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Authors: Lavyrle Spencer
Tags: Fiction
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gonna take me and my friends out to Valley Fair next week. Like that's all that mattered to me, you know what I mean?"
She flexed her right arm and curled him closer.
"Oh, Joey, have you been worrying about that all this time?"
"Well, it must've sounded pretty selfish."
"No, no, Joey honey--don't you worry about it. It was just a human reaction, that's all. It's hard to believe news like this, and when it comes we simply . . . well, we express our disbelief.
You know how it is--we go along day by day taking our routine for granted and all of a sudden something like this happens and we think of the most common things and say, Gosh, how can it be true when the person we lost left unfinished business?" I remember when your dad died I kept saying, But we were going to go on a trip to Florida together." And today when Christopher came and told me the news I kept blubbering about Greg not having fixed the end of my garden hose yet.
So you see, I did the same thing as you. When we hear that someone we love has just died, we don't think, we just react, so don't worry about it."
Janice said, "Wanna know what I thought about all the way home on the plane?"
"What?"
"About how much I'd been cheated out of when Greg died, because he'll never get married and have kids and have a wife who'll be my sister-in-law, and how awful Christmas is going to be from now on, and that my birthdays will never be the same without him there."
"I think every one of us had those thoughts today."
They lay awhile, studying the faint night-light that picked out shadowed objects in the room--moonbeams through a curtain, the bulky presence of furniture, the dresser mirror reflecting the blue-black expanse before it.
Lee's arms were growing numb. She took them from beneath her children but kept Janice and Joey close to her sides. "Now I'll tell you what I thought--several times today. And when it happened I felt so terrible . . . so . . . well, let me tell you.
In the midst of all the planning and the telephoning and people coming and going I'd catch myself thinking, Did anybody call Greg yet?" And then it would strike me Greg's dead. He won't be coming. And I'd feel so strange and terribly guilty that I could have forgotten he'd died, that he was the reason for all the commotion."
Janice admitted, "The same thing happened to me."
Joey said, "Me too."
They took comfort from the fact that once again they'd apparently pinpointed a human reaction, then Janice whispered timorously, "Nothing's ever going to be the same."
Her mother replied, "No, that's for sure. But we owe it to ourselves to keep our lives full and good and as happy as possible, in spite of Greg's absence. It's what I had to tell myself a thousand times after Daddy died, and it got me through.
When things start to get you down I want you to think of that.
Your happiness is imperative, and you must work hard at having it."
In time they grew drowsy. They each slept sporadically, tossing frequently, ultimately, they made it through the first night without Greg.
In the morning they forced themselves to do the things they must: bathe, eat, answer the phone . . . again . . . and again . . .
and again. Between the incoming calls, Lee made one of her own, to Lloyd.
"Hello, dear," she said. "It's Lee."
"Little one. It's good to hear your voice, shaky as it is."
"I need to ask you a favor, Lloyd."
"Sure, anything."
"Will you come with me to the funeral director's this morning?"
"Of course I will."
"I don't want to put the kids through that. Sylvia would have come and so would my folks, but I'd rather be with you."
"That's the nicest thing you could have said to an old man at this hour of the morning. What time should I pick you up?"
With Lloyd at her side she felt a sense of calm once again, as if Bill were there with her. Dear, kind Lloyd, the eye in the middle of the storm--how grateful she was to have him in her life.
She had dealt with Walter Dewey before and knew what to
She flexed her right arm and curled him closer.
"Oh, Joey, have you been worrying about that all this time?"
"Well, it must've sounded pretty selfish."
"No, no, Joey honey--don't you worry about it. It was just a human reaction, that's all. It's hard to believe news like this, and when it comes we simply . . . well, we express our disbelief.
You know how it is--we go along day by day taking our routine for granted and all of a sudden something like this happens and we think of the most common things and say, Gosh, how can it be true when the person we lost left unfinished business?" I remember when your dad died I kept saying, But we were going to go on a trip to Florida together." And today when Christopher came and told me the news I kept blubbering about Greg not having fixed the end of my garden hose yet.
So you see, I did the same thing as you. When we hear that someone we love has just died, we don't think, we just react, so don't worry about it."
Janice said, "Wanna know what I thought about all the way home on the plane?"
"What?"
"About how much I'd been cheated out of when Greg died, because he'll never get married and have kids and have a wife who'll be my sister-in-law, and how awful Christmas is going to be from now on, and that my birthdays will never be the same without him there."
"I think every one of us had those thoughts today."
They lay awhile, studying the faint night-light that picked out shadowed objects in the room--moonbeams through a curtain, the bulky presence of furniture, the dresser mirror reflecting the blue-black expanse before it.
Lee's arms were growing numb. She took them from beneath her children but kept Janice and Joey close to her sides. "Now I'll tell you what I thought--several times today. And when it happened I felt so terrible . . . so . . . well, let me tell you.
In the midst of all the planning and the telephoning and people coming and going I'd catch myself thinking, Did anybody call Greg yet?" And then it would strike me Greg's dead. He won't be coming. And I'd feel so strange and terribly guilty that I could have forgotten he'd died, that he was the reason for all the commotion."
Janice admitted, "The same thing happened to me."
Joey said, "Me too."
They took comfort from the fact that once again they'd apparently pinpointed a human reaction, then Janice whispered timorously, "Nothing's ever going to be the same."
Her mother replied, "No, that's for sure. But we owe it to ourselves to keep our lives full and good and as happy as possible, in spite of Greg's absence. It's what I had to tell myself a thousand times after Daddy died, and it got me through.
When things start to get you down I want you to think of that.
Your happiness is imperative, and you must work hard at having it."
In time they grew drowsy. They each slept sporadically, tossing frequently, ultimately, they made it through the first night without Greg.
In the morning they forced themselves to do the things they must: bathe, eat, answer the phone . . . again . . . and again . . .
and again. Between the incoming calls, Lee made one of her own, to Lloyd.
"Hello, dear," she said. "It's Lee."
"Little one. It's good to hear your voice, shaky as it is."
"I need to ask you a favor, Lloyd."
"Sure, anything."
"Will you come with me to the funeral director's this morning?"
"Of course I will."
"I don't want to put the kids through that. Sylvia would have come and so would my folks, but I'd rather be with you."
"That's the nicest thing you could have said to an old man at this hour of the morning. What time should I pick you up?"
With Lloyd at her side she felt a sense of calm once again, as if Bill were there with her. Dear, kind Lloyd, the eye in the middle of the storm--how grateful she was to have him in her life.
She had dealt with Walter Dewey before and knew what to
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