Life After Yes

by Aidan Donnelley Rowley

  Like me, he went by his middle name.

  And he was a junior. He came from someone. I remember our discussion about names, and his cryptic words: Parents, like the rest of us, have agendas.

  Lawyers and clients and family fill the large chapel, hordes of black. And I think a dangerous, inappropriate, Fisher-esque thought: I wonder how many people are here because they loved this man, because they knew him, really knew him, knew about more than his stellar litigation record, his predilection for big steaks and double martinis. How many of these people knew the story behind his name, the octaves of his laughter, the depths of his regret?

  How many people showed up to make business connections? How many people showed up, like we so often do in life, because they thought they had to?

  And then there are bagpipes and plaid. And “Amazing Grace.”

  And, suddenly, I’m back at Bird Lake on that January afternoon, huddled with family and the other faces from Dad’s life, listening to this worn-out and lovely Christian tune that on that afternoon played from Dad’s old boom box.

  Once we’re seated, Fisher’s wife walks down the center aisle, holding the hands of two teenagers. An impeccable family, a united front. Today, her hair is straight and her eyes are red. The kids are dressed in black too, and they share a dazed expression. Periodically, they lift their gaze from the floor and look around into the masses, people their father has touched in some way, people who pulled him away and demanded his time.

  Mary Fisher and her kids take a seat in the front and peer back as six strong strangers dressed in matching black carry the coffin forward.

  The beautiful box, like life, is full of sharp corners and blurring detail.

  The music fades and Fisher’s daughter, a skinny girl with glasses, stands and climbs the steps to the podium. Her mother rubs her back as she walks past, and sends her off with an encouraging nod.

  Her little girl unfolds a piece of loose-leaf paper with the scraggly edges, stares blankly into the sea of strangers, and looks down. “I loved my father very much,” she says.

  Her mother nods. Keep going. Do him proud.

  “Even though he was very busy a lot of the time, he came to my cello recitals and helped me with my homework.”

  At these simple words, people around me start crying.

  “He loved us. I know because he told us all the time.”

  And I think: This is not how I want my kids to know I love them. I want them to know because I am there, holding a hand, cutting the unwanted crusts off a grilled cheese. Because I read them stories as they’re falling asleep, or make the rubber ducky quack during bathtime.

  Mary Fisher nods proudly, but a frown overtakes her pinched face when it seems her little girl goes off script.

  “I wish he was around more.”

  She folds her paper and returns to her mother, who has no choice but to throw an arm around her brave and honest girl and squeeze tight.

  Miles Shannon is the next to speak, Fisher’s ostensible good friend, the partner who accompanied us on our first-day lunch.

  “Bill was a good lawyer and good man. He had the power to light up a room, to argue any point and win, to make believers of us all. His track record speaks for itself. He was an asset to our firm and he will be sorely missed.”

  Good. Power. Argue. Win. Record. Asset.

  Mildy speaks slowly, deliberately, enunciating clearly and carefully like the good litigator he is. His words are economical, well-chosen, entirely impersonal. He speaks as if he is before a jury.

  And maybe he is?

  Listen to me, folks. This man meant well, he worked hard, you will mourn him.

  I look around and think: Who’s next? Who’ll be the next to get the life sucked from him by this world?

  And I see Cameron. His caramel hair, carefully parted, neatly combed. On his face is an expression of unadulterated worry, as if this day is some sort of warning for him.

  Or for us all.

  Next, an old man climbs to the podium. He wrestles with the microphone, and stares out at us all with a look of confusion and wisdom. His father. The original Fisher. His words are simple, woven with sadness and wonder. “It’s amazing how you can raise your son into a person you no longer recognize. I never understood the desire to be a lawyer. But I respected him…I should’ve seen it coming though. The boy could argue. And manipulate. When he was fifteen, he crashed the family car. Before I had time to punish him, he said: ‘Remember to focus on the fact that I’m okay. Not everything’s about money.’” His voice trails off and laughter thunders in the vast chapel.

  And part of me thinks: It’s unfair that some people live so long. Years are things that should be doled out equally.

  But then I think: A father shouldn’t, it seems, survive his kin. Or see them die.

  And I think of Fisher, horizontal and lifeless in a box custom designed for his exit, and wonder if he can hear all this: the fact that his little girl mourned him even before he died, that she called him Father and not Dad. That his partner stood and carefully quoted bland statistics like he was reading from the back of a baseball card. That his own father, his namesake, no longer knew his boy. Can Fisher hear these words—some canned, some truthful—about the man he had, perhaps unwittingly, become?

  Eyes fixed on the thousand or so faces, I miss the one suddenly next to me. “Losing the tree for the forest?” Kayla says, slipping in, late as usual. She wears black too. Missing from her eyes is her trademark glint, that sarcasm waiting to burst.

  “Hi,” I say.

  “Hi,” she says. “A law firm gathering without booze is like a car without wheels. Very sad, going nowhere.”

  Her metaphor is as mixed up as she is.

  “Guess I’m going to have to get by without the sauce for a little while anyway,” she says, rubbing her belly.

  “It’ll be worth it,” I whisper, and grab her trembling hand.

  She nods. “I guess so.”

  Then she reaches into her bag and grabs something and slips it to me. That little figurine of the Towers. From the little newsstand in Times Square.

  “I thought you’d like it,” she whispers.

  “I do.”

  And in this gathering where we bow to death and mourn one end, swimming in there, somewhere beyond her prudent cloak of practical black, is a tiny reminder of life, of another chance, of a new and unexpected beginning.

  And soon the music will stop, and some charity will be announced in Fisher’s name. And that coffin will be whisked away. And all these people will scatter like ashes. Go back to their days, as if this was just a lengthy and last-minute conference call, a blip on a finely tuned schedule.

  Or maybe not. Maybe they will take the day, go for a walk. Call a family member. Maybe they will realize that life isn’t carved in six-minute increments of billable energy, but lived in more meaningful units—in moments, in days, in years—that aren’t unlimited.

  Chapter 26

  Home that night, I uncork a pinot grigio and pour myself a glass. I swallow fast and keep the bottle close. And soon, everything is in slow motion.

  And it hits me: This is why I drink. For this feeling. When things are speeding and spiraling, when things are out of my control—and aren’t they always?—the blurry buzz saves me.

  The voices on the TV drone on and on about one word: tomorrow.

  And I wonder what’s worse: pain or the anticipation of it? Or whether these things are really the same.

  The phone rings. Sage. Do I want him to come home early? Yes. Obviously. This is no night to be alone.

  “No,” I say to him as the tears come. “I’m fine.”

  Another test.

  “Okay, Bug,” he says as an aria of male laughter swells in the background. Bob Marley croons “No Woman, No Cry,” and foolishly, I decide those words must be meant for me. For them, it’s just another night at the office.

  I hang up. Drink more.

  Another call.

  It’s Mom.
We talk about little things: the unseasonable weather, my wedding registry, how bad the bugs are in Wisconsin. We chatter on, nervously dancing around the conspicuous reason for her call, pausing only to refill our respective wineglasses.

  “I wish you were here,” I say. “Or that I were there.”

  “Why?” she says quickly, defensively, as if convening on the anniversary of Dad’s death would be ludicrous. “Why is tomorrow any different than any other day? He’ll be no more dead tomorrow than he is today. The goddamned media is so obsessed with anniversaries, hell-bent on stirring things up right when they’re beginning to settle.”

  “I guess,” I say.

  Are things settling? Do we want them to?

  When asked if she wanted to read his name during the televised memorial at Ground Zero, her answer was unsurprising, and so very Mom. No, I don’t want to wait in a line of strangers to read aloud the name that floats through my head every day, the name I no longer call out when I’m on the toilet and there’s no paper left, or when I’m buried in a wonderful novel and need a refill of wine.

  Dad was the nurturer.

  Tonight, her voice is alarmingly crisp and calm like those September minutes before it all happened, her words calculated, practiced even, braided with anger and pain she refuses to admit.

  And I think: I will have to do this someday. I will have to be strong, pretend I’m okay when I’m not, to protect someone.

  “So, how’s everything there?” she asks.

  “Okay,” I say. “I found my dress.”

  She laughs. A cork pops. “A dead father, a pregnant bridesmaid, a rendezvous with an old love, the untimely death of an esteemed colleague, and we’re talking organza?”

  “I see Michael has given you a news flash,” I say.

  And here we are, separated by a generation, swallowing the silence with our white wine, doing the same thing on opposite ends of the line; drinking through our denial of a day that has no choice but to arrive.

  “Things will be okay,” I say.

  This simple change of tense sparks something in Mom. “That’s my girl,” she says. “And they will. You’re the pilot.”

  More silence. More swallowing.

  “I still wish you were here,” I say. “I could bring you toilet paper and keep your glass full.”

  “I love you, Prue,” she says. “And so did he. So did he.”

  “I know,” I say. And as our TVs buzz on in the background, we both cry and gulp wine. And the calmness cracks, finally cracks, and sadness snakes through.

  “Let’s talk tomorrow,” I say.

  “It’s a date,” Mom says. “And Prue?”

  “Yes, Mom?”

  “I can’t wait to see your princess costume. I just wish he were around to see it too.”

  “Me too,” I say. “Me too.”

  We hang up. And keep drinking.

  Sage walks in.

  “You’re home early,” I say.

  One test passed.

  “Of course I am. I’m no dummy,” he says, eyeing the wine bottle on our coffee table. “Thirsty, huh? How many have you had?”

  “Not nearly enough,” I say.

  “How was the day?” he asks me, his words one-size-fits-all, plain. A sobering—or is it comforting—thought: I will hear him utter this question every night for the rest of my life.

  “Fine,” I say. A quick, thoughtless reply, not untrue. I don’t tell him about the sad faces of good people. How you can tell a lot about a person when she crumbles, when the tears come. How grown people blend and look alike until they cry. I don’t tell him about Kayla, her pallid face and shaking hands.

  That little figurine of the Towers sits on the table next to Mom and Dad’s wedding picture. Sage picks it up.

  “From Kayla,” I say. “A peace offering.”

  I pour another glass of wine. He sits next to me on the couch. The TV blares in the dark room. Indecisive, I flip channels. Men and women wear pinstripes and appropriately ominous faces and American flag pins and say it over and over: tomorrow. They talk about freedom and the vitality of the American spirit and a downtown man who is holed up in a studio apartment with his potassium iodide and particle mask.

  “Have you talked to your mom?” Sage asks me, expectantly.

  I nod.

  “How’s she holding up?” he asks.

  “Fine,” I say. That word again.

  He doesn’t pry, but sits there with me, his breath heavy.

  “Are you still going to the gym in the morning?” he asks.

  “Of course I am. Why wouldn’t I?”

  Fuck. I am my mother.

  He lets me pick where we will get takeout. Queen for a day. Lucky me.

  As I pour another glass, he grabs my wrist gently. Takes the glass away. Walks into the kitchen. And I follow. He dumps the wine. Rinses the glass. Looks at me.

  “I’m not going to let you do this anymore,” he says. “Put your shoes on. We’re going out.”

  I hold his hand and follow as he pulls me through the streets of our neighborhood under a starless September sky. We walk by our local fire station where framed photos of nine men, young and smiling, perch on windowsills. Votive candles flicker on the sidewalk beneath.

  When he leads me down the concrete steps to the subway, I don’t fight him. Oddly, on this night, my paranoia doesn’t swell, and I’m not scared. Tonight, this isn’t about letting terrorists win or lose, or letting my future husband win or lose. No, tonight is about something far bigger than winning and losing.

  On the platform, an old man plays “The Star Spangled Banner” on his saxophone.

  When we get off at Vesey Street, Sage stops in a bodega and tells me to wait outside. In a few minutes, he returns with two cups of coffee in trademark paper I NY cups and hands me a new souvenir mug for our growing collection. On this mug, above a picture of the Towers, it says, in words painfully trite and true: “Gone But Not Forgotten.”

  I clutch that mug and through fresh tears I say, “Beats Spode any day.”

  Sage nods and kisses my forehead.

  I sip bitter coffee, sweetener-free, and clutch my new gift as he walks me to the site. To Ground Zero. And there they are: the sixteen barren acres I’ve heard all about on the news. The footprints of the Towers that just one year ago stood proudly and peacefully, hours from collapse.

  The debris is gone. So are all the posters.

  We pace around the so-called Pit, apparently six or seven stories deep, an abyss of mud and darkness. We stand there, hand in hand, on the sidelines of the cemetery where Dad is buried. The cloying smell still lingers. Tomorrow, this place will be baptized in tears. Tomorrow, people will gather, read names, fly flags. Politicians will make cameos and offer well-cooked sympathies while proclaiming battle.

  “This happened,” he says, gesturing around us. “Nothing—getting a kitten, getting married, drinking buckets of wine, or fighting me is going to change that, Bug. This isn’t something you or any of us should ever let go of or try to escape.”

  I nod, clutching my new mug, burying my head in his shoulders, holding on to him. And I look at him through the salty blur of tears and wine and say, “Thank you.”

  Because away from here, even only one year later, 9/11 has been packaged and prodded like an event from an American history book.

  Tonight, I don’t see things, this gray gash in the side of the city, as an American. It’s not about religious freedom and equality. It’s not about economic opportunity or political choice. It’s not about safeguarding our lives and democracy.

  Tonight, I don’t see things as a lawyer. It’s not about the law of intent and consequences. It’s not about guilt and innocence. Or chaos and order.

  Tonight, I don’t even see things as a New Yorker. It’s not about hometowns and pride and souvenir mugs. It’s not about there being a conspicuous hole in our glorious skyline.

  But tonight, finally, I do see things as a daughter. It is about Dad. It is about the fact t
hat he is as gone as those Towers. It is about the fact that he will never again answer the phone when I call. That I will never again hear his “Hi, hi.”

  “Life will go on,” Sage says, marring the silence of this bittersweet moment, this melancholy and beautiful moment, his unsullied optimism breaking through, “if you let it.”

  And as the clock strikes midnight, ushering in that new and dreaded day, I clutch tightly to this boy, this man, my future. And something strikes me: Maybe you can hold on and let go at the very same time.

  Chapter 27

  I wake up and find Sage in the kitchen cooking bacon.

  “Morning, Bug,” he says like he does every morning. And I’m thankful he hasn’t written a special script. He leaves the pan long enough to kiss me on the forehead.

  He hands me a cup of coffee. And as I empty the sweetener into it, he looks at me disapprovingly.

  “Don’t say it,” I say. “I know it’ll do me in.”

  He nods.

  “What is the point of monitoring our intake of sucralose or aspartame or wine when boom, just like that, we can be sitting there sucking smoked salmon off a sterling fork and, bam, it’s just over?”

  “Sweeten away,” he says, fear in his eyes.

  And for a moment I wish there were something—artificial, carcinogenic, I don’t care—that I could sprinkle to sweeten bitter moments like this one.

  “Drink up and wake up,” he says. “We’ve got work to do.”

  “We do?”

  We sit side by side on our Pottery Barn love seat. It’s years old, but newness still seeps from those synthetic stripes. We hunch over our coffee table, stuffing envelopes with wedding invitations, passing the small roll of American flag stamps back and forth.

  And on the television, Katie sits there, nervously twisting her legs like pretzels, talking to someone, so very euphemistically, about “the events that occurred a year ago.”

  Sage and I lick our last stamp at the same time.

  He dangles an envelope in front of me. “Want to leave this one out?”