Serendipity

One- From Her To Him

It wasn't like I wasn't expecting it, when she died. I was. My whole life, I grew up knowing the fact that all of my family was dead, aside from him.

And I'd been okay with that, as long as he stayed well away from my mom and I.

Perfectly and truly okay with that.

Until my mother died from cancer, and I realized that he, the guy who abandoned us when I had yet to lay my eyes on him, was my only option.

She was young, my mom, in her early 30s, just beginning to truly live, and then she was gone. Quick as that. Just gone.

We shared a tiny apartment throughout my childhood, on the east side of Manhattan. She homeschooled me, and took a night job at a bar on the west side. She rode the subway.

She never really told me much about my dad. Whenever he came up, she got really quiet, or left the room, but I knew that he left her before I was born. She might not have been angry about that, but I was.

We didn't have much money, but we were getting by, and that was enough for both of us.

We had a dog, named Ollie. In the grand scheme of things, we shouldn't have been able to afford him, but we managed to. My mom took some money away from my school budget. She told me that feeding a living animal was much more important than an education, and I laughed, because I could only agree.

Ollie died, after he ran away into the streets, and was hit by a New York City taxi. He was three years old and I missed him like hell.

To cheer me up, my mom told me that the wind took the dead to even more incredible places. I wasn't sure what she meant, but she said it with such conviction that I had to believe her.

It was odd, she said a lot of things like that. She was quite a philosopher, really, for a native New Yorker.

She never cried, my mom, I remember. Or rather, she rarely cried. I still don't know whether she did it to protect me, or if she was just that strong, but she didn't. She didn't cry.

There is only one instance that I can remember clearly. I woke up in the middle of the night, and I heard a sound. I thought it was Ollie, but as I squirmed, I saw that Ollie had made himself comfortable on top of my legs. It was my mom.

I threw Ollie off, and walked to the hallway outside of mother's room. I remember how cold the floor felt, how cold everything felt, as I squatted down against the wall. She was bawling. I didn't say a word, but I think she knew I was there. She was on the phone, sitting on the floor on her knees, yelling and crying all at once, crying about bills and life and me. She cried about tiny apartments, and Ollie, and subways. At the end of the conversation, I remember, she said his name, my dad's: Michael. That's what I remember most.

I fell asleep right there, right against the hallway wall. I was too stunned and afraid to move.

If the strongest woman I'd ever met, the one I'd looked up to most, could cry that much, was I supposed to cry too? Was my life really that bad?

Two months later, she told me she'd been diagnosed with breast cancer.

Ollie was gone by then, and I think it all got to her, because the strongest woman I'd ever met broke again. They tried everything, she told me, but she only had a few weeks. She didn't cry this time, she just hugged me, holding onto me like she was holding onto the world, and told me how much she loved me.

I grabbed her shirt, and cried into her shoulder, knowing that in months, she wouldn't be here to hug, she wouldn't be here to teach, she wouldn't be here at all.

And then, of course, she died one month later, and the wind carried her off with it's evil breaths, and left me here, tiny apartment-less, mother-less, and love-less.

At the funeral, I didn't cry. I held it in. I wanted her to see how strong I was, how strong I could be without her. Hundreds of people were there, and I didn't know any of them, but they seemed to know me. There were no speeches, or casket- just me, a box of ashes, and hundreds of useless "sorry"s.

Sorry is what the social workers said, with their big lipsticked smiles, and black tailored suits, before they told me that in a week, I would be moving to Australia.

They gave me paperwork with the tickets, and a picture of my father. I had his nose. He was smiling, the kind of smile that only shows a tiny piece of your teeth. He had tiny freckles near his crooked nose, and dark brown slanted eyes. His face was stubbly, and his ears could barely be seen behind his shaggy mane of hair.

And all I saw in him was my nose.

I pocketed the picture and the ticket, punched a social worker in the face, and went to the only place I'd ever called home by myself.

I could almost feel her there, watching me, waiting for me to break. But I didn't. I only broke as the social worker's loaded me onto the plane.

And now, I sit here, wiping tears from my eyes, with bruised knuckles and a cut lip, staring out of the window at a raging ocean, wishing more than anything for the rough waves to sweep me up and drown me.

I listen as Nirvana bursts into my ears through a set of ratty headphones, and bob my head slightly. It's a distraction.

I reach into my pocket, and take out the picture of my dad. I definitely have his nose, it's crooked but small, and suites him perfectly. On me, it looks abnormal.

It occurs to me, that in less than an hour, I will be with my dad in Australia. The thought sends a shiver down my back, and all of the pain from her death returns.

In that moment, I think of Ollie, my mom, and midnight study sessions. I think of cab drivers, and angry New Yorkers, and broken air conditioning in a sweltering hot city.

Below me, the sea is giving way to barren land, and I rest my head on the window, falling into a light sleep, before I am awoken by the clunk of wheels on the pavement, and the cheerful waving of my father from the dirty airport window.