Dave sits in silence. He knows I’m right, but he wants someone to blame, and I’m the only place he can turn. He surely can’t blame Lana. He wants to believe we could have done something to change it. Part of me wonders if he actually thinks we could go back and make different decisions and change things. But we can’t. No matter how hard we try, we simply can’t.
Though I would never tell Dave, I do wish I had done more. Done something, anything. Lana and I had had our disagreements, boy, did we ever, but I didn’t want her to die. No mother wants to bury their child; it’s supposed to be the other way around. If I could change things, I would, in a minute. But we have to live with our decisions.
The hospital solidifies everything. The doctor tells us that Lana could not have been saved, no matter what we had tried. It was too late. She had hanged herself sometime between two and three in the morning, her neck snapping instantly. She didn’t suffer, the doctor says, as though that could offer us comfort.
Our daughter, who could have had such a promising life ahead of her, is dead. It doesn’t make it better to know she didn’t suffer. Nor does it make it better to realize that she and I will no longer have to endure her apparently horrible life. She won’t have to wish to die anymore, pray not to wake up in the morning. She is gone. And we don’t want her to be gone, because no matter how bad things got, and how often I may have disapproved of her choices, I never lost hope that one day things would click and she would be okay. We would all be okay.
Maybe she’s in heaven and happier, but here on earth, without her, we are not. Her pain may be gone, but she has left us in so much. I think after some time, I’ll be healed enough to live a relatively normal life, but looking at Dave, his face pale, with a look of total desperation and depression, shoulders hunched—I don’t think he’ll ever be the same. This scares me. I lost my daughter, and now I’ve lost my husband too. Dave is an empty shell, his spirit vanished right along with Lana. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. I haven’t really had Dave in a long time. He was always in the palm of Lana’s hand.
“I’m going to order an autopsy,” the doctor tells us.
My jaw drops.
“That’s not necessary, Doctor. She killed herself; can’t you see that? I don’t want my baby all cut up.” I’m raising my voice. I don’t mean to, but the thought of scalpels and bone saws and tests—it’s not happening. Not to Lana.
“I’m sure the medical examiner will rule it a suicide, but she was a young, attractive woman, and I want to be sure nothing more was going on.”
“She was young and attractive, so that means she must not have killed herself?”
“You can take it up with my supervisor if you have an issue; otherwise, my decision is final.”
I’m about to protest further and ask for the name of the person in charge of this entire hospital when Dave opens his mouth.
“Can I see her?” Dave asks the doctor.
“Yes, yes, of course,” he says.
Walking to the room where her body is located feels like an out-of-body experience. The whole hospital is cold and busy, full of suffering people. At least they’re still alive.
Once we arrive at the room, Dave puts his hands on the window and looks in, a lost puppy dog begging for its owner to come back. The doctor opens the door and I watch as Dave rushes in, grabbing Lana’s hand tightly in both of his. He kisses it and cries. He kisses her cheek and cries harder. He’s talking to her, but I can’t hear what he’s saying.
He looks up, and waves me in, as if he’s just noticed I’m not by his side. I don’t want to go in. I saw her body. I touched it. I can say good-bye to her without being in the room.
Dave waves me in again. He’s not going to take no for an answer, but I hold my ground. We all grieve in our own way, and Dave is going to have to learn that sooner rather than later. After a few more moments of Dave sobbing and looking adoringly at Lana, he comes out.
“You want some time alone with her,” he says. “I understand.”
This is not true, but I find I can’t say that out loud, so I go in.
“Hi,” I say to my daughter, trying to break the awkward silence that can’t ever be broken. “I wish things weren’t like this. We were trying. We did the best we could, you know. I don’t know what else you wanted from us. I’m sorry.”
I walk right up to her body and touch her hand. I run my fingers over a bruise on her arm. I wonder silently where she got it, knowing she was always running into one thing or another, rarely without a bruise someplace. I wonder if the doctor noticed it.
“Bye,” I say, and walk out of the room to Dave, his arms open, waiting to embrace me.
I don’t much feel like a hug at the moment. It’s not like it’s going to solve anything—we’re not going to heal each other with a touch—but there’s no avoiding it, so I fall into his arms like a dead fish, my body weight fully on his. He stumbles but manages to hold me up. It’s kind of nice to be held, supported, loved. I’m so
