Loss

The thunder wakes me on the day of your funeral. It is the kind of thunder that shakes the house, the kind of lightning you can see with your eyes closed, the kind of storm that makes my daughter run into my bed. It is too early but we all go downstairs in the darkness, the rain and wind thrashing through the trees. You were never known for your patience.

Downstairs, my black dress hangs from the molding. My husband pressed it for me the night before with the iron we had borrowed from the neighbors. Ours is apparently broken.

I got to see you one last time. This time I knew it was goodbye. We made the trip after school, my children wanting to see you too. I brought a small bouquet of dahlias and zinnias and my favorite yellow snapdragon. You had changed so much from when we last saw you, but you were awake when we arrived and awake when we left.

Other family members were there: my mom and aunts to care for you and those who wanted to say goodbye. My aunts gave my children fruit snacks and lifesavers and they crawled around the couch and floor. Your white carpet had bits of leaves and dirt and you managed to tell us all to shut the front door one last time.

You told me you loved me when I left and I looked into your bright blue eyes. There could never really be enough time to say goodbye, never enough words to tell you how I felt. 

After we left, my children got Happy Meals and they swam in my parents’ pool until dark, the cool September air keeping me firmly on the patio. We put them in their pajamas, their hair wet and dripping when they got into the car. The moon shone through ripples of clouds.

I was in the waiting room at the eye doctor the following Monday when I saw two missed calls from my parents. That was when I knew you were gone.

“Katie?” I heard a voice say from behind me.

I stuffed down my grief and went into the exam room.

Now, the rain falls in sheets as we make the drive to the church. It is a drive deeply rooted in my childhood and I peer through the rain, looking at the familiar hills and the winding stream that I loved as a child. 

Your casket is draped in the American flag and I recognize the pipe organ from my parents’ wedding photos. I read an essay that I wrote less than a week before you died. I worry that my voice will break, worry that my anxiety will find me, but my words are strong. It is only at the last hymn that I cry.

The sky clears at the cemetery. We can’t bury you because of the heavy rains but we visit your gravestone after the ceremony, my heels sinking into the earth.

After, we eat and drink and toast to a life well-lived. My son eats five pieces of bread and my daughter helps herself to the buffet. There is cake and Italian cookies and family that I haven’t seen in such a long time.

The ride home is calm, a stark contrast from the morning. I am tired but the exhaustion hasn’t caught up with me yet. My children play in the backseat, the Frozen soundtrack fills the car, and in the sky there is a rainbow.