"I uh, brought notes. I uhm.. didn't want to spend the entire time rambling..." she speaks in a quiet tone. As if she doesn't want to be here. Why come? She looks exhausted, her hairs messy and she has a bare face with no makeup. Nothing. But yet, she looks so pretty. How can someone this pretty be left behind with such guilt and grief?
"It's okay if you ramble" the lady says, comforting her.
"Nah, it's not" she coughs, you can tell how awkward she feels about talking about her husband.
"It is" the lady argues.
"It's not" she laughs. She keeps sorting out her stuff getting ready to talk. But clearly is trying to avoid it by passing time.
"So um... I...." We lock eyes. She recognizes me, but quickly looks away.
"I was online, yesterday. And um a bunch of people had posted links to this infographic" she starts.
"Sorry does everyone know that-" she shakes her head in denial. I look around, the class of full of elderly people, or at least ages 40+, and they all shake their heads slightly with confusion. Leigh and I are the only younger people here.
"It's um.. it's a cartoon that illustrates statistics... so um.." she puts on a fake smile. "This infographic was about marriages.. and um.. it said that if your spouse dies it feels like you're loosing $38,780 a year". She read off her note, and then looked back at the circle.
"Which sounded crazy to me at first. Like think how do you... how do you put a dollar amount on death like how is that even a thing with a price tag." I see what she means about rambling. She begins to scratch the back of her neck, anxiously.
"But then I started to think about what it would feel like to loose $38,780 a year. And it would feel like a problem you could never fix. It's an impossible amount of money to loose." She laughs. Everyone around starts to nod their heads in agreement. I suppose that loosing that amount on money a year is a similar feeling. Loss. Hopelessness. Don't know where to go from there. She starts to wake up a bit, and the look of embarrassment crosses her face.
" I don't know if it's that exact number, the 780 at the end feels a bit... weird. Um... but I..." she starts to panic internally.
"I would say that my... husband being dead... feels like the same kind of impossible thing." She finished her speech there, nodding her head in denial. Not wanting pity off of anyone around her. She puts down her notes back in her back. A long silence follows her big long speech about infographics, as if it's taken a strong effect on the people around her. But I suppose she's right. It does feel impossible to not have that person who was around you everyday to suddenly be gone.
"Thanks for sharing" everyone says, she cuts them off.
"No. Okay. You're welcome" everyone goes quiet. An awkward silence fills the room. The lady who runs the group begins to break the silence.
"You still have a few minutes" she says with a comforting tone.
"I don't really want them" her smile fades into sadness. The women moves onto the next person and group Carrie's on as per usual.
-
Everyone's beginning to pack up, I want to catch Leigh before she storms off. So I quickly put my book in my bag and grab my coat.
"Leigh" I shout over. She turns around and looks at me. She seems to be in a hurry.
"Oh. Hey Kate." She says refusing to make eye contact.
"I didn't know you came here" she says. I take a breath, as I'm filling up with anxiety.
"Yes well, I guess we're more alike than we thought" I say, trying not to be corny. She does a fake smile.
"Listen I'm sorry-" I cut her off.
"No it's fine. I get it now." There's a long pause.
"So that was your party. You're the widow Jack keeps mentioning." She nods.
"He was good friends with Mat. We'll maybe not good but at least friends. I never really met him though." She looks at me, and puts her bag over her shoulder.
"Do you want to get a donut?"
