The Vanishing Year(8)

“Mick.” I faced him, and he seemed surprised. His blond hair flopped in front of his green eyes. His face was tanned, lined, but in a broken, weathered way that made women want to fix him. One woman, in particular. “She’s dead. But thanks for stopping by.”

I watched his reaction through slitted eyes and he was appropriately surprised, then sad.

“Ah, I’m sorry, Peach. I knew she was sick.”

“But you didn’t come?”

“Your mama and I . . . I loved her, but we just aren’t the same kind of people.” He made a coughing sound, which almost sounded like a sob. For a second, I looked up. His eyes were dry.

“I don’t know what that means.”

“It’s easy, sugar. She’s a good person.”

“Was.” I pushed my glass away, the liquor sliding up over the lip and onto the bar top.

“What’s that?”

“She was a good person. She’s dead now. She’s actually in the county coroner’s office because I, her daughter, and possibly the only person who truly cared about her, can’t afford to bury her.”

He sat on the barstool next to me, his palms flat on the wood in front of him. “When?” His voice was soft, the swagger kicked out and his grief coming too late.

“A week ago, Sunday.”

“Your mama had a million friends, H. Everyone loved her, she was a spirit, you know?” He said this to me, like I didn’t know, and I wanted to kick his shins with both feet, hard. I pictured that, the toe of my high heel making small, pointed, bluish green marks, like the ones he’d left on Evelyn’s arms, dotting his flesh like tiny fingerprints.

The truth was, she used to have friends. Before Mick. Before cancer.

“Yeah, well, where are they?” I pulled the corner of my napkin back, pressing the pad of my finger into the puddle of whiskey and touching it to my tongue.

“I don’t know. I have some phone numbers, we could call some people. Get help.”

“Why don’t you help? She loved you, you know.”

He looked pained. “I was never good enough, that’s all, Hilary. I’m sorry about Evelyn. I’m sorry about everything.”

I waved my hand. It didn’t matter. Mick had been in and out of our lives so much, he’d hardly been a stabilizer. I hadn’t seen him in more than six months. Just enough time for Evelyn to get sick, really sick. For the cancer to come back with a vengeance and for her to die. Alone.

“I can help you. I can get money, what do you need?”

“Three thousand dollars.”

“That’s not a whole lot.” He rubbed his jaw, his three-day stubble, flecked with new gray. “Can I give you a ride home?”

“Just go away, Mick.” I rested my forehead on the back of my hand, which cupped the top of my glass. Everything felt so heavy. When I looked up he was gone.

? ? ?

The days had started to blend into each other. I ignored my phone, which rang incessantly with professors and friends, people I’d blown off when I left that night. When the call came from the care nurse: Come home now. Evelyn won’t make it through the night. I hopped the BART to Richmond with little more than the clothes on my back and my pathetically near-empty wallet. Almost two hours later, I arrived home, too late. Evelyn had passed away before I could say good-bye.

Professors wanted me to come back to class, to take the final, to graduate. I listened to exactly three out of twenty-two voicemails. Molly: Hilary, what the hell happened to you? Just call me. And then, Hilary, you have one final, that’s it. Please don’t throw it all away. Call me, we’ll make arrangements for you. That was Dr. Gupta, her delicate accent floating through the line, comforting only in its familiarity. I almost called her back, the one person who seemed to have some empathy, who had always been a presence for me, an ear. I sat with my finger on the button, thinking, but eventually hit delete. Hilary, if you don’t come back this week and take your final exam, you will not earn your degree. This is the last time I’m calling you. Dr. Peterman. Asshole prick. I deleted them all. It all felt so hopeless.

I couldn’t scrabble for money from within the walnut walls of an exam hall, especially since if I had any hopes of passing, I’d need to study. I had two weeks left to bury Evelyn, before the state intervened. But I had no real way of getting my hands on any money. I tried to apply for a credit card, but with no history, I’d been denied.

I went to see Evelyn’s “estate” lawyer, a thin, rumpled sort of man who operated from his damp basement in Elmwood, and he’d laughed at me. There was nothing but debt. I had to pay the debt before I could pay for Evelyn. I was stuck in this quasi purgatory, hopeless and bottomless. The self-loathing felt like a thick, wet blanket. The haze of alcohol dulled the sharp edges. Just a little.

“Here’s what will happen,” he explained to me, his twitchy fingers ashing a cigarette so frequently, so nervously, he lost the cherry more than once and had to relight. “The state will do what’s called a state-funded burial. It’s not actually a burial. They’ll cremate the body. You have time after that to claim the ashes, but then you owe the funeral home fees, as well as the state. Then they dispose of the ashes how they see fit.”

A wave of intense nausea overtook me. “Dispose?” I squeaked, breathing through my mouth. His breath smelled like fish.