We Rip the World Apart

Evelyn Toronto

Evelyn

Toronto

2004

The next morning, Kareela still sleeping, Evelyn knocked on the door of Kingsley’s study. He swiveled in his chair as she entered. “I forgot it was Christmas.”

Kingsley nodded, his expression as unconcerned as if she’d forgotten to pick up milk. Evelyn’s chest expanded and tightened. She fought the urge to scream. To cry. This shouldn’t be all on her. It couldn’t be all on her.

But…she had always been the one to get the kids’ presents.

“I’ll go out tonight,” she said. “After we put up the tree.”

Kingsley nodded again, then turned back to his desk. What are you doing? she silently yelled at his stooped shoulders. School’s out. Why are you staring at that screen? She almost said it aloud but turned away, remembering how he’d collapsed into her arms. His sobs shaking them both.

Later that evening, after they’d played the music, after they’d hauled the tree up from the basement, inserted its branches, pulled out the garland and lights and decorations, Evelyn stepped off the bus in front of Eglinton Square mall. Her stomach clenched, despite the relief of stepping away from her family, from the loud, cheery music that hadn’t done enough to mask the long stretches of silence. Instead, it had emphasized the memories attached to each decoration and highlighted the falseness in Kareela’s smile, the way, so quickly, she’d learned to be delicate with them, as if she didn’t need any delicacy herself. Evelyn had thought Kareela was fine. Was managing, almost too well, in a world without Antony. But had Evelyn simply been blind? Had the horrible, all-consuming pain of loss numbed her to all else? She was doing the bare minimum to keep her daughter alive. To keep her job. To ensure Kingsley was fed—the only thing she could do to aid him in keeping his too.

It wasn’t enough.

She turned, placed her hand on the door, stood for one breath, two, the pain hitting like a hurricane. “Excuse me.” A woman rushed past, opening the door beside Evelyn, and Evelyn stepped back. She turned around, trying to resist the brutal force tearing through her, trying to remember what she was doing here, why. Kareela. She was here for Kareela, who couldn’t wake up to an empty tree. Who, after accidentally dropping one decoration tonight and breaking Rudolph’s antler, had ripped five more from the tree, shattered glass and ceramic spreading across the floor before Kingsley threw his arms around her, stopping her fit with a bear hug, catching her angry fists and then her tears with the breadth of his chest.

In the massive complex, surrounded by stores, and people, too, Evelyn froze, not knowing where to go, what to get.

Pajamas.

The girl definitely needed those. The three-quarter length pair she’d been wearing the other night wouldn’t do, especially as the nights were getting colder.

She headed to a kids’ clothing store, passed her fingers over the racks of animal and princess and multicolored designs, then held up a pale pink set with unicorns boasting purple manes. But the size. She didn’t know her daughter’s size.

Kareela was six. She’d be seven in— Evelyn froze. She was seven. Kareela was seven, as of last month. Evelyn spun, looking for an escape as a wave of torment pressed against her. She tossed the pajamas on the top of the rack, ran to the change rooms, and slammed a door behind her. She crouched to the floor, her hands pressed against the wall as sob after sob erupted. Kareela had lost her brother, and then Evelyn had not only forgotten Christmas, but the girl’s birthday, too.

“Ma’am.” A knock on the door.

She’d forgotten her daughter’s birthday.

“Ma’am? Are you all right?”

“I’m fine!” Evelyn croaked as she turned and pressed her back against the wall, trying to control her sobs, her hitching breaths.

“Ma’am.”

“Just a minute. I’ll be out in just a minute.”

“Can I call someone, or—”

“No!”

Evelyn closed her eyes. She concentrated on breathing. In. Out. In. Antony was gone, and Kareela, could Kareela have forgotten, too? Her own birthday? The year before, she’d talked about her birthday-extravaganza plans a full month in advance. And yet this year, she said nothing. To save her parents? To not put a burden on them?

“Ma’am?”

“Size seven!” Evelyn yelled, the grief like a boa, wrapping itself around her. The shame. “Girls. Five sets of pajamas. Several T-shirts. Short- and long-sleeved. Three or four pairs of pants. A zip-up hoodie. She likes pink and purple. Turquoise, too.”

“Ma’am?”

“And sneakers. Size two. Something with glitter if you have it.”

Silence.

“Take it up to the cash. I’ll be there in a few minutes to pay.”

“Ma’am, are you—”

“Go!”