Cause of Death

by Laura Dembowski

  “Can you do chest compressions?” the 911 operator asks.

  “My husband already is. It’s not working,” I scream into the phone. “It’s not working.”

  “The ambulance should be there shortly. Keep doing compressions, and I’ll stay on the phone with you until help arrives.”

  She does stay on the phone, repeating that the ambulance is on its way. But I know there’s no hope. She could have been hanging there all night for all we know. I can tell Dave is growing tired and defeated, knowing he can’t save his precious little girl. Our precious little girl.

  When I hear the ambulance pull up, I run back downstairs, figuring that at least I’m getting my cardio in for the day. I open the door for the EMS workers, and seeing them flips a switch in me. I lose control of myself and start wailing, as though none of this was real until the moment they walked in the door. This can’t be happening. All I’ve ever done was take care of Lana, and this is not possible.

  I manage to compose myself enough to lead the workers upstairs. They check Lana for a pulse and do some CPR, but within a couple of minutes, they know there is no saving her. Lana is gone.

  When they stop working on her, I fling myself onto her body, barely noticing the police officers that now fill our house. Why are they here? I clutch Lana so hard that I dig my nails into her back. She still smells like herself. Smells alive.

  “She’s not dead,” I scream. “She can’t be. I can smell her.”

  I pick her up and feel the weight of her body on my chest. I don’t want to let go, but the EMS assholes pry her from me and put her on a stretcher to take her downstairs.

  We watch as the technicians put her into the ambulance. I ask to ride along, but they say that’s not a good idea, so we follow them to the hospital in our car so a doctor can officially pronounce her dead.

  Dead. Lana is dead.

  For the first time since we found Lana we are silent. The absence of sound is awkward and making me paranoid. It is an eerie silence that makes me squirm in my seat. I wish one of us would say something. I could easily solve this problem by speaking, yet I don’t, since I have nothing to say.

  As we near the hospital, Dave finally speaks.

  “You should have taken her to a doctor.”

  “Why didn’t you?”

  “I work. She was your responsibility.”

  “You two were always so close,” I say. “It’s not like you really thought she’d ever do this.”

  He sighs. “No, I guess I didn’t, but still.”

  “So you’re blaming me for her death?” I ask angrily. My daughter has just died, and now my husband is accusing me of being responsible.

  “No, I’m not. I just—”

  “You think I could have stopped this?” I said, cutting him off. It’s like when he says, “I love you, but . . . ,” and I can’t deal with it. Not today. “I did everything I could,” I continued. “We both did. We bought her things and let her move home and didn’t make her go get a job. What more could we have done?”

  Dave sits in silence. He knows I’m right, but he wants someone to blame, and I’m the only place he can turn. He surely can’t blame Lana. He wants to believe we could have done something to change it. Part of me wonders if he actually thinks we could go back and make different decisions and change things. But we can’t. No matter how hard we try, we simply can’t.

  Though I would never tell Dave, I do wish I had done more. Done something, anything. Lana and I had had our disagreements, boy, did we ever, but I didn’t want her to die. No mother wants to bury their child; it’s supposed to be the other way around. If I could change things, I would, in a minute. But we have to live with our decisions.

  The hospital solidifies everything. The doctor tells us that Lana could not have been saved, no matter what we had tried. It was too late. She had hanged herself sometime between two and three in the morning, her neck snapping instantly. She didn’t suffer, the doctor says, as though that could offer us comfort.

  Our daughter, who could have had such a promising life ahead of her, is dead. It doesn’t make it better to know she didn’t suffer. Nor does it make it better to realize that she and I will no longer have to endure her apparently horrible life. She won’t have to wish to die anymore, pray not to wake up in the morning. She is gone. And we don’t want her to be gone, because no matter how bad things got, and how often I may have disapproved of her choices, I never lost hope that one day things would click and she would be okay. We would all be okay.

  Maybe she’s in heaven and happier, but here on earth, without her, we are not. Her pain may be gone, but she has left us in so much. I think after some time, I’ll be healed enough to live a relatively normal life, but looking at Dave, his face pale, with a look of total desperation and depression, shoulders hunched—I don’t think he’ll ever be the same. This scares me. I lost my daughter, and now I’ve lost my husband too. Dave is an empty shell, his spirit vanished right along with Lana. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. I haven’t really had Dave in a long time. He was always in the palm of Lana’s hand.

  “I’m going to order an autopsy,” the doctor tells us.

  My jaw drops.

  “That’s not necessary, Doctor. She killed herself; can’t you see that? I don’t want my baby all cut up.” I’m raising my voice. I don’t mean to, but the thought of scalpels and bone saws and tests—it’s not happening. Not to Lana.

  “I’m sure the medical examiner will rule it a suicide, but she was a young, attractive woman, and I want to be sure nothing more was going on.”

  “She was young and attractive, so that means she must not have killed herself?”

  “You can take it up with my supervisor if you have an issue; otherwise, my decision is final.”

  I’m about to protest further and ask for the name of the person in charge of this entire hospital when Dave opens his mouth.

  “Can I see her?” Dave asks the doctor.

  “Yes, yes, of course,” he says.

  Walking to the room where her body is located feels like an out-of-body experience. The whole hospital is cold and busy, full of suffering people. At least they’re still alive.

  Once we arrive at the room, Dave puts his hands on the window and looks in, a lost puppy dog begging for its owner to come back. The doctor opens the door and I watch as Dave rushes in, grabbing Lana’s hand tightly in both of his. He kisses it and cries. He kisses her cheek and cries harder. He’s talking to her, but I can’t hear what he’s saying.

  He looks up, and waves me in, as if he’s just noticed I’m not by his side. I don’t want to go in. I saw her body. I touched it. I can say good-bye to her without being in the room.

  Dave waves me in again. He’s not going to take no for an answer, but I hold my ground. We all grieve in our own way, and Dave is going to have to learn that sooner rather than later. After a few more moments of Dave sobbing and looking adoringly at Lana, he comes out.

  “You want some time alone with her,” he says. “I understand.”

  This is not true, but I find I can’t say that out loud, so I go in.

  “Hi,” I say to my daughter, trying to break the awkward silence that can’t ever be broken. “I wish things weren’t like this. We were trying. We did the best we could, you know. I don’t know what else you wanted from us. I’m sorry.”

  I walk right up to her body and touch her hand. I run my fingers over a bruise on her arm. I wonder silently where she got it, knowing she was always running into one thing or another, rarely without a bruise someplace. I wonder if the doctor noticed it.

  “Bye,” I say, and walk out of the room to Dave, his arms open, waiting to embrace me.

  I don’t much feel like a hug at the moment. It’s not like it’s going to solve anything—we’re not going to heal each other with a touch—but there’s no avoiding it, so I fall into h
is arms like a dead fish, my body weight fully on his. He stumbles but manages to hold me up. It’s kind of nice to be held, supported, loved. I’m so used to giving love that receiving it is oddly comforting, more so than I ever would have thought. I give in fully and wrap my arms around him. Tears begin flowing involuntarily, and he cries too.

  We stand like that, together, for the better part of half an hour. I occasionally glance at Lana’s body and think that if something good has come out of this, perhaps it’s that Dave and I will have a chance to fall back in love with each other. We will just have to find a way to let Lana go.

  When we are ready to leave, Dave drives us to a hotel for the night. Our house is currently a crime scene, police crawling all over it, collecting evidence that isn’t there, alone with all that jewelry, those electronics, our crystal and china. We will return home when they vacate the premises, but for tonight, it’s probably not such a bad idea to sleep somewhere else, as there is most definitely a dark cloud over the dwelling we once called home.

  I never realized how much funerals cost, as I’ve never had to plan one before. My sister Beth took care of both of our parents’ funerals, which were paid for out of their bank accounts. Now that I’m the one in charge, my eyes are practically popping out of my head. After I get over the sticker shock, I find myself unable to spare any expense. Lana was our daughter, and we must show everyone exactly how much we loved her. Dave is not reeling me back in. He’s even worse than me. This funeral director must have seen us coming a mile away. Must see all the parents of dead daughters coming, willing to drain not just their bank accounts but also their retirement accounts, to give their flesh and blood the proper resting place.

  I think of what Lana would want. I bet she pictured a funeral like the ones in the movies. The funeral home packed with people who want to pay their respects. Tons of floral arrangements. Everyone crying over her tragic passing, and then laughing about all the good times they had with her. Then it would rain just a little at the burial, again, surrounded by people, before the sun would come out and a rainbow would appear, a sign her spirit was shining down on us.

  It’s what I imagine, anyway, and it’s what I want for her. It’s going to be difficult to achieve since she didn’t have any friends, but I know Dave will make sure all his colleagues show up, and I’ll go through all my e-mail and phone contacts; hell, we’ll hire actors if we have to.

  As I walk over to Dave after we’ve looked at all the caskets, we both point to our favorite at the same time. We’ve chosen the identical solid wood model, in a dark stain, the most expensive one in the place. She would have loved it. I get choked up at the thought of her selecting the same casket for Dave or me had the tables been turned, as they should have been. Our daughter burying us, years and years from now.

  “Is food allowed?” Dave’s asking the funeral director in charge of what I am now certain is the Neiman Marcus of funeral homes—and why shouldn’t it be?

  “Yes, sir, of course. What did you have in mind?” the well-dressed manager asks. I swear he’s wearing Armani.

  Dave would never buy an Armani suit for himself, but he’s already ordered a full-length Carolina Herrera ball gown for Lana to be buried in. In fact, it’s being made just for her, a rush order the designer was more than happy to accommodate (for a not-so-nominal fee) once she’d heard how much Lana had always loved the dress after seeing it on an awards show some years before.

  “Maybe a few waiters walking around with hors d’oeuvres—something with truffles, maybe Kobe beef. Lana would have liked that,” Dave says, looking at the floor as the manager takes notes.

  “Dave, are you sure truffles and Kobe are really necessary?” I ask, quietly whispering in his ear. The food isn’t really for Lana, just Dave’s friends, and they don’t really deserve to have truffles and Kobe.

  He doesn’t answer, instead glaring at me as though I am the reason Lana is dead, and I can only repent by spending my last dime on her funeral.

  “Oh, and I’d like a cellist to play that one famous song—you know . . .” And he hums the song. Badly. I want to plug my ears, but I just tune him out. I’m using the skills I learned tuning Lana out over the years. If this is any indication of my future, I’m going to need to further hone this ability.

  “Ah,” the director nods his head, “the prelude to Bach’s Cello Suite Number One. No problem, sir.”

  Dave goes on to request calla lilies in all available colors to be flown in from South America, and a white hearse to represent Lana’s innocence. I don’t put up a fight on those. She loved callas, and it’s all going to be so beautiful, but I’m going to lose sleep over the food tonight, I just know it.

  By the end of the meeting, we’ve spent over twenty thousand dollars. I nearly choke when I hear the number. The director looks sadly at me, at us, pours a glass of water for me, and rounds it down to an even twenty thousand. How kind of him.

  “Why are you being so stingy with Lana’s funeral?” Dave angrily questions me in the car on the way home.

  “I’m not, Dave. Between this and that dress, we have emptied our checking and savings accounts. Emptied them, Dave. I want the best for Lana, but I think we have to draw the line somewhere. Don’t you?”

  “Not really.” His hands are clasped around the steering wheel as though his life depends on it. “I’d rather spend it on her. She deserves it. Her life ended too soon.”

  “She ended it,” I say, then regret it as soon as the words come out of my mouth. Not because they aren’t true, but because Dave is having a hard time accepting that they are.

  “Why does that matter so much to you? You keep saying it over and over again, like it should make it easier for me to accept her death. Clearly it’s made things easier for you.”

  “She had the fucking life, Dave. Don’t you agree?”

  “No, obviously not. She killed herself, so she did not have the life.”

  “She wanted to come home. She wanted nice things. She didn’t work. She did whatever the hell she wanted. And then she went and killed herself and left us to clean up the mess. I’m sad about it, I am,” I say, getting worked up, “but I’m pissed about it too.”

  “We failed her, Margaret,” he says, pulling the car over. He puts it in park.

  I just want to go home, but it seems Dave has other ideas. The air-conditioning is blasting us, blowing my hair all over the place, ruffling his shirt like the feathers of a bird.

  He looks right at me. “We failed her. We are the problem here, not her. If the most expensive funeral is possibly any consolation to her, if she can see or hear us, wherever she is now, then I want her to have it.”

  I’ve never heard such profound words come out of Dave. They bring a tear to my eye. I shiver, then turn off the air. It gets stuffy in the car almost instantly, but I like it better than the chill of the fan.

  “Me, too,” I say. “But what about us? We can’t empty our savings trying to pay for her funeral in hopes that maybe it will comfort her, because she’s dead. It won’t.”

  “We won’t,” he waves his hand. “I make plenty of money, and I figure you might want to get a job, for something to do. You spent your days with Lana.”

  Not by choice.

  “You don’t have many friends,” he continued. “I’d hate for you to spend all day in that big, lonely house and want to kill yourself too.”

  My eyes bulge. Does he really think I’m going to suddenly become suicidal? I do not want to kill myself. Nor do I want to get a job. I’ve been out of the workforce for the past twenty years, and I only worked part-time before that. Once Lana was born, I was out. What does he want me to do—be one of the old ladies who works at Hallmark? No, thank you.

  “I’d rather stay at home. Get in touch with some old friends. Do some work around the house, or look for a new one. I don’t really want to get a job. I don’t feel ready to face people,” I
say, figuring Dave might understand that.

  “I don’t want you to get stressed, so you do what’s best for you. Moving’s a good idea. I can’t think about anything other than Lana when I’m in the house. We could downsize.”

  Downsize? He wants to downsize? I’m not moving into some shitty apartment. Does he want to live in one of those active senior communities? I can tell him right now, that is not happening, unless he wants to do it alone. I want to build a nice new house. Change all the things I hate about this one. Downsize. He’s clearly lost his mind.

  “We don’t have to rush into anything,” I say, trying to change the topic before he puts down a deposit on some shithole. “Why don’t we take a vacation?” I suggest, figuring it may help both of us cope.

  “How can you think of taking a vacation right now?” he asks, shocked. “We haven’t even buried Lana yet.”

  “After the funeral, of course,” I say. How could he think I meant before? “I thought it might help us forget.”

  “Forget!” he says with vitriol. “How can we forget? You know,” he continues, “I feel like I don’t even know you anymore.”

  “Forget was the wrong word,” I say, trailing off. The rest of the ride, the rest of the day, in fact, is filled with nothing but contentious silence.

  He’s right. He doesn’t know me, and I don’t know him. The only person we’ve gotten to know over the past twenty-seven years is Lana, and in doing so, we’ve totally lost ourselves, and each other. But none of that matters. Lana is the only thing that matters.

  Still.

  As soon as I walk into the funeral home, I worry no one’s going to show up. The first hour is just for family, and I’m not holding my breath that they’ll show up either. I thought they would feel as though they had some kind of duty, but apparently I am wrong. We are early, thanks to Dave’s antsy anxiety that we’d hit a traffic jam in the middle of the day on a five-minute trip, but I didn’t protest and got in the car, too tired to fight another battle.