The first thing to do, she tells me, is to get all traces of him out of the apartment.

I sigh, glance at the clock in the living room. It is smallish, round with a silver frame; two hands, flat black chopsticks, mark off minutes on a white numbered face. The third hand, shiny and sharp, reminds me of a hypodermic needle which is not—considering the circumstances, that my heart feels as if it’s been pierced straight through—a strange likeness to assign. Tick Tock, the little clock says. Hänni it’s been 10 days since he left. He is not coming back.

My step mom, a sturdy Norwegian with a killer sense of humor and fierce loyalty to family, is standing in front of the couch. She’s come to take care of me. In these, the first few worst days of my life, she is the one who is keeping me fed, calling the lawyer, making sure that when I’m in the bath—my head submerged in salty, lilac-scented water—I reemerge on the surface, even though I don’t want to. Even though I’d rather drown.

Elida, my stepmother, she is a lioness. And right now I’m as helpless as a mewling, newborn cub. So when Elida palms the cheap Ikea console and says we need to get rid of his things, I comply. The first object that needs vanished into the ether? Our wedding portrait wherein his full round face and crooked smile are on prominent display. Elida picks up the silver frame, flips open the velvet backing, and removes the Kodak paper. “Here,” she says, thrusting the black and white couple towards me. “You need to cut this into small pieces and put it in the litter box for the cats to shit on.”

It seems crazy, but—wielding the scissors with the orange plastic handle—I do it. And then, miracle of miracles, I feel better.

(Photo credit: Delta407@Flickr)

—-

Sweet and salty, her communications—once full of blithe—are now peppered with sadness.

In an email response about dining room furniture for my new apartment, Elida recommends a parson’s table. “They are very versatile,” she says. “You might try getting one used and painting it stealth black, it has a wonderful chocolaty undertone.” And then—a shotgun blast to the stomach, a strange orphan in an otherwise bucolic discourse—Elida tells me that her brother is not doing well. “He is going to die,” she says, “and he knows it.”

In a separate email, Elida bestows the virtue of zebra rugs—“A diehard classic, if there ever was one”—and then she laments the loss of her beloved father. “Our last years were so sweet,” she writes. “I miss him so much,” she says.

Things have not been easy for Elida this past year. In the spring a mystery malady rendered her auntie Robyn—for whom she has become a part-time caretaker—an invalid. Last fall, Elida’s brother, Mark was diagnosed with end-stage pancreatic cancer. Just after Thanksgiving, Elida’s dad, my Grandpa Byron, died suddenly when an aneurysm ruptured in his stomach during a flight from Anchorage to Seattle.

It must be hard for Elida, keeping her eyes open when there’s so much cold air blowing in them.

—-

In all this, I can’t help be reminded of a time—three years ago this January—when the struggles Elida tackled where mine. At the apartment one afternoon, in another house-clearing exercise, she instructs me to drag Blake’s computer desk—all cheap blonde laminate and wobbly metal rods—onto the third-floor landing. “Now,” she commands, “push it over the railing.”

Woooooooosh. The table free falls, and when it connects with the concrete, it makes the most delicious smash. Chunks of pressboard shrapnel splinter across the parking lot. And then—like she’ll do a million times in the months leading up to my post-divorce recovery—Elida assists me in picking up the pieces.

(Photo credit: Damork@Flickr)

Today I am better. Elida is not. She is in a black place, and I’m embarrassed to admit, I have not helped her like she has me. I’ve avoided phone calls, can’t will myself to purchase a condolence card. You know the conversations where you die a little inside, it hurts so much to have them? I circumvent those by emailing a steady stream of frivolity—paint colors, wall patterns, ghost chairs; these are topics from which I won’t stray.

I’m a jerk. I know this. I’m not sure how to change. Except—I can do as Elida once told me—and take a first step. The first thing to do, I think, is to let her know.

I open my MacBook, prompt a browser, and type:

Dear Elida,

I just want to say, I love you.
(P.S. I’m sorry for being such an asshole.)