Abandon (20 page)
Epilogue
4.5 years later
Late August in Cary is a sight to behold. Emerald-green grass and trees as far as the eye can see. This is one of the things I missed after leaving my house in Cary. But Senia and I enjoyed the life we created in Chapel Hill: going out for the occasional beer with the rest of the gang when they weren’t busy having kids or traveling. When they weren’t around, Senia and I got very good at pretending to know what the heck we were doing with Molly. Maybe we did know what we were doing because she’s still living with us – in our new house in North Raleigh – even though she started classes at UNC last week.
But it’s no surprise that she didn’t feel like coming to a birthday party for a four-year-old. She has to draw the line somewhere. As I pull our car into Chris and Claire’s curved driveway, I can’t help but feel a bit nostalgic for the brief time Molly spent here with Senia and me. The three of us have made a pretty great team and sometimes it’s hard to remember that she’s not my daughter – especially since I never heard from Elaine again after Grandma’s funeral. I wish I could say I worry about Elaine, but I don’t.
The crying begins just as I kill the engine. “She’s calling your name,” I say to Senia as I open the car door.
“She’s two months old,” she replies as she slides out of the passenger seat and immediately opens the door to the backseat. “If she’s able to call either of our names, it has to be yours, Da-Da.”
“Very funny.”
Senia caught me trying to teach Sia – short for Florencia – how to say Da-Da the other day. I’m not stupid. I know she can’t speak yet, but there’s no harm in hammering it into her head. Da-Da
will
be the first word she says.
She takes Sia out of the car seat and I grab the baby bag from the trunk. I can’t help but reach for her feather-soft cheeks as we walk toward Chris and Claire’s front door. I wish I could touch those cheeks all day long.
Senia doesn’t bother knocking or ringing the doorbell; she just walks right in. Old habits die hard and Chris and Claire are family so it makes no sense to knock here. Besides, I work here and they’re all probably out in the backyard celebrating Jimi’s fourth birthday already. We’re a little late to the party today because Senia wouldn’t leave until Molly understood the concept of standard deviation. I’m glad someone in this family understands statistics.
I don’t know much about anything other than music, which is why, when I decided to quit touring, I expanded the small music studio I originally installed in this house — with Chris and Claire’s permission. We now record all our albums here in Cary, but when it’s time to tour, Chris and Jake take Will Rawlings in my place. I know Grandma would be proud to know that I never abandoned my family when they needed me.
Jake spots us first as we walk through the back doors out onto the patio. It’s a small party for a few family and friends, so I should have no problems executing my plans for later today. I just need to make sure Chris and Claire do their part.
“Hey, man,” Jake says, giving me a one-armed bro-hug.
Rachel kisses both Senia and I on the cheek, then she gazes longingly at Sia. “Can I hold her?”
“Of course,” Senia replies as she hands over my precious girl.
Rachel wanted to wait until the touring slowed down before she and Jake had kids. They were all set to start trying for a baby next year, until Rachel developed PCOS – polycystic ovarian syndrome. Now, she’s not sure she wants to take the risk of having a miscarriage. I’ve tried to get Senia to talk to her about it, but Senia still has a little bit of a problem talking about the baby we lost. There’s something that happens when you lose a child, no matter what stage of their development. The experience definitely made us appreciate what Chris and Claire struggle with every day. I just hope that one day, the hole in Senia’s heart will close a little bit more. And I hope that Rachel and Jake will get the chance to feel what I feel every day with my Sia. Like a part of my soul that died a long time ago was reanimated, given a second chance.
Rachel and Senia wander off to deal with the kids and to show Sia off to all the other parents. Jake turns to me with a serious expression. “I got what you asked me to get,” he mutters out the side of his mouth. “It’s in the freezer.”
“Thanks, man.”
We set off to find Chris. I need to make sure he and Claire came through with their roles in today’s surprise. On the way to the kids’ play area, I’m stopped by Joel, Jackie’s new husband. He could be Jake’s dad with that lumberjack beard.
He claps me on the arm. “Where’s your wife and baby? We got something for the baby.”
“She’s not my wife, but she’s right over there,” I say, nodding toward the patio area where Claire, Rachel, and Senia are fawning over Sia.
“Well, you should get on that. Girls like her don’t come along but once in a blue moon.”
I sigh at this advice. Joel is a great guy, but he’s become quite comfortable with telling me I need to hurry up and get married. He doesn’t know that Senia is the one who has refused to marry me. I’ve asked her to marry me twice and both times she shot me down. The first time she told me she wanted to finish school before she started worrying about planning a wedding. I asked her again the day she graduated from UNC – I’m nothing if not completely compulsive and eager when it comes to Senia. She still turned me down. She didn’t want me to just ask her because “It was time.” She wanted me to ask her when the time was right. She said I’d know when that time came. And she was right – as she always is.
It seemed logical that I should ask her as soon as we found out she was pregnant last year, but I didn’t. I knew she wouldn’t want to look back on her wedding pictures and remember that she was two months’ or six months’ pregnant. I knew she would want to wait. So I’ve waited patiently for the past ten months, biding my time and making my plans. I don’t know what she’s going to say, but I hope to God that I’ve planned it right this time.
After the birthday cake is cut, I walk inside the house to begin putting the plan in motion. If everything is going as planned out there, Claire should be offering to take Sia while Senia goes to look for me. I can just imagine Senia’s face when Claire tells her that we’re going to play hide-and-seek.
I open the freezer and retrieve the surprise that Jake brought for us, then I reach into my pocket and retrieve the ring that Chris just handed to me behind the bouncer. Now, I just have to get to my hiding place before Senia gets there.
Once I’m settled into the darkness of my hiding spot, I close my eyes, trying to keep calm, as I wait for her. She’s going to say yes. She has to.
She’d
better
say yes or I’m going to ravage her tonight. She’d like that.
The door handle turns and the sound of Senia’s laughter is like music to my ears. A crack of light appears, just enough for me to see my surroundings and I quickly rise from the bench and turn on the light switch. Senia opens the door all the way and shakes her head when she sees me standing in the steam room, holding a bowl of frozen yogurt, with a ring sitting on top like a three-carat cherry on the life we’ve built.
She presses her lips together as I take her hand and pull her into the steam room. “Yes,” she says with a nod. “Just … yes.”
I scoop the ring out of the yogurt and she smiles as I lick it clean then I slide it onto her finger. I plant a soft kiss on the back of her hand, then I kiss her madly.
“If you didn’t say yes this time,” I whisper in her ear, “I was going to break out the whips tonight.”
“In that case, no.”
I kiss her again and a million thoughts race through my mind, but the one that stands out amongst them all is this:
You can’t let your past define your future
. Once you get that figured out, you begin to understand the joy of living in the present. And the present is full of tiny gifts that we can only see when we stop looking behind and ahead of us. Sometimes, these gifts land right at our feet. Sometimes, it’s our feet that carry us toward them, running at full-speed until our hearts nearly give out. Either way, never stop noticing them, and never stop wishing.
Chapter One
January 8th
Mikki
The moment you realize you’re going to die is nothing like I imagined it would be. I imagined a deep internal struggle coupled with a visceral physical response—fight or flight. But there’s no fighting this. I’m going to die.
It’s possible that everyone on this plane is going to die. I wonder if they feel this overwhelming sense of peace, or if the squeal of the plane engine has drowned out all their thoughts.
He grabs the oxygen mask as it drops from the compartment and he’s yelling something as he puts the elastic band over my head. He pulls his own mask over his head then he grabs my hand and looks me in the eye. There’s no panic in his eyes. Maybe he feels this same calm I’m feeling. Or maybe he just wants me to know that he loves me.
He loves me.
Or maybe the look in his eyes is his way of telling me he trusts that whatever happens to us in the next few seconds was meant to be.
Fate.
I used to think fate was for religious nuts and people who were too afraid to take their fate into their own hands. Now I know the truth.
Chapter Two
January 3rd
Mikki
Rina,
Please don’t look for me. You probably won’t find me. This shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone, and please don’t blame yourselves. I’m just tired. Trying to cope.... trying to forget.... It’s not enough anymore. I just want to close my eyes and know that it will all be over soon. There’s nothing anyone could have done. You’ve all done more than enough. I hope you all find peace knowing I am no longer suffering. I love you guys. Tell Meaghan I leave her my black box.
Mikki
I tuck the note inside a plastic baggie and seal it tightly, then I lift my bedroom window an inch and lay the bagged note on the window sill. I shut the window tight to trap the note there.
Taking one last look around the bedroom, I smile as I think of how much I won’t miss this house. The pink tulip-shaped knit cap my best friend Rina bought for me in Holland sits on top of my dresser. I’ve only worn it once, the day she brought it back for me from her family vacation last summer. I was in High Point Treatment Center at the time, in the dual diagnosis unit because I’m one of the special cases that needed both treatment for attempted suicide and drug detox.
“You look awfully cheerful for someone who’s traveling alone.” Meaghan’s green eyes follow my suitcase as I drag it down the stairs, then her gaze shifts to my face. My sister is seventeen, but she’s not stupid. She knows the signs, which is why I’m trying my hardest not to exhibit the typical suicidal behavior.
I didn’t give away all my belongings. I’m not traveling light. I have tried not to appear too chipper over the last couple of days. Yes, it feels amazing to have a plan. It feels like a ten-ton slab of cement has been lifted off my chest. I can breathe. I can think about the future without the crippling anxiety and depression that comes with not knowing if the pain will ever end.
But I can’t let Meaghan or my parents see how ridiculously relieved I’m feeling. They’ve seen that behavior too many times. The last time I made plans to die, three months ago, my mom saw the signs and followed me to the hotel room where I was going to hang myself. The time before that, I swallowed a bottle of pills in my uncle’s bathroom. It was my cousin Gertie who noticed I was acting too happy. She told my Uncle Cort, “Mikki is smiling again.” Uncle Cort broke the door down and that’s when I ended up in High Point. That’s also when I swore I wouldn’t commit suicide anywhere that someone could find me.