Chapter Forty-One #5
Mrs. Millman rejoins us, carrying a photo of the painting that was, she says, Corby’s inspiration for the mural.
“The artist was Pieter Bruegel the Elder, a Renaissance painter who lived during the sixteenth century. Most of his peers were painting commissioned portraits of courtiers and other prominent people, but Bruegel’s subjects were commoners—peasants at work or play.
This one’s called Landscape with the Fall of Icarus , although the boy’s death is curiously understated.
” When she points to it, I can see what she means.
Maisie butts in to ask her whether this library has any dinosaur books.
“A couple at least,” Mrs. Millman says. “Come with me and we’ll have a look.
Let’s give your mom a little alone time with your father’s painting.
” I don’t know what Dr. Patel has told her, but I think Mrs. Millman gets the gist of why I’m here.
Thinking of Dr. Patel’s advice, I speak softly, privately. “Corby, I’m here. I’ve come to see your mural.” Saying it, rather than just thinking it, somehow seems necessary.
“I feel so moved by what you’ve created.
I can almost see you working on it, bringing it to life day by day, section by section.
” I come closer, focusing on the brushstrokes, following them with the tips of my fingers.
Doing this makes me feel closer to him than I did during those awkward hugs in the visiting room.
“I… I recognize that it’s you in the foreground, looking down from some higher spot at those men floating down the river where we released your ashes this morning.
” I choke up, wait, and then go on. “One of those men in the inner tubes looks like it might be Manny.
… I see Maisie and me on a path that runs alongside the river.
… And Native women and men going about their lives like those peasants in the painting Mrs. Millman said inspired you.
“Oh, there’s Mrs. Millman, wading into the water with Dr. Patel near those three boys who are skipping stones.
When I met with Manny, he gave me a study you did of those boys.
I had it framed and hung it in the hallway between Maisie’s bedroom and mine.
Ours until…” My voice cracks. I reach into my coat pocket and pull out a tissue.
Wipe my eyes, my nose. “I could never bring myself to scatter your ashes until today, Corby, but this morning I was finally able to release you.”
I dread saying the next thing, but why am I here if I don’t?
“Corby, I’m so sorry for your suffering, not only for the horrible way your life was taken from you by the virus, but also for all the ways you suffered having to bear the responsibility for Niko’s death.
” I take another deep breath and will myself to continue.
“The truth is, I bear some of the responsibility for our tragedy, too. I sometimes smelled alcohol on you when you slept next to me. And I knew you were taking more of those pills than you should have been. I wish I’d confronted you instead of telling myself that things would be okay again once you found another job. I wish I had been a better wife.
“In the time you were here, I regret that I only managed to visit you so rarely, and never with Maisie, even though I knew how badly you wanted to see her. During those times when I did come, I would sit across the table from you trying to cope with the confusion of emotions I was feeling: sorrow, anger, despair, love. Please know, Corby, that despite everything that went wrong between us, I never stopped loving you.”
I’m struggling to continue, but I have to face the pain and keep going.
“I’ve thought many times about what I said to you in anger the last time we talked.
When I found out why they weren’t releasing you, I assumed the worst instead of listening to your explanation.
I must have sounded as cold and unforgiving as my mother.
But then last year I received an unexpected letter from Manny and we arranged to meet in person.
He wanted me to know that you had been clean and sober in the almost three years you two had roomed together.
“I was in tears when he told me how horribly you suffered because of those guards and… and how they did something so ugly to you, I can’t even say the word.
Manny said you started taking that prescription to ease your suffering after that happened.
When I learned what the circumstances were, I was finally able to get in touch with your pain instead of just focusing on my own.
Corby, even though it’s too late, I want you to know that I have forgiven you for what happened the day Niko died.
I’m so sorry I withheld that forgiveness from you while you were alive. ”
I hear Maisie and Mrs. Millman somewhere else in the library. Maisie’s enlisted her in the game she sometimes plays with Bryan.
“Triceratops?”
“Herbivore.”
“Correct. Allosaurus?”
“Um, carnivore?”
“Correct.”
“Corby, I need you to know that I’m going to remarry.
Bryan is a carpenter and a kind, good man.
We met at a grief group last year; his wife died from a cerebral hemorrhage, so he understands loss.
They had always wanted a child but could never conceive.
My child with him, a girl, will be born a month and a half from now. ”
“Here’s a hard one. Oviraptor.”
“Let’s see. Carnivore?”
“Nope. Oviraptors were omnivores.”
“Corby, Bryan and Maisie get along well. He’s a good stepfather to her, but you will never be replaced. Sometimes she and I look at photos of you and I tell her about how much we loved each other.
“To this day, I can see you standing there at the door of that student apartment in your baggy yellow sweater, your hair rumpled and disheveled, those tired bags under your beautiful eyes. It makes me teary every single time. Maisie loves that story about your cross-country trip and wants me to tell it over and over. She and I filled a scrapbook with the drawings, notes, and cartoons you sent her and I’ll sometimes see her take it off the shelf and look at it on her own.
I will always help her to keep your memory alive.
Rest in peace, Corby. I love you and I always will. ”
Looking closely at Corby’s depiction of himself from the back, I spot a random bristle from his brush, lodged in his reddish hair where the paint was applied thickly. I pluck it out and hold it between my thumb and index finger. No bigger than an eyelash, it feels to me like a rare treasure.
I’m startled when Maisie, at my side, asks me whom I’m talking to. “Your father,” I tell her.
“Oh. He was a good artist, wasn’t he?”
“Yes, he was.”
“Mom, can you pick me up? I want to see something up at the top.”
I tell her no, sorry. She’s too heavy for me to lift now because of the baby.
From behind us, Mrs. Millman says, “Hold on.” She disappears, then comes back holding a step stool. “Just be careful,” she says.
Maisie climbs the stool to the second-highest step and reaches toward something on the far-right side of the mural—a strange figure I hadn’t noticed.
Butterflies are flying free from what looks like a small, green chrysalis with a child inside.
Oh, it’s Niko! The baby moves inside of me as I watch Maisie reach up, high-fiving the image of her twin. “Hello, boy,” she says.