Page 114 of My Heart Still Beats
She takes my hand. “I’m so sorry for your loss.”
“Thank you.”
I repeat that conversation—or a variation thereof—so many times I lose count.
In the meantime, parishioners, guests, friends, and relatives nosh on the feast my aunt prepared. I love my aunt’s cooking—she makes the best enchiladas—but my stomach is a void.
I’ve been forcing myself to eat bland things all week—oatmeal, rice with a sprinkle of salt, plain pasta with butter.
Even my staples of bacon and Ben & Jerry’s haven’t sounded good to me since Da died.
I didn’t get to say goodbye.
I didn’t get to hold his hand and tell him I love him.
“He knew,” Mom has assured me.
I know he knew, and I know he’s been worried about me since the Garrett situation.
He never approved of my leaving the church, of course, but still he loved me, was devoted to me.
I’ve tried looking up to the heavens to talk to him—to tell him that I’m okay—but it feels all wrong.
We were a traditional Catholic household, and my father was definitely the head of the family. My mother never worked outside the home except to volunteer for school and church activities.
Will she have to get a job now?
So many unanswered questions that we haven’t even allowed ourselves to think about because we’re mourning.
I haven’t brought these issues up with my mother, but I’m wondering… Will I have to move back in with her? Help her make ends meet?
I’ll do it if I have to.
The old Tessa? Man, would she have balked at that.
This Tessa, though… This Tessa will do her duty. Do what she has to do to take care of her mother. It will be my penance for not being here to say goodbye to my father.
I know better than to think that way, of course. I was in Jamaica with Braden and Skye, celebrating their impending nuptials. I’m Skye’s best friend, and that is where I was supposed to be. Plus, my father had no history of heart issues. We had no idea he might have a massive coronary and not make it.
He was strong and fit, though my mother’s Mexican fare was filled with dairy and meat fat.
All these thoughts go through my head as the same words come out of my mouth again and again.
Thank you for being here. I appreciate you being here. Yes, he was a wonderful father.
When the receiving line has finally dwindled down, I rise and turn to my mother. “I’ve got to get out of here for a minute.”
My mother nods. “Go ahead, Tessa. You too, Eva. Uncle Josh and I have got this.”
My mother is so strong. Her husband—her life mate—was taken from her, but she’s concerned about me.
My mother and father had their share of knock-down drag-outs over the years, but they had one rule. Never go to bed angry. Not once in the entire time I lived with them do I remember them not sleeping together in the same bed.
And they never did go to bed angry.
Even when they were up until the wee hours of the morning—as Da used to say—they would find some common ground, and then they would go to bed.
I look around my house. Remnants of Nana are still here, her figurines of the Blessed Mother and her crucifix.
