“I get it. You’re a grown woman and you’re leaving.” She waves a dismissive hand. “I can’t stop you.” She stands now, walking toward me and placing her hands on my shoulders. “If I suggest something, will you listen?”
“Maybe,” I say hesitantly. I can see the wheels spinning in her eyes, and that’s hardly ever a good thing.
“Well,” and then she laughs lightly. “This is just too darling for words.” She giggles like she’s just had the most brilliant idea. “So I was talking to Jessica Grant this morning. You remember her.” I shake my head to her statement, but she just continues. “You met her when you were six, at their house outside of Philadelphia. She was my sorority sister in college.” Another head shake. “Whatever.” She waves me off like it’s not important. “She was telling me how her son is moving across the country to Seattle for a new job that he starts next month.”
“And your point is?” I tilt my head at her because I have a bad feeling about where this is headed.
“My point is,” she’s smiling huge now, “that he doesn’t like to fly and was debating renting a car to drive out there. Jessica was against this, naturally, but now that I know you’re going off into the wind,” she points at me, “you can take him.”
“Um. No.”
“Katherine, he’s a nice young man, and since you don’t have a destination picked out, this is perfect.”
“Mom, I’m not driving a stranger across the country.” I’m trying to be firm here, but she’s not listening. She’s already decided on this, and I can feel her itching to run over to the phone to tell this Jessica woman—whom I’m certain I’ve never met—about the ride I’m giving her son.
“You know him. I just told you,” she huffs, annoyed that she has to repeat herself. “You met him when you were six.”
“Right. Let me amend that then. I’m not driving across the country with a man I don’t remember,” I widen my eyes for emphasis.
“You are. It’s the friendly thing to do, and if you’re going to be traveling in a car across this godforsaken country, it’s much safer if you do it with a man. I won’t take no for an answer, young lady.”
“Mom. No,” I stomp my foot like a small child because that’s how she makes me feel.
“It’s done.” She’s smiling like she just won. “I’m calling Jessica now and telling her that you’ll pick him up in three days. His name is Ryan and he’s a very nice young man. A computer whiz or something.”
Have I mentioned that my mother is mad old-school? Like she thinks that this is the 1950s or something. Even her furnishings are reminiscent of that era, and not in a cool mid-century modern way, but in a very floral, ugly, grandmotherly way.
“Mom. I don’t feel comfortable driving with a man I don’t know for several weeks.” It’s my last ditch effort. “Please understand that I can’t take him.”
“Katherine,” she grabs my shoulders again, leveling me with her most serious motherly expression. “If you don’t travel with him, then I will be calling you eight times a day at least to make sure you’re safe.” She means it. Shit. She just got me, and judging by her smug expression, she knows it.
“Fine,” I huff out, feeling like such an epic failure. If this were a few years ago, she never would have won. Losing Eric and Maggie has taken all the fight out of me.
Now I’m a spineless zombie.
“I have to go finish packing. Text me his info.” I lean forward to kiss her cheek, which she accepts stiffly. Maybe this guy won’t want to drive with me any more than I want to drive with him.
“I’m going to call Jessica now.” She’s bubbly sunshine, and now all I want to do is go home and crawl back into bed for the rest of the day.
And that’s exactly what I do. I go home, shut off all the lights and close the curtains, making the small apartment as dark as it’s going to get for this time of day. I hate this bed. I hate this apartment. I hate this life. So I sleep, ignoring the phone calls and chimes to indicate voicemails and text messages.
I wake an untold amount of time later to the familiar feeling of a vise wrapped around my chest. I dreamt of them again. Of the time that Eric and I took Maggie to the playground and she went down the slide by herself for the first time. The look of pride and triumph in her eyes is something I will never forget.
I drive by that park every day on my way to work. Followed by the ice cream store that we went to after the park. It’s the same place that Eric took me for our first date when we were twelve and then proposed to me nine years later.
It’s the same place they were on their way to the night of the car accident.
That’s why I need to get out of here.
I will never be able to move forward if my grief is constantly holding me back—at least that’s what my therapist says. In my gut, I know I’m running away. I know this, but I have to.
I miss them too much. I can’t take it anymore.
Instead of getting easier, it’s getting harder, and I find I have to remind myself of my morning promise more and more throughout the day.
I don’t want to die. I just don’t want to live without them.
I don’t know how to live without them.
Eric and I met when we were twelve; when he moved into the neighborhood with his parents and older sister. And even though we were impossibly young, I think I fell in love with him instantly. He married me ten years later on the anniversary of our first date, and then a year later, we had Maggie.
Life was perfect.
We were happy.
Rolling over, I grab my phone and see that I have two text messages and one missed call, with a voicemail from an unknown number. I check the texts first and see that one is from Maya and one is from Ellie.
Ellie and I used to be best friends, and then the accident happened. She couldn’t handle my grief. I think it made her uncomfortable. And I get that. Grief makes people uncomfortable.
Deal with it!
It’s not exactly like I am having the fucking time of my life.
She completely bailed on me without a word, and any time I run into her, I get the pity eyes.
Let me tell you, there isn’t much worse than those, because no one wants pity. Someone to listen? Sure. A shoulder to cry on? Absolutely. But pity is the worst, and that’s all I get from her. That and her talking about me behind my back. So when her text says, Heard you’re moving away. I think that’s a smart idea. Good luck with your life, I don’t respond. I mean, what can I say to that anyway? Thanks? Yeah, no.
Maya, on the other hand, is a good friend. One of the few who can tolerate being around me. Even my nursing friends can’t handle it. People talk shit about you when you’re happy, but they cannot stand you when you’re miserable. They treat you like it’s contagious.
I need out of this place, like yesterday.
Maya wrote that she’s bringing over wine tonight. I knew I liked that girl for a reason.
Finally, I get to the missed call. I hit the button to listen to the voice message and put the phone on speaker so I don’t have to move my position to hear it. An unknown male voice comes out of the speaker.