I mindlessly scroll through Facebook, Instagram, Twitter. I see your friends. I think of you.
I kiss and hug and say love you and have a good day to Mike and Iris as they head out the door for school, leaving me alone to get myself together. The house is quiet. I think of you.
Sometimes I get back in bed for a few minutes. I think about how I should go to the gym. In some sort of delusional state back in November, I paid for a yearlong membership and have only gone twice. I don’t want to go to the gym. I scroll through Facebook, Instagram, Twitter again or answer some emails or pay some bills or do some writing. I make breakfast, usually two eggs and Ezekiel toast. Sometimes, I make a Greek yogurt–fruit-nut bowl thing and think about how you once proclaimed that “all white girls like Greek yogurt.”
I shower, stand in my closet, and hate that most of my pants no longer fit. I put something on. I spray some stuff in my hair and scrunch it. I pour my coffee, start the car, turn on a podcast, and drive the eight minutes to work. I turn off the car, linger for a moment, take a deep breath, think of you, and try to prepare myself for the students and the parents and the emails and the lesson plans and the ungraded papers and the letters of recommendation that all wait for me on the other side of the car door. I don’t know how to do it anymore. Or maybe I don’t want to do it anymore. Or maybe I don’t want to do anything anymore. It’s hard to tell what’s real and what’s grief.
The day happens. It takes energy. I mostly want chocolate.
I get back in the car at four o’clock, turn the podcast back on, drive the ten minutes to Iris’s school. I think of you.
When I walk through her classroom door, Iris smiles with all of her teeth, which have little spaces in between them like her daddy had when he was her age. She runs hard into my arms. It’s a legitimate, daily high. It’s a thing I need to keep doing all of these days. We drive home listening to Toddler Tunes on Pandora and calling out all the red lights and green lights along the way. I think this is impressive. I think everything she does is impressive. I think of you.
We pull into the driveway. Iris insists on climbing into the driver’s seat. “I drive the car!” She orders me to sit in the back seat. “Seat belt on, Mommy!” This is both adorable and maddening. I watch her press every single button in my car ten times in a row and wait for something to break. I think about how I’ll have to drive out to the fucking dealership in the suburbs. Or Mike will do it. Of course, Mike will do it. He does it all. I think of Mike. I think of what a raw deal he’s gotten. I need to be more present in our marriage, I think. I must be the world’s worst wife. Unpleasant. Detached. Disconnected—emotionally and physically. I try to remember the last time we had sex. It’s been so fucking long; I can’t. Please God let him still love me if I ever crawl out of this hole.
Iris continues to play with the hazard lights. I’m impatient and want a snack and eventually peel her out of the car by bribing her with television.
I cobble together some semblance of dinner—pasta, so much pasta—while she pulls at my shirt and gets out her little metal stepladder to “help” and narrates the TV show and sporadically cries about something the dog did.
We sit down around six. I complain to Mike that I can’t eat like this anymore. I long for vegetables but it takes so much work. Iris starts melting down. Depending on the degree of the day’s highs and lows, I can sometimes talk her through her feelings calmly and lovingly, assuring her it’s okay to be mad and sad. I can offer her hugs and give her pots and pans to bang on as an alternative. Other times, my head falls into my hands or onto the table, I grumble and wait for Mike to intervene. On darker days, I lose my patience and walk away from her completely, leaving her alone and screaming for mommy. I hate myself in these moments. I hate myself in lots of moments.
After dinner, we bathe her, make some jokes, play some hide and seek, put on some pajamas, read many books. I think of you. I tell her goodnight, she tells me to go drink apple juice, and Mike puts her to bed.
At this point, I usually collapse into my own bed. Occasionally, I fall asleep. Mostly, Mike and I binge-watch something and tune out the world. I think of you.
I scroll through Facebook, Instagram, Twitter again. I post yet another picture of Iris. I think of you.
Around 11:30, I take 5 mg of Ambien. (Or, lately, 7.5 mg, sometimes 10.) I stole the bottle from your medicine cabinet when we were cleaning out your house. I figured I would need it. I think of you.
The house is quiet. I do some writing. I think of you. I kiss Mike good night and lie there in the dark and eventually fall asleep and wake up too
