Christmas is only a week away and it seems that everyone has already moved on.
Well, everyone except me.
It seems hard to believe that my mother died only one year ago around this time. Unlike the rest of my family, I remember the day quite clearly. It had been a cold winter; ice crystals encased bare branches. The sound of limbs giving way under the piled ice and snow crackled overhead every few minutes.
As usual, I was sitting behind the parking lot of my school taking a smoke break during biology. My friend Naomi came to find me once class let out. Since I was only ever out back or taking a nap in my beat up Dodge, her search was always short.
“You know Mrs. Perdue’s going to call your mom again if you keep skipping bio, right?” Naomi gave me an awkward smirk paired with raised eyebrows.
I shrugged her off as I always had, but really I was dreading facing my mother because of how she was. My father was never much of a disciplinarian and I think after a few too many arguments he had just given up on me. But my mother, she isn’t–wasn’t–a screamer when it came to me getting in trouble but I hated it just the same. She would just stare past me and then fix her gaze on me with eyes that were reproachful, but so full of disappointment.
I could feel my cell buzzing as school let out and knew it was my mom. I was anxious about talking to her and even my phone’s vibrating felt angry, so I ignored the call.
I avoided my house for a few hours and wandered around at the mall before I found my way to Matt’s place. According to my parents, my boyfriend Matt was just another in a long list of mistakes I had made in the last few years. My parents weren’t wrong, but at least Matt was quiet and didn’t judge me.
Matt was high as usual, with a half-empty measuring copy of vodka next to him. After some sloppy making out, Matt stared into the distance with glassy eyes that were devoid of any coherent thoughts and I took that as my cue to leave. It must have been around five when I got home and, even then, I hesitated to turn the key.
I wish I hadn’t.
It was in the early evening roughly a year ago that I found my mother on the floor of our living room, eyes lifeless and the phone in her hand; the last call to me.
The neighbors brought condolences accompanied with casseroles and everyone at my school had adopted a sappy look paired with a slight tilt of the head. I couldn’t understand why sympathy came with weird physical ticks and bland one-dish meals.
I thought, if anything, Naomi would be able to understand me. But she took to rubbing my shoulders or knee when she tried to express herself and that just pissed me off. I didn’t stay out late anymore and was always home on time. But that didn’t help, because I was alone until Dad came home from work around ten.
He would smile at me with half-hearted weights around the corners of his mouth. I’ve seen how he can never bring himself to look directly at me. I didn’t talk to my Dad much before Mom died. After, we’ve said even fewer words, but I try to understand him and help where I can.
Once I made dinner, roasted chicken with wild rice and chickpeas with a side of steamed broccoli and homemade lemonade. I’m not sure what possessed me to do that, but I did and I left the light on in the kitchen so he knew it was there. When I came down in the morning, I saw the food still sitting, cold and missing one chicken leg, which my dog had absconded with.
I told Naomi about it the next day and she tried to rationalize my father’s actions.
“Maybe he didn’t go in the kitchen. I mean, he may not have seen it,” she said.
But when I had looked at the untouched food I saw a few pudding snacks and an empty bowl in the sink that I didn’t leave there. I didn’t tell Naomi.
A year and I still didn’t know what to feel about this void that seemed to crawl out of my chest slowly but violently. My dad just continues going to work and coming home, but what am I supposed to do?
I went to school and started doing my homework again, and even the biology teacher started praising me in class. None of that helps… I feel more isolated than ever.
It is in history class that I have my meltdown. We are reading about the advent of radio and the day the Titanic hit the glacier. As we read, I can’t get the movie out of my head. The sounds disappear into a fog and all I can see is my teacher speaking wordlessly as if in a dream.
I am so entranced in my daydream that I don’t realize the deep bite I have dug into my lip. I can see my teacher’s face melting and shaping like malleable clay into the face of my mother, complete with that eternal disappointment she had for me right up through the end.
It isn’t until the salt of my bloodied lip seeps onto my tongue that I realize my teacher has been shaking me to break me out of my self-loathing trance.
And then the tears start.
When my father comes to the guidance counselor’s office, he has my mother’s look of disappointment on his face, though it is different on his rough features. The counselor excuses himself to give us privacy, though I send a mental plea for him to stay that goes unanswered.
My father, a burly man with big blue eyes and dusty gray hair sits sadly before me. Then he surprises me, looking at me directly.
I look back into his eyes, which well up with tears as he reaches a hand out to mine.
He holds my hand and I squeeze tightly.
I cry for what feels like forever as I sniffle and choke on the mucous caught in my throat.
“I just miss her,” I manage to say.
And he whispers, “Me too, baby.”
When we pull away from our grieving embrace, he looks at me without a smile but full of warmth. He kisses my forehead.
I don’t know what things will be like this Christmas without my mother and without knowing how she felt about me, but I have my father. And I know, from the way he looks at me, that I am loved.