Between Now and Goodbye (45 page)

Fifty Six – Charles

Libby insists on taking the first stint of driving, and even though I protested back at the house, now, three hours into our journey I'm glad that she insisted, because I'm not able to concentrate enough to drive.

I keep going back to that room in my head. I keep opening the door and walking in, over and over, and no matter how desperately I want to see something different in my minds version of events, my head refuses to play it out as anything other than a memory. Each time I go into the room, I see my mom lying there. Eyes closed, afternoon sun streaming in through the windows, and across the white covers on her bed, that almost exactly match the paleness of her skin.

I remember feeling as though something was wrong, even before I'd been in the room for a few seconds. I knew she wasn't just sleeping. The room was too quiet, she was too still and I knew. Still, I didn't want to believe or accept it, because the thought of my mom really being gone, was too much to handle.

I went over to her and I remember taking her hand, calling her name in all my hopelessness. I remember crying as I took her pulse, and crying harder when I found none. Then, I left the room and I gathered the kids together. I remember wishing that Libby and Julie were there to help me as I tried to explain it to them, but in hindsight, I think it was good that it was just family in the house. It gave us all a little bit of time alone together to grieve.

Katie wanted to go in and see mom, and eventually all of them went in, except for Lewis. I wasn't sure it was a good idea letting Georgia and Sean see her like that, they wanted to come in though, and in a way I think it helped them to understand, seeing her like that. I think they knew what was happening.

Katie was the first to leave the room after we heard Lewis crying outside. She said that she'd handle it. I took Georgia, Sean and April out of the dining room and told them to go and play. I knew there were things that needed to be done, people that needed to be told, but I ended up just going back to her bedside, sitting down and crying.

That's how Libby found me, and when she walked in I felt myself breaking even further. As she held me, I didn't think I'd ever get through it. Then Lewis ran off, and panic overtook grief.

Libby was my rock. She found him, brought him home, organized everything with some help from Julie. Then my aunt Gina arrived and took over and that's really when I started to retreat.

My aunt was at the cabin, and between her, Libby and Julie, everything was being taken care of. I didn't have anything to do, and so I was left alone with my grief.

'Char?' Libby's sweet, soft voice pulls me back into the moment. 'We've been driving for a little over three hours, and it's just coming up to noon. 'Do you want to stop for lunch?'

'I'm not hungry.' I reply instantly.

'You didn't eat anything this morning, and you didn't have dinner last night.' She takes her eyes off the road for a second, 'You should eat.' She adds, meeting my eye.

'Maybe later,' I reply because I don't want her to worry about me. She shouldn't have to worry about me, 'you can get something if you like.'

'I'm good for now, I'll eat when you're ready to eat.' She replies.

'Well played.' I laugh and then feel a stab of pain for laughing. I shouldn't be able to laugh at anything so soon after losing my mom.

'Char, it will be ok.' Libby slides her hand onto mine for a second, squeezes lightly and then puts her hand back on the wheel.

'How do you know?' I ask a little snappily. 'You've never had a parent die.'

'No, I haven't.' She doesn't seem at all knocked back by my harsh tone, and that makes me like her even more. It also makes me feel guilty for snapping at her in the first place. None of this is her fault, and she's doing everything she can to make me feel better. 'But I do know you, and so I know that you're going to be able to get through this. You'll pull yourself together, and you'll take care of your family.'

'I don't know how to handle her being gone.'

'Time,' Libby replies, 'in time you'll find a way.'

'And until then?'

'Until then you'll do the best you can, until it gets a little easier, and then a little easier still. You have me to rely on.'

'I'm not exactly going to be the perfect boyfriend.' I warn her, 'You'd be better off without me.'

'Hey,' she looks at me again, just quickly and then, ever the careful driver, her eyes return to the road. 'I don't want you to start pushing me away, because you think I'd be better off without you. I really, really like you and I'm not going to give up on us just because you're going through something awful. I'm not with you because I pity you, I'm with you because I want to be with you. I'm with you because you make me happy, and because I'm not looking for the perfect boyfriend, I'm looking for someone who isn't afraid to need me. Someone who likes me for me, and someone who will accept that I like him even when he's dealing with tragedy.'

'You're kind of perfect you know.' I lean my head back against the headrest.

'I'm not perfect.' She shakes her head, 'Nobody is, which is why I don't want you feeling like you're not good enough just because you're not always able to be perfect.'

'Sorry.' I sigh and push a hand through my hair, 'Old habits I guess.'

'I'm not Julie. Julie isn't even Julie anymore.' I remind him. 'You don't have to be anyone but yourself for me.'

'Thanks.'

'So...do you want some lunch?'

'Libs.'

'Char.' She catches my eye. I see a turn for a diner approaching.

'Make the turn.' I sigh. She smiles at me triumphantly, makes the turn and gives me a little hope that maybe everything will be ok eventually.

By the twelfth hour of our trip I'm driving. Libby sits beside me with her legs curled up onto the seat, the window down, letting in the late evening air, and a cool wind, which is helping calm down the hot sticky feeling clinging to me.

Libby's angled just slightly in her seat, so she can see me better as I drive, and she has a notebook open on her lap, pen poised, with the cap being chewed each time she pauses from writing.

We've been working on a list of things that we need to get ready for when the kids go back to school, because it's almost September now and they start in the second week. Libby too will return to school, and I'll be at home.

'Lewis needs new sneakers.' I say. It feels good to be concentrating on something productive, and it helps to stop the grief from enveloping me.

'Sneakers.' Libby nods, jots it down on the list and then starts chewing her pen again. 'You'll be staying home with April, right?'

'Yeah.' I nod, arm hanging out of the window and tapping on the side of Libby's light blue car, 'Why?'

'I just wondered if maybe day care could be an option, so you could go to school.'

'My mom and I thought about it, but it just won't be feasible in the budget. Her...life insurance,' I swallow hard, 'will help out but it's not a huge amount, and she didn't have any savings. I'll own the house, or at least I will when I turn eighteen in April. Even once it's mine, selling it and downsizing isn't an option, we're crammed in there as it is. I'm uh...my mom and I discussed what to do with the money from her life insurance, and she always hated that were were so cramped in that house. Two bedrooms with six kids. So she asked me to use dome of the insurance money to build an extension onto the house. Creating two new bedrooms.'

'Wow, big task to oversee.'

'I think I need a big task.' I reply, 'I need to be busy or I'll lose it straight away.'

Ok, so the insurance money will extend the house.'

'Yeah, and we'll have a little left over to help with the basics. Food, clothing and so on.' I sigh heavily, 'I've got my job, but only if I can find people to watch April. I can't afford daycare or professional nannies. Aunt Gina is only staying with us until I turn Eighteen, so until then I can go to work without a problem. It's just after she leaves, I'm going to have to save a lot of my wages until then, in case I can't work.'

'Char, do you know how many people love you? You'll find someone to watch her. I can watch her after school if you need to get an evening job, and once school breaks for summer, I can watch her all day. I can watch all of the kids.'

'Libs I can't ask you to do that.'

'You're not asking, I'm offering.' She smiles at me, 'I'm just being your super supportive new girlfriend. So don't worry about it. We'll figure all of this out.'

By hour twenty nine Libby is driving again. Despite our promises to sleep, neither one of us has. I don't think either one of us can, so we've been keeping ourselves going on coffee and energy drinks. Keeping a nice level of buzzed going as we drove all through the night and into the second day on the road.

We're just four hours away from Carver now, and I'm feeling an itch to get back there. I want to check on the kids and make sure they're ok, and help Aunt Gina with any preparations that are left for the funeral.

Opting out of flying home, has started to feel a little like I was running away. I feel bad for doing it, but at the same time I needed it. I needed some time to clear my head and having Libby here has helped more than I can say. Besides, Libby wouldn't have made it home in time for the funeral if she'd driven alone, however much she would have tried, she wouldn't have been safe to drive all of that way in one go. Even if we haven't slept exactly, we have rested.

The whole drive Libby and I have talked things through, she listened when I needed to talk, soothed me when I needed to cry, talked when I needed to discuss things and helped when I needed to keep busy by planning for the future.

With each hour that passes, I find myself growing closer and closer to her. I find myself wondering how I never noticed how beautiful she was, and I find myself wondering why I ever dated Julie.

Don't get me wrong, I liked Julie when we started dating, we were best friends and had been for a really long time, and while we were dating I did fall in love with her. Now, looking back on the relationship, though, it's blatantly clear that we weren't suited in the slightest.

She's moving fast into her future, and I'm being thrown into one I didn't see coming. Both of us moving forwards, but in different directions and at different rates.

Libby and I, we compliment each other. She knows me better than anyone has ever known me, and I know her, I suspect, better than anyone else has ever known her.

I reach over and lace her fingers through mine.

'You ok?' She asks.

'No,' I say honestly, 'but I think eventually I will be.'

Fifty Seven – Julie

Home feels strange after spending the last few weeks at the cabin. It feels strange being back here and knowing that Mrs Parson's won't be coming home with Charles and Libby, who are due to arrive in about an hour.

When I walked through the doors of my house, my mom came running down the stairs and pulled me into a tight hug. We both cried for ages, standing in the hall and sobbing our eyes out.

My parents told me that I didn't have to go to boarding school. They said that they could see I'd made a lot of changes, and I've learnt my lesson. They said that if I wanted to stay and be here for Charles, then I could.

I considered it for almost the entire first day I was home, but in the end I decided to still go. I don't know if that makes me selfish. I hope it doesn't, but I just feel like I need a clean slate. I feel it so strongly that staying here doesn't seem like an option for me. Besides, he has Libby and she'll be able to help him far more than I can.

I'll stay for the funeral, that's happening tomorrow, exactly forty eight hours after we left the cabin. Libby and Charles will make it home fifteen hours before the funeral, and I think it's good for Charles that he's had this time. I think if he'd been around here while his aunt, my mom and Libby's mom worked on the funeral and arrangements for a little get together afterwards, he would have fallen apart.

Instead, he's out on a cross country road trip with the one person who I feel confident, will be able to keep him from being swallowed by his grief.