. It’s not like I assumed it would be. There is no couch or deep psychoanalyzing, but there is discussion of my anxiety, and she helps me figure out solutions so I don’t become overwhelmed by it.

I’m figuring out my life, except for the most important part, Vince. I haven’t told Maryanne about him yet, not sure where to begin. Back when I was a fourteen-year-old kid hanging on his every word or when he walked through my parents’ front door the day after my brother died or the kiss on the baseball field. Or his hand on my neck or the party with Patch or the night we shared a bowl full of ice cream in my parents’ kitchen. Our story is full of fits and starts, and that’s my fault. I know the only way back to him is to once again start, but with myself first.

I close down Instagram and toss my phone into my purse. I told my mom I’d be at her house in fifteen minutes, and I’m already late. As I speed down the street, Christmas decorations blur together out of my window, blow-up Santas and snowmen, wreaths on doors, and trees in windows.

With Dad permanently living in the city now, Mom decided to sell the house. She said it was too big for one person, and a little too much to live with the memories. She didn’t say which memories, but it’s not hard to guess. As I pull into the driveway, I’m overcome with sadness that soon the house I grew up in alongside Ray will belong to another family. I never thought I’d be so attached to stone and brick, but I cry through all of George Michael singing “Last Christmas” and some of “Jingle Bell Rock” before shutting off the car.

Maryanne tells me not to shy away from the journey, rather to embrace it. I’m supposed to give myself the freedom and respect to grieve, and I have to give it to others as well. I can help my mother work through her own grief, but I don’t have to add it to my own. I should be a model, Maryanne says. So that’s what I’m trying to do.

The front door’s open, and I let myself in, stepping out of my boots before striding across the carpet. I unwind my scarf and take off my coat, leaving them on the sofa in the living room. All the decorations are already packed up, the pictures, lamps, books, and the oil painting of Tuscany that used to hang above the fireplace.

“Mom?”

“Up here,” she answers, and I follow her voice upstairs. She’s in the hall, taping an empty cardboard box together. Two are already stacked up and labeled behind her, and she looks good, healthy.

After my episode in the city, I was too embarrassed to go home. I was afraid to face her, knowing I’d hurt her. Neither one of my parents had ever hit me in my life, and while her slap was physically painful, it wasn’t nearly as bad as what I said to her. With Nell’s help, I rehearsed my apology, but when I finally went home, I didn’t get to deliver it. Before I spoke even one syllable, Mom towed me in for a hug and didn’t let go. We both cried, for what seemed like hours, and when I finally tried to apologize, she stopped me, her hands on either side of my face saying, “I know. Me too.”

And that was it. We haven’t brought it up since. Now when we talk, we try to move forward. It’s not easy, especially when she gets weepy at the mention of Ray’s name, but she’s been acknowledging my own loss too.

“What do you need me to do?” I ask her.

She readjusts her headband, keeping her newly trimmed bangs away from her face. I talked her into them since I recently got mine back, but she hates hers. Oops.

“I packed up the guest bathroom,” she tells me. “Wanted to wait until you were here to go through the closet.”

I pick up a box and shuffle to the guest room, which used to be Raymond’s bedroom. The closet became storage for all of our old belongings we didn’t take with us when we moved out. Mom doesn’t have to voice the reason she waited for me to do this part. When I open the closet door, I’m met with the ordered chaos of old boxes and big plastic bins stacked on top of one another. Some are open, spilling out Barbie dolls and high school yearbooks.

“I can’t believe you kept this,” I say, picking up a scruffy pink Care Bear.

“I can’t believe you didn’t keep it,” Mom says, coming up behind me. She takes it from my hand and runs her fingers over the rainbow on its belly. “You loved this thing.” She smiles to herself then gently pushes it back into my hands. “Maybe you can give it to your child when you have one.”

I start to laugh but stop because of the love and hope that cross her features. I never imagined myself as a mom—I never imagined a lot of things that have happened—but life’s thrown me a curve ball before, and it might again. I give Cheer Bear a squeeze and set it down to grab the bin on top of the pile in the closet. Mom sits on the floor, a box on one side of her, a bag on the other. “This is for things we want to donate,” she instructs, patting the box. “And this is for trash,” she says, holding out the bag.

“What if we want to keep something?”

“Put it in a separate pile, but you need to take whatever you want home today.”

I open the small bin to find it’s filled with school assignments, art projects made out of noodles or clay, a notebook of stories I wrote as a kid, and other mindless things. Everything from it except the notebook of my scribbles goes in the trash, and I open another one, this one toys. We chitchat while inspecting each item, deciding whether to donate or trash them.

“I made reservations for Christmas dinner.”

I glance up to my mom. “Oh?”

“Your grandmother doesn’t like the idea of going out, but what else are we going to do? I’m certainly not going to cook anything.”

Her voice is so much surer than it’s been since February. She’s gained some of her no-nonsense attitude back. I used to bristle at it, but now I’m glad for it. My mother had always been a type A problem-solver, but after Ray died, she lost all of that. She couldn’t problem-solve her way out of her son dying. I don’t think it’s all back yet, and maybe it won’t ever be, but she’s happy now. As happy as she can be.

I think divorcing Dad has a lot to do with it. And, in some sick way, it’s good. It’s forced her to wake up. Dad didn’t fight with her over assets. It’s been mostly painless. I suppose after burying a child, divorce might be like a walk in the park. She’ll be moving in to a small condo close to one of her friends and a short drive to Nana and Pop’s apartment, and I’m happy for her.

I pull down another box, this one of Raymond’s trophies and knickknacks. “The girls might like to have these,” I say, holding up two small derby cars from when he was a Boy Scout. “Do you want any of this stuff?”

Mom’s eyes water as she shakes her head, and I push the whole box next to the trash bag. It’s a shame to throw it all away, but there is no value in it for other people. “We have our memories,” I tell my mother. “That’s what’s important.”

She agrees with a slight nod and brushes her hand over the gold figurine on top of a skinny baseball trophy.

I open another box to find it filled with our old baby stuff, little booties, thin blankets, finger- and footprints from the hospital. Watching Mom gingerly touch each item breaks my heart all over again, and I have to turn away to keep from crying. I open another box.

We work like this for another hour until the closet is empty and sorted. With both of us here, it’s not too terrible deciding which of Ray’s stuff is important enough to keep and which old Blink-182 CD could be thrown out. When we finish, we carry the piles downstairs and the two full bags of trash out to the bins next to the house.

“Thanks for helping,” Mom says as we stand by my car.

“Of course. Do you want me to give Dad’s stuff to him?” I ask, referring to a small pile, including Ray’s framed high school diploma and a few pictures.

She props her hands on her hips. “You’re going to see him?”

“Well, I was thinking of it, yeah.” The idea of following through has my stomach in knots, but I’ve been over and over it with Maryanne. If I want some kind of closure, I need to talk to him too.

Mom’s shoulders rise with a deep breath, and she softens. “I guess if you’re going, you might as well…” She hands the pile to me then hugs me and kisses my cheek before pulling back sharply. “What in the world are you washing your clothes with?”

I pull my sweatshirt up to my nose. “Huh?”

“It smells like…an animal or something.”

“Oh, that,” I say with a grin. “I went to a shelter to go pet some animals today.”

“What?” She practically convulses in horror.

“I went to a shelter to play with the animals. They need love too, you know.”

She wrinkles her nose.

“I’m considering adopting a cat. His owner moved and couldn’t keep him.”

“Oh, Cassandra.” She braces her hand on her throat in horror.

I lift a shoulder. “His name’s George, and I thought it was destiny…George St. George.”

She makes a sound in the back of her throat like she’s allergic to even the thought of George.

“He’s really sweet, you’d like him. He’s old and fat.”

She closes her eyes, waving her hand like she can wave the idea of him away. “No. Cats shed everywhere. They sit on the furniture, and they’re?—”

“They sit on the furniture?” I repeat with big eyes. “How dare they?”

“Don’t make fun.”

“Maybe you should think about getting an animal to keep you company,” I ponder out loud, and she shoos me away.

“No. Absolutely not. No.”

It only makes me laugh more. “Okay, I’ll get you one for Christmas. Not a cat, but maybe a rabbit or something small. A guinea pig!”

“Cassandra, I swear, if you bring one animal near me…”

I don’t hear the rest of her threat because I close the car door. I drive away, eyes in the rearview mirror where Mom’s hint of a smile is reflected back to me.