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Cameron
My dad died on a Tuesday morning before the sun rose. I couldn’t help but think that he’d planned it that way. Once the excitement of the fall festival was past, and he had his chance to give clear-eyed goodbyes to all his kids, to their partners, to tell them he loved them and was proud of them, his body could finally stop fighting so hard.
Parker was the last to leave the house, and while I sat on the front porch with my dad, I saw the way his body sank into the chair when the car pulled away.
“It was a good weekend, son,” he told me. His eyes closed.
“It was, Dad.” I patted his hand where it sat on top of mine. “It was.”
We moved him back into the house, and he slept almost the entire day. The hospice nurse visited and told my mom that it could be any time, especially now that he’d gotten through this big thing he’d been holding on for.
For the next week, he hardly ate a thing, and we all knew that it would happen soon. Greer and Adaline both came back one more time during that next week, staying at home for a couple more nights. Just to be there.
There were no more big conversations to be had. No final goodbyes because he’d lived so well the last couple of years, there was nothing left unsaid in our family. In typical fashion for my dad, he didn’t want us all gathered around, watching him with tears in our eyes.
He wanted us living our lives, so that was what we did.
In the end, it was just him and my mom in their bedroom, and when she told us about it later that morning, she said it was quiet and peaceful, and the last thing he said was that he loved her.
I held it together while Ian and Poppy and I took turns holding her, before we sat in the quiet kitchen and let Mom cry. We made the necessary calls and made sure my mom got some food in her. Poppy clung to me and wept while the funeral home came and moved Dad’s body out of the house. I held it together then too. But the whole time, I wanted Ivy with me.
Ian could tell I was torn, so he set his hand on my shoulder and told me to go to her. I’d left my house as soon as I got Mom’s call and told Ivy I’d be back as soon as I could. She was hazy with sleep when I woke her, but she nodded, giving me a soft kiss and telling me again that she loved me, and she’d be waiting.
I hugged my brother, and we both had reddened eyes when I pulled away.
“Thank you,” I told him.
“I got this,” he said. “Let me handle things for a while, okay?”
When I walked back through the door a couple of hours later—my chest hollow and my throat gritty from all the things I was holding in—she was waiting in the kitchen with sad eyes, a big pot of coffee brewing, and a bowl of cereal ready if I was hungry, because that was about the extent of her cooking skills.
I bypassed both and just let her hold me while I wept. Ivy’s arms were strong and firm, her heartbeat steady while I wrapped my body around hers. She didn’t say anything while I cried, and it was exactly what I needed.
Every day, it seemed, she was exactly what I needed.
She stepped up in the gaps over the next couple weeks, seeing exactly what needed to be done when the rest of us were bleary-eyed with the sting of grief.
She commandeered a meal schedule when half the damn town wanted to bring casseroles, wielding a spreadsheet like a weapon to anyone who approached the house.
She brought Olive out for walks with Neville when Greer needed a moment to collect herself and played chess with me and Ian, even when we didn’t want to be distracted. Still, she always kicked our ass.
She helped my mom organize photos and said she’d take over creating programs for the memorial service. Poppy and Adaline worked on the photo slideshow for hours with Ivy’s help, crying and laughing over the images they’d settled on.
Every night, she’d tuck her body next to mine, the weight of her against my chest, and I finally felt like I could let the pressure of the day go because, for the first time in my life, I had someone to help me set it down.
Some nights we fell asleep like that, a few soft kisses and a whispered I love you. Some nights, I’d slide between her legs after undressing her in the dark, and she’d hold me then too. Her neck arched, her body bare, and her gasping moans in my ear were my favorite sounds of the day.
I knew I could have survived all those days and nights if Ivy hadn’t been there. But instead of just surviving, I had a partner who held my hand and didn’t let me face my grief alone. She made me think about the future and how we might build a life as beautiful as my dad and Sheila’s.
My dad’s plans had been set years before, so we honored his wishes to be cremated and planned a memorial service.
We did it on a Tuesday, two weeks after he died, because Parker and Beckett and Emmett could all sneak away from their regular season duties for a day back at home.
It seemed like the entire town turned out for his memorial service, and I was relieved that it wasn’t the somber affair I’d always pictured in my mind. People told stories, laughed about things my dad had done over the years, the way he parented an insane group of kids with such ease.
Those first few weeks after Ivy showed back up at my house passed in a blur—the dichotomy between the loss of my dad and her unexpected, sweet presence in my life made my head spin when I thought too deeply on it.
Once the memorial service was over and my family dispersed again, our new normal was a little bit quieter and a little bit more settled.
