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My alarm goes off and I awaken easily, spring from my bed and practically skip to the bathroom to shower and get ready. As feelings of excitement and anticipation run through me, I realize something. I’ve been ridiculously happy and carefree while getting prepared for this trip. I feel more energized than I have in months and it feels really great. Clearly having a change in routine and something to look forward to is exactly what I’ve needed.
As I wheel my suitcase from my room an hour later, Oliver knocks on the door, turns the unlocked knob and opens the door. “Good morning, sunshine.” He sees the suitcase to my right and after handing me a coffee from our favorite java café, takes it, “Let me get that.”
I’d respond to him but I’m already taking a sip of my coffee. He smiles as I do so and I murmur my thanks. While he takes my suitcase out to the car, I stop and take one last look around my place. Meatball went to my neighbor Melissa’s house last night. I have no doubt he’s already soaking up and adoring the affection he’s receiving from her ten-year-old daughter, Audrey. Sometimes Audrey comes and knocks on my door just to ask if she can pet him so she was thrilled to get to keep him for a few days.
Other than that, my refrigerator has been cleaned, my garbage taken out and my thermostat turned off. Shutting my door and locking it, I meet a smiling Oliver at his car.
“Thanks for agreeing to pick me up a little early.” He opens the passenger side door for me.
“No problem. I’m glad you mentioned it.”
Once I’m seated he hurries to the driver’s side and we take off. Running silently through my packing and to-do list and unable to identify a single thing I’ve forgotten, I settle in a bit and sigh.
Oliver turns to me with a large smile, “Are you excited?”
“I’m really excited, actually.”
“What do you mean by ‘actually’? Like you doubted it?”
Shrugging I don’t answer him.
“Well I for one know we are going to have a great time. I have the trip well planned. It includes plenty of down time of course because I know you’ll want a lot of beach time, but I’ve also got some activities thrown in there too.”
“Like what?”
“You’ll have to see,” he laughs when I roll my eyes. “I promise you’ll enjoy it.”
We talk about menial things like the weather we’re supposed to have in Hawaii, my hope that the ocean water is warm and how it’s crazy for me to think that this time tomorrow we’ll be at the beach for the whole day. Before long we’re pulling through iron gates and driving down a long road that twists and turns until we reach our destination. Grabbing the notebook I brought with me from my bag, I take it with a pen as I exit the car. Walking along a trail up a short hill, I admire the lush green trees, the green grass and enjoy the breeze on the air while Oliver walks silently at my side.
She’s easy to find, I know the path by heart. I stop before her stone and my eyes run over the engraving there. Pamela Renee Sinclair – Beloved Mother. The dates on either side of the line brings an ache inside of me so intense it makes it hard to breathe each and every time I see them. She didn’t have enough time. Forty-five years is not enough time. It seems ridiculous that all of the things she’s managed to accomplish in those years, all of the life that she lived is represented by nothing other than a line. A small line.
“I’m sorry, Remy.” Oliver’s voice sounds loud on the wind and startles me.
“Sorry? Why?” I’m not sure what he has to be sorry about.
“I haven’t been here since the funeral. I always meant to visit, it’s just…”
“It’s okay.”
“No, it’s not.” He steps forward and lays a bouquet of carnations next to her headstone - her favorite. I always thought it strange to like carnations. To me they appear odd – almost damaged and broken looking with the petals all crooked and crazed. Mom always said that was partly why she loved them – because they’re so different from other flowers. They stand tall, are long lasting, and beautiful in their wildness.
“Yes, it is. You were there for me when I really needed you,” looking Oliver in the eyes I want to make sure he sees my sincerity. “When mom passed… I was… lost, broken and alone.” Oliver was away from college at the end and I don’t think I’d ever missed him more than during that time. When my mother passed I was with her at home. Hospice had started coming and had just assumed her care. The day didn’t seem significant at the time, in fact that morning she had just told me that for some reason she was really craving French fries. We laughed and wished we could share them together reminiscing about the last time we had done so and how I had giggled watching her lick the salt off her fingers. But within a couple hours, everything took a turn for the worse.
“When you found out, you came home, stepped in and stood by me the whole time. You helped me make funeral arrangements, write her obituary, helped me through the worst of my grief. That’s what matters, Oliver. Not that you haven’t been here to bring flowers to her grave. My mom would have been just fine with that trade off as well.”
He reaches for my hand and squeezes, “Well, I’m not. I promise to do better,” he kisses the tips of his index and middle fingers and touches them to my mother’s headstone. “I’ll give you some privacy. Take your time, okay? We have plenty of it to spare until we need to be at the airport for our flight.”
Once I nod, he leaves and I’m left standing there with a breeze pushing back my hair. Potpourri from the flowers at the graves all around me travels on the wind reaching my nose, a bird sings a song in a tree nearby.
Sighing deeply I sink to my knees, “Hi, mama,” I whisper and tears immediately come to my eyes.
Each time I come here our last moments enter my mind. I wonder how long it will be before that stops? How long before it quits haunting me? Watching her leave me, leave this world, being helpless to do anything about it, telling her that it was okay, that I understood, that I’d be alright, even though my heart and soul was screaming for her not to go. I pushed past that emotion and told her that I was incredibly lucky that God chose her for me. I told her that my love for her was deep and vast and that she was always my greatest reason. My reason for sunshine when clouds were gray, just like the song she used to sing to me. And then she was simply gone. I’m not sure what I expected exactly, but my grandma had always told me how my mom came into this world screaming her lungs out. That she wanted everyone and anyone to know that she was here, that she was alive, and that she was going to leave a mark on this world. Her exit couldn’t have been more different. Here one moment and gone on the next breath.
I didn’t expect the world to feel so incredibly empty the second I knew she was no longer in it. I didn’t expect the ache in my chest to hurt so much that I felt like I too was dying. I never knew I could cry and wail and scream and feel such devastation and anger at the same time. I knew with absolute certainty that I would miss her every minute, of every day, for the rest of my life.
“I’m sorry it’s been a little bit since I’ve been here. I don’t really have an excuse, I just haven’t gotten here like I meant to.” Picking a blade of grass I twirl it between my fingers and tell her all about the trip Oliver and I are going on. “The truth is mom, if I wasn’t leaving town today I’m not really sure when I would have gotten here. Not because I don’t think about you every day, but because, I received some bad news and I knew coming here would mean my telling you about it. And it’s stupid, I know you aren’t really here, but the act of speaking it, well… it’s still hard.”
Throwing the blade of grass down I look at her headstone, then down again and pull another blade of grass from the ground and stare at it for a moment, “I have breast cancer, mom,” I say quietly, as if saying it loud would make it even more true which is silly. “I have it too.”
