Louisville Magazine

NOV 2012

Louisville Magazine is Louisville's city magazine, covering Louisville people, lifestyles, politics, sports, restaurants, entertainment and homes. Includes a monthly calendar of events.

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what gives Him the right? Mostly, though, I'm angry with myself. I should have been with you when it happened. I should have tried harder. I should have loved you more. I savagely tug the drawer out of its socket and shove it across the floor. For good mea- sure. It groans as it scuffs the hardwood, trav- eling perhaps two feet before thudding to a lethargic stop. I barely notice; I am already up, fumbling towards the bathroom. My face in the mirror is old and puffy; traces of gray trickle into my scalp, and laugh lines sag into parentheses around my mouth. I was beautiful, once. Today, though, at 1:40 in the morning on a second Friday in Sep- tember, there's no one to be beautiful for. Bargaining — Lucy, the daughter Hi, God. How are you? I'm fine. I don't like the idea of being buried when I die. What if it rains so hard that the water seconds after I walked in. My dad's lifeless body in a case, wrapped in a suit, eyes shut- ting everything out — I couldn't. Te truth is, God, there are so many things I wish I could have said. Te "should-haves" stack neatly on top of each other, pile up to the roof of this church. I wish I had hugged him more. I wish I had said yes when he asked me to help him make banana bread two Fridays ago. I wish the last thing I said to him was not "Tis is my life, too," in a love- less voice before I drove over to Sara's. I was angry at him for making me get a tutor, God. I should have said, "I love you." I feel tainted and stained and so, so ashamed, as I watch them lower the box of what used to be my father into the ground. I don't deserve to stand here, in the arms of a shivering mother, amid a hundred innocent well-wishers in black. I wish I could tell him how sorry I am. I wish I could make this all go away. It's funny that the primary bond combining the three of us is now, so conspicuously — gone. I can almost feel his absence — a vacuum that his kindness and charisma and laughter would usually inhabit — gnawing away at my living room. sweeps the earth away? What if an ocean falls from the sky and pounds the dirt, melts it un- til there's nothing left but soggy roots and a crisp, dead coffin? I hate coffins, too. A neat, shiny little box to house your dead bodies. I don't think I would want that. My dad was a great man. One of my best friends. He had gentle brown hair and a buoy- ant laugh just like mine. One shade deeper. He would steal my mom's apron whenever he cooked dinner, and every Saturday morning he would tell me a riddle over breakfast. He was always calm — which matters, because I was always frantic. I'm even more frantic now, without him. Dear God, I don't really believe in you. But I would give anything to have him back — my health, my hair, my happiness. Anything. I don't believe in you, God, but I've prayed more to you in the last three days than I have in my entire life. I'm praying for my father back — the father I shouldn't have lost. Not at sixteen. Not ever. Te burial feels damp in the trickly sun. After, we all go inside for tears and laughs and his favorite sandwiches — watercress with to- matoes. A celebration of life, Grandma calls it. (You might already know this. You're sup- posed to be all-knowing, right?) Today is at least better than the wake last night. I had friends there — Ryan, Erica, Hyeon-Ah and Sara in a circle at the door, waiting for me with that same look of strong, crushing sym- pathy. I can't take that look anymore. I left [82] LOUISVILLE MAGAZINE 11.12 Hi, God. If I do better, if I start to believe in you . . . can I wake up tomorrow and real- ize this was all a dream? Depression — James, the best friend Two weeks after the funeral, Alice and Amelia come to visit the loft. I haven't been answer- ing her calls, Alice says. I'm family too, she says. Te visit takes me completely by surprise; I scramble in a long-legged frenzy to clear off the coffee table and rag-strewn couch so that they can sit. Once, I would have been em- barrassed by the mess, but apathy has a way of inhibiting embarrassment. A diffuse cloud of empty and still seizes you, torments you with its thorough lack of feeling. Suddenly, you couldn't give a damn if visitors think your home is a dingy wreck, replete with abandon- ment. Suddenly, you embrace the fact that it is what it is. Amelia seems to he doing better than she was when I last saw her — waving a stoic goodbye as my cab backed out of the drive- way. Her mouth is more relaxed and her eyes gleam with open sadness. I'm glad she's not holding it back anymore. Alice seems the same. I brew some Earl Gray, microwaving the mugs rather than boiling a kettle like I would have done a month ago. As the two women in front of me sip their tea, I try to summon a smile. I don't want them to worry. I startle myself with how much I used to care about their warm words and laugh- ing eyes. Tey helped pick out the raspberry ganache cake at my wedding, sent Will over with lasagna after the divorce. Alice was there at my high school graduation, burying her tears in Richard's sports coat (Richard was still alive) as Will and I switched our golden tassels. It's funny that the primary bond com- bining the three of us is now, so conspicu- ously — gone. I can almost feel his absence — a vacuum that his kindness and charisma and laughter would usually inhabit — gnaw- ing away at my living room. Pain was never really something I feared when I was younger. Had my mother not stopped me, I would have plunged directly into the army after high school. I antici- pated the sting of muscles, the grating of skin against stone. Tat's what life was, I'd thought. Tat was the kind of hurt I was pre- pared to take. Bones mend; wounds heal over. As I learned later, that has nothing to do with pain. Pain is holding the widow of your best friend in your arms as she lets out a shat- tering scream in a hospital waiting room. Pain is watching the slender silhouette of a wife and partner walking resolutely out the door, suitcase in tow. Pain is feeling your life move sluggishly past its peak, watching it dwindle downwards. Pain is feeling all the reasons to go on slide listlessly out of your grasp. Teir stay is painfully long. My back aches from sitting up so forcefully, and my teeth nearly shudder as I continue to force my smile. As Amelia finally gets up to leave, she crosses to the shades and slips them open. Sunlight pours into the loft like a ghost, and she smiles at me weakly. "Don't forget to keep living," she tells me on her way out, her hand sitting comfortingly on the small of Alice's back. As the door thuds shut, I return to the living room. Te sheets of sunshine revel in their new freedom, alighting on the couch, illuminating air particles, glorifying them in gold. It's disconcerting. Tree weeks ago, my life was still sad. I was still living off ramen noodles and Gala apples, a freshly divorced 43-year-old whose youth had slipped away unnoticed. But three weeks ago, my life didn't know pain, or helplessness. Not like this. Death had not yet occurred to me. As it turns out, death does not wait to be acknowledged. I snap down the shades once more, and the sunlight ceases to dance. Acceptance — Alice, the mother "Yes, I have a son, Roger. I had . . . well, my other son, William, passed away last Septem- ber." I look my new acquaintance squarely in the face as I speak. It's better this way, I've found, to say it outright. No averted eyes, withdrawn half-smiles. I hesitate to say that abruptness eases the pain — I wonder if any-

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