by Jamie Berris
Tomorrow, May 2nd, would be the one-year anniversary of Lydia’s death. Emotions had been up and down throughout the last year; to say they lived on a roller coaster wasn’t far from the truth.
They had come a long way in the past year. Since getting her license, Sadie had the freedom to come and go as she pleased, driving herself to and from school, tennis practice, and to her friends’ and Dylan’s houses. She and Jayna were also getting along better.
Jayna was kissing up to Sadie so she would cart her and her friends around, dropping them off at the mall or the movies. Sadie had been letting go of the reins around the house. Jayna had had no choice but to step up to the plate and watch Nicholas more often and help out with more chores, mainly doing some of her own laundry instead of expecting Sadie to do it for her.
Nicholas seemed to be steadily improving as well these last couple of months. He hadn’t cried as much for his mommy. Lydia was most likely slipping from Nicholas’s memory, even though she was still a part of the family through videos, pictures, and letters that Sadie and Jayna read to him.
Thanks to Sadie, Nicholas still had a mother figure. Kurt told Sadie he was grateful for his daughter’s devotion and couldn’t imagine how he would keep his family on track if it weren’t for her running the show.
Sadie suspected that Kurt and Marissa had been more or less seeing each other for the past few months but had kept it mostly private. Marissa hadn’t been back to their house since Sadie’s birthday party, but Sadie knew they were secretly seeing each other. Kurt had been having dinner with “clients” on a weekly basis instead of his usual monthly outing.
The spring night was warm and Sadie had finally finished her homework. She went downstairs to tell her dad goodnight and heard him outside on the phone.
As she got closer, she could see him sitting in the chair by the grill, illuminated by the full moon and a clear starry night.
“I can’t wait to see you again,” he said before hanging up.
Sadie was standing on the other side of the screened door as he went to walk inside.
“Who can’t you wait to see?”
Chapter 9
Dear Sadie,
It’s been 365 days since I’ve been without you, physically. But, Sadie, we both know I’m always with you in your heart. I know today must be difficult, but I can only hope that things are getting better. You made it through an entire year: four seasons, all the holidays, birthdays, sad days, and happy days.
Treasure life, Sadie. I mean stop and listen to the birds sing, pluck a bunch of wild flowers and stick them in a vase on the kitchen table. More importantly, take the time to stop and smell them when you walk by. Watch the sun rise and set now and then, gaze at the stars, and really enjoy and appreciate the color of the trees in the spring and fall. Feel the sun on your face and the harsh winter wind slap at your cheeks.
Laugh as often as you can, at yourself and with your family and friends. Don’t hold grudges; it’s such a waste of time and energy. Be quick to forgive and quicker to forget. Admit your mistakes and learn from them, but don’t hold them against yourself. Dream big and never give up.
Believe ~ In ~ Yourself.
Today may be the anniversary of the day that I died, but I don’t want it to be a day of sadness. Let it be a day for remembering our good times. I’ll start. Remember when we were at the deli at the grocery store and you walked up to a hunched-over, little old lady and started pulling on the hairs growing out of her chin? I was beyond mortified!
You were probably just three and Jayna was a baby. I was ordering lunch meat, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw you being so cute talking with this elderly woman. In reality, you were just intrigued with her inch-long chin hairs. Next thing I know, I see her chin nudge forward and she yelps. You had grabbed onto one little whisker and started pulling it! There were at least five other mothers waiting at the deli, looking at me like I had just allowed you to beat her with her cane.
The sweet old lady looked at me and asked me if she had something on her chin. I didn’t have the heart to tell her, but you did. As the words started coming out of your mouth, my hand flew across it to try and silence you. I had never wanted to disappear more in my entire life!
I was so embarrassed, but I wasn’t sure whether to abandon my cart and run out of the store or to laugh and make a joke out of it.
I threw my turkey in the cart, grabbed your hand, and proceeded to walk away with a smile on my face as you continued to yell, “But Mom, she had long hairs sticking out of her chin.”
Now how can you not laugh at that story?
Remember when I was pregnant with Nicholas and Jayna announced to our waitress that the doctor was going to stick his hand in my privates to get the baby out? I was in mid-drink, and I snorted my lemonade out my nose and clear across our table of food. Our poor waitress, the look on her face!
What about the time we were in Pentwater and I was playing on the monkey bars with you and Jayna and I fell off and I knocked myself out cold? Ranger Rick had to come to my rescue because Dad was off fishing . . . seriously!
Which reminds me of last summer when we were all fishing off the pier and Dad reached back to cast his pole and caught his hook, worm included, on Jayna’s braces. She went ballistic as the worm wiggled on her tongue and Dad kept tugging her head before he realized he’d hooked her wire! Ha! Hilarious!
We’ve had gazillions of laughs together, Sadie. Remember the fun times, keep making them, and keep laughing.
I love you,
Mom
Sadie welcomed the raging thunderstorm; it was fitting for the day. She felt like she had a thunderstorm brewing inside her chest. Every time she looked at the clock, she thought back to the events of her mom’s last day: when they all said their good-byes, when they sat by her bedside and prayed, when Lydia took her last breath, and even when the coroner came and took Lydia from her home.
That had to be the hardest. Knowing her mom would never physically walk through the house again had been, and still was, hard to bear. A year later Sadie could still see her moving around the kitchen, cooking meals, and emptying the dishwasher. She had packed the most amazing lunches: fancy wraps with provolone or goat cheese, marinated mushrooms, and stuffed peppers.
Sadie remembered getting teased about her lunches when she was little, but as she entered middle school, everyone was asking to trade sandwiches. Lydia loved to cook gourmet, and she taught Sadie to appreciate good food.
Lydia had a thing for brownies. She did not make the quick and easy kind out of the box. Ever. Desserts in the Booker house were made from scratch. Her brownies were thick, gooey, and rich, and she always put something in them, whether it was caramel, chunks of chocolate or candy bars, M&Ms, or peanut butter cups.
Sadie had a brownie in her lunch every day since she started kindergarten. Sadie’s grandmother Rose had started the tradition and Lydia had carried it on. Plenty of days Sadie gave them away to her friends; no one could eat a brownie every single day of her life. Sadie hadn’t eaten a brownie in a year; she wasn’t sure if she would ever let another pass her lips.
The one-year anniversary landed on a Friday, so Kurt said they could skip school. At eleven in the morning, they were all moping around in their pajamas. Sadie heard the buzzer on the dryer and went into the laundry room to fold the clothes. Usually she folded the clothes on the counter in the laundry room as she took each piece out of the dryer. Today she filled the laundry basket with the clean clothes and took it out into the kitchen to fold the clothes on the countertop. That was where Lydia had folded laundry.
Nicholas was watching his Cars DVD, and Jayna had the music in her room upstairs cranked. Kurt was in the basement, lifting weights. He dealt with stress by lifting weights and boxing. Sadie could measure his stress level by how long and fiercely her dad pounded the bag. She was hoping he would come get Nicholas and include him in the boxing. She probably should have been playing a game with Nicholas or reading a book to him, bu
t she didn’t have the energy and felt like being alone. So there he sat, comatose in front of a movie.
As Sadie folded the laundry, she thought about the events of the last year. They made it through the holidays and the first day of school. Jayna got her period, and Sadie had to show her how to use a tampon. Last week she took Nicholas’s training wheels off and taught him how to ride a two-wheel bike, and they had all blown out candles on a birthday cake not made by their mother’s hands. Sadie welcomed sweet sixteen, Jayna thirteen, and Nicholas four. Kurt was a forty-four-year-old widower.
Lydia was absent for Jayna’s dance recital, Nicholas started indoor soccer over the winter, and Sadie just made it to the state finals for tennis. Lydia had given Sadie her first racket at age four and taught her how to play. The two of them played tennis together all summer long while Sadie was growing up. She remembered riding their bikes to the high school courts several times a week and, more often than not, stopping for ice cream on their ride back.
Lydia was good about spending individual time with her kids. She and Jayna would dance together in the living room for hours. Jayna was a dancer and took hip hop, ballet, and tap. Lydia also had been a dancer while she was in school. She had one daughter for each of her hobbies.
Sadie felt like Nicholas was really cheated of the special time that his mother would have devoted to him. That was probably why Sadie felt guilty that he was sitting in front of a movie right now. Their mom would have been doing something fun with him.
Kurt was a loving father, but when it came to spending quality time with Nicholas, he sometimes needed a little push. If Sadie suggested something for the two of them to do together, Kurt was always willing, but it didn’t always come naturally.
Sadie put the laundry away and cleaned the bathroom on the main floor. It was a perfect day to go crawl back in bed and sleep the storm and sorrow away, but looking at Nicholas still vegged out in front of the TV made her cringe.
She sat down next to him, and he immediately snuggled up to his big sister. He had always been a little cuddle bug, even still at four. Sadie kissed his forehead, and suddenly tears were streaming down her cheeks. She missed her mom for herself and for him.
Kurt came upstairs and she quickly wiped her tears away. “Go get dressed, you two. We have plans. It’s a surprise. Tell Jayna to get ready too. I’m headed for the shower.”
Nicholas showered with Sadie, and per his request, she gelled his hair. Nicholas was adorable now, but she knew he was going to be even more of a looker when he got older. He had a very unique look to him. Whereas Sadie looked like her dad and Jayna looked like their mom, Nicholas was a mixture at most, but even that was hard to see sometimes.
Sadie caught herself staring at the nose that was definitely his mother’s. He was puckering his lips ever so slightly just as their mom did when she was deep in thought or concentrating on something. Nicholas’s eyes were mesmerizing. They were deep blue, sometimes almost gray-looking, nothing like anyone’s in the family.
Without any idea where their dad was taking them, Sadie dressed Nicholas in a decent pair of cords and a white shirt with dark and light blue stripes. She figured they could at least honor their mom by dressing nicely for the day.
Sadie put on a pair of white skinny jeans that Dylan had drooled over. Even though it was pouring out, it was still spring, and the weather was supposed to do a one eighty this afternoon. She picked out a lavender top she had just bought from Hollister, pulled her hair back in a messy bun, and added her mom’s diamond earrings.
Kurt was waiting for them in the kitchen. He was eating a banana and watching the rain fall outside the window, no doubt thinking of Lydia. Of course, Jayna was still getting ready; it was always a process for her.
“Let’s go, Jay,” Kurt yelled for the fourth time before Jayna walked downstairs.
When Sadie first saw Jayna appear in the kitchen, her gaze quickly turned towards her dad. He, too, recognized the sweater she was wearing. It was Lydia’s favorite Michael Kors cream cashmere sweater that she had worn in the family portraits they had taken soon after she was diagnosed with cancer.
Jayna and Sadie had worn a few of their mother’s things—her everyday jewelry, shoes, some of her tops, things they always did—but this was different. It had meaning. It was like . . . the sweater.
Jayna knew all eyes were on her. Nicholas was oblivious, but Kurt and Sadie were both thinking the same thing—how much Jayna resembled Lydia. She had their mom’s long straight hair, mascara swept her lashes playing her eyes up to an almost exact match of Lydia’s, and she was wearing lipstick, which had to have been their mom’s.
Sadie also noticed how much Jayna had developed. When did that happen? It seemed only yesterday she was flat-chested and gangly. Today she filled out the bust in the sweater almost as much as Lydia had, and when had her legs gotten so long?
Looking past her family, Jayna grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge and headed for the door.
“I guess we’re ready?” Kurt said as they filed out.
Kurt backed the car out of the garage and paused before putting it in drive. “You girls look nice. Mom would have been proud.”
They pulled into Frederik Meijer Gardens, and Sadie felt her heart flutter just like the butterflies they were about to see. Lydia was diligent about always taking trips to the same places every year at the appropriate time or season.
In the spring, they saw the butterflies blooming at the Gardens. Summer meant, of course, the beach, bike rides and picnics, and berry picking at a local farm. They visited their favorite orchard to go on hayrides, pick apples, eat donuts, and drink cider at in the fall. They visited the same pumpkin patch year after year to pick out Halloween pumpkins and gourds.
The last Saturday before Christmas they would bundle up and ride in the horse-drawn carriage through town to look at Christmas lights. Afterward, they would always go out for hot chocolate and dessert. St. Patrick’s Day breakfast always meant green scrambled eggs. Valentine’s dinner included red and white heart-shaped cheese and lobster ravioli. Lydia liked traditions; she was a creature of habit.
Sadie was trying hard to take on some of the smaller rituals that her mother had, such as making green scrambled eggs for breakfast on St. Patrick’s Day and heart-shaped pancakes with red M&Ms for Valentine’s Day. But since their mom died, they had only made it to the pumpkin patch last fall—no carriage rides, no apple picking at the orchard, and no family picnics.
It wasn’t that Kurt didn’t do special things with his kids, because he certainly did, but he was more spontaneous and did things by the seat of his pants, and they weren’t the predictable things his wife had done.
The Booker Family albums contained almost the same pictures and events at the same places year after year. Everyone was just another year older, with different clothes and hairstyles.
As they circled the parking lot, trying to find an empty space, Sadie couldn’t believe that her dad had thought of this adventure on his own. The rain had slowed to a heavy mist, and it was warming up to feel humid. Nicholas insisted that everyone carry umbrellas, so they popped them up and dodged the puddles as they made their way to the door.
Inside, it was a tropical paradise. The glass walls and cathedral ceilings let in plenty of natural light. Everywhere they looked, lush green plants and palm trees flourished. Exotic flowers sprinkled bright red, purple, orange, pink, and yellow colors ubiquitously.
As they walked through the warm garden heaven, butterflies of all colors and patterns swarmed their bodies. Some would land on their arms or heads; others were more timid. Many butterflies were sucking the nectar from the flowers or oranges, and as they did, they ever so slightly fluttered their wings. It was beautiful and peaceful.
Sadie imagined her mother in heaven—peaceful, warm, in a tropical paradise with no pain. She also thought of what she was missing on earth: simple moments like this with her family.
Nicholas was on Kurt’s shoulders and Jayna at
his side. They were looking in a big glass cage filled with cocoons about ready to hatch into butterflies. As Sadie stared at their backs, the sadness suddenly felt excruciating. She didn’t know where she belonged anymore. Was she a kid in this family, or was she her mother’s replacement? Sometimes the burden was overwhelming and it felt sickening.
Kurt turned around and saw Sadie’s blank stare and watery eyes and his face fell. “Should we go?”
“No, I’m okay. I miss her so much, and I can’t help but imagine what our life would be like if she were still alive. Mom loved doing this kind of stuff. It’s just not the same.”
Kurt shook his head and wrapped his arms around his daughter. Jayna turned and walked the other way, as if Sadie was overreacting and embarrassing her.
After the butterfly gardens, they went to Lydia’s favorite French bistro. For dessert, they ordered their mom’s favorite coffee-infused crème brulée, chocolate-filled crêpes, and cream-filled éclairs.
Nicholas kept mentioning that he missed his mom, but these days he clung to Sadie so much that she doubted he really understood the words he said and simply repeated what he was hearing. The deep-hearted longing he felt for her was fading, and Sadie knew that she was everything to him, sister and mom all rolled up in one. Sometimes it was comforting; other times she hated and resented the responsibility.
On the way home, Sadie was busy texting Dylan when Kurt’s cell rang. She sensed his demeanor change as he looked at the number on the screen. He let it go to voicemail and tucked the phone back in his pocket. Sadie didn’t bother to ask who it was. She knew.
~*~
Later that evening, Dylan and Sadie were going to the movies. She told her dad good-bye, and as she was walking through the mudroom, she saw his cell lying on the counter.
She couldn’t help herself. She pressed the recent calls button and, sure enough, saw a seven-digit number with Marissa’s name underneath it. Rage raced through Sadie’s veins as she chucked the phone back on the counter and followed Dylan out, slamming the door behind her.