Two Kisses for Maddy_ A Memoir of Loss & Love - Matthew Logelin [103]
It began slowly. Madeline grabbed the candle, getting a little frosting on her arm. Okay, I thought, maybe she’ll be satisfied with that. But she suddenly tossed it aside and started grabbing fistfuls of cake, like a bank robber trying to pick up the cash spilling from his bag as he fled the scene of the crime. She was squealing with delight as the frosting gushed through her fingers and flew in every direction while she waved her hands with excitement. Within seconds we were both absolutely covered in cake. And for a few minutes, I completely forgot about everything but Madeline’s happiness.
She looked so damn proud of herself after the destruction, and truth be told, I was pretty proud of her, too. To see that smile, and to think just how far we had both come—that was enough.
The food and drinks disappeared and the sun began to set, signaling bedtime for the littlest guests at the party. After everyone was gone, the grandparents were back in their hotel rooms, and Madeline was fast asleep in her crib, I flopped down on my couch and picked up my BlackBerry for the first time in hours. There were two texts from my friend Katie. The first one read, “Buying fish food at Petco right now. Husband cursing your name as we speak. Great party. Thanks for having us.” The second one, also from Katie, one hour and thirty-seven minutes later, said, “Fish is dead. Back to Petco to return food.”
It’s a momentous occasion in any parent’s life when your child makes it through the first year, and now it was finally time to stop counting in weeks and months. My daughter was one year old, but so too was my pain. It was the first time I had thought about things on such a large scale—time had been filled with hours, days, weeks, and months, all counting back to Madeline’s birth and Liz’s death. It wasn’t like I suddenly decided to stop marking time in small increments—before the first year of anything, there’s no other way to count the passage of time. Mondays reminded me just how amazing my life was, and when the sun rose on Tuesdays, I was instantly transported to that twenty-fifth day in March when the only woman I’d ever loved died right in front of me. Each week that passed was excruciating, and each month that I confronted was yet another kick to the balls.
Yes, Maddy and I had made it through a year without Liz. But really, a year is nothing. It felt like such an arbitrary measure, especially when it was used to quantify the time since sadness had entered my life. Of course, it had also been a year since Madeline—and the happiness that only she could bring—had entered my life. I had never ever imagined I would be in the position I was in, and I wished like hell that I would someday wake from some sort of deep coma to find Liz and Madeline sitting next to me, telling me that it had all been an awful dream. But I knew that would never happen. We had officially made it through the worst fucking year of our lives. I took comfort in the fact that Madeline wouldn’t really remember a goddamned thing about it. I wish I could say the same for myself, but I knew I would remember every second of it. But with a year now behind us, maybe—just maybe—we could begin to look to the future.
Restlessness suddenly got the best of me, so I walked back outside, the lights directly below the pitch of the roof illuminating the entire area. I stood in the wet grass, looking at the disaster that was my backyard. Only one thing had been missing from this party.
I closed my eyes and remembered the day we first saw this house, how Liz squeezed my hand and looked at me with eyes that told me that this was the house where we would soon start our family. I remembered the photos I took of her, standing right on those stairs—beaming with the kind of glow that only an expectant mother could have—just days before she would walk out of our house for the very last time. I remembered the look of relief on her face when she saw Madeline for the first and only time. Before I let myself