Page 59 of To Save Him

 

 

 

Chapter Nineteen

 

“SO WHAT HAVE we got here?”  Brandon looked down at the assortment of plastic bins, cardboard boxes, and black garbage bags I’d placed on Gabriel’s bed.

“These,” I said, pointing to the bins, “are for things I should keep—things like trophies, yearbooks, anything I can’t bear to part with.”  I paused, because I could already feel emotion threatening to choke my throat.  “The boxes and bags are for anything I can give up for donation—either to one of the thrift stores in town or the homeless shelter.”

“Did you want to save any of Gabe’s clothes for JR?”

I’d considered it, but JR didn’t feel right about it.  Neither did I.  I couldn’t even offer them to Brandon—I knew in my heart I needed to let some things go.  The night before, I’d had Annabel and JR go into Gabriel’s room to pick out mementos of their brother—and I put no stipulations on it.  Whatever they wanted—and I didn’t need to know what it was.  It was a personal thing, and I hoped whatever they chose was something that helped them remember their older brother and would remind them of their love for him for their lifetime—that, whatever it was, they could simply touch it or look at it and be transported back to a time and place where they could cherish him.

So I didn’t want to know what they chose, although telling me would have been okay, but they didn’t.  I think they could see the pain carved in my face at the mere prospect of taking down the shrine I’d let their brother’s room become.  They knew just as I how unhealthy my treatment of that room had been.  It was like a wound on my body I’d been babying—except it had been a psychic wound I’d ignored.  Rather than cry, I’d pretend things were normal—and leaving his room untouched helped me do that to a degree.

But with Brandon, maybe I could do what I needed to.

The kids were in school that day, and I knew it was better that way.  I was likely going to have fits of crying and mourning, and it was better that they not see it.

I answered Brandon’s question.  “No.  I had the kids pick out something of their brother’s last night to remember him by.  I…don’t think I’m strong enough to have daily reminders of him like that.”

“Oh.  Yeah.”

And then I felt like an asshole.  “If, um, you come across something of Gabriel’s that you want to keep as a memento, just let me know.”

His face was somber but calm.  “All this was before I knew him.”

I smiled then.  “Yes, mostly.  He did come home during furloughs—but who knows what we’ll find?”  Just that thought pained my heart once more and I knew I needed to take the plunge.  “Guess we should get started.”

“What do you want me to do?”

As difficult as it was going to be, I wanted to go through the things that would likely be most personal—although Brandon might want to do that too.  “Uh, maybe I should start small, start with the things I know we’re not going to keep—like clothes.”

He nodded and then pulled me into his arms so that my face rested against his chest. How had he known how badly my heart ached for my son?  It was then that I allowed myself to give in to my utter misery and I sobbed for a few minutes uncontrollably.  My heart was sending out a message to my son, that letting go of his earthly possessions did not mean he would be stricken from my heart, did not mean that he didn’t matter, that his life was not worth nothing.  It didn’t mean I would forget him, and my mind raced over his life—that first time I fed him rice cereal and how more of the mush wound up running down his chin than in his mouth, how I had to scoop it off with a spoon before trying again…and how his deep blue eyes communicated not just love but trust and curiosity about the world.  And then I remembered him at three, when he was still an only child and we were living in a smaller home in town.  He’d been playing out back and scraped his knee.  Cleaning it up and putting on the bandage hadn’t consoled him at all, but when I kissed my index finger and pressed it to his “booboo,” telling him that mama’s love would “make it all better,” he’d grinned and wrapped his tiny arms around my neck and then returned to pushing his cars through the dirt.  The days rushed through my mind—his first day of kindergarten and howI’dcried at letting my baby go; becoming pregnant with Annabel and having my son excited to finally have a sibling on the way; his first day of middle school, of high school; his anger at his father’s abandonment; the way he took over trying to help raise his little brother—teaching JR how to “pee like a boy,” something his mother couldn’t do.  His first girlfriend.  Overhearing him talking to one of his friends about his girlfriends.  Sending him off to the Marines.  Seeing him in uniform for the first time.  Viewing my son as the man he’d become.

And that life had been ripped away all too soon.

My only solace was that my oldest son had lived life to its fullest.  Out of anyone I’d ever known in my life, Gabriel was the one who’d taken thecarpe diemmaxim to heart.  And if Gabriel was the epitome of embracing life, I was the opposite, sleeping with death.  This act—cleaning out his room—was a symbol of letting go so that I too could live my life.  I knew it would be what Gabriel would have wanted…and what my living children needed.

WhatIneeded.

So I pulled in a jagged breath, then another, and pulled back from Brandon a bit.  I sniffed, bringing my hand up to my nose and eyes to wipe away the moisture, although poor Brandon’s shirt had taken the worst of it.  “Sorry,” I said—for what, I wasn’t sure.  There was so much to apologize for and yet I knew he would never expect that.

He rested a finger under my chin and I looked in his eyes.  He might have seemed so young in his overall appearance but in his eyes I could see the wisdom and understanding of ages.  And those eyes told me it was all okay.  He kissed me lightly on the lips.  “We’ll start whenever you’re ready.”

I sucked down another breath and nodded.  Taking the first step would be the hardest.  So I walked over to the closet and pulled down a dress shirt.  As I folded it only the way a mother would, the tears began to pour again like a faucet—and I let them.

But I kept folding.  And I placed the shirt in a bag before turning around to pull another shirt off a hanger.

Letting the tears rain down.

 

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