I Liked My Life(51)

Sounds like I could have learned a lot from Linda. Keeping a distinguishable life of my own was my great life struggle. It made me feel greedy to long for more than I already had.

Rory continues speaking, but Eve’s mind drifts to the eulogy Meg gave at my funeral. I can’t follow her stream of consciousness exactly, I’m too high up, but for weeks after I died Eve read it before bed. She knows it verbatim and so do I.

Madeline loved to read. She was wise and often told her truths through quotations or storytelling. I don’t know who originally said it, but her favorite words of wisdom were, “Everything will be okay in the end. If it isn’t okay, it isn’t the end.” How I hope that proves true for all of us gathered here today in sadness.

When we were little, Maddy loved skinny-dipping and drinking ice cold, fresh-squeezed lemonade. If she were standing here now she’d laugh and say she still loves those things. As kids we watched the Muppets. Maddy could impersonate Miss Piggy to a T. She’d bob her head around and say in a mousy voice, “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and it may be necessary from time to time to give a stupid or misinformed beholder a black eye.” She drank Shirley Temples long after she was of age to drink stronger. Her favorite fortune cookie read: Simplicity of character is the natural result of profound thought.

Although she was interested in many things, nothing competed with the responsibility and joy she found in motherhood. Eve was Maddy’s life passion and true gift. She loved her family unequivocally, and wanted nothing more than for Eve and Brady to be happy. That’s why today is so damn confusing.

Meg’s voice cracked with the last sentence and she stepped off the pulpit in tears. It was unclear to those in attendance if that was all she had to say, or if that was all she could get out. Paige was next up. She looked out at the faces that weren’t mine and began to sob. She’s lived in Wellesley twenty years and no one could ever remember seeing Paige so much as frazzled. There was total silence as her husband led her back to their pew. The memory arrests Eve and she forgets, for a second, where she is. She snaps back to the present when people begin to shuffle toward the parking lot. Eve follows, not wanting to burden Rory with her presence, when a man’s voice shouts: “What the hell did you say?”

It’s Brian. His words bring foot traffic to a standstill.

“I said I’m glad you could finally make it to see your mother,” Greta hollers back.

“You’re accosting me at my mother’s funeral?”

“Yes, I am, young man,” she says evenly.

“Young man? I’m twenty-six.” Being on the offensive makes him sweat. He takes off his jacket, revealing his professional success with a custom-tailored shirt and platinum cuff links.

Rory intervenes. “Greta, Brian, please, now is not the time.”

“Oh, Rory, I’m sorry, honey. This jerk is your brother, so you have to forgive him. But I … I … don’t.” Greta points her index finger in Brian’s face. He’s handsome, the kind of man who looks athletic without actually being so. “How dare you come here today and cry like you lost something you cherished.”

Brian clenches his right hand into a fist, the way Brady has so many times this summer. “How dare you, lady. You have no right to make this spectacle. You’re not even family.”

She shakes off his words in that unflinching way only old people can. “Ask anyone who works hospice and they’ll tell you this about family: it’s made of the people who show up. You don’t know my name, do you? I cared for your mother for two years. Two beautiful years. I bathed her, dressed her, fed her when her arthritis flared up … and-and here you don’t even know my name.”

Brian’s head is down now, in a look of surrender. “Good,” she says. “At least you’re standing here, silent, looking as repentant as you should feel. I’m Greta Robbins and I have one last question. Do you have any idea how much the woman you ignored sacrificed for you and your self-absorbed life?”

It’s been a drizzly day, and as though on cue, rain pours down in violent sheets. The weather breaks up the crowd. Eve walks away in shock.

Once in the privacy of the car, she pounds her head on the steering wheel, weighted by Greta’s words. Someone should have said that to me, Eve thinks. I was so selfish my mom killed herself. Of all the thoughts to come through with great clarity, it seems cruel this had to be the one. It’s torture to hear Eve give herself this undeserved lashing. I want to communicate the whole of my story to her, but it’s layered and emotional. I tried pulling Brady into the fold during his run last week, got him to stand right in front of the problem, but he was distracted by Todd Anderson’s car and tore off. Without context to draw from my story will never be told. I love you, I say instead, over and over. I love you. I love you. I love you.

It’s not enough. Eve is hysterical. I find Rory. I hate to intrude during such a sensitive time, but I can’t let Eve drive away in such a state. Check on Eve, I guide. Check on Eve.

She spots Eve’s car and suddenly there she is, tapping on the window, motioning to let her in. “You look like you need a tissue, and I happen to have a pocket full,” Rory says, helping herself to the passenger seat. “They’re crumbled, not dirty.”

“Thanks.” Eve tries to get her breathing under control. “Listen, you don’t have to, like, sit here with me. I’m fine. God … you’re the one who should be consoled.”