3. Kendra
Kendra
July twenty-first.
Nothing good comes out of this day. I wish I could skip it, sleep past it every year, put myself into a magical coma, wake up with it being a false reality.
But every single year the twenty-first day of July comes, reminding me of the most painful day of my life, the most haunting truth that rips me apart at my very seams.
This is the day we lost her.
This is the day she cupped my cheek for the last time.
This is the day she warned me was coming for so long, but I had lived in denial.
This is the day my dad and I laid in her bed, each on one side of her frail body, no longer able to fight, and whispered our words of love, affection, and admiration as she finally let go.
This is the day that took my beautiful mother from me, and every year that I have to open my eyes without her I feel thoroughly gutted.
Every year since, my dad, Nana, and I would pack up a picnic, go to my mother’s grave, lay out a full spread of all her favorites, and remember her a little bit extra . . . and all together. Now, however, the tradition falls to me and Pop to uphold, nestled between Mom’s and Nana’s headstones.
It has been six years without Nana.
Fourteen years exactly without Mom as of today.
She was only thirty-four fucking years old.
I am only six years younger than the age she was when she died.
It makes me feel sickness roil through my stomach thinking about it.
Nothing good comes from this day.
I wipe my tears as I finish packing up the basket I need, checking the time—ten thirty a.m. My dad is picking me up soon and we are heading to Fox Grove Cemetery together.
Max Powell is everything a father should be.
He is strength personified in every aspect of life.
When Mom died, he of course grieved right alongside me, but he also did not let us get totally lost in it.
It was the summer after my eighth grade year.
I was so heartbroken, exhausted from the long years of watching my mother suffer with her battle against aggressive breast cancer, and felt like I was unanchored without her.
She was gone, and it was just the two of us.
I didn’t have any siblings, and the only other family we had was Nana.
Pop got both of us into extra therapy right away.
I had already been going every other week for a year leading up to losing Mom.
He never pressured me or pressed to know what I did or said in my sessions, which sometimes was just sob.
My dad built as many safe spaces for me as he possibly could at home but was humble enough to recognize that the peace and comfort that I found here, with Nana, was invaluable.
My parents had me when they were so young; my dad was twenty-one and my mom was twenty.
Pop was a foster kid that wound his way through the system and grew up way too fast because of it.
At eighteen he was out in the real world and on his own, feeling overwhelmed and lost. He met Mom and he said she was his North Star, that she led him right to where he was meant to be.
Nana and Grandpa, before he passed, were their only family.
After Mom died, Nana was a thread to my mother that I desperately clung to.
That is why my dad let me keep coming back summer after summer.
Even though we only lived a few towns away, it felt like stepping into a totally different world.
One where nobody knew who I truly was or my sad history.
I didn’t have to explain things if I didn’t want to and was allowed to be a lighter version of myself that I couldn’t find in my town.
Over time this felt more home than where I was raised by my parents.
So, when Nana gifted me the Fox Grove house in her will, it felt like the most natural thing in the world to give up the small apartment I had been living in closer to Pop, walk through the door of the cabin, and claim it as mine.
I was finally able to breathe in a way I think my nana knew I needed, and she gave me the greatest gift she was able to in her final wishes.
The sharp honk of a horn gets me moving quickly through the kitchen, scooping up the picnic basket, a tattered patchwork quilt that Nana deemed “our grave blanket” in her twisted humor, my sunglasses, and an ironically cheerful bouquet of flowers.
My dad’s old, trusty blue F-150 is idling in the driveway, him behind the worn, black steering wheel. He gives me a crooked, sad smile as I swing the door open on a screech that makes my teeth clench.
“Hey, there she is,” he roughs out, voice already thick with emotion today.
“Hi, Pop.” I lean over and kiss his stubbled cheek.
“Thanks for doin’ the basket.”
“I’m happy to, you know that.” I give him a soft smile as I click my seat belt into place.
He slowly backs out of the drive, clocking the large For Sale sign next door.
“That’s new,” he says nodding at the Savellis’ yard.
“I know,” I tell him with a deep frown. “They told me they are moving to Arizona to be close to Alexander and Lauren . . . They’re having a baby.”
“Oh, Kendra.” He grips my hand. “I’m so sorry. I know how hard that must be for you, for so many reasons.”
“It’ll be okay. I’m happy for all of them, truly.
It’s just going to be a huge adjustment not seeing them all the time.
And I am praying to God that I don’t get a shit neighbor.
” I let go of a watery laugh, looking up to blink away my tears.
It’s too early in the morning for that and not being spilled for the right topic.
Pulling through the iron and stone gates of Fox Grove Cemetery a short time later, it takes us no time at all to find the familiar dark headstones reflecting the bright summer sunlight. Dad takes the picnic basket and my hand as we quietly make our way over.
I fan out the “grave blanket” as he walks up to Mom’s headstone, running his fingers delicately across her carved-out name.
Elizabeth Stella Powell
Loving Wife, Mother & Daughter
As always, I give him privacy as he whispers words to her.
I take my time laying out the food I prepared for today: all of Mom’s favorite things.
Fruit salad with extra strawberries and a drizzle of honey, Nana’s sun tea, turkey club sandwiches, sugar snap peas with hummus for dipping, and oatmeal cookies without raisins.
I don’t know why I bring the snap peas every year, Pop and I hate them and they go untouched.
He settles down next to me on the blanket and uses his warm, rough thumb to swipe the tear rolling down my cheek away.
I wasn’t even aware it had happened, but being here today always has that impact on me.
My eyes wander between my mom’s headstone and my grandmother’s, the weight of the loss of the most important women in my life bearing down on me like a heavy hand that won’t let me open my lungs fully to the fresh summer air.
I let my tears fall and allow the one man that has always been there for me my entire life to hold me the way he always has. Together we laugh, cry, and love each other through the grief that has never gotten lighter, but we learned how to carry anyway.
“I know going every year must be so hard,” Lainey says later that night at Sutton’s, “but I think it’s a really special tradition that you have with your dad.”
Tired of all the tears, I snag a tissue and dab my eyes.
I can’t get them to stop today. Some years are so much harder than others.
Some months, some days, some hours, some minutes.
Grief can sweep in and snuff out all the other emotions, demand your attention, and consume you in a way that makes you feel as if you are suffocating on absolutely nothing at all.
“Thanks,” I manage to whimper out. “My dad is so strong, I don’t know what I would do without him.
Going there any other day feels like a peaceful visit.
Like a place I’m usually drawn to. I even bring the grave blanket, put it between Mom and Nana, lay there and talk to them, or even read a book. This day, it’s just not the same.”
“Of course it’s not.” Sutton grabs my hand, rubbing it gently.
If anyone knows the depths of grief, it’s her.
So fresh, thick, and heavy it rolls off her in waves most days like a fog.
I look down at her forearm, the battle-worn angel wing tattoo with a sword through it, rippling with her movements: a memorial for her late husband.
“I also don’t know what I would do without you girls.”
Our soggy group hug is interrupted by the ringing of Lainey’s phone.
“Hello?” Lainey answers, standing and pacing. “Remington, what’s going on?” She looks at us, eyes going wide, our worry immediate.
Sutton and I grasp hands and scoot closer together on the couch. Rem is a firefighter with Fox Grove Fire Department, so there are plenty of reasons for us to worry about a phone call that causes such a reaction from Lainey.
“A WHAT!” Lainey shrieks.
See . . . Nothing good can come from this day.