Jolene sits in the Adirondack chair on her small deck, watching Michael and Carl teaching Lulu how to fly a kite. Betsy and Seth run along behind, laughing, waving their hands in the air. Mila is their adoring, cheering audience. The day smells of kelp steaming on the rocks and charcoal burning down to ash in the barbecue pit.
Every few seconds, someone yells: “Look, Mom!” and she looks up, smiling and waving. It isn’t that she can’t walk along the beach. In her new prosthesis, she can do almost anything—she runs, she skips, she chases after her five-year-old. She even wears shorts and rarely feels self-conscious.
She is here, separate from them, because she has something to do … something she’s been putting off. She can’t do it with them, but neither can she quite do it without them.
Lulu’s giggle floats on the air.
Jolene reaches down for the letter in her lap. Her hand shakes as she picks it up and sees her name in her best friend’s handwriting.
At last. After months of therapy, she is past the time when words can break her. Or, she hopes she is.
She eases the seal open, feels it resist for a second and then give. The letter is written on plain copier paper. She can imagine Tami on that last day before they left, with her clothes piled in a heap on her bed and her duffle bag by the floor. She would have rushed around, looking for something to write on, and probably curse that she’d forgotten to buy stationery. Tami was like that; she remembered all of life’s big things, but the little details had often passed her by.
Jo
If you’re reading this, it didn’t go the way I wanted over there. It’s funny, I never thought I’d die. I pictured you and me lasting forever, sitting on your deck, watching our kids grow up while we managed to stay young. I hope that’s where you are now. In a deck chair, with a fire going in the pit. I hope Michael and Carl are down with the kids on the beach. Is my chair empty beside you?
Jolene looks up, into the clear blue sky. An eagle flies past, dives deeply into the blue water, and comes up with a bright silver salmon in its beak, dripping water on Jolene as it soars to the top of an evergreen.
Don’t be whining about how much you miss me. Of course you miss me. Wherever I am, I miss you, too. But you know all that. From the time we met, we knew everything that mattered about each other, didn’t we? We just knew. I guess that’s what best friends are: parts of each other. So you’ll have that with you, have me with you.
I don’t want to get maudlin. I’m sure you’ve cried enough tears for me to fill the bay. I know I would cry for you.
God, Jo, we had it all, didn’t we? That’s what I’m thinking about now, on a sunny day when I’ve been asked to think about my death.
Here’s what matters: take care of my baby. My Seth. It’s hard to even write his name. My damn pen is shaking. Make sure he knows me. Me. There are bits of me that only you can share. Tell him about my dorky sense of humor, how I used to cry when he hit a baseball in Little League, what dreams I had for him. Make him know that I was more than his mother; I was his champion. Tell him that sometimes when I laugh too hard, I sound like a seal. Help him remember me. That’s my last request of you.
And that you take care of yourself. That, too. Michael loves you and you love him. I hope to shit you haven’t blown that. If you have, I will definitely haunt you.
I know that sadness has stalked you in your life, Jo, from early on. I saw you fight it and win. You always won. But maybe now it’s harder. Maybe you should give in to it just enough. We’re all sad sometimes. I’m sad right now, thinking of you reading this letter. But I want to look down (God—I hope it’s down and not up) and see you flying, running, laughing, living your life to the fullest.
Play without a net, flygirl. Because even from here, I’ve got your six.
Always.
I love you.
T
Jolene folds the letter into thirds and slips it back into the envelope. She knows she will read it a hundred more times in her life. Whenever she needs to remember.
For a brief, beautiful second, she looks in the chair beside her and sees Tami there, her head thrown back, laughing, saying something Jolene can’t quite hear.
“Look, Mom!” Betsy says running up to her. “We found a yellow ribbon on the beach.”
Jolene smiles and rises to her feet. She takes the ribbon in her hand, feeling its satiny softness between her fingers. She can’t help thinking of Tami’s ribbons. Of Smitty’s ribbons. Of yellow ribbons on trees all across the country. To her, yellow will always be the color of good-bye.
“Mom?” Betsy says, looking up at her. “Are you ready to come to the beach yet? We’re waiting.”
Jolene holds up the ribbon, watches it flutter in the breeze; then she loosens her hold on it, lets it fly up into the blue, blue sky. Sunlight blinds her for a moment, swallows the strip of fabric, and takes it away. Good-bye.
“I’m ready,” she says quietly, taking her daughter’s hand.
Smiling, she walks down to the beach to join her family.