Chapter Thirty-Seven
Gabe
There was a stillness to the morning I’d always liked. Those few hours of lag between the sun peeking over the clouds and the rest of the world waking when it was too quiet for even my thoughts to interrupt.
This morning’s sunrise was masked with clouds, the ground still damp from the rain. An orange glow had broken through the gray blanket, slowly burning away the veil to let the first glimpses of daylight through.
I watched with the cold stone of my mom’s grave against my back, an early blossom from her rose garden between my fingers.
It had been a late night at the hospital, mostly watching Dad sleep.
The anesthesia had worn off, but it turned out emergency heart surgery did a number on the body.
The doctor assured us it was normal and would likely take a few weeks for his energy to fully recover.
When it was time to leave, I’d driven Evan home in his car.
Neither of us had said much on the drive. The same was true once we got home. I’d hung out in the kitchen until he’d gone to bed in case he needed anything, then I’d gone to bed myself.
After as little sleep as I expected, I’d walked to the cemetery. The towel I sat on protected my jeans from getting wet, but I welcomed the early morning chill. It sharpened things. Reminded me what was real.
My mom’s gravestone behind me.
That my mom was actually dead.
That my dad had almost died too.
All of it felt wrong. Like the world had been flipped upside down and no one else noticed we were walking on the ceiling. If it weren’t for the sharp sting of cold against my cheeks, I’d be sure this was some fucked-up dream. No matter how much time passed, a part of me still expected to wake up.
Yet oddly, being in the hospital yesterday had made the truth of it easier to accept.
Like I was finally walking the steps I’d been meant to take when my mom got sick, and now that they were behind me, I felt closer to her somehow.
Almost as if I’d finally been able to put down enough of the shame I’d been carrying by not being there with her that she could fit her arms around me again.
It was like Aubrey had said—love remained after a person passed. I did believe it. I’d just struggled to feel it with my mom.
Ever since she died, there’d been this distance.
I had memories of her, but her love—the love I’d always, always known from my mom no matter how many miles separated us—felt out of reach.
Like not only did I have to watch the game on TV instead of being in the stands, but then the TV had been locked away in a separate room so all I could hear were muffled sounds.
My dad, Evan, Aubrey—in my head, they were all in the room with the TV, watching the game loud and clear, getting to experience the rush of the plays and the energy of the crowd. None of us got to experience it in person anymore, but I felt like the only one shut out completely.
Why else if not that my mom was mad at me?
Why else if not that I didn’t deserve it?
Yesterday at the hospital, it was like the door had been cracked open. I’d heard the game again. I’d felt her there. And it felt like she was telling me we were okay.
Maybe she had forgiven me. Or maybe she’d never felt there was anything to forgive.
Maybe I was the one who needed to forgive myself.
Here, with her, felt like the place to try.
I couldn’t say how much progress I’d made, but it felt good to sit with her in the quiet. To feel her again, even if it was all in my head.
I told her about London. How I hadn’t minded the weather but had missed good Mexican food. Nothing had come close to the family-owned restaurant in the strip mall here by our house.
I told her about assistant training for Coach Peters.
How I’d worried I’d be too bitter about giving up competing to do it well, but it had given me as much satisfaction, if not more.
How Noah had made the Olympic team, and I might have been happier for him than I ever had been from one of my own victories.
I told her about my ideas for Coach Lou’s gym. How I’d planned to coach Noah when he went pro, and about the amateur and pro rosters I’d wanted to build. The kids’ summer camp I’d envisioned my pro boxers teaching at.
I told her about Aubrey.
How she’d been a light in the darkness for me the first six months after the funeral. Before that, even.
She’d been the one to pick me up from the airport when I’d finally landed in Philly.
My dad and Evan were dealing with the funeral arrangements and things like neighbors stopping by with food, and instead of whisking me away and tossing me into the fray, she’d stood with me in baggage claim long after I’d gotten my bags and hugged me.
The same way she’d hugged me yesterday at the hospital when I’d asked.
No words. No accusations. No attempts to make anything better. She was just there. The ropes for me to fall onto, holding me up. Holding Evan and my dad up too.
Even once I’d run back to London after the funeral, she’d been there. Mostly in brief texts she’d send every so often. Nothing pestering, but enough to know I hadn’t been forgotten.
There’d been one match—my last before retiring—that had been especially rough. I’d blamed my shoulder, but that wasn’t it. Physical therapy had done its job, and physically, I was fine.
Mentally, I’d unraveled.
I retreated to my hotel room, wanting to cry but not able to even do that. So I texted her. Three words I hadn’t felt allowed to admit.
“I miss her.”
With the time difference, I figured she’d be at work and wouldn’t have the chance to reply, but she did right away.
It allowed me to breathe again. And the conversation never stopped.
We didn’t always reply to each other immediately. If I was traveling for one of my fighter’s matches or she was busy with work, we’d go several days between messages, sometimes weeks. But the conversation was always open, reminding me I wasn’t alone. Even when I felt like I should have been.
Her leaving the door open like that was a big part of why I’d been brave enough to come home. Knowing there would be at least one person here who didn’t hate me, myself included.
Seeing her in the kitchen on New Year’s…my nerves had been unreal. When I looked back, the excitement at seeing her wasn’t new. As kids, she had always lifted my mood.
Being around her was like basking in the sun. Being with her…it was like being lit by the sun from within. A burning star that could never be extinguished.
A different kind of warmth filled my chest at the thought of Mom smiling as I talked about Aubrey. I could picture the glint in her eye, like she’d known all along.
Maybe she had. Maybe when she’d boasted to me about Aubrey that Thanksgiving, she’d been planting a seed. I’d never know. Right now, I wasn’t sure it mattered. I still had a job offer on the table from Coach Dotson.
It felt wrong to think about with Dad still in the hospital, but I’d need to decide eventually. Sooner rather than later.
Across the headstone-covered field, another factor in that decision trod down the path toward Mom’s grave. He walked with his hands in his pockets, so much more grown up from the kid he still was in my head. More grown up than me in a lot of ways. It had been especially true these past two years.
Evan’s steps slowed as he reached Mom’s row. He stopped a few feet away, studying her headstone, partially obscured by my torso. “Mind if I join you?”
I scooted over so there was room for him on the towel. He sat beside me with his back against the other half of Mom’s grave.
We’d need to leave for the hospital soon. Hopefully, the rest of Dad’s night had gone well. For now, we stared out at the rows of memorial stones in silence, an easiness in the space between us that had been missing for a while.
Evan picked at a clump of grass by his knee. “This is the first time I’ve been here since the funeral,” he admitted.
That was unexpected. I figured he tagged along for a good number of Dad’s Saturday morning visits.
“I know,” he said, taking in my expression. “You’re not the only one who’s been avoiding shit.”
“What have you been avoiding?”
For me, it had been that Mom was really gone. The longer I’d stayed away, the more it had morphed into shame. Knowing what Evan and Dad must have thought of me and not being able to face it. To face Mom. Or myself.
No way Evan held that shame. He’d been here when both our parents needed him most. Had stood strong when all I could do was crumble.
He peered at the headstone in front of him. “Anger mostly. At Mom.”
“What for?” They’d been on good terms when she died. I was certain of it.
“For dying.” He laughed once under his breath and threw the loose blades of grass. “Can you believe that?”
“Yes.” I’d had moments of anger too. Just another form of the same pain coming to the surface.
“It’s not like she chose to get cancer and die,” he said, still looking out at the cemetery as if he were talking to the graves instead of me.
“But she was supposed to hang on. God, I was so sure she’d beat it.
If anyone could, it’d be her. At the very least, she was supposed to give us more time, but she didn’t.
She was always so strong for everyone else, but when it came time to fight for herself, it felt like she just gave up.
And I know, I know, it’s stupid to feel that way.
I know it’s not what happened. But every time I think of her, I can’t help but wonder why she didn’t fight harder.
Why was she so quick to let go? Why was she okay with leaving us? ”
I had no answer for him. I could only be glad she’d been so at peace with what her life had been that she’d been able to let it go without regrets.
“And then, I left you,” I said, realizing how much that must have stung when he’d already felt abandoned by our mom.
“Yeah.”