Page 87 of What Remains of You
The red-blue flame dances in front of her. She lets it burn until the heat licks at her fingers. She drops the match, and the pages smolder, sending off a stinging odor that reminds Diana of almonds. She lights another match, bringing it to the edge of the folder. The flames jump across. She sees letters—aDhere, aJthere—as the papers curl up into themselves and disappear.
After a last look at the letter Tom wrote, the one he held in his hands and left for her to find, she lights another match and positions it at the letter’s corner. A narrow corkscrew of smoke rises up and out the window. She holds the letter over the sink, the fire closing in on her skin. When she can hold on no longer, she drops the paper, watching it fall into the sink and disintegrate.
Diana shovels the ash into a pile, scooping it onto a paper towel. She gathers up what remains and goes outside.
With her phone’s flashlight, she finds a rusty trowel in a bucket of tools on the corner of the deck and walks across the lawn to the garden. Amid the ever-spreading mint and her temperamental rosebush, she digs. A few inches down, Diana places the ashes.
She reaches into her pocket for Grace’s rock. She rolls it around, running her fingers along its rough surface and pointed end one last time. She places the rock on top of the pile of ashes and sinks both into the ground, her hands settling into the damp dirt.
Diana silently fills the hole, patting the ground with her palms, before standing up to return inside.
The next day, Diana surprises Duncan and Phoebe with a trip to the ocean. The forecast calls for a scorcher, so she wakes them early to get a parking space at Good Harbor Beach before the crowds arrive. The kids tumble into the minivan with sleep still in the corners of their eyes.
They build sandcastles where the waves turn to foam around their feet. At low tide, they wade out to Salt Island in the frigid water, their lips turning blue, Diana holding Phoebe’s hand as they follow Duncan over the rocks. After a short rest on damp towels to eat peanut butter sandwiches, the kids return to the water to try out the boogie boards Diana found in the basement. As Diana stands on the shore, they swim through the chilly Atlantic, Duncan waiting for Phoebe as she works to keep up with him. Afterward, salt still stuck to their skin, they sit outside at a seaside restaurant, eating fried clams and onion rings, ketchup dripping down their chins.
With achingly full bellies, empty plates in front of them, Diana tells her children that when Tom was a teenager, he worked on a horse farm. “Remember when I went up to Vermont? I met the lady who owned the farm. She said your dad even cleaned the horses’ stalls, though I bet he didn’t like that too much. Cleaning wasn’t his thing. Remember how he always left his dirty socks all over the house?”
“I like it when you talk about Daddy,” Phoebe says.
When you speak of me to Duncan and Phoebe, tell them their father was imperfect, but he loved them, and you, more than anything.
“I do, too,” Diana says. “I’m going to be better at telling stories about him.”
Duncan rubs his palm across his eyes. Diana reaches for his other hand and gives it a squeeze. “That work for you, Duncan?”
He nods quickly and beams a smile at Phoebe. “I think we need ice cream. What do you say?”
“A chocolate and vanilla twist with sprinkles,” Phoebe agrees. She looks up at Diana. “Want one, Mama?”
Diana laughs as she pulls a credit card out of her wallet and hands it to Duncan. “I’m too full. I’ll just taste yours.” The kids scramble off the bench. “A small cone is enough!”
As her children weave between the other tables to a window through which teenage waitstaff sell frozen confections, Diana thinks of Ava. Someday, she’ll tell Duncan and Phoebe about their half sister. Perhaps a trip to Maine would be good for all of them.
Thinking of the future inspires her to pull her phone from her shorts pocket and send a text that is long overdue. Camille, she writes,I’m interested in the library director job, and I’d love to talk with you about it.
Camille’s response is instantaneous:About time I heard from you, I’ll send a meeting invite for this week. We have a lot of planning to do.
Diana looks over to the window to find Phoebe’s face obscured by what is most definitely not a small cone. Duncan, holding aloft his equally oversize ice cream, shrugs as if to say,You said large, right?
Diana shakes her head, laughing, and her children’s smiles are so wide and so joyful that her heart aches in response.
Her phone buzzes, and Diana looks down to find a message from Chris, accompanied by a photo of a pile of wood.I’m making a second Adirondack chair for my porch. Should be ready in a week or so. Think you might like to break it in?
Diana swears she can smell sawdust.I’d like that very much, she texts back.
“Mama,” Phoebe says as she approaches their table, Duncan at her heels. “We figured you’d want more than a taste.” She licks melting ice cream from her hand. “Want to share with us?”
“Absolutely,” Diana says. She wraps her arm around her daughter, kissing Phoebe behind her ear, where she smells of the sea, of childhood, and of everything Diana loves most in the world. “There’s nothing I want more.”
