Her “living urn” came—the soil, the supplements, the seedling. He couldn’t remember ordering them, but he must have. She’d bookmarked the page on his laptop. Joshua stood there at the counter, looking at the kit, his wife’s ashes, and got to work.
Lauren had loved plants. She’d grown herbs and flowers in pots on the rooftop and had bought hanging baskets for their rented house on the Cape. Their apartment was filled with plants, which reminded him they probably needed watering. He glanced around. Nope. Too late. They all looked dead.
As he followed the instructions, mixing his wife with the additive and soil provided by the living urn company, he was almost cheerful. He could picture her coming in. “What are you doing, hon?”
“I’m planting your tree.”
“Oh! Cool! Make sure those roots aren’t too squished.”
“You got it, babe,” he said aloud. Pebbles lifted her head to look at him.
This plant would not die. If it did, he’d kill himself. In a sudden panic, he booted up his laptop and ordered a gauge that monitored the soil’s moisture, pH, sun exposure, nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium. He read about what kind of exposure dogwood trees favored. The best room in their apartment would be their bedroom.
He’d have to go in there, then.
He did, spending not a second more than he had to, then fell asleep on the couch, hoping to dream of her.
Since her death, he’d dreamed of her often. In one, he came home, and she was tidying up the kitchen. “I came back just for a little while,” she said. “God, what a mess!” Or she was in her mother’s house, and he came in just as she was about to go into the attic. “Lauren!” he said, and she ran into his arms and hugged him, laughing.
The worst dream was almost an exact replica of her final hours in the hospital, a memory that Josh, when awake, had forbidden himself to think about. In the dream, though, she sat up at the end and said, “I feel better! How are you?”
The cruelty of waking from that made Josh feel like he’d been hit in the chest with a baseball bat. Why would God give him that dream? Josh was raised as a Christian—Lutheran—though it didn’t really take. But these days, it was hard not to blame someone. To want to kick God in the nuts. Thanks for nothing. I knew you didn’t exist.
Jen texted every day. She was the only one Josh could tolerate, and only because Lauren had loved her so much. Darius checked in every fourth day, asking if he wanted company or to get out of the apartment. Donna would call, leaving tearful messages on his voice mail, and he’d call her back dutifully. Jen finally told her to give him some space, which Donna took very personally, and Josh just didn’t have the energy to care.
One day, when his hair felt sticky, he took a shower, standing under the spray, unable to tell if it was too hot or too cold. Why was he in here again? Oh, yes, hygiene. Lauren’s shampoo and shower gel were still on the shelf. He took the cap off, inhaled, then found himself lying on the shower floor, racked with the pain of losing her, the sounds coming from his mouth terrifying and unstoppable. He eventually fell asleep there, exhausted and wrung out, and woke up only when the water had turned frigid. Lauren would’ve been horrified to find him passed out like that. Let her be. Let her come in and say, “Jesus, Josh, what are you doing? Don’t be such a loser, hon!” She loved saying that to him, her voice always playful and full of love.
He found himself studying the framed pictures of them that Lauren had put throughout the apartment. Their wedding day. Hawaii. New Year’s Eve, when they’d hosted an actual party here, Josh’s first time ever doing so. Lauren giving Sebastian a piggyback ride. With his mother on her birthday. With her family at the wedding. The two of them in Paris. The two of them in the Caribbean. The day they got Pebbles. Holding Octavia in the hospital.
Knowing he couldn’t stop her illness and believing it were two different things. Wasn’t he the golden son of Rhode Island School of Design? Of Brown University? Didn’t he have a fucking PhD from Massachusetts Institute of Technology? Hadn’t he sold nine medical device patents in the past decade with five devices already on the market? He was a certified genius, and his purpose in life had been to be her husband, to protect her, and he’d failed. He’d failed.
He should eat something, he thought, tearing his eyes off the photo. Instead, he lay on the couch and fell asleep.
Lauren was walking on the beach way, way ahead of him. They were on Cape Cod, but the spinner dolphins they’d seen in Hawaii were leaping out of the ocean, and Lauren was running ahead to get a better look, and he couldn’t reach her, because he kept stumbling on the sand. The rocks at the shore’s edge knocked together, clacking rhythmically, and Lauren’s long pink summer dress was just a dot now, and the clacking was louder now, banging, knocking, barking—
He woke up in a lurch. Pebbles was barking, and someone was knocking on the door. “Quiet,” he said sharply to the dog, and she obeyed, making him feel cruel and hard.
The knocking stopped. “Josh? It’s Sarah.”
Shit. He did not want to see anyone. Especially Sarah, who was all too healthy. Why couldn’t she have been the one who—
“Josh? It’s important.”
He hauled himself to his feet, the blanket tangling in his legs. “Um, it’s not a great time,” he said, moving closer to the door so she could hear him. His voice was strange to his own ears.
“I know. Open the door anyway.”
“Can you come back, um . . . next week?”
“No.”
He leaned against the door and ran his hand over his face.
“Joshua. Open the door or I’m calling 911 for a wellness check.”
She worked in social services, so he imagined she meant it.
“Josh. I’ve called you every other day, and you haven’t answered once. Please open the door. You’re not the only one who’s been grieving this past month.”
Jesus. A month since his wife died? It seemed like a decade. It seemed like thirty seconds ago.
He opened the door, and Sarah flinched, then hugged him. He patted her shoulder, wishing she would stop.
“You smell horrible,” she said, hugging him tighter.
“Sorry,” he said, stepping back.
She came inside and bent down to pet Pebbles. “Hi, honey! I missed you!” Pebbles wagged joyfully, and Josh felt a stab of resentment. That was Lauren’s dog. Lauren should be the one petting her, calling her honey.
Which was stupid, he knew.
Sarah straightened, wiped her eyes and looked around the place. “Oh, boy.”
He’d drawn the shades against the view, the sun. Cartons of food were in various places, some full, some empty. He noticed a pizza box under the coffee table, the corner chewed off. Pebbles must’ve swiped it. He hoped it wasn’t because she was hungry.