“I’m Kevin and this is Candy,” says the man, who has gel-glazed hair and a silver chain around his neck.
“Suleika,” I say. “Nice to meet you.”
“Su-what?”
“Su-lake-uh,” I enunciate.
“The hell kinda name is that?” replies Kevin. A harsh bark of laughter escapes his lips. “Ain’t American, are ya?”
It’s unclear to me if this is a sincere question, a joke, or a racist dig. I don’t know what to say, so I laugh, too, hating myself a little for it.
“You here by yourself?” asks Candy.
I say yes without thinking and instantly regret not telling them I am here with my boyfriend, Buck, who is out bison hunting and will be back any minute with his guns. That thought is quickly followed by another. I don’t need a man to feel safe on the road: I just need to be discerning about whom I engage with and how. In this instance, it means politely wishing my new neighbors a nice rest of the day and retreating to my cabin. I watch through the screened window as Candy and Kevin head back to their car and, to my relief, drive away.
Once they are gone, I wander back outside and stack logs in the fire pit. They’re damp. The fire only catches after several tries, but once it does, I watch with satisfaction as the flames leap and lick at the cool air. The rain has ceased and I snap off Oscar’s leash to let him run loose. I lie on my back in the dewy grass, stretching my arms out and caressing the blades with my fingertips. The scent of wood smoke seeps into my nostrils.
I doze off and when I awake, it’s already dark. A crescent moon hangs above and all I can think is that it looks like a milky fingernail clipping. Once again, I’m too tired to try out my camp stove, so I fix another peanut butter and jelly sandwich and plop down at the picnic table with the envelope of poems Ned gave me. But before I can start reading, the sound of crunching brambles distracts me. Squinting into the woods, I glimpse a large dog and a large man wearing a flannel shirt stretched tight across a bulging belly. He’s lugging a huge blue tarp filled with—what? Maybe just camping supplies, I think. Alternately, could be a cadaver. He hauls his load onto the porch of the cabin to my right, without so much as a hello. As he takes a seat on the steps, cracks open a beer, and begins to work through a twelve-pack with remarkable speed, I feel uneasy. My hope for a quiet night by the fire evaporates. I take the poems and what’s left of my sandwich inside.
I’d prefer to stay in until morning but the cabin has no plumbing and the outhouse is about seventy yards away. Before bed, I grab a flashlight and toiletries to make a quick trip to the bathroom, but as I open the door, Oscar darts between my legs and disappears into the night. “Oscar,” I whisper once, then again more loudly. “Oscar, dammit, come here.” I strobe my flashlight along the outskirts of the woods, pacing up and down in the tall grass, as I call his name with mounting frustration.
“Your dog on the loose?” My beer-chugging, tarp-dragging neighbor has materialized behind me, and his voice makes me jump.
“Yeah, but I’ve got it under control.”
“You need help looking?” he says. It’s as though he hasn’t heard a word I just said.
“I’m good,” I repeat more firmly and walk away.
I’ve been living so long in the constricted world of illness that it’s not just the safety of my body I don’t trust but that of the larger world, too. It’s hard to know what reasonable fear is—what you can and can’t trust. As much as I love Oscar, I’m not about to search for him in the woods with an unsettling stranger. I turn and march back to my cabin. As I do, I hear the thump of a nubby tail against the porch. Sure enough, it’s Oscar, a grin stretched across his scruffy face. “I should send you back to the shelter,” I grumble, scooping him up and bolting the door behind me.
The next morning, my cold has worsened. My entire body aches and my head feels as if it’s filled with wet squelching sand. It’s hard not to feel discouraged by the thought that the majority of the trip might be just this—anxious nights, intermittent sickness, and exhaustion chasing me across state lines. I drag myself to the picnic table outside, where I tinker with the camp stove until I finally get it working. Blue flames flicker under a pot of bubbling oatmeal, and as I dig into my breakfast, my neighbor and his dog reappear. “Howdy,” says the man, tipping the trucker hat he wears smashed over a greasy mess of curls. “I didn’t get a chance to introduce myself. I’m Jeff, and this here’s Diesel,” he says, pointing to the black Labrador by his side. “I wanted to apologize for last night—I’m deaf and I couldn’t really hear you. I made sure to put in my hearing aids today. Glad you made out okay with your dog.”
I can see him more clearly in the light of day. His nails are ragged and his cheeks covered in week-old stubble, but his eyes are kind. I feel a stab of guilt: In the last few years, I’ve been on the receiving end of enough assumptions to know better. Once, on a snowy winter day in Manhattan, a man yelled at me on the bus for not offering my seat to an older woman. Sir, I know I may look young but I’m sick, I’m on my way to chemo, I wanted to explain, but didn’t. Instead, under several pairs of reproachful eyes, I flushed with shame and vacated my seat.
“How long have you been camping?” I ask Jeff, making an effort to be friendly.
“I’ve been sleeping in a tent for the last few weeks, but the rain’s been real bad, so I moved into a cabin last night.”
“Wow. A few weeks?” I say, impressed. “I’m also on a long adventure.”
“I guess you could call this an adventure…I had to sell my house and I’m having trouble finding a place I can afford, so this is home for now. A lot of folks at the campground are in the same boat. Tough times, but you won’t find me complaining.”
Jeff and I talk for a while longer. He tells me about the beaches in nearby Plymouth, a town on the coast. “It’s real pretty over there,” he says. “You should check it out.” The weather is warmer today, and since I have nothing else planned, I do. As I walk along the pebbled shoreline, I think about Jeff and Diesel, about how they are going to fare in the winter months without a home. I think about Ned and his students. I think about the people and the miles of highway I have yet to encounter. Oscar chases waves along the edge of the water. Great streaks of pink and orange crisscross the ocean as the sun sinks lower and lower on the horizon.
* * *
—
A few days later, once both the weather and my cold have improved, I search for a place to try out my tent, determined to camp for real before leaving Massachusetts. Noodling up the coast, I reach Salisbury, where I find Pines Camping Area. I park in front of the A-frame cabin at the entrance. A permed helmet of white hair bobs up from behind the reception desk. Its owner is hooked up to a portable oxygen tank. A pack of Marlboro Reds rests on the counter. “Can I help you?” she rasps.
When I ask if there are any available tent sites for the night, she hands me a map of the campground. “Take your pick,” she says. “You’re the only one here.”
The pine trees loom tall above me as I maneuver past vacant RVs toward the edge of the grounds. In the waning light, I move quickly to unpack my tent and set it up. I spread a plastic tarp and the tent’s skeleton onto the ground and stand back with arms folded, surveying my equipment. How hard can this be?
Wrestling with the metal rods, I get my answer fast. My secondhand tent had not come with an instruction manual. After several failed attempts, I toss out any romantic notions of the woods as a respite from civilization and pull out my phone, resorting to a YouTube tutorial. A hunter dressed in camouflage with my exact tent model—a Big Agnes Fly Creek—drawls instructions from a forest somewhere in America. I watch and rewind and watch again, scrambling to clip the tarp to the poles just so.
Since I left home a week ago, I haven’t gotten very far on the map and little has gone smoothly. But with each stressful situation, I’m exercising new muscles. I have to believe that
if I keep striving toward the person I’d like to become—one who is self-sufficient and independent, one who camps fearlessly in the woods—eventually I’ll get there. Once my tent is finally set up, I crawl inside with an overinflated sense of accomplishment. Headlamp strapped to my forehead, I open my notebook and uncap my pen. I’m camping! I write. In a tent! Alone!
28
FOR THOSE LEFT BEHIND
ODD THINGS HAPPEN when you’re on a road trip alone. The monotony of driving becomes meditative: The mind unwrinkles. As the usual anxieties and concerns vacate, daydreams flit in. Occasionally, a wisp of an idea appears out of nowhere only to recede, a shimmery mirage in a desert. Other times, an avalanche of memories tumbles forth, loosened by an old song on the radio or a déjà vu–inducing landscape. The interplay between geography and memory becomes a conversation. They spark and spur each other. Sometimes they even lead to unplanned visits.
LIVE FREE OR DIE reads a big blue sign as I cross into New Hampshire. I’m curious about the origin of the state motto. When I stop at a gas station, I learn via a quick Internet search that it was coined by General John Stark, a famous Revolutionary War veteran, in 1809. Debilitating rheumatism had forced him to turn down an invitation to the anniversary of the Battle of Bennington, so he’d sent a message by mail: “Live free or die: Death is not the worst of evils.” As someone trying to break out of a life that no longer feels free, the first part of the slogan resonates. But death does feel like the worst of evils, especially for those left behind, who may never find closure in their grief.
I’m reminded that Melissa’s parents live nearby, only a short detour from my route. It doesn’t seem right to drive by without at least reaching out, so I shoot her mom, Cecelia, a text letting her know I’m in the area. Last-minute breakfast? she offers. I know a place off of 93 in Windham. It’s nice, quaint, and has outside tables so we can sit with our dogs.
Perfect! I respond. I can be there in an hour.
Back in the car, I watch the lines of the highway stream past in long white ribbons, remembering the last time we saw each other. It was a year and a half ago, on a warm, blustery April night in Brooklyn. We’d gathered for Melissa’s wake, which—in true Melissa fashion—she had insisted we call a “party.” Before heading over, I met up with Max, the poet from the pediatric ward, at a Mexican restaurant, where we each downed a beer and a tequila shot for some liquid courage. The wake was held a few blocks away at a cavernous venue that typically hosted art openings, music video shoots, and fashion shows. I remember Max holding my hand as we made our way through the crowd to where our cancer crew stood in a huddle. The room was packed, airless, and hot. A chandelier made of glowing lawn ornaments cast a smoky, scarlet hue. Melissa’s paintings covered every inch of wall space. Per her instructions, there were handles of whiskey, forties of beer, and bottles of good wine, and as the booze flowed, the laughter grew rowdy. When it came time for everyone to take a seat—to acknowledge why we’d all gathered—a contained sense of panic filled the room. Up until that moment, the wake could have been mistaken for a surprise birthday party, but it was as if we were all beginning to realize that our guest of honor would never arrive.
That night made Melissa’s absence real in a way it hadn’t felt before. It also made visual the devastation her death wreaked on her family, friends, and community. Max sat next to me, wide-eyed and looking a little faint. I wondered what it must feel like for him to be here, given that he and Melissa shared a diagnosis. Though he was okay for now, Ewing sarcoma is vindictive, often returning again and again to pillage the body until its last breath. As if reading my thoughts, Max wrapped an arm around my shoulders and I leaned my head against his. “I’m getting a grotesque sense of what my own funeral might be like,” he whispered.
A program of performances, readings, and toasts began, punctuated by the sound of muffled sobs. Melissa’s father, Paul, spoke first. “As a parent, there’s no greater pain than losing a child,” he said in his strong Irish brogue. “But we take great comfort in the incredible legacy that Melissa left us through her art, and through all her wonderful friends. In the last three years, I spent an amazing amount of time with Melissa as she battled this dreaded disease. I consider myself the luckiest dad in the world.” He went on to recount what he described as one of the best days of his life: It was a beautiful summer afternoon and despite being in the middle of another round of chemo, Melissa was feeling pretty good. She took him to the museum, then to lunch in Brooklyn and to see her friend Chuck, a tattoo artist. “You’re getting a tattoo today,” Paul recounted Melissa saying. They opted for matching tattoos of the traditional Irish claddagh: two hands clasping a crowned heart, symbolizing love, honor, and friendship—three things Melissa had in abundance. From there, she took him to a bar across the street, where some of her friends were playing bluegrass. “One of the guys handed me a guitar and we started rockin’ it out,” Paul told the room, grinning. “Afterward, Melissa grabbed me by the arm and said, ‘Dad, you really are cool, aren’t you?’ And, let me tell you, twentysomething-year-olds do not say that to their dads.” Then he picked up a guitar, strummed, and sang an old favorite folk tune called “Dimming of the Day” before closing his remarks with a line that said it all: “I will miss her forever.”
As speaker after speaker rose to share a memory or a favorite story, my gaze kept straying to Melissa’s mom, who stood off to the side, appearing shell-shocked. She was dressed in a blazer, and in honor of her daughter’s favorite pastime, had fastened a gold marijuana leaf brooch onto one lapel. Her expression struck me. Face blank. Jaw locked. Eyes steeled. She never cried until the end, when it came time for her to take the mic. “Melissa was just amazing…” she said, her voice cracking as she began weeping inconsolably. “I was supposed to say more, but I just…I can’t.”
We call those who have lost their spouses “widows” and children who have lost their parents “orphans,” but there is no word in the English language to describe a parent who loses a child. Your children are supposed to outlive you by many decades, to confront the burden of mortality only by way of your dying. To witness your child’s death is a hell too heavy for the fabric of language. Words simply collapse.
* * *
—
Melissa’s greatest worry in the final weeks of her life had been what would happen to her parents once she was gone. I didn’t know what to say whenever she brought it up. I didn’t know what to tell her parents on the night of the memorial. Other than a quick hug and a hurried expression of condolence, I’d kept my distance, afraid of uttering the wrong thing or breaking down in their presence. What could I possibly offer to ease their pain?
Now, as I drive to meet Melissa’s mom for breakfast, I still don’t know what to say. We’ve never spent time together without Melissa. Until today, most of our encounters had taken place in hospital waiting rooms and hallways. Bearing right at exit 3, I pass a field of cows, a white steepled church, and a farm stand piled high with russet potatoes. When I pull up to the Windham Junction Country Store and Kitchen, Cecelia is waiting for me in the parking lot, dressed in a denim jacket and black Converse high-tops. She looks just like her daughter, but with glasses and streaks of gray in her shoulder-length black hair. My chest tightens at the sight of her.
We order coffee and sit outside. The thicket of trees bordering the café glows. “It’s peak foliage weekend,” Cecelia says, as we admire the view. She has with her a schnauzer puppy she recently rescued from a shelter—she tells me that after seeing how much Oscar helped me, she decided to adopt one of her own. “They make everything a little better, don’t they?” I say as the two dogs begin to play.
“They do,” Cecelia tells me. “But I won’t lie to you: It’s been a miserable year. Paul and I have been thinking about packing up and moving. We need a fresh start. We’re thinking California or Arizona, but who knows if it’ll happen.”
My face brightens
at the thought of them retiring somewhere with palm trees where the sun shines all year. “Why not do it?” I ask.
“We haven’t been able to clean out the house since Melissa died,” she confesses. “It’s a mess—I’m talking near-hoarder status—and it’s embarrassing. That’s why I asked you to meet me here instead. We want to move, but we just have so much stuff and I don’t know where to start. What am I supposed to do with her old rocking horse? What about her paintings? Her clothes?”
I can’t pretend to have solutions for Cecelia’s predicament. The task of determining what to keep or give away is difficult enough to do for one’s self, let alone on behalf of a child who has died. It’s a task that seems to bore into the very meaning of grief, into the anguished battle between holding on and letting go, between staying moored to the past and allowing pieces of it to drift away. But I am certain Melissa would not want them to live in a mausoleum of her old things. In one of our last conversations, when I’d asked Melissa if she was afraid of dying, she replied: “My biggest fear is that my parents’ lives will be ruined forever.”
“Melissa would want for you and Paul to find a way to continue on. To be happy,” I say.
“I don’t know if we’ll ever be happy,” Cecelia says. “It’s unbearable. Every day, every hour, without her here. The worst part is that other parents treat us like we have some kind of curse, a contagious one. Grief makes people uncomfortable, I guess. They want you to be positive, they want you to quit talking about your dead daughter, they want you to stop being sad. But we will never not be sad. So what do we do?”
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