Family Money(10)

After getting out, I followed Raul around the other vehicles. On the opposite side of the burned vehicle, I noticed a medic zipping up a black body bag. The sight of it stole my breath. Someone was clearly dead. But was it Joe? I kept praying this was all somehow a bad coincidence. That this was a different minivan, and whoever was in that body bag was not my father-in-law.

A young officer walked over to Raul, glanced at me, and then the two officers had a conversation in Spanish I couldn’t understand. My eyes drifted back over to the vehicle, searching desperately for anything that might not match up with what I saw yesterday. But it was too hard to tell. Nothing was left of the minivan except the metal frame. The younger officer gave Raul a small black bag and walked away.

Raul turned to face me. “The body is burned badly, Alex, especially in the upper region around the shoulders, neck, and head. I don’t mean to be overly graphic, but we won’t be able to determine anything by facial recognition. But it is a male about five-foot-ten with a slender build. Does that match up with your father-in-law?”

I swallowed, nodded.

“Two items were recovered,” Raul said. “A small belt buckle and a ring.”

Raul started to open the bag. I thought about how Joe always wore a black golf belt with a little silver buckle with the Titleist logo on it. Was he wearing it today? I couldn’t remember, but my heart was pounding so fast.

Raul gently poured the contents of the bag into the palm of his left hand. A charred belt buckle and a ring. I immediately recognized the word Titleist on the buckle. And it looked like Joe’s gold wedding ring. Still, I didn’t want to believe it. This couldn’t be happening. I reached down with a shaky hand, picked up the ring, and looked inside to see if there was an inscription.

I felt my heart collapse.

Joe and Carol. Always, Forever.





SEVEN


I could barely focus on the highway as I drove across the border and made my way back to the Holiday Inn. Taylor had already called and texted me three times since I’d been at the scene of the explosion. I hadn’t responded yet. I had to get to her as fast as possible. There was no way I was going to tell her what had just happened over the phone. Twice I had to pull over on the side of the highway to try to catch my breath and calm down. But it barely worked. The closer I got to the hotel, the faster my heart raced. I worried I might have a full-on panic attack. But I had to hold it together for Taylor.

I pulled into the parking lot and settled in a spot close to the front doors of the hotel. I sat there a moment, knowing I couldn’t go inside and do this in front of the kids. I typed out a text to Taylor, paused before sending it.

I’m in the hotel parking lot. Please come down alone.

I took a deep breath and then let it out as slowly as possible. I knew sending this text would initiate one of the most brutal moments of our lives. The tipping of a domino that would change everything in devastating ways. I needed to be ready. It was time for me to show Taylor the same kind of strength she’d demonstrated to me over the years.

I sent the text. Taylor bolted out the front doors of the hotel two minutes later. She scanned the parking lot until she spotted our Tahoe. I could see the fear pouring out of her eyes. Of course, she knew something was wrong. There would’ve been no other explanation as to why I hadn’t called or texted her back until now. It crushed me to have to confirm that fear in her.

I got out of the Tahoe and walked around to the front of the vehicle. She ran over to me and then slowed a few feet away, as if she were trying to read my face before I ever said anything. But I could see she already knew.

“No! Don’t you say it!”

I stepped toward her. “I’m so sorry, Taylor.”

“No, Alex! No!”

I grabbed her arms with both hands, pulled her all the way into me, even though she was trying to yank away. She kept screaming, “No! No!” and fought me for several seconds. But I didn’t let go. Finally, she buried her face into my chest. The full weight of her suddenly collapsed in my arms, as if she had nothing left, and all I could do was keep her from dropping to the pavement.





EIGHT


It took us a couple of days of coordinating with Raul and the police, the US consulate in Matamoros because it was an international death, and a local funeral home, where we had Joe’s body cremated—or what was left of it—before we finally packed everything up in the Tahoe and drove back to Austin.

I had originally wanted Taylor to take her mother and the kids home without me on that first day and let me handle everything, but she thought it would be even more traumatic for our girls to immediately yank them out of the trip. I had to admit she was right. The remaining time with the other orphanage kids helped to ease some of the initial shock and grief our girls had felt when we told them the tragic news about Papa’s death in a car accident. We decided to not go into the horrific details of what really happened at this point. There were a lot of gut-wrenching tears with my girls that first day and plenty of discussions of heaven. Taylor somehow put aside her own shattered heart to make sure the girls processed their hurt first. On the other hand, Carol simply shut down on us when she received the news about her husband. There was no emotional outburst from her the second time around. My mother-in-law just went white-faced and stoic. It was an awful thing to witness, as if watching the blood drain completely out of her body within a matter of seconds. Carol had remained rather emotionless the past two days. Even my girls couldn’t seem to get her to smile.