Lost (16 page)

Our wedding was simple. We got married
in the park near Brian’s parents’ house and moved into the run-down townhouse
that we bought. I had a little bit of money from an insurance policy my father
had, and Brian’s parents helped us with the rest of the down payment.

Brian did most
of the work on the house. He updated the electrical wiring, the plumbing, and
even installed hardwood flooring on the tiny first level. He sanded our old
kitchen cabinets and painted them. And then he took pictures, put together a
portfolio, and used it to get his first job—remodeling his parents’ neighbor’s
basement. And then things just took off.

I worked and
took care of Sam, who I had legally adopted at that point. Our lives were full,
we were happy, and when I found out I was pregnant with Carey, Brian
immediately hired his old friend, Joe, to be his foreman—not quite the reaction
I expected!

My pregnancy
with Carey was uneventful. Sam, who was three at that point, was thrilled with
the idea of a new baby. He would come with me to Walmart or Target and help me
find little things for the nursery.

About 18 months
after Carey was born and when I was about 3 months pregnant with Jimmy, Brian
suggested we look for something bigger. I admit that I was sad. The townhouse
was our first home, but as Brian pointed out, we were outgrowing it. I gave my
two week notice at work, and while searching for our new home, we sold our
townhouse to a young couple—much like us—that had just gotten married. Since
Brian didn’t like the idea of a community, he proposed building us a house and
figured we could live with his parents until the house was done. I greatly
opposed that plan, and so he gave in and bought me our home on Placket Street.

We spent 13 perfect years in our house
on Placket Street... together.

We brought
Jimmy home from the hospital to the house. I got pregnant with the girls there.
I nursed four kids and my husband through the chickenpox in the house. Yes. All
five at the same time. Only Sam, who had gotten them when he was 4, and I
escaped. We celebrated birthdays and anniversaries there. Sam’s graduation and
the death of Brian’s parents. The house had seen so much love and so many
tears. It even saw me lay my husband to rest way too early.

I was grateful
that only a few of our closest friends came over to the house after the
funeral. They understood my grief—my shock—and comforted all of us during it.
Joe, who later bought the company, brought his wife and their little girl, and
he played with Jessie and Maggie until they both fell asleep. Anthony took
Jimmy and Carey outside and just sat with them—later Sam joined them. Ben took
care of all the funeral arrangements for me, and then saw that the flowers were
donated to a nursing home afterwards.

And Amy and
Bee—they were my rocks. Anthony set up a cot in my bedroom, and the two of them
took turns staying with me at night for those first few weeks. Sometimes they
would both stay. If one of the kids—especially the girls—woke up crying, they
were the ones that comforted them those first few night. And when I couldn’t
sleep, they sat with me and held my hand.

Bee even
coordinated a casserole drive as she called it, and I don’t think I cooked for
at least three months following Brian’s death.

They helped me
get it together as the months went by, and at the moment I felt like my heart
was breaking all over again. Sam was in his first serious relationship—with our
dear friends’ daughter! I wished he had Brian around to talk to about dating,
relationships, women—heck, even sex. I wished that he was around to experience
first love all over again, by seeing it with Sam and Karie. And I prayed that I
would be able to channel him in some way and give Sam the advice he needed.

But I was also
feeling something shift in me. I was feeling an acceptance—a realization that
it was okay to smile again, to laugh. And it was time.

I called Bee
and Amy that night and that was all I had to say—“It’s time.”

“Are you sure?”
Amy asked.

“I am.”

Amy nodded.
“Okay, you let us know when.”

“We’re there,”
Bee said.

I wanted to
take the kids on a vacation, but I wanted it to be more than that. I wanted it
to be the start of us reclaiming our lives and moving forward without Brian
there to catch us. Now, it would just be the kids and I. Well... and our
friends.

We had taken a
cruise with Ben, Amy, Bee, Anthony, and Ant two years ago and absolutely loved
it. Ant, Jimmy, and Carey were in one room, and Sam was in another room with
the girls. Brian had surprised me by upgrading our small interior room to a
balcony. One night we were sitting on it and talking.

“This is
perfect.
This
is what I worked so hard to give you guys,” he told me as
he kissed my neck.

I settled into
him and said nothing. He was right. It was perfect.

“If something
happens to me, cremate me. Because I want my ashes spread here.” And he pointed
to the dark water below us.

Despite the
gloomy thought, I nodded and agreed that such a send-off was a wonderful idea.

But then I let
him down. I couldn’t bring myself to cremate him. Instead, Ben helped me pick
out a lovely stone to mark the place where they lowered my husband’s body into
the ground. I needed him there—somewhere I could be with him.

But
symbolically, we could still let him go, and that’s what we were going to do.

I got on the phone with the travel agent
we used to book the first cruise. I explained to her what we wanted, and she
said she would handle it. She even offered to call Bee and Amy after she got
everything situated.

“Oh, but
Janice... I just need two rooms this time, not three,” I reminded her.

“I know,” she
said softly, and then told me she would take care of everything.

And she did! 45
minutes later she called me back. She told me that Bee, Anthony, Ant, and Karie
were booked, and so were Amy and Ben. She had two rooms for us—an interior for
the boys and a balcony for the girls and I right across the hallway. Four rooms
booked for everyone. We were leaving in 10 days.

“KIDS!” I screamed up the stairs.

“Damn, Mom.
You’re loud,” Carey muttered running down the stairs.

I flicked his
ear and told him to watch his mouth. Obviously, he got his mouth from Brian.

When all the
kids were with me in the living room, I told them to sit. They sat, and I
began.

“Okay. We
talked about a vacation right.”

They nodded,
and a few of them grunted.

“We’re going on
a cruise,” I said with a slight excitement. “The same one we went on two years
ago with Dad.”

No one said
anything. Only the girls looked excited.

Finally Sam
spoke up. “Lot of good memories.”

I nodded and
looked at him, happy that he got it. “Exactly! Look, one night Dad and I were
talking. He said if something happened to him, we should cremate him and
scatter his ashes in the ocean.”

“But you didn’t
cremate him, Mom,” Jimmy reminded me.

I held up my
hands. “I know. I know... I couldn’t. And that’s on me. But I still want to do
something to honor him and to remind all of us that it’s okay to move on. I
know a part of each of us died with your Dad, and we’ll hold that in our hearts
forever. And that’s okay,” I reassured all of them. “It is. But it’s also okay
to let go of some of the pain and move forward. And that’s what we’re gonna
do.”

“I couldn’t let
your Dad go. That was selfish of me, but I wanted him here—where I could go and
be with him. I needed that, and I think Dad would understand. But this...” I
pointed to a family photo that was taken right before we boarded the ship on
our first cruise. Ben had taken it with Brian’s digital camera, and I just got
it printed at Walmart a few days ago. “This is something we can let go of. The
idea that it’s all of us or nothing. Dad is gone, and we have to hold on to the
good times, but we can’t live with a ghost. Do you understand?”

The girls
didn’t and looked at me blankly, but the boys all nodded.

“It’s symbolic.
I get it, Mom,” Sam told me.

“Yeah,” Jimmy
offered.

Carey filled
in, “I like it, Mom. Dad will always be with us... in our hearts. But it isn’t
the seven of us anymore, and we’ll need to accept that.”

I got up and
hugged him. “That’s exactly it.”

I let him go and
sat back down. “I know Dad would want that. I want us all to remember him. Your
father was a wonderful man. He wasn’t perfect—”

“Daddy always
told us, ‘Mommy’s not perfect, but she’s perfect for me!’” Jessie chimed in,
pleased she remembered.

“Exactly! I
used to tell your Dad the same thing. He wasn’t perfect, but he was perfect for
me. And that’s how I will remember him. If you guys remember something funny
Dad said or did, talk about it. If you think of a funny story or have a dream
about him, tell us. Never be afraid to talk about Dad. And if we cry, we cry.
We’re still healing, guys, but we’re getting there. And I promise you, I know
in my heart that is just what Dad would want.”

The boys were
looking at one another and nodding, and the girls sat quietly on the rug.

“You know what
I think of when I think of Dad?” Jimmy asked everyone.

“What?” Sam
said.

“I remember
that last day with Homer. Dad was so gentle with him when he picked him up and
put him in the car. And Dad cried with me when he brought him home and gave me
the urn the next day.”

“Did Dad tell
you about the dog, Mom?” Maggie asked.

“What dog?” The
girls were still learning how to share information.

“One time, Dad
took us out for ice cream, and he saw a car in front of us hit a dog,” Maggie began.

“Oh yeah!”
Jessie jumped in, as they often do with each other. “The guy that didn’t stop.
Dad said a bad word and stopped the car. He pulled over and got out of the
car.”

“Yeah,” Maggie
continued. “He covered the dog with his coat so we wouldn’t see and took it to
the vet Homer went to.”

“Was that Dad’s
yellow work coat?” I asked the girls.

“Yeah, that old
one with all the paint on it!” Maggie replied.

“I always
wondered what happened to that coat, but he never said anything.”

“That’s how Dad
was,” Sam said, sliding off the chair he had been sitting in to sit with the
girls on the floor. Then he added, “I used to like watching Mom and Dad dance.”

“
What
?”
All the kids asked with puzzled expressions.

“Yeah. When we
first moved here, and Dad was redoing the floors in this room, he and Mom would
dance at night. You know Dad always listened to music when he worked, right?”

Brian would
blast rock music, hip hop, rap, or whatever would keep his blood pumping to get
the job done.

“Mom and Dad
would what? Headbang?” Jimmy teased.

“Nope. When he
thought we were in bed, he’d put on slow music and call Mom out of the kitchen.
He’d always ask her the same thing.” Sam looked up at me, wanting me to answer.

“Hey, sexy
lady. May I have this dance?” I smiled and let the tears fall.

The kids all
laughed—no doubt because they could hear their father saying those exact words
to me.

“And I would
always say, ‘Nope. Too busy!’” I teased.

“No you
didn’t!” Jessie laughed with me.

“I did! Every
time. And then your father would come and pick me up and twirl me around and
around until I got dizzy.”

“Did Dad do
that, Sam?” Jessie asked him.

“Every time,”
Sam answered and one tear fell as he smiled at me.

“Carey?” I
turned to my son. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah. I was
just thinking about Dad teaching Sam to drive,” Carey said sadly.

I know how
badly he wished Brian could have taken him out those last few months before he
got his license. Instead, Sam and I tried our best to fill in. I moved to sit
next to him and took his hand.

“You know, I’m
glad I tagged along a few times when Dad took Sam out,” Carey continued. “Then
when Sam was teaching me to drive a stick shift, I heard Dad in my head. I
remembered what he would tell Sam.”

“That’s right!
You did come along.” Sam remembered as well.

“Some of the
things you told me were exactly what I remember Dad telling you. Word for
word,” Carey told Sam.

“I learned from
the best.”

“Yes. You did,”
I agreed. “We all did.”

The next 10 days were filled with
planning, filling out travel documents, and phone calls.

“Mom? It’s
Carey.” I heard when I answered my phone.

“Yes, Honey. I
know. What’s up?” It was his third phone call of the day.

“When are we
leaving again? I need to ask Mr. Carideo for time off.”

I had offered
to call Tommy, but Carey said he would take care of it.

“It’s his job,
Julie. His responsibility.” I heard Brian’s voice in my head and dropped it.

“Mom?” Carey
called to me on the phone.

“Oh, sorry. We
are leaving on July 7th, and will be back on the 14th. Write it down this time.”

“7th to the
14th... got it!” He parroted back to me. “Okay. I close tonight, Mom, so I’ll
be late.”

“Okay. Be
careful with my van!” I said quickly as he was hanging up. I could only hope he
heard me.

It was nice to
relax. Everyone already had passports, so that was taken care of. I had already
filled out all the paperwork we needed to for traveling. The boys could take
care of their own packing, and I would help the girls pack. So I was sitting in
my favorite chair, drinking a glass of iced tea, and catching up on my
celebrity gossip.

“MOMMY!” I
heard one of the girls bellow from upstairs.
Guess
People
will have
to wait.

I got up and
just walked up the stairs. As I was walking into their room, Jessie came
running out and again screamed, “MOMMY!”

“I am
right
here!”
Sheesh, I think my ears were ringing. “What’s the matter?”

Jessie looked
so upset.

“Maggie, did
you do something to your sister?” I asked my other daughter, who was smirking
on her bed.

“I didn’t do
anything. She’s freaking out about her bathing suit.”

I took a deep
breath. Jessie is just like her Aunt Amy—she loves fashion. In fact, Amy is
usually the one to take Jessie shopping for her “first day of school” outfits.
Jessie couldn’t wait to wear high heels and makeup, and her beautiful long hair
has always been her pride and joy. I do my best to keep up with her, but I
often fall short.

“Okay. What’s
the problem?”

“Well, first of
all, I can’t find my pink suit. I think Mags took it.”

Maggie hated
that nickname and protested, “I did not! Do you really think I would wear a
pink suit, Mom?”

Maggie was more
like me, a semi-tomboy. She was always careful to look her best. Her best just
didn’t usually include dresses and sandals like her twin.

“She’s lying,
Mom! I need my pink suit!” Jessie looked like she was about to start crying. I
was supposed to be reading about Kanye and Kim or Prince William and Kate!

“You know what?
Carey and Sam are at work, and Jimmy’s out with friends, so why don’t the three
of us run to Target and see if we can get you gals some new suits? I want to
get some sunblock anyway.”

Jessie said my
proposal was acceptable as she shot Maggie the evil eye. Maggie shrugged and
asked if she could pick out a new book.