by Leia Stone
My mom looks over at me, pulling one of her hands from mine and strokes my face. “Oh, but honey I did. It was you.”
Tears roll down my cheeks before I can say marzipan, and my mom’s eyes well up as well. It seems that this time we aren’t going to try to hold it in.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t here all those years. I’m so sorry.” I weep. How many dinners have I missed, how many mornings in the garden sipping tea? Life is so precious, and none of it is promised. She’s fucking fifty-five and I’m counting the days I have left with her.
My mom cups my cheeks and I know it’s hard for her to hold her hands up for so long because they tremble. “I don’t resent you for doing as I told you to do. I wanted to raise a strong, independent woman who would never need to depend on a man for money, and I did.”
A tear slips from the corner of her eye and rolls down her cheek. “When I didn’t have you here in person for company, I had Owen. I was never alone.”
I nod, swallowing the lump in my throat. I would forever be grateful to that man for being there for my mom all those years when I couldn’t.
My mom’s hands fall away from my face and she wipes my eyes.
Rolling onto her side, she tucks her hands under her cheeks and faces me. “I went to a cancer group therapy thing my first round,” she tells me, her eyelids getting heavy. “It was Owen’s idea. Everyone was going around the room and saying what they felt their life purpose was.”
I nod, stroking her arm and soaking in all her words, wanting more time.
“One lady really felt her purpose was to write a book, but she was too scared to put it out there to the world. If she got better, she was going to publish it. Another man, he hated his desk job, had always wanted to work with animals. If he got better, he was going to quit his job and start an animal rescue.”
That sounded nice. It made me think of anything I felt I had left to do, a burning desire. The thought came to me immediately: to have a baby with Owen, to right that wrong we made so many years ago.
“What was your big regret? Your unlived purpose?” I ask her.
She smiles, her eye lids closing for a moment. “I didn’t have one. My purpose has always been to be your mother, and I got my dream the day you were born.”
I can’t help the sob that forms in my throat. Leaning forward, I cry as my mother holds me. I cry so hard my body shakes, and all the while she rubs my back and takes care of me in what should be her darkest hour, but is mine as well.
“I love you, Mom,” I tell her when I can catch my breath.
“I love you too, baby girl.”
It’s the last thing she said to me. Somewhere in the night my mom found her way to heaven.
"You know there's a celebration of life going on back there, right?"
It's Livvie's voice, coming up behind me. I'm sitting on a bench in the shade outside the church. She comes into my view, backlit by the sun.
My mom didn't want a funeral. She wanted a celebration of life. It was written in her end- of-life instructions, which Pastor Greg had in his possession. I stayed for the formal ceremony in the sanctuary, but after only a few minutes in the room where everyone moved into for lunch, I ducked out.
"I'm aware," I say wryly, toying with the gold bracelet on my wrist. It was my mom's.
Livvie sits down beside me. "I didn't go to my grandma's funeral. Couldn't stomach it. I hated watching other people grieve, people who didn't know her like I did. I felt like they shouldn't be allowed to be sad." She chuckles, the sound holding no mirth. "As if there is some competition for who is allowed to feel grief based on who knew her best."
"I guess I'm feeling a bit of the opposite. Like I didn't know her the way all those people in there knew her, and I shouldn't be allowed to feel so hollow. Like ten years gone from here has taken away my right to grieve."
Livvie frowns. "Did you go ten years without seeing her?"
"No."
"Did you go ten years without talking to her?"
"No, we talked nearly every day."
"Did you go ten years without loving her?"
I slide my gaze up to meet Livvie's. "Obviously not."
She raises her eyebrows in a look that tells me she has led me to water, now it's up to me to drink.
My shoulder bumps hers. "I get it."
I’m realizing that I do the guilt and self-punishment thing really well.
"Good." She wraps me in a one-armed hug.
Owen finds us sitting this way and approaches cautiously. I think Livvie's tough exterior, her tell-it-like-it-is attitude, sets him off-kilter. It makes sense to me. I’ve lived and worked with people who acted like her. Owen hasn't.
Livvie releases me and then stands, pulling me up with her. "You have to get back in there, Autumn. Don't be a chump like me." She winks at me and walks away.
Owen watches her go, his hands tucked into his dark grey dress pants. "Chump?" he asks, bewildered.
"Chump. Technical term." Despite the day I’m having, I smile a little. Livvie is a breath of fresh air for me.
Owen reaches out to me, folding me into his body and kissing the top of my head. "You disappeared."
"I couldn't stand all the finger foods and different types of salad." I'm joking, but it's not totally untrue. The smells of all the foods were meshing together, and I pictured them as different colors, mixing into something grayish-brown and hanging over the room like smog.
"The food is mostly gone now. Do you want to go back?"
I nod against him and he lets me go, only to capture my hand. We walk back into the church, and an idea strikes me. I pull my hand from his. "Owen? I need a few minutes alone. With her…"
"Of course." He brushes a kiss onto my cheek. "I love you."
"I love you too," I answer before opening the light-colored wood doors into the sanctuary. It looks different in here. The lights have been dimmed, and without the backs of people’s heads to look at, it seems so lonely. I've never been alone in a place of worship before, and it's off-putting. I creep forward quietly, matching the volume of the place, which is silent.
At the very front, to the left of the pulpit, is my mom's casket. A spray of purple and white flowers lies on top of its closed hood. When I reach the gleaming dark wood, I press a hand to it.
I don't know what I was thinking would happen. Maybe a sensation. A whisper from the great beyond. A feeling in my heart telling me she's nearby. Instead I feel nothing, and it wrecks me.
Marzipan.
It doesn't work. Fat tears roll down my cheeks and I don't wipe them away. They slip off my chin, landing somewhere, soaking into the fabric of my dress, the carpet, maybe even my shoes.
Once my tears subside, my blurry vision clears, and I see the corner of a folded piece of paper sticking out from under the flowers. Using two fingers, I pinch the paper, tugging gently, and the paper clears its hiding spot.
The first thing I notice is the handwriting. It's familiar, but I can't figure out why. I begin to read.
My Beautiful Faith,
I've learned something new today. Nothing can prepare a man to lose a person they love.
Looking back now, I wish we'd done things differently.
I wish—
I look up from the note. I can't keep reading, it feels like an invasion of privacy. And now I realize why this handwriting is familiar. It's the same as the note I found when I first moved back, the one in her pantry. It seems that the old love isn’t so old.
It seems like my mom had a secret. Someone nobody knew about.
Someone who is here now at her celebration of life, or was at least here long enough to place this note on her casket. I look around, as if they could be hiding in the shadows somewhere. Of course, there is nobody here. Only me. And the body that once housed my mother. I'm still not sure what I believe, but I'd like to think her soul has moved on to heaven. It's a peaceful idea, one that helps me believe she still exists, just in another form.
I decide not to read t
he note, instead slipping it in with the flowers and allowing my mom’s secret to lay to rest with her.
I press my lips to my fingers, then place the kiss on the top of the casket. "Bye, Mom. I love you." I still don't feel her here, but it seems like the right thing to do and I realize that nothing can make me feel better right now. I just need to live through this and take it day by day.
I find Owen out front. He is chatting with people. They have all heard he was my mom's oncologist, and it's turned him into a sought-after discussion partner. I see him talking to Linda, my mom’s chemo buddy. She survived. She survived and my mom didn’t. I’m happy for her, of course, but it really hits home what a beast cancer is. It doesn’t care if you’re rich or poor or have a family. It takes anyone it wants.
"You're like a celebrity," I murmur into his ear after Linda gives me a small smile and walks away.
"Z list," he says, kissing my temple. "Livvie said to tell you goodbye. She had somewhere she had to be."
The sun is hot, and I'm listless. How am I supposed to walk away? Get in Owen's car and drive back to my mom's house? Wake up in the morning and do what? The person who brought me here, who drank my green juice and ate the gluten free, kale-infused food I prepared, doesn't need those things anymore. What now?
"Are you ready?" Owen squeezes my hand.
"I suppose so." My voice shakes as I gather my hair off the back of my neck and move it so it drapes over one shoulder. "We should say goodbye to Pastor Greg."
We find the pastor standing with two other men. One man speaks, his arms moving animatedly like he's telling a story.
We make our way to him, and I touch his elbow to get his attention. Turning to me, he smiles and steps away from the conversation, nodding to the two men as he goes.
His eyes are red like he's been crying, and I’m touched he would care for a member of his congregation so much.
I extend a hand to him. "Thank you for the beautiful service."
Reaching out, he shakes it. "Your mom was a very special member of our congregation. Heaven gained an angel, that's for sure."
I smile. "Yes."
"We'd love to see you around here more often. You're welcome anytime."
I blink at the invitation, not sure what to say. I promised to go next Sunday, but the Sunday after that and after that? I’m not sure. What God lets my mother get cancer and be taken from me? I’m in the anger phase of grief. "I'm a work in progress right now."
He chuckles. "Aren't we all?"
"Pastor Greg?" An old woman walks up. "Your daughter called the church phone. She says you were supposed to pick up your granddaughter for ice cream a few minutes ago."
He makes a face. "Shoot! Can you please tell her I lost track of time and I'll be there soon?" He reaches down and peels the sleeve of his jacket up, peering at a two-toned watch that makes goosebumps break out on my arms. It’s the watch.
The watch.
The one from my mom’s … it’s his?
My eyes widen.
A brief look of panic skips across his face as he sees me looking intently at the watch and he quickly replaces it with a smile. "Don't be a stranger. You either," he adds, his eyes jumping over to Owen.
As he walks away, I stay rooted in place and I don't move until Owen pulls me along.
"Are you okay?" he asks, glancing back at me.
"The two-toned watch belongs to the pastor…"
"What watch?"
"The watch I found in the kitchen. The watch my mom said was yours. But then you said it wasn't and I forgot about it." My mom’s secret lover, the man who left the note … was Pastor Greg? Did she give him back his watch when he came to the house to see her?
Now my mind spins with different scenarios of why they didn’t work out and I’m tempted to run inside and read the note on her casket in its entirety. I know that the pastor has been divorced for over a decade, and my mom isn’t the type to be a mistress, but I can’t help but think something scandalous might have happened. Did her cancer keep them apart, his relationship with God? His family?
Owen stops me in the middle of the parking lot, pulling me from my thoughts. He looks back at the church. "Are you saying your mom and the pastor were … together?"
"I'm saying they were something."
In the hot summer sun, Owen tugs me to his chest. "She must have had a reason for not telling you."
I'm sure she did. People keep secrets for different reasons. I know a little something about that.
We get in Owen's car and he cranks the air conditioning.
"Can I stay at your place tonight?" I shrug out of the cardigan I wore over my dress. "I don't want to be alone in my house right now."
"Actually," Owen says, turning to face me, "what do you think about putting your stuff into boxes and bringing them to my place, then taking the stuff out of boxes and putting them in drawers and cabinets?"
My mouth drops open. I'm still reeling from the watch, and now this? "You want me to move in with you?"
"Yes." He purses his lips nervously.
I laugh. I don't know why but I'm laughing, and then I'm crying, and Owen pulls me into a hug and wipes away my tears.
"Of course, I'll move in with you," I say, sniffling. "I don't know why I'm laughing. Or crying. It's just a lot. This day is a lot."
He nods and then a nervous look creeps over his face. “I wanted to ask you something else … but this day is probably not the time for it.”
I frown. “Is it a good something?”
He nods, his eyes piercing into me.
“Well, then today is perfect for it because I don’t want to remember this heavy feeling.”
He takes my hand. “You know how you told me that your mom’s last words to you were how much she loved being your mom and how much she loved you?”
I nod, getting teary-eyed at the memory. Dropping my hand, Owen reaches into his pocket and pulls out a slim ring box.
My eyes widen.
“Well … your mom’s last words to me were to give me her blessing for us to marry…” He gulps. “If you’ll have me.”
A sob breaks through my throat and I feel it then. A small tingle up my arm, a presence in the car with us.
My mom.
“Yes!” I cry out and we crash together, kissing as my tears fall in a seal around our lips.
It’s not as perfect as some may think this should be, proposing in a car at my mother’s funeral, but it’s perfect for me. It gives me hope in a future with Owen, a future I will have to navigate on my own, without my mother. It gives me faith that things are going to be okay.
Hah. Faith. Something I had with me my entire life.
That night, after unpacking most of my things and setting them up around Owen’s house and in his dresser, I snuggle in beside him to go to sleep. Staring down at the huge princess-cut stone on my left finger, I smile.
What an emotionally draining yet also fulfilling day.
Owen reaches for me, his hand landing softly on my abdomen.
My abdomen.
My eyes flutter open, then close, and as I'm slipping back into sleep, I have a final, drowsy thought.
My period is late.
With everything going on with my mom, I never did get around to going on birth control.
Chapter 29
Owen
"Do you want to grab a beer after work?" Ace rounds the nurse’s station, holding on to either end of the stethoscope that's slung around his neck.
"No can do," I answer, slapping the paper files I'm holding against the desk. "Today Autumn had all of her stuff sent to my house from New York. I gotta help her unpack."
I can't help the wide grin on my face. Fifteen-year-old me is pumping a fist in the air in excitement. Hell, twenty-eight-year-old me is doing the same.
I got the girl, the girl of my dreams. My future wife is Autumn Cummings. It still feels crazy to say.
Ace wrinkles his nose like he's just smelled rotten potatoes. "You're out of your m
ind. A girl tries to leave a toothbrush at my place and it's sayonara." He whips his hand around like he's waving goodbye. I know he’s joking, he was happiest of all for Autumn and I. Even offered to throw us an engagement party.
"You'll change your mind one day,” I tell him.
He shakes his head and pounds a fist against his chest twice. "Bachelor for life."
"Fifty bucks says one day you'll eat those words."
He throws out a hand. "A hundred says I never will."
We shake on it. Nurse Theresa stares at us from her spot behind the computer, wearing a low-key look that says, I don't know how you two are doctors, because you're idiots.
Ace takes one look at her expression and says, "Well, that's my cue to leave." He goes in the opposite direction I'm headed in, which is to my office to grab my things so I can leave the hospital.
When I get to my car, I send Autumn a message asking her if she needs me to pick up anything on my way home. She responds with a picture of some casserole cooking in the oven.
I know it won't always be this way. Next week Autumn and Livvie will start moving inventory into the new space at Tlaquepaque. She'll be interviewing potential employees, and Livvie will move down to Phoenix to be with her husband, leaving Autumn in charge of it all. But for right now, it feels like the domesticity I always wanted with her.
After pulling my car into the garage, I walk inside. The place smells good, and it's not just the mouthwatering smells wafting in from the kitchen. There's a candle burning on a table, something that definitely wasn't there before. There are also new throw pillows on the couch, and a blanket draped artfully on the back of a chair.
"Welcome home," she says, her arms sliding around my waist from behind. She presses her nose into my back as she hugs me.
"Music to my ears." I loosen her grip so I can turn around to face her. Placing a finger under her chin, I tip up her face to kiss her. "You're beautiful." Her hair is piled messily on her head. She wears yoga pants, a tank top, and not an ounce of makeup.
She rolls her eyes as if she doesn’t believe me.
"I have something to show you," she tells me, and her eyes sparkle like a clear night sky. "Follow me."