I've been thinking a lot lately about Cory's service, and about how Bob flew up here to see her:
"It's Bob, devastated by the news, on my way to BC."
I was frozen. Didn't respond. Couldn't respond. Brain stem.
How do you text someone to explain that you inadvertently, but most certainly, sent your mutual child to her death? Would he agree that it was indeed my fault?
So instead, I held the phone, reading and rereading that single line in the backseat of the car, unable to stop shaking, finally allowing myself to be led by the arm into a florist to pick out gobs and gobs of flowers to put on top of my child's casket. It was the beginning of several surreal experiences. They all had capital letters: The Selection of the Flowers. The Choosing of the Casket. Deciding on a Cemetery. The Securing of the Plot. Dressing Your Dead Child. Viewing Your Child's Corpse. The list went on and on, each thing more horrifying than the last. Brain Stem.
I have the vaguest recollection of demanding roses and firmly overriding Tim's suggestion that everything be pink. There was a little table or a desk that we gathered around, some woman, my Mom, and my sisters. I remember my knees shaking hard enough to move the table above them. There was a big album to choose from like when you plan a wedding. I remember feeling like I was floating above my body. I fought the urge to vomit the entire time I sat there. Walking out of that store was sweet relief.
By the time Bob got here, I had decided he'd forfeited his right to be there when he told Cory she was crazy and when he told me I could keep my schizophrenic kid. Yes, I would keep her and I would put her to bed this last time without him just like every year of her childhood. Just like every single year-the sweet smell of her baby scalp, her chubby toddler body, her sturdy little girl body, her gawky pre-teen, long, lanky frame, her young adult body that sometimes shook with tears when the voices were particularly scary and demanding. "Hold me, Mommy, I'm scared." Limbic system. Where were you for this girl? You show up NOW?
Was it the right thing to do? It sure felt like the right thing, but I was quite out of my mind, so I'm not really sure. Protecting her seemed paramount, probably even more so since I had failed to do so when it counted most. I had all those times he'd hurt her and disappointed her pulled up in my mind ("I lived without you for ten years and I can live without you for ten more") and anyone who had hurt her like that...well, they were not welcome. Limbic system.
So now, when I look back, I can see I made that decision with my emotions and I start to feel responsible. But then, I remember that his actions towards Cory happened, regardless of how I felt about them. Those actions were not my fault, so I cannot be held entirely to blame. Stand up fathers who treat their children well, who provide for them, who love and care for them their entire lives are seldom turned away from their children's funerals. You just don't see it much.
I don't feel good about my decision.
But somehow, I bet Bob doesn't feel too great about his decisions, either.
It was what it was. I have to live with my decision of not allowing him to come to the funeral just as he has to live with failing Cory her entire life. I hope for his sake and his son's that he's doing better by his boy than he did by my girl.
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