Chapter Twenty-Six
I entered the bedroom, which was dark except for the moonlight glowing through the curtains. Lucinda was under the covers, her back turned away. An empty glass and a bottle of wine sat on the night table. She had gone upstairs after the call with her mother, and I’d gotten Ethan to bed, then come to check on her.
“How you doing?” I sat down on the bed, putting a hand on her arm. I couldn’t see her features in the darkness, just her outline.
“I’m wallowing. I’m having myself a good wallow.”
“You’re entitled.”
“I drank three glasses of wine.”
“Good girl.” I patted her arm. Usually my wife was a lightweight. She didn’t drink because it disrupted her sleep. “Want more? You’re allowed.”
“God, no. I wish we hadn’t called Mom. It just upset her.”
“No, it didn’t,” I rushed to say. “She was happy to see you. She was really happy.”
“She’s not happy, ever. I just didn’t realize it before. She’s miserable all the time.”
“No, she’s not.”
“She’s not even there. And now, neither am I.”
“Yes, she is.” I’d never heard Lucinda talk like this. “She smiles, she laughs.”
“She makes sounds and noises. It’s not really a laugh.”
“It’s a laugh,” I said, but in truth, I wasn’t sure what it was.
Lucinda fell silent, and I knew it was killing her to leave her mother. I remembered a time, not long after Caitlin had passed, when Lucinda, Ethan, and I had been leaving the house to go to Allison’s lacrosse final, but Bay Horse had called, saying Mom was agitated and Lucinda should come right away. Lucinda had wanted to go to the game, and Allison was already there, waiting for us. The finals had been a big deal, against Central Bucks West, and even Ethan had been psyched.
Lucinda’s face had fallen. I should go see Mom.
You sure? It had been her decision to make, but I’d felt for her. Why not go after the game?
That’ll be too late. Lucinda had buckled her lip. You go, Monaco.
Monaco was our code for when one of us was going in our representative capacity, as if we were ambassadors of a small country, the country of us, trying to be in two places at once, tag-teaming our children’s soccer semifinals, select choir recitals, and Annie Get Your Gun. I put the memory out of my mind, as Lucinda shifted on the bed.
“Jason, you know what I realized, talking to Mom?”
“What, honey?”
“That we both lost a child, her and me.”
“Right.” I cringed. I hadn’t thought of it, either.
“I saw her go through it, after Caitlin died. She spent, like, a month in bed. We went through it, all of us. We cried together, like normal people. Allison was at Caitlin’s funeral, remember? She was only eleven.”
I thought back. It had been Allison’s second funeral. Her third would be her own.
“I can’t help but compare, you know? Allison was so much younger than Caitlin when she died. Is it harder for us, or easier?”
I had no answer. It hurt to think about. “You can’t compare.”
“Right, you can’t, and at the end it’s the same. You don’t want to outlive your child, no matter how old your child is. It’s because you can’t handle it.”
“I’m sorry, honey.”
“I can’t handle losing Allison, I really can’t. I don’t want to get out of bed, ever. Ever, ever. I use Ethan as an excuse. I want to lay around all day. I give up, I do.”
I felt alarmed. I rubbed her back. I knew the only thing that could bring her out of it. “You have to think about Ethan.”
Lucinda didn’t say anything, but I knew she was listening. Ethan was my best argument. She would never let him down. We both knew she loved the kids more than me. And I loved her more than the kids. I didn’t know if that made me a good husband or a bad father. Or both.
“Lucinda, your mother lost Caitlin, but she was still there for you. She was always there for you, and you’ll be there for him. You’re not going to fall apart because of him.”
“Maybe you’re right.”
“I know I am.” I needed her to believe it.
“You know, I never really noticed it before, she was holding the doll and I really started to think about that doll, and I think she got upset because she dropped it.”
“I thought she was upset because of the hand lotion.”
“No, she was upset because she dropped the doll. I know her. She never missed a stitch, her whole life. She did petit point. She’s a perfectionist.” Lucinda sniffled. “I know how she feels, because Allison’s gone and Ethan’s not eating, and it’s a disaster. A disaster.”
I fell silent. She was right.
“Jason, remember in college, that photography class I took?”
I didn’t follow the conversational turn. “Sure.”
“I loved that class, and the teacher, she said something really great once. She said, ‘Whenever you’re taking a portrait of someone, you and your subject are in the present, but if you’re any good, you can see their past, and even their future.’？”
“You think that’s true?”
“I don’t know. I try, in family portraits, but I know they’re not really art, with everyone worried about their hair or their neck or whatever, just trying to look better, or thinner, or younger.”
I wasn’t sure how this applied, but I didn’t interrupt.
“All we have are memories, and right now I have memories of her and I have memories of Allison, and they’re with me all the time, and my mother doesn’t even have that.”
“True, but she has the present.”
“But she doesn’t have me. I can’t check on her in the bathroom, or hug her, or touch her, and she needs help, like with her eyebrow pencil or plucking her chin hairs.”
I hadn’t known my wife did those things for her mother.
“Let’s be real with each other. I was saying I wanted to call for her sake, but really, I wanted it for me. I miss her. Is it okay to miss your mommy, at my age?”
“Of course it is.”
“I keep thinking of that story you told us about some farmer who got his arm caught in a hay baler. ‘Traumatic amputation,’ you called it, right?”
“Yes.” I had told that story at the dinner table, and that was when I learned farm life shocked suburbanites.
“So that’s how I feel, like when Allison died, somebody pulled off my arm. Just yanked it off. Now she’s gone, and today, somebody pulled off my other arm, because I can’t have my mother anymore, and it’s not about her, or Allison, it’s about me.” Lucinda shifted in bed. “I’m spraying blood all over the place.”
“I’m so sorry, honey.” I patted her back, but it was as if she couldn’t feel my touch, or even hear me.
“Jason, it’s too much, what we’ve lost. Allison, our lives, the house, the business, my cameras, my lenses, my jewelry, all of it is gone, gone, gone, and at some point, it’s just too big to overcome, you can’t overcome it. It’s not possible to lose everything and still go on. I’m telling you I’m spent, I’m done—”