“Voilà,” he said, waving his hand. I was grateful he was distracted for a few minutes in the house of grief.
“You guys must be hungry,” I said, realizing it was long past dinner time. “Can I make you something?”
“Mom, we should be making you dinner,” Maddy said.
“I’m sorry, I’m just not hungry.”
“Tea, then?”
“Tea would be good.”
But when she brought the steaming cup to me, I couldn’t take a single sip because my stomach was still churning, twisted as if I wouldn’t even be able to swallow without it all coming back up.
We didn’t know what else to do, so I crawled under the blankets on the couch and the kids got into sleeping bags on the air mattress. It was unbearably quiet.
“Wow, Madd, I haven’t slept in the same room as you in forever,” Ian said.
“Feels kinda nice,” Madison replied.
“I remember when you were six, Maddy, and had your own room and Ian was so desperate to be with you—he would wait until you were sleeping, then sneak in his blanket and pillow and sleep on the floor next to your bed.”
“No!” Ian said. “I left my warm bed to sleep on her floor?”
“I kinda remember that,” Maddy said.
“Another time you had a sleepover with your friends, and everyone was in sleeping bags in the living room, and you wouldn’t let Ian sleep down there with you. But in the middle of the night, he brought down his blankets and slept on the kitchen floor, just to feel like he was part of things.”
“OK, even worse! You let me sleep on the cold, hard kitchen floor?”
“I knew you were there, but I didn’t kick you out. Doesn’t that count for something?”
“When you were a baby, Ian, your sister used to climb into your crib to sleep with you. I have pictures of you two somewhere.”
I hadn’t known how uncomfortable the couch was until I was lying down on it. I reached behind my pillow to plump it up and heard something squeak. When I pulled it out, it was one of Penny’s favorite chew toys, a green alligator that squeaked when you pinched its tail. I held the toy to my face and sobbed into it until Madison took it away from me.
“I want it—I want to keep it!”
“I’ll put it someplace safe,” she said, leaving the room.
“I’m so sorry, Mom.” Ian was crying quietly, his shoulders shaking.
“Come down with us, Mom,” Maddy said when she came back to the living room.
So all of us, just the three of us now, lay side by side on the air mattress, holding on to each other for dear life, until the sun went down and darkness set in, obliterating everything but our shared grief.
79
Ian and Maddy were still sleeping early the next morning, so I rolled carefully off the air mattress and stumbled to my feet. I was so light-headed I had to hold on to the wall and make my way into the kitchen. I opened the cabinet and pulled out a mug, but my stomach turned over when I thought of making coffee or brewing tea.
It was a twenty-minute drive to the salon, but when I got there, I realized it wouldn’t be open for another hour. I reclined the seat of my car and closed my eyes, but all I could picture was Pen wearing the little “hug a dog” shirt to stay warm. When I took it off, her fur was always matted down and she shook herself like dogs do after a bath, until her hair stood up, all frizzed out. Then she would look at me as if I’d done her a great indignity by messing her up. She was always such a girly-girl, just like Maddy.
When Madison was in elementary school, she wore her hair long and down her back. She liked it braided, but first I had to work a comb through the snarls. I’d sprayed on detangler until her strands were damp. She’d always complained and pulled away from the comb, making it even more difficult.
“Maddy, all over the world right now there are little girls getting their hair combed by their mothers, and all of them hate it,” I told her. “But when it’s over, their hair looks pretty all day long.”
She’d accepted that, and all too soon, she was doing her own hair. I missed those mornings helping her get ready for school.
I may have dozed a bit in the car. When I opened my eyes, the mall lights were on and I could go in.
“I want it short,” I told the stylist.
It was the same young woman who’d worked miracles on me just a couple of months earlier. Back when I wanted to look fabulous to go out and start dating. I felt so angry at myself now—I’d wasted time on my appearance instead of spending it with Pen. I’d spent hours waiting for replies to my online messages, as if that mattered. I’d cried over men. Over men! My grief now was crushing. This was loss. This was anger at the universe. Everything else was infinitesimal and far, far away.
“How short?” the stylist asked.
“Short short.”
“You have such pretty hair—I hate to see it all go,” she said, pursing her plum-colored lips. “Let’s start off with shoulder-length.”
Still dizzy, I closed my eyes and listened to the shears clipping away. My mind was stuck on replay; all I could picture was Penny waiting for me on the kitchen floor.
When the kids were little, they were both scared at night, even after bedtime stories and checking for monsters in the closet and under beds. I used to rub their backs and sing, but as they grew older and their lives became more complicated, their worries became larger than what was under the bed. I’d
