Whatever It Takes (12 page)

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I had calmed myself down enough to make the drive to my grandparent’s house but as soon as I stepped into their living room and the familiar smells of my Nana’s home greeted me the tears fell quickly.  My mother tried to comfort me with a hug but I pulled right away from her to sit with my grandfather on their old, floral-patterned sofa.  He looked so old in that moment, his face lined with sorrow, his thick, white hair unkempt atop his head. 

“Hi Pop,” I cried into his shoulder.

“Hiya sweetheart.”  His words came out like sandpaper and his thin arms squeezed me tightly.  “She loved nothing more than you and your sister, you know that don’t you?”

I could only nod.  My throat wouldn’t allow any words to escape just then. 

My sister arrived shortly after and, like me, she rejected our mother’s comfort and came right to Pop and me.  The three of us cried together for the rest of the morning.

Sometime that afternoon, my grandfather went to rest and Stephanie and I joined our mother at the kitchen table. 

“We should make some calls,” I said, breaking the silence after a short time.  “Nana’s brothers and sister.  Her cousins.”

“I took care of that already,” my mother said and I raised my eyebrows at her.  “What?  I am capable of using a phone, Emma.”

I decided to ignore that and just asked, “Where is she?”

“Jensen’s Funeral Home,” she answered.  “I had them pick her up from the hospital earlier.  I’m going there to make the arrangements in about an hour.”

“I’ll go,” I insisted.  How sad was it that I didn’t trust my mother enough to take care of her own mother’s funeral?

“I’ll do it, Emma,” my mother replied sternly.  “I can take care of it.”

“Well you’re just full of surprises today, aren’t you?” I shot back.  “Who the hell knew Karen Harrison could take care of anything?”

“Emma,” my sister started.

“No, Steph,” I continued.  “I bet you’re just as surprised as I am that she’s even here, let alone taking care of things.”  I knew I was being nasty and maybe a little unfair but I needed to take my anger out on someone and she seemed to be the only logical choice.  “Let me ask you something, Mom.  When did you start caring about anyone other than yourself?”

“That’s enough!” my mother yelled at me, her brown eyes narrowing in the same way mine do when I’m angry.  “I know you’re upset but don’t you forget I lost someone today, too!  And I’m still your mother and you will not talk to me like this!”

“You haven’t been my mother since I’m eight years old!” I screamed and stormed out of the room and out the front door.  I slammed it loudly and then regretted it, only because I didn’t want to disturb my grandfather.  He didn’t need to be dealing with a yelling, screaming mess right now. 

I sat on their stoop and fumed, too angry to cry.  What pissed me off the most though was that I knew I had just acted terribly.  She may have been a shitty mother, but she didn’t deserve that, not that day, and the fact that I knew I was going to have to apologize enraged me all the more.  Then I somehow blamed it all on Gavin.  If he hadn’t cheated, he’d be there with me and I wouldn’t have acted that way towards my mother.  I wondered how else his actions were going to affect other events for the rest of our lives. 

My sister came out to join me and sat beside me.

“Where’s Gavin?”

Without looking at her I told her he was at work.

“He couldn’t leave for this?  It’s an emergency.”

I shook my head and bit my lip.  Now was not the time to spill our secret.  I didn’t need to add any more stress to this situation.

“Not that I blame you or anything,” Stephanie continued, “but what the hell was that in there?  That was very unlike you.  I’m the sister who has the emotional outbursts, remember?”

I half-laughed and then finally turned to look at her.  My sister took more after our father, with hair a bit lighter than mine and our mother’s, but with the same brown eyes.  Her face was rounder but we both had the same chin and the tiny smattering of freckles across our noses. 

“I’m known to lose it once in awhile,” I said.  “I’m sure you remember.”

“Yeah, you lose it over an odd number of tic-tacs left in a box-”

“That was one time and it was because I knew you stole some to drive me crazy on purpose!”

“I,” my sister continued like I hadn’t interrupted her, “on the other hand, am the one who has emotional response of a fourteen-year-old with PMS.  What’s up?”

I shook my head and shrugged.  “I don’t know.  I guess it just bothers me that it was Nana who took care of us and everything and now Mom is doing it like it’s been her job forever.  And maybe I still don’t understand why she couldn’t pull it together enough to take care of us but now in a crisis she’s able to?”

“Or maybe you feel like you need to be in control of this and you’re worried that if you’re not, Mom is going to screw it up?”

“Yeah, probably,” I admitted.  My sister knew me just as well as Gavin did when it came to the control issues.  She probably understood it better though, having lived through what made me that way.  That was part of the problem, relinquishing the control over this to my mother.  I didn’t tell her the other part.

“Look,” she told me, “just let her handle this.  There’s not that much to do, anyhow, right?  It’s really the funeral home that takes care of the details.  Let her make the calls, let her pick out Nana’s dress.  She probably feels like she owes it to Nana anyhow, ya know?  Since Nana had to take care of us?  Let her do this so you and I can just be sad, Emma.”

I nodded. 

“Besides, Aunt Connie is going to be here for this and do you want to be the one to fight with her on every little detail?”

My sister had a point.  Nana’s sister was a beast. 

Gavin

I picked up the phone to dial a number, someone’s number, anyone who might know where Emma was at that moment and then set it down again.  If I started calling around it would arouse suspicion in our friends.  Emma wasn’t the type to leave home without telling me where she was going and certainly not without her cell phone.  I didn’t want people to start asking questions neither of us were ready to answer. 

It didn’t worry me when she didn’t respond to my texts throughout the day; she never did, but when I got home to find her gone and her cell phone on the breakfast bar the panic set in.  I thought she had left me but after checking through her things it didn’t appear she had packed any bags.  Still, it was almost ten o’clock and I had no idea where she was and it was scaring the hell out of me. 

Finally, when I couldn’t take it anymore I picked up the phone to call Diane when I heard the garage door open.  I hurried to the door and watched with relief as my wife pulled her car in.  Our eyes met through the windshield and the sadness I saw in hers tore me up.  She looked terrible.  Her face was pale and her nose was red and irritated.  She looked like she had spent the last week crying. 

“Thank God you’re home,” I said as she exited the driver’s seat.  “I’ve been worried sick, Em.”

She said nothing to me as she walked passed and into the kitchen.  I watched and waited patiently as she poured herself a glass of wine and sat at the table.  After it didn’t seem as though she was going to explain herself, I sat across from her and spoke again.

“Where were you?”

“I needed to go out.”

I swallowed a lump in my throat when my first thought was that she had been to see a lawyer.  Was she going to divorce me without even trying to work this out?  I knew I had screwed up royally but was she ready to end this?

“I was worried, Emma.  You didn’t even have your phone with you so I could try calling.  That isn’t like you.”

She looked surprised like she hadn’t even realised she had forgotten her phone at home and then took a sip of her wine.  Still, she stayed silent.

“Are you going to tell me where you were?” I asked. 

She waited a beat and then responded.  “I drove out to Benton.  My grandmother died this morning.”

“Oh Emma,” I sighed and then stood to go to her.  When she didn’t turn towards me for comfort I was disappointed but I put my hand on her shoulder anyhow.  “Why didn’t you call me?”

She only shrugged and took another sip of wine. 

Frustrated, I ran my hand through my hair.  I was angry, not necessarily with her, but with the situation. 

“You should have called me, Emma,” I continued.  “I would have left work, I would have driven down there with you.  What happened?”

She downed the rest of her drink and then poured herself another. 

“Probably a heart attack,” she said quietly.  “My grandfather found her in bed early this morning.  He called for an ambulance but there was nothing they could do.  She was already gone.”

“I’m so sorry,” I told her and placed a kiss on top of her head.  “Are you okay?”

“I don’t know what I am.” 

I sat again, this time in the chair next to her and took her hand.  “What can I do?”

“Nothing.  The service will be in a few days.  I’ll need to go back down there for that.”

“I’ll go with you,” I said, though it came out more like a question.  Surely she didn’t think I was going to let her go through that alone.

“If you want,” was her reply.

I took a deep breath to control myself and just looked at her for a minute.  She stared down at the glass of wine in front of her, her fingers twisting around the stem, while she avoided my glare.  Now she was just being ridiculous but I couldn’t get angry with her.  She was hurting.

“Of course I want to go with you to your grandmother’s funeral, Emma.  Please don’t tell me you’re expecting me not to go.”

She shook her head.  “Of course not.”

I heaved a sigh of relief once again and sat back in the chair.  “Can I fix you something to eat?”

“No, thank you.”

I didn’t know what the hell to do.  I just watched her as she sipped her wine and stared at everything but me.  I knew she was still angry with me but couldn’t she put that aside for now and just let me comfort her.

“Emma, I don’t know what to do here,” I finally confessed to her.  “I want to hold you while you cry, I want to kiss you and tell you everything will be okay but I feel like you don’t want that from me right now.”

She finally looked at me then.  “I don’t know what I want right now, Gavin!” she exclaimed, exasperated.  “I’m sad and I’m confused and I’m so tired.  Please, do not turn this into a fight, I do not have it in me right now!”

“Why are you confused?” I asked softly.

“Because I want to cry on your shoulder.  I want you to hold me and kiss me and make me feel better but I can’t let you do that!”

“Why not?”

“Because-” she cut off and thought about her response for several seconds.  “Because you don’t deserve to make me feel better!  I know how stupid that sounds but that’s how I feel.”

I knelt before her on the tiled floor and turned her towards me.  “It’s not stupid.  I understand what you mean.  But this is just us, Emma.  I’m not going to think you’re weak for allowing me to comfort you while you’re hurting.  And I won’t think for one second that anything will be forgotten because we have something else to grieve over right now.  Let me help you, let me take care of you.”

I reached up to cup her face and begged her with my eyes to just give in and let me help her.   She left my hand where it was but didn’t move any more than that. 

“I have an idea,” I said and then rose to my feet.  “Wait here.”

I went into our master bathroom and ran a bath for her.  I poured in some bubble and lit the few candles she had placed around the jacuzzi tub.  After making sure the water temperature was just right I met her back out in the kitchen.

“Come with me?” I asked her and held out my hand.  She took it and let me lead her into our bathroom.  I brought her wine glass with me and handed it to her and said, “Take a bath and try to relax.  Get some comfort from this.”

She smiled a little and thanked me. 

I left the room, closing the door behind me and went and poured myself a glass of wine.  While I sat in a stool by the bar I felt so helpless.  Damn, this couldn’t have come at a worse time.  It was bad enough that Emma was dealing with what I did but now she had the loss of her grandmother, the woman who raised her, on top of it.  I cursed myself once again, thinking what a piece of shit I was and how awful I felt for my wife.  What the fuck else was going to happen?

You should never ask yourself that question when things are bad.

The next morning, Emma and I got a call.  Her grandfather died in his sleep that night. 

Emma

“It’s sort of romantic, isn’t it?” my sister asked. 

We had just buried both of my grandparents and most of the family had gone to a nice restaurant after.  Why do people do that?  Why do we feel the need to eat when someone dies?  I didn’t want to eat.  The thought of food just then made me ill.  Still, I went to dinner and Gavin and I sat with Stephanie, Diane, and Mike as we pushed around the food in front of us.  The five of us were able to sit at a table to ourselves away from the older folks who came.  I was grateful.  If one more person told me how sorry they were I was going to scream.