The Art of Saying Goodbye - Ellyn Bache [103]
“The girls helped me write it.”
“I knew they must have. It was perfect.” She squeezes his hand even as someone else comes up to claim him. When she turns, she comes face-to-face with Brynne, who must have trailed her through the room—and who is, she realizes, the one she came here to see.
“Your dad says you helped write the obituary,” she says.
“Do you think she would have liked it?”
“She would have been very proud of you. Very touched.”
“Thanks.” The girl’s eyes are swollen, but her face is as composed and implacable as the moon.
Julianne has tried to be strong for Brynne. She contained the tears she wanted to shed, at least while they were together. The one time she finally broke down, it wasn’t until Brynne went home. This was during the first of Paisley’s itching, when Brynne brought over a jar of skin cream she hoped would help, a pure and unexpected luxury the child surely couldn’t afford—this was what made her cry.
Now Julianne fears for her. She thinks the word orphan, though that’s not strictly true. Motherless, then. Fourteen, and a whole life to face. “I hope you’ll still drop by sometimes,” she says, aware that Brynne won’t, but not wanting to shut off the possibility.
She hopes the girl is tougher than she looks.
On the morning of the funeral, Andrea is in the spare bedroom ironing her dress when Courtney shuffles in, still wearing the shabby sweatpants and old flannel shirt she sleeps in. Her fuzzy hair is all over the place, stiff from gel but shapeless, as if she’s tossed her way through a night of bad dreams.
“We’re leaving in an hour,” Andrea says. “I want you to eat something and then get dressed.” She speaks in the precise, clipped tone she’s used ever since their confrontation over the tattoo. She used it when she explained that she would pick up Courtney from school early in order to keep an appointment with a doctor who removes dye from the skin. She used it to explain that this might be the first of several visits. If necessary, they’ll continue the treatments in California after they move, until the offending ring of tattooed stars is gone.
In the doctor’s office, Courtney leafed through a magazine in the waiting room, then endured the procedure with the silent stoicism she’d perfected when she was a cancer patient of three. Andrea was spared the dull, sinking feeling that usually accompanied her daughter’s medical treatments. She could have watched a spinal tap or lumbar puncture without flinching. The flame of anger that had burned ever since she found Courtney slumped drunkenly on the lawn had not abated. It hasn’t abated now.
“I’m sick,” Courtney says, hugging herself into the oversize shirt.
“You’re not sick.” Andrea keeps her tone cool, though it’s true Courtney is pale. “Even if you were sick, you’d have to go to this funeral. It isn’t optional.”
“I have cramps.”
Courtney does not have cramps. She never has cramps. “If you were twenty-five years old with a new job, would you call in sick just because you had cramps?” Andrea lifts the dress from the ironing board and shakes it out.
“You’re wearing that frumpy thing?”
“Yes. I told you.” It’s a perfectly respectable navy blue sheath.
“Well, don’t wear it to my funeral.”
Andrea struggles for clarity against the band that begins to tighten around her chest. “I don’t plan to be at your funeral. I plan to be in the ground in Mount Olive cemetery, lying peacefully next to Dad, where by that time both of us have been resting for many years.”
“The best-laid plans of mice and men,” Courtney says.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“. . . oft do go awry.”
“I guess I should be gratified to hear you quoting poetry.”
“Robert Browning,” Courtney says defiantly.
“Robert Burns,” Andrea corrects.
“Yeah. Well. You never know who’s going to be in that cemetery.”
“No. You never do.” With effort, Andrea moves to the closet, arranges her dress on a hanger, hooks it over the door.
“Anything can happen.”
“We’ve had this discussion. We can have it again if you want to, but not now.”
Courtney’s lip begins to tremble.