I look through the window of your car
a week after you went missing, no hope
of seeing you there.
The patience of the hardware store owner
dwindles with the police’s efforts to
organize search parties.
Flowers in the altar around your bumper
stretch into the adjacent spaces,
wilt in the autumn sun.
I come here every day after school
to tell you what you missed, no hope
of hearing your voice.
The saddest people to lay bouquets,
the same ones who bullied you
seven months ago.
They tell stories of how you joked around,
then repost some hotlines and hashtags on
their Instagram stories.
I only remember their faces
contorted in laughter after
calling you a slur.
The sun sets earlier each day.
I feel its growing shadow, no hope
of seeing you again.
Tag: Grief
Three Assemblies in November
I.
The Friday
after a presidential election,
the school gathers in the gym.
There’s a speech, then
the concert band performs the Armed Forces Medley.
As tradition,
they invite veterans from the community to attend,
parade through the gym behind a banner
as their branch’s theme plays.
You only see
the empty spaces where people should be.
II.
The Friday
after the next presidential election,
a different school gathers in Teams meeting.
There’s a speech, then
the yearbook advisor plays a slideshow set to the Armed Forces Medley.
As tradition,
they invite students and staff to submit pictures and bios of veterans in their families,
honor them as integral parts of the community
as their branch’s theme plays.
You only see
the empty spaces where people should be.
III.
The Friday
after a third presidential election,
the school gathers in the gym.
There’s a speech, then
the concert band performs the Armed Forces Medley.
As tradition,
they invite veterans from the community to attend,
stand up to be recognized
as their branch’s theme plays.
You only see
the empty spaces where people should be.
Up here, it’s a haunted house
“‘… up here’ –she gestured to her head– ‘it’s a haunted house.’” – Gabrielle Zevin, Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow.
We flew across the country to bury your ashes by your eldest daughter's plot. There was a barbecue in your niece's backyard that week, where your extended family — our extended family, I guess — gathered to see each other and share their memories of you. It was a sunny day, mid-July; I was exhausted. I took a nap on a loveseat in the empty living room. Like you had done during family gatherings when you were alive. Water is boiling in an electric kettle on top of a file cabinet behind my desk. I pour it into a mug covered with titles of commonly banned books. I dig a teabag out of the drawer of the cabinet I emptied of files and filled with tea, coffee grounds, and snacks. I dunk the teabag in the water, watch the brown cloud stretch, grow. Steam sways like a wind chime's mallet in an autumnal flurry. Every few minutes, you remind me to take a sip, so I don't have to microwave it like you needed to near the end. When I was in elementary school, I walked to your house when the school day ended. It was a cold, dark winter. I watched cartoons while working on math homework — simple multiplication, I think. You made me hot cocoa by microwaving a mug of milk, squirting in chocolate syrup, and twirling whipped cream on top. Did you add a cherry? Did you keep a jar of maraschino cherries in your fridge? I don't remember. One of my students asks me to see their choir concert. I put it in my calendar to make sure I can attend. I arrive early, park in the same spot I left two hours earlier. I sit in the room where students ate lunch six hours earlier. They have a solo during the final song. My heart is full, my eyes teary. This must be a fraction of what you felt during my concerts. You tell me to help put chairs away when the concert ends. I tell them how proud I am of them and their performance. They introduce me to their family. You tell me how proud you are of me as I drive home. It was spring. My mother, your younger daughter, buried some of your ashes along the edge of her yard which overlooks a small creek (which exists when it rains for a day or two). You are split between two sides of a continent; flowers bloom around your name every year.
A Mutual Aching to Leave
Each section is based on the Oxford English Dictionary’s word of the day from March, 2022.
I. cardiffian, n.
I start my day watching river water flow into the bay.
II. barley sugar, n.
A candy shop by the footbridge switches its sign from closed to open. The display case filled with fudge, hard candies my mom would like. I consider buying them, before remembering she’s gone.
III. beastie, n.
A dog walks by that looks like hers. No matter how far I travel, I cannot escape her memory.
IV. interrrobang, n.
I keep landing on inconsequential memories, not ones with thematic resonance or impactful consequences. Why do I keep thinking about the time her tea kettle vibrated on the element, her worried exclamation asking me what I did, her laugh afterward scolding herself for jumping to conclusions?
V. toyetic, adj.
I used to run across the house barefoot on Saturday mornings to beat her to the tv so I could watch cartoons. She’d bring me breakfast, which I’d absent-mindedly ignore while children would command small monsters to attack each other.
VI. kente, n.
I head back to my hotel; wrap her urn in a cloth made by her best friend, gifted at her memorial back home; place it in my backpack to take her on a Dr. Who walking tour — something she asked for in the hospital.
VII. anythingarian, n.
As I walk from landmark to landmark, I debate what to do with her ashes. She told me many different ideas, locations, never settling.
VIII. chipmunk, n. and adj.
During a break for lunch, a chipmunk approaches my table outside the cafe, looks me dead in the eye. I see her. In those eyes. It’s like she’s sending me a message.
IX. bandulu, n. and adj.
A voice emits from the eyes. “Rialto Beach. Scatter me on the rocky shore.” I open the permit application when I get back to my hotel, but the letters blur, the boxes checker. I book a flight back home. I’ll just go the coast and do the thing.
X. zombocalypse, n.
People walk around the airport like packages on a conveyor belt. I sit alone by my gate in an uncomfortable pleather chair when someone walks toward me, sits in the seat right next to me. It is my mother.
XI. cuddy wifter, n.
A notepad appears on her lap, a pen in her left hand. She draws quick lines to make feathers of a great blue heron standing in a still pond. “I want so much to be at peace.” Her voice a tired drawl.
XII. amaxophobia, n.
The ceiling dings. An announcement about my flight boarding soon. “I can’t believe you flew my ashes across the planet. You know I hate flying.” “You said you wanted to see the places in Dr. Who. And it was a walking tour.” “You can’t believe everything a dying woman tells you.”
XIII. bassa-bassa, n.
The ceiling dings. My boarding group is called. She stands before I do, stomps her feet, yells at me for putting her through this. People walk through her as she screams.
XIV. belove, n.
She continues to guilt me as I walk through the skybridge, down the aisle to my seat near the back of the plane. I’m sure she will go on for the whole ten hours until we land in Seattle. I will do whatever is needed to give her peace. It’s what a son should do.
XV. overshare, v.
My guilt is immense. Guilt about making her travel; guilt if I hadn't traveled in the first place. There is no winning. My guilt is immense.
XVI. utopiate, n.
My ZzzQuil kicks in somewhere over the Atlantic; I fall asleep. My feet bare, toes dug into the edge of sand pulled under by the surf. Soft wind, quiet roar, the sun behind a pale canvas of clouds.
XVII. flaithulach, adj.
The last time my mom saw the coast — winter — a last escape before chemo kept her homebound. She stood on driftwood logs, arms wide, a deep breath of salty air. Ocean spray or tears, I’m unsure.
XVIII. powfagged, adj.
An overhead announcement of our imminent arrival in Seattle wakes me. My eyes struggle open. My mom's voice crescendos as blurs transition into shapes. She scolds me for falling asleep while she was talking.
XIX. credentialism, n.
Baggage claim, she draws me in a graduation robe, holding a diploma cover. “I wish I could have seen it.” “Me too.” “You shouldn’t have taken that semester off.” “I had to. You are more important than a piece of paper.” “I was dying. That ‘piece of paper’ would have been your key to a successful future.”
XX. bestiary, n.
I wait for my Uber in the parking garage. Midmorning, the smell of concrete and gasoline. Five Subarus drive by ten people and one ghost waiting for their getaways. A blue Prius pulls up. The driver leans their purple hair out of the window to announce my name. They offer to help with my suitcase, but I decline, placing it in the backseat, until my mom mutters under her breath. I put it in the trunk.
XXI. wych elm, n.
The driver makes small talk while my mom complains about how everything’s changed. They stop the car just past the driveway under the tree in our front yard whose branches leave a fluctuating pattern on the hood. I transfer luggage from their car to mine while my mom taps her foot, stares at the mailboxes down the road.
XXII. free solo, n.
I take 512 to I-5 to 101 for a beat, route 8 to 12, then back to 101, but clockwise, along the coast — the sun sinks into the pacific. She watches it all in silence.
XXIII. siu mei, n.
The full moon exposes a near-empty parking lot. The rocky shore tinted blue, except for an orange spot at the driftwood’s edge. A family sits on logs around it, laughing, singing.
XXIV. light fantastic, n.
My mom walks over the logs to the wet sand — no footprints — and dances to the singing family.
XXV. imagineer, n.
I wake up to an overcast sky — a matte canvas behind my fogged windshield. My mom's urn secure in my backpack beneath the passenger seat. It’s time for her final walk along the coast.
XXVI. archaeobotanist, n.
“Before you were born, your father drove us out here for a weekend in the summer. Rialto was pretty unknown back then — hardly any other people were walking the shore. You could really hear the waves crash and the rocks shuffle beneath your feet. “We sat on a log right around here for a break halfway to Hole in the Wall, and I just stared at the horizon. The crashing waves surrounded me. Then your father, that sweet man, put this flower in my lap — looked like a paintbrush imbued with fire — so orange, so warm. “I kept that flower in a notebook for years. I pressed it between the pages I wrote about the trip. “I never wanted to forget.”
XXVII. dayside, n. and adj.
After a rest, Hole in the Wall in sight, I take her urn out of my backpack. It feels like she would want to see it approach, feel the sun one last time.
XXVIII. saketini, n.
She squats over a tide pool to poke a crab hiding under an anemone. It flinches, untouched. She laughs. “Yes,” a sigh, “That’s what I needed.”
XXIX. chip, v.
The rock juts out into the water. Hole in the Wall, an arch at its end. Tide’s coming in; I have to move fast. I step around tide pool edges barefoot, quickly, before they’re buried.
XXX. monophobia, n.
Under the arch, anemones sway in tide pools sloshed by the incoming tide. I hesitate. Her urn, opened, in my hands. I know I need to. I know she needs it. But what will happen? What will happen when she is finally gone?
XXXI. jeune premier, n.
I scatter her ashes along the tide pools on the north side of Hole in the Wall. I look south to her standing on the other side. She walks toward me through the arch, dissolves in beads of light, which expand to the Hole’s rim, fade to an overcast sky.
A Time We Were
I’ve typed half an email to you a dozen times, desperate as a maple reaching over a scenic byway. Do you remember when we used to communicate through the wind? I could hear your voice, your thoughts, just by how you exhaled through your nose during one of Mr. Slater’s lectures. We could be states apart, but I would still know; thoughts were leaves on autumnal breezes falling on the mossy forest floor. Heavy currents eroded our bridge, felled trees snapped our power lines, space debris brought down our satellites, and now you’re just ones and zeros — a silent amalgamation of pixels.
A question I would ask you
Do you think trees get scared when the fog rolls in and they can’t see their friends? That’s a question I would ask you if you weren’t swallowed by the galaxy’s ever-growing throat. Instead, it’s a question I ask myself on my drive home under Sara Bareilles singing about stirring cinnamon into coffee. I climb out of the bedroom window and onto the once-ours roof after dusk that night to watch the sky go through rapid puberty. You don’t notice how much the lights from town pollute it until your favorite constellations, your guideposts, start loosing limbs. Are you watching the same stars fade away? Maybe you’re walking on the sidewalk of the gentrified neighborhood downtown trying to decide whether to spend your grocery money at Trader Joe’s or Whole Foods. Maybe you’re sleeping in a box underground. Maybe you’re dust swimming in the Puget Sound around Orcas Island. Maybe you’re star stuff floating out there somewhere, slowly trying to reclaim the sky. I think I like that one best.
Forgotten Mugs
I forgot I made coffee, had to watch it reheat through the perforated grate of my microwave. I saw a mug of Lipton tea spinning in my grandmother’s microwave when she forgot about her tea, after she started starving herself, when she told me, one Sunday morning, the last time she knew my face, “It is Hell to be old and sick.”
Cottonwood Seeds en Route: V. Nadine Sauer
Each section is based on the Oxford English Dictionary’s word of the day from May, 2020.
This is the fifth and final entry in Cottonwood Seeds en Route. It is a continuation of Part IV: Isabella Dudosa.
I. Dulciloquent, adj. It’s not only because old books are cheaper— though that certainly helps. The language flows like rivers with centuries-old glacial water— crisp, refreshing. The pages age, change shape and tone like a person’s face and voice. They’re the only ancestors I have— roots for the rootless. II. Arte Povera, n. I know it doesn’t seem like much, Elinor, but our home has all we need. I realize you may find the stacks of books annoying, but I haven’t found a good bookshelf at Goodwill yet. So, instead our apartment has some free-range novels— no oppressive, corporate cages here. You, as a wildflower, can probably appreciate that. I know I could get something cheap at work, but it’s all soulless squares— an erasure of home and culture. We’ll MacGyver something, Elinor. III. Microfinance, n. After my shift, I usually drive home, cuddle with Falstaff as I eat dinner and watch Dragon Ball Super. Lately, every commercial break is an ad from Target thanking me for my service, lauding themselves for donating masks to hospitals. They say they care about me. Not enough to increase hazard pay. Not enough to ensure safer working conditions. Not enough to provide guaranteed COVID-19 leave. Not enough to cut a CEO’s salary to cover the loss of hours of their employees. IV. Padawan, n. You called my name from the backyard to show me the tomatoes you were growing. You held this bulb in your hand that was as black as your hair, and I didn’t believe you. You held it up to me, told me to bite it. “They’re delicious, honey. Try it.” I squirmed as I held it, imagined black ooze gushing from phantom bite marks. I closed my eyes. My trembling hand raised it to my mouth, and I bit it like a wolf on deer meat. I smiled as seeds and juice dripped down my chin. Delicious— just as you said. V. Sinistrorse, adj. feels like no matter what i do i always wind up back here. the same patterns recurring perpetually. i still water your tomatoes when I think of you, so they’ll be ripe if you come home. VI. Mural, adj. I wake up surrounded by four walls covered in specks of memories lingering in the paint. I drive to work enclosed in four walls made of glass so I can see the world, but not touch it. I work in a store with four walls full of food and clothes, enough to nourish multiple impoverished villages. I don’t know what to do when these four walls inch inward like a long exhale— air seeping through a seam on a spaceship. VII. Femina, n. When I learned my grade couldn’t go down over the closure, I stopped turning in anything. Most days, I have work— had to pick up extra shifts cleaning to keep my hours up. Today, I have off; the sun’s out. I watch the leaves on the birch across the complex wave in the breeze. Lying on the couch, draped over the edge, I can’t bring myself to move. VIII. Simony, n. I didn’t trust you when your will said you wanted to be cremated. It’s hard to separate your mom from the body she inhabited. We did it, though— well, you know that, since you’re sitting on the side table by the window overlooking your tomatoes. I hated that guy at the funeral home who kept trying to upsell us on gaudy urns covered in emerald crosses fully aware we couldn’t afford them. I also hated that pastor who did your service. I’m sorry; he did a fine job. He just kept going about praying and donating to save all of our souls. IX. Time-Ridden, adj. “Hey Nadine! How are you and Elinor?” “Oh, we’re great! Elinor’s started teething, so I gotta massage her dirt sometimes after I water her. How about you and Lupine?” “We’re good here too. Lupe started dancing to They Might Be Giants yesterday, and she’s so good, I’m thinking about enrolling her in Auburn Dance Academy.” “Yesss! She would out-dance all of them! I’d enroll Elinor too, but I don’t know if Cory would get us there.” She pauses. “What do you mean?” “Well, when I was leaving for work, they screamed like Goku going Super Saiyan when I turned the ignition—“ “They?” “Cars don’t have genders; keep up. Anyway, after achieving their new form, I was able to drive to work. They had to power up again to get me home, but it took less time that time, so I think they’re getting stronger.” “Hasn’t Cory been struggling for a while now?” “Yeah, sure, but they’re on the up-and-up. Got ‘em a new battery just before the closure.” “And it— they’re already struggling to start again?” “It only happens sometimes. Cory’s doing fine.” “Have you thought about maybe replacing Cory? It’s kinda unsafe to keep driving them.” I pause. “I can’t get rid of Cory, Isabella. I’m not going to lose them.” “Isn’t your safety important enough to warrant a consideration, at least?” “I’m perfectly safe.” “But someti—“ “It was hers! Okay?! I can’t.” X. Monody, n. They asked me to speak at your memorial, but I couldn’t find the words. There are no words for the gaping tear your death made, the shrapnel haphazardly embedded in my limbs. When someone dies suddenly, people say they wish they had known it was coming; they’re wrong. Knowing, watching you wither, hoping for another day made the period at the end of your sentence much worse. Your medical bills were so much, we had to sell the house, leave the garden you spent years curating. Before we moved into this apartment, I repotted your black tomatoes, so they could live on our porch. I still water your tomatoes, drive your car, read your books, because it makes me feel like you’re still here or you’ll soon come back from wherever you’ve gone. XI. Adespota, n. Do you ever think about who makes the wind blow? Why they want to rattle the dogwood’s branches so much? Or, maybe: who spends the hours setting up endcaps to show off brand-name labels at just the right angle when you walk through a store? What about the people— long shadows now— who cleared the forest, flattened the hills, paved and painted the roads you drive on as you lament the hours you’ll spend sanitizing the pharmacy? XII. Begrudgery, n. I know it’s bad, but on Sunday, when Instagram was full of people with their living moms, captions saying they looked forward to seeing them again after quarantine, I wanted to scream. XIII. Awfulize, v. it’s been two years, nadine. you keep dragging her around with you in that old car. you know the risks. don’t you remember that time it stalled in the middle of the intersection on meridian in front of fred meyer? you don’t want to end up in a bodybag. you’ve stalled— life on pause. each day like the one before. drag yourself out of bed. drag your feet at work. are you even alive? is there a will that lingers in your heart? is there a pulse there? steps echoing down a long hallway? or, have you stopped walking? standing in place staring at one picture in the gallery though hundreds await you. you can see the edges of their frames in your periphery. move your foot. move your foot. why can’t you take step? XIV. Peck’s Bad Boy, n. (and adj.) “Ms. Sauer, can I see you for a minute before the end of your break?” Charles insists on referring to minor employees in such formality for reasons lost on me. He butchers Suri’s last name every time. I leave the disinfectant and rag on the table where I took my break reading For Whom the Bell Tolls. I place the book in my locker on the way to Charles’s office. His office is small, loose papers scattered across his desk. “Thank you for coming to see me, Ms. Sauer. I greatly appreciate your work here.” Sounds like one of those commercials. “It’s really great that you volunteered to help us keep up with sanitizing the store. Are you sure you’re not overworking yourself?” “Yeah. I’m sure.” Not where I thought this was going. “Why?” “We’ve just gotten some recent survey results saying some employees have had negative interactions with customers and morale seemed down—“ “So you’re asking this to everyone?” “Not exactly, no. The results correspond with times you were here, departments you were assigned to. We just need to make sure customers are having a positive experience from the moment they enter our store to the moment they leave.” “But I’m just wiping down the floors, shelves, and counters. I’m not really interacting with anyone.” “It’s a— vibe thing. “Maybe you could try smiling more.” Ugh. “I’m wearing a mask. They can’t see whether I’m smiling or not.” “It’s about the vibe you give the customer— your aura. Does that make sense, Ms. Sauer?” I sigh. “Yes, sir. I’ll smize all day.” XV. Quint, n. There’s no way I could have gotten this far without my friends. I know I’m not great to be around when I get lost in the fog. So, I bought five books after my shift to thank them (and show them I know modern books). First, I grab Two Boys Kissing by David Levithan for Crys, because I thought she’d appreciate the splintered narrative structure and the narration of gay ghosts. Second, I buy The Fire Never Goes Out by Noelle Stevenson for Suri, because it’s a graphic novel (which they love) by the showrunner of She-Ra (which she loves) about figuring out who she is. Third, I put The Martian by Andy Weir in my basket for Isabella, because it’s a story on her favorite planet which tackles its science and psychology thoroughly. Fourth, I get I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou for Violet, because she finds metaphors everywhere and she helped me appreciate poetry, especially poems by Angelou. Last, after hesitating at the end of the aisle, The Divine Comedy by Dante ends up in my basket for me. My mom had always said she meant to read it, the way everyone says they mean to watch The Sopranos, but Goodwill never had a legible version. I bag them individually (I hope Isabelle, Crys, and the planet forgive me), leave them on their porches on my way home. XVI. Simkin, n. In the back of the pantry is a bottle, half full, older than me. A faded label, faint swirly writing. Its cork sneaking a glimpse of the kitchen when the door opens. My dad takes it out sometimes to look at it— never drink nor open— late at night, when he gets home from Applebee’s covered in dishwasher stains. Lately, after my late sanitation shifts, I’ve seen the white of Seth Meyer’s attic reflect off the curve of the bottle and the streams on his cheeks. XVII. Bukateria, n. Near the end, days before the doctors shrugged and we lost the house, the realization came that things were worse than I thought. I had walked out of the hospital after spending the night in your room. We spent that night splitting the penne you liked from Applebee’s. Dad brought it for you after his shift, as he did every night he worked. As you fell asleep, I read a chapter from Sense & Sensibility to you, because it was your favorite. But, when I left the hospital that morning, I walked up to the coffee stand on the edge of the parking lot before getting a ride to school from Crys’s mom. The realization came when Kelsey, the barista, said, “Morning, Nads!” I had been to this coffee stand outside the hospital so much, not only was I on a first-name basis with the barista, I had earned a nickname. You had been in the hospital so long, it felt normal, routine— no end in sight. XVIII. Pickthank, n. and adj. Calling it “hero pay” is not enough to justify poor working conditions. XIX. Simplex Munditiis, adj. and n. On my way to work, I drove by TJ Maxx, its planter covered with cottonwood seeds, scattered like melting snow. Some cottonwoods, when felled, don’t make good nurse logs, lacking the width and girth to last long— fell too early, too soon, too young. They try their best— stretched like shadows at dusk, spread thin to help whoever is still sitting there longing for shade. XX. Antelucan, adj. it happens a lot— i get home late, my clothes covered in patches of lemony disinfectant. i eat some leftovers of what dad brought home from work that night or the one before while watching an anime i don’t need to think hard about. i shower then read before falling asleep at some witching hour or other. then terror; never the same, but never that different. sometimes, you’re swallowed by a void pulsing from shadows in your hospital room’s corners, slowly capturing finer details until everything becomes two-dimensional, matte like a cartoon— outlines bolden until all is black, all is void. sometimes, you and i are in cory driving to the discount movie theater in the mall when we get t-boned in the parking lot, shards of glass falling like hard rain in a thunderstorm— sounds like one too— sticking out of your skin like darts in the dartboards movies use when they want to establish conflict or character. sometimes, you’re in a pit of quicksand, waist deep, and I’m standing on the edge reaching on my tiptoes toward you, and you keep saying “no, don’t. it’s okay,” and I argue with you as you slip deeper and deeper, the thixotropic sand climbing over your blouse, your shoulders, devouring your hair, your neck. your eyes wide, cracks in the dam evident, before becoming dark, empty. i startle awake at the end as the night sky’s blue-black begins its transition to orange peel. i watch the line march across the sky out my window until my alarm tells me it’s time to get up. XXI. Angrez, n. and adj. This morning, Falstaff digs his claws into my thigh when I ignore my alarm. This afternoon, rain pounds on Cory’s windshield when I drive to work. When KZOK plays “Blackbird,” I see my mom swaying and humming in her garden. When I pull into a parking spot, I count between inhales and exhales in my hands. XXII. Muscose, adj. I latch onto you to get as much as I can before you’re completely gone. Always have. I worry in hindsight that maybe I drained you of energy you needed. I’ve been told that’s not true, none of it is my fault. You can never know how immense the impact of both your presence and your absence can be. I carry you now like you carried me then. XXIII. Oblique, adj., n., and adv. “Hey, are you alright?” “Yeah, I’m fine,” I say as I get in Crys’s car. She squints. “Then why did you call me at midnight to ask for a ride home?” “Well, Cory was tired from flirting with all the mall cars— you know how they are— so they kinda fell asleep, and they’re so cute when they’re sleeping, I just let them be.” Crys rolls her fingers along the rim of her steering wheel. “Cory didn’t start again?” “Yeah. I tried a couple times to get ‘em up, because sleeping at home is def safer than sleeping in a parking lot— true for both cars and humans— but they shut me out after the third time.” “Shut you out?” “The anti-theft system kicked in. It happens sometimes. It’s not a big deal.” “Nadine, I think it is a big deal. Cory’s been falling apart for a while, and—“ “I just put in—“ “— a new battery in March that’s not solving the whole not-starting thing. Are you sure you shouldn’t look at getting a newer car?” “I have to hear this from you too? Isabella already lectured me about this.” “Is that why you called me? Because she would lecture you again?” I open my mouth; no words come out. “It’s alright,” she sighs, places her hand on top of mine. “I know Cory is important to you.” I look at Cory sleeping in the spot beyond Crys’s left headlight. I shake my head. “It was her car, Crys.” “I know,” she nods. “And it must be hard with her anniversary coming up, right?” “Yeah.” I clear my throat. “It’s not like we can afford another car anyway.” “You could always trade Cory in to pay for it.” My cheeks burn. “Would you have traded your sister in when she was sick?” The engine’s hum fills the silence. “I know you’re hurting, but that was a truly awful thing to say.” She shifts the car into drive. XXIV. Plutodemocracy, n. Puyallup changes when you get a few blocks off Meridian, especially at night when strip malls become neighborhoods, street lights become sparse. I stare at trees consumed by shadows as Crys drives, silent, chewing the inside of her lip, angry tears welling up in her eyes. “I’m sorry, Crys. There’s so much going on, and it just kinda… I took it out on you. I’m sorry.” Her eyes don’t leave the road. “I know I upset you. You came to help me and I was a dick… I’m scared, Crys. I— The anniversary of her death is coming up, so I’m seeing her everywhere. Cory is dying, and I need them. They connect me to her and allow me to get to school and work, which we need to pay off all those stupid bills... “And work is a constant reminder of how close death is. My job is literally going aisle to aisle disinfecting everything to eliminate the threat of a deadly virus, and my only protection is this old shirt I fashioned into a mask.” My throat feels like my knuckles after washing my hands a tenth time in one day. “I know you’re going through a lot. I don’t hate you. I’m still mad though. You can’t just walk away from the thing you said.” “I know.” There’s a long silence as she turns into my apartment complex. She parks in the middle of the lot outside my building. “Your mom is not her stuff. Her soul is not in them, and she still lives in your memories.” “I think that’s easier to believe when you have a lot of stuff and the money to get more stuff when you need it.” She sighs, nods. “I know she’s in my memories. Sometimes, it even feels like she’s my shadow. And I worry about losing even a millimeter of her.” “I’m sorry.” “I’m sorry. I appreciate you and your friendship so much.” “I appreciate you too, you dick.” She chuckles as she shoves my shoulder. “Now go to bed. It’s past your bedtime.” “Thanks for the ride,” I say as I close the car door. I wave as I walk up the stairs to our door. XXV. Hendecad, n. We never ate at restaurants much, but on the last day of the school year, my mom would take a half day at her office, pick me up from school to take me to the Original Pancake House for lunch. She died on a Saturday— the 26th of May— Memorial Day weekend. 9th grade, my last year at Ferucci. Neither my dad or I were capable to being around other people for months. I don’t remember the last month of that year, but I do remember the bus ride on the last day to an empty apartment— walls of unpacked cardboard boxes. Last year, it still didn’t feel right. I drove myself home in silence. They may not be open this year— doesn’t look like the closure will open up by then— but I should get something from there to commemorate surviving my junior year while working full-time amid a pandemic. She would want me to. XXVI. Simili-, comb. form Me crouching on the patio, humming a Phoebe Bridgers song as I water two pots of struggling tomatoes is not the same as you walking by planters in the backyard humming the Beatles as you hose lush beds of vegetables I wasn’t able to save. XXVII. Alkahest, n. I wake up Tuesday morning, the 26th, to a bright sun outside my window— no dreams nor dew drops— and a text from Isabella about Skyping. I sit up in my bed, start my laptop while taking a drink of water from an old pickle jar on my nightstand. “Nadine! Lupe said her first word! Look!” She holds up Lupe’s pot, tiny purple highlights on her tips. “Did you hear her? She said, ‘shhh!’ I think she’s going to be a librarian!” “Oh my god! Yesss!” I reach over, pick up Elinor. “Look at your sister! Aren’t you so proud?” Elinor nods. “That’s not all,” Isabella adds. “Hold on.” She looks down, starts typing. I set Elinor down, look outside, see white fluff float between the trees. I hear several bloops from my computer, turn to see four faces smiling, three hands waving. All of their voices meld together as they say hello. “We didn’t want you to be alone today,” Crys says. “And—“ “And,” Violet cuts in, “I actually have internet now! Did you know there’s a deadly virus spreading all over the world? Google told me. You’re welcome.” “Dude,” Suri chuckles, “don’t even get me started. I’ve had to explain it to Yusef and Amina like every day.” “Ugh Same!” Isabella yells. “It’s like Alejandro has amnesia, I swear!” It’s the first time I’ve seen all of them at the same time since lunch on the last day before the closure. XXVIII. Vehemence, n. “Anyway,” Crys emphasizes each syllable to get our attention, “we wanted to show you we’re here for you. We know how important the anniversary of your mom dying is, and we want to support you.” They all nod. So many half-sentences stuck in my throat. “Your mom was the best,” Isabella says. “Remember my quinces? She volunteered to bring salsa for the snack table using tomatoes from her garden, and she placed both bowls in the center of the table with labels she made herself. “And she made a point to fake-revise the mild salsa label to make it say ‘White Salsa!’ I was dying!” My computer erupts with laughter. Crys wipes a tear from her eye, a hand on her heart. “Oh my gosh, my mom’s face when she saw it!” She inhales, exhales through her nose, goes wide-eyed, juts her chin out. “That was the face!” Isabella yells, laughing into her hands. “She purposely sat us at our table so she could see people’s reactions to it,” I reminisce, see her snickering into her napkin. “She was so proud.” “I wish I could have met her,” Violet says. “She sounds like a great mom.” “Me too,” Suri agrees. “If only I could have gone to Ferucci too.” I often forget they went to Glacier View. It feels like they’ve always been in my life. “Yeah,” I say. “She would have loved you nerds.” XXIX. Sidereal, adj. It’s a small action, but it reverberates. Before the call, I felt cold, like I was laying in a puddle during a storm. After the call, though, which bounced from stories about my mom to stories about quarantine, I felt less alone. Warmth spread from my chest to my limbs then out. That afternoon, the clouds opened up to blue sky, birds started singing. The sun came out, stayed out the rest of the week. XXX. Dataveillance, n. One of the line cooks from Applebee’s follows my dad to Target in his pickup several nights after I left Cory there. I meet them by Cory’s spot, my dad having to drive me to work the last couple days. Charles had commented on a car being in the lot too long. He plans on calling a tow company tomorrow morning. Luis opens his tailgate, climbs into the cargo bed. The truck’s creaking and staining fills the empty lot. He uncoils a long rope, hops off the truck, lays under it to get a better vantage of the frame as he ties one end of the rope around it. “I really appreciate your help,” my dad says, getting under Cory with the other end of rope. “No problem,” Luis groans as he gets back up to his feet. He bends over, stretching his back. “How old is the car?” “Uh,” I stammer, “about 20 years old.” I wring the strap of my messenger bag. My dad tugs on the rope a couple times, gets to his feet, brushes off his jeans. “It gets the job done for the most part, though.” They walk me through how we get Cory home safely— how I will put them in neutral, get pulled by Luis’s truck, only braking and turning when he does until we’re in our complex. Luis’s eyes bounce between my dad and Cory. “You need a car?” “What?” My dad asks. “We have a pickup we don’t use much since Isaac went to college. You could use it.” “It’s alright,” my dad shakes his head. "We don’t need your charity.” Luis focuses on Cory. “You can pay for it, then.” My dad looks at me. I shrug. “How much?” “How much you got?” Luis insists on finding a compromise, while my dad reluctantly drags his feet. They work out an agreement that doesn’t hurt my dad’s pride and figure out a day for me to pick up the truck. XXXI. Gas Giant, n. A thunderclap. Rain patter. Wind howl. Saturday morning, I drink coffee sitting in the living room floor next to my mom’s ashes and Elinor. We watch the sky flash, gutters spill over with rainwater, young sprouts struggle in the wind. I focus on a cottonwood seed snagged on the rim of one of the tomato pots. They shiver, inch like they’re afraid to fly on their own. I put down my mug, place a hand on my mom’s urn, boop Elinor’s nose. The sliding glass door opens; cool air roars in as I step onto the porch. My face is wet with rain as I clip the seed’s fluff between two fingers, whisper in their ear. I let go, and a gust of wind sweeps them up. I watch them sail across the parking lot. I lose them in the clouds, but I’m not worried— I know they’ll be okay.
I Wanted to Write Something You’d Like
You always told me how much you liked the way I describe things, so I’m going to try to do that now.
I had just got home from work. I parked my Focus in the driveway. The early-December frost was still lazily slumped in the corners of the curb. The clouds had layers, many wispy strands floating together attempting to make a uniform grey sheet. The air was cold and thin, much as it always was on the top of the hill we lived on.
We called it a hill, anyway. Ryan and Laura had called it a mountain when they first moved here, remember? They were really confused when we laughed, and then we got into a senseless argument about the differences between the definitions of “hill” and “mountain.” Far too academic for such a stupid thing.
Right, so, I had left the car, situating my your-beanie on my head. Thank you, again, for finding it in a shoebox in the back of the closet when I had lost mine, and subsequently not wanting it back. The car’s warmth that had soaked into me and my clothing dissipated far too quickly; I hate thermodynamics.
I went to get the mail, the chore I always do before going inside the house. The sidewalk, somehow, still had a layer of frozen dew. The border of the frost followed the shadows of the Diaz’s house and Tyrell Jackson’s pick-up. There was a soft, faint crunch when I stepped. Not a full-on-snow crunch, but there was an attempt, like Simba trying to impress Mufasa with his roar.
The mailboxes recently got changed from the individual sub-sandwich-shaped boxes nailed to several two-by-fours to the factory-farm-chicken-cage letter prisons on metal poles. Our box was number 7, even though our house number was 23561. I don’t understand why they couldn’t consolidate the numbers to be the same— I’ve talked your ear off about this thing before. Too much, in fact. I’ll move on.
There was nothing there. Well, there were ads for Safeway and Albertson’s, but those don’t really constitute mail; anything that lands in the recycle bin instead of on the dining room table doesn’t count as mail.
The apple tree in the corner of the Tanaka’s yard by the mailboxes was bare. Its branches were thin and weak in the breeze. A plump robin perched on one of the lower branches, making it and its relatives bob up and down under its weight. It must frequent their bird feeder. The robin’s head twitched left and right, seemingly unperturbed by the cold. Perhaps by instinct, perhaps realizing how alone it was, the robin took off and flew down the block.
Our mailbox, if you remember, was around the corner on 22nd Street. The view on the way back, where 22nd meets 162nd, faced west. When the sky was clear, we could see the Olympic mountains. Today, the wispy clouds bunched up high enough that the silhouette of the mountains from the setting sun was crisp. A deep-orange fire burning behind the glaciers and rock reached up to meet the blue-black of the evening sky.
The colors blended, or met, or touched— I don’t know, but there was a line in the sky between them. It felt like there should be a word for it. Or, maybe I thought I was supposed to see some undiscovered color that would give me some transcendental realization. But there wasn’t a word that could placate me, no epiphanies.
I didn’t turn on 162nd back to the house that day. I kept walking west down 22nd, taking deep breaths of icy air, seeing how long I could exhale steam. The steam coned out from the pinpoint precision of my mouth to the broad shotgun array a few feet away, before losing all sense of rhythm and deforming into clusters of chaotic clouds.
At the end of 22nd, where the housing development started to turn back on itself, there was a clearing on the northern corner— something about how if the number of houses exceeds x, then the developer needs to build and maintain a small park, so the lot was left empty. The wild grass still had white tips, completely untouched until my footsteps broke their peace.
I could see the abandoned golf course from the lot. Well, the edge of it, around the tree line— you know. We drove by it whenever we went to the highway, and we had walked around the lonely concrete trails that lead from hole to hole. There were three parked cars on the shoulder of the spur that lead to its parking lot. The company that bought the land barricaded it years ago, but never did anything else with their purchase.
I had always meant to draw up a map of the golf course and blow out the proportions to become the world for a story I had thought of. When we had gone on our first walk around it, I had started piecing together the cities. There was a railroad track along the eastern side that would transport goods throughout the towns along the foothills of the impassable mountain range. There were rolling hills and vast lakes and small, dry patches of desert; ocean would hug the western coast.
The story was supposed to revolve around a woman making a dessert for some special occasion, how stressed she felt while making it. Maybe stress isn’t the right word; she would be excited to make the thing and for people to eat it, but she wanted it to be perfect. She’d walk around the floating flour specs of her kitchen and pour precise measurements of sugar into different measuring cups, some complicated fractions would stick out from the recipe that would need to be broken down and converted.
With every ingredient she’d add, there would be a cut away to another person who would be moving through their daily routine to gather, package, distribute, or sell the ingredient the woman just used. Their lives would be rough and stressful and tiresome. Then, it would jump back to the woman and her dessert.
I never wrote that story. I had thought about it, as I said, but I never wrote it. I knew that if I did write it, I’d show you, and you’d probably tell me it was weird. So, I’d save it on an external drive somewhere and always mean to come back to it and fix it, but be too afraid to read it again. Its 0s and 1s would sit on that disk undisturbed until the end of time.
Maybe I should have written it. Maybe you would have liked it. I don’t know.
The orange was dimming around the peaks of the Brothers and Mount Constance. The bones in my fingers were starting to ache. It’s weird how the cold pierces so deeply so suddenly. Small icy flakes shifted horizontally in the air carried by the soft northerly wind. I started to walk back to our house.
Your hatchback was in the driveway. I had forgotten. It had sat there for several months, and I had seen it there every day, but I had momentarily forgotten that you were gone.
This realization happens too often, I admit, but your death just hasn’t dug its roots deep enough. I’m afraid they never will, that I will keep forgetting and having to remember all over, and the gale of grief will consume me again.
I cried that day. I curled up in the front yard and hugged my knees into my trembling chest. The grass was cold and wet, slowly changing colors in the faint glow of the Morozov’s Christmas lights.
M. Espinosa 