I try to keep communication with Cecilia Sanderson to a minimum. It’s the same policy she had with me during my entire childhood, so you could say that I learned it from her. She continued the practice up until recently. But this past week, I have had five missed calls from my mother. When my phone starts ringing at the end of my workday, I know I should ignore it again.
I’ve learned my lesson long ago.
But there’s something that makes me duck into one of the single-use bathrooms and forces my fingers to swipe the screen of my phone.
I try to tell myself I’m answering because tomorrow is my birthday, and maybe this is simply a call to celebrate that. But I doubt Cecilia remembers the date I was born, even though she was there. And she’s never bothered to celebrate my birthday in the past, so why start now?
No, I pick up the phone because I’m afraid.
There’s a gnawing fear in my gut that she has an important piece of information I would regret missing. The anxiety is some lingering internal damage from the day that Josh called me and asked if he could come visit. Normally he didn’t call. He would text his travel plans, and I would wait, excited for him to show up at my door. When we did talk on the phone, it was never just a voice call. We would video chat.
So that time he called me was odd, but I didn’t think about how strange the break in habit was until Josh arrived with a frantic look in his eye. Then the next morning, after going out and putting on a show of normalcy for my friends for a few hours, Josh sat on my couch and started crying. My brother was never shy with his emotions. But they tended to be excitement and enthusiasm, frustration and humor. I saw him tear up during movies or cute animal videos on the internet. But I never saw him sob with such a hopeless cast to his face.
That was the day that he told me about his diagnosis. It was so strange, the way that he had tears running down his face and fear in his eyes and yet he still tried to joke and make me laugh. I think he thought if I thought it was funny, what the doctors told him couldn’t be serious.
So I joked back with him.
And now I hate phone calls.
But I also need to pick them up.
“Cecilia.”
I may have referred to her as “Mom” at the funeral, but the moniker sounded wrong coming out of my lips. She never did much to earn the title. Josh was the one who took care of me. Mrs. Perry was the one who showed me what a mother’s love should be like, even if I only ever got small doses. Just enough to keep me going.
“Darling,” Cecilia greets me. “It’s been too long since we caught up. You ran away from the funeral before I could introduce you to my friends.”
Gross. Despite the circumstances of what had me leaving the funeral early, now I am glad that I did. The idea of having to directly speak to any of the people that were in attendance because they are associated with my mother makes me want to peel my skin off cell by cell.
“Darn. I’ll catch them at the next funeral for your child.”
“Of course,” she agrees, and I don’t know whether to laugh or hang up. While I’m deciding, she continues talking. “I wanted to talk to you about something.”
“Is it an emergency?” Because that is the only reason I picked up this phone. Now, though, I’m having trouble contemplating what emergency I would care about that would be conveyed to me by my mother.
“It’s very concerning, dear.” If I were standing in front of my mother, I expect I would see a practiced pout on her lips. “Emilia mentioned that you are doing the most fascinating thing for your brother. Why didn’t you tell me? It sounds like something from a movie. I think the world needs to know about it. They need to know how far his family would go to make sure that he is resting at peace.”
Damn. I would have preferred if my mother didn’t know about Josh’s ashes and the letters. And I don’t like where she’s directing the conversation.
There was nothing in Josh’s request about the world knowing. Sure, Josh took photographs that were world-renowned. But if he could’ve taken pictures and gotten paid and no one ever saw them other than friends and family, I think he would’ve been fine with that.
Josh and I aren’t like our mother. We’re not fame chasers.
I keep quiet, mainly to avoid saying something that will escalate this into a fight. Today was a long stretch in the office with my head buried in data and constant coworker distractions. I’m too tired and burnt out to go at it with my mother.
“Well?” she presses when I continue to say nothing. “Are you going to tell me?”
“Tell you what?” In the mirror I spy two dark circles under my eyes that scream at me to go home and sleep. “There’s nothing to tell. I’m doing something Josh asked me to do. If he wanted you to do something, I’m sure it would’ve been in that letter he wrote you.”
She huffs, and I try not to let curiosity push me into asking what he wrote her. His note to our mother could have contained anything. Forgiveness. Condemnation.
Despite Josh’s loving personality, I suspect the latter.
He had little time for people who didn’t at least try to be decent. Take our father, for example. The man left soon after I was born and never got in touch. Apparently, he sent childcare payments—though nowhere near enough if you ask Cecilia or Florence—and that was it. But when I was thirteen, I convinced myself that something was keeping him away. That Florence was wrong about me being the reason he left. That my father had wanted to be my dad all along but couldn’t for some reason. Maybe our mother’s uncaring personality had driven him away, or she was keeping us from him. Maybe he was so ashamed for leaving in the first place that he never thought we could forgive him. But I could. Thirteen-year-old Maddie was willing to do anything just to have one parent who cared about her.
I begged Josh to help me find him. Just a phone number. Just to call him and tell him that if he wanted back in my life, I’d welcome him.
At first, Josh tried to convince me not to bother. He didn’t refuse outright—that harsh of a rejection was never Josh’s way. But he did his best to gently redirect me. He asked what I wanted from a father and promised he’d do all of the things a dad would, if I just let go of the idea of the man who provided half my DNA.
But I was relentless, and eventually, Josh gave in.
After some internet sleuthing, he found a phone number and an address. On my fourteenth birthday, almost exactly thirteen years ago to the day, I called him. We sat in the front seat of Josh’s car, my brother behind the wheel, fingers tapping an agitated rhythm and me clutching his cell phone because I didn’t have one. The car stayed parked on the driveway because we weren’t looking to go anywhere, I just wanted to keep Florence and Cecilia from interrupting.
Although, if our dad invited us to visit, I was ready to beg that we drive to New Jersey, where Josh said he lived.
When the call connected, I heard a voice that reminded me of my brother’s, only a note deeper.
And it was so strange to hear the almost-Josh voice tell me he didn’t want to see me. That he left us with Cecilia for a reason. That he started over and has a different life now. That we never knew each other in the first place.
What was even more jarring was my goofy, loving brother tearing the phone from my hand and snarling into the speaker that the man was a piece-of-shit scumbag who didn’t deserve to know me and would never understand the amazing person he’d missed out on.
Josh hung up, started the car, and drove us to my favorite Italian-ice stand, where I forced myself to eat a cup of strawberry-flavored ice chips so my brother wouldn’t be able to tell that my heart was a crumbled-up mess.
But he knew. Josh always knew.
He stopped at the supermarket, bought a twenty-four pack of bargain-brand toilet paper, then drove us to New Jersey, where we spent the rest of my birthday TPing our father’s house. And when we stood back, admiring our handiwork, Josh wrapped an arm around my shoulders and held me tight against his chest.
“I know the world tells us that we need a mom and dad. But we don’t, Magpie. We need each other. You have me. Always.”
Those words held me together for a long time.
But they weren’t true. Because it wasn’t always, was it?
“I think your brother would love the idea of us doing this together.” My mother’s voice pulls me out of the painful tangle of memories back into my agonizing reality that this woman is left, and Josh is gone. “Where is the next trip? When are you going? I can meet you there anytime, anyplace.”
Fuck, no.
I should’ve been expecting this phone call. Should’ve known it was coming and braced myself. Of course my mom is looking for a new angle. Something to write about on her blog and social feeds.
Her meal ticket is dead now.
But this? Spreading her son’s ashes across the United States? That is a perfect story to milk. So many staged grieving images she could take in beautiful destinations. Even if she only wrote one article per state, that’s eight right there. Publish one a month and that’s most of a year covered. And I’m sure she could drag this out. The opportunities are limitless. I wouldn’t be surprised if she tried to add on a few states just for dramatic value. Who gives a fuck what Josh wanted?
My eyes lock on my wrist.
Love, Josh
I did. I do. That’s why this is my job.
Well, not mine alone.
“I’ve already got someone to do the task with.” I don’t know how those words made it out of my mouth with how hard my jaw is clenched. But I did it. I said something relatively mature, when all I wanna do is screech like a banshee and tell my mother to fuck off into the sun.
“I know, dear. You’re doing this with Dom. His mother told me. Can you imagine how that made me feel? To find out from Emilia about what is being done with my son?” She lets out a dramatic sigh I expect is supposed to sound disappointed. “I know that Dom is an attractive man. And that he was friends with Josh. But I am his blood, Madeline. This is something that I should be doing.” There’s a pause, and then she adds, as if it’s an afterthought, “With you, of course.”
I want to stab something, but there’s nothing stab-able in this bathroom. All I can do is grab a paper towel from the dispenser and crush it in my hands.
Not satisfying my violent urges in the least.
“You’re not coming on these trips. Josh did not ask you to and so you are not coming.”
I speak in a robot voice, attempting to emulate Dom’s tone from whenever I frustrate him to the point of murder. Sometimes I find pretending to be Dominic Perry is the only way that I can talk to my mother. Not that it gets anything across to her. But it helps keep me from fighting, screeching, and drawing blood.
“I think this is what Josh would have wanted,” she repeats.
I think a random person on the street would have a better idea of what Josh would’ve wanted than my mother does.
And the fact that Cecilia believes she has more of a right to Josh’s final wishes than Dom does is baffling to me. He was in Josh’s life daily. I bet all of the dirty secrets that my brother had, Dom knows. Hell, the guy might know more than I do. As much as it sucks to admit, Dom is probably the person who loves Josh almost as much as I do. Whenever I visited Josh in the hospital, likely as not I’d cross paths with Dom, or Rosaline would show up and I knew her husband wasn’t far behind.
Ex-husband, I remind myself.
Dom is the one who showed up for Josh. And as frustrating as it is to have him on these trips with me, he’s letting me grieve in the only way I can seem to manage: by spouting off a weird mixture of insults and sarcasm and truths before descending into intense silences and heavy, stuttered breathing.
My mother would never allow me the space to deal with the complex emotions of spreading my brother’s ashes. Having Cecilia on even one of these trips would destroy something in me.
And that’s not how it feels with Dom.
I thought it would. I thought spending one more moment in his presence would wreck me.
But—and I don’t think I could ever admit this out loud—having Dom on each of these trips is…helpful.
I suck in a deep inhale through my nose, the stress of this phone call tightening my airways.
Then I stare at Josh’s handwriting on my wrist. The love he left for Dom and me.
And only us.
“No, Cecilia. I’m doing this with Dom. He’s the only one I need there with me.”
Did I just say I need him?
“Now, Madeline, think about this.” Her voice is tense, vibrating with anger she’s trying to suppress. I guess I’m not the only one getting pissed off lately. “Think about how many people could benefit from this story. My writing helps people. People need to know about Josh.”
“The people who matter do know about him,” I snap, done with my Dom impression. “And it’s clear that you’re not one of them. I’m blocking your number. I can’t do this anymore. Go back to pretending that you don’t have a daughter. Because as far as I’m concerned, you don’t.”
I end the call and shove my phone into my bag, then crouch down in the public bathroom with my arms wrapped around my knees, and my forehead pressed against them, and I wait for the tears to come.
But they don’t.
Happy fucking birthday.