Missing Hart (8 page)

Gesturing to the envelope that said, ‘What to do now’ I said, “That one, unfortunately, we have to read because I think it’s going to explain what kind of burial she wanted. Do you want me to open it?”

I hadn’t realized that Dillon had come back into the house, so I startled when he answered the question from the kitchen doorway.

“Yes. Read what it says out loud.”

With shaking hands, I opened Marissa’s final instructions and began to read them to Dillon and Leah.

My three loves,

Dillon, Leah and Minnie,

I’ve done everything I can to make this as easy as possible. My clothes are packed up and my cell phone and keys are where you can find them. I’ve stocked the house with enough food for at least two weeks, the laundry is done and the kitchen, living room and bathroom are all clean. I will leave the key to my car in the glove compartment. The car will be parked on the street I’m going to.

I’d like to be cremated. What you do with me from there is up to you. Should you want to keep my remains in an urn that’s fine. If you would rather scatter my ashes, that’s fine too. In the end, it doesn’t really matter where that physical portion of me winds up. You don’t need a headstone or an urn to connect with me, because I’ll always be with you.

My final request is that you post no obituary for me. Other than the staff at the bookstore, Dillon’s work friends and my therapist, there is no one else that I feel needs to know. More importantly, I never want him to have the satisfaction of knowing that he got what he always wanted.

I know the three of you will each blame yourselves for my actions, but you need to accept the reality that this was my choice. I know it will hurt, I know it will be a shock and I know it’s selfish of me to go. But the truth is, I’m not afraid anymore, and I never have to be afraid again. What lies ahead of me is peace, which is all I’ve ever wanted. In time I hope you can remember the good times that we had, and that you can forgive me for choosing to end my suffering. I love you three more than I can say.

I stayed as long as I could. My letters to each of you will explain better, but I know you may not be up for reading them now. Just know that nothing any of you did could have changed this outcome. This was all me.

Live your lives to the fullest and be happy. I’ll be a peaceful angel watching over you now~ happy and free.

Love Always,

Marissa

It took strength I didn’t think I had to read the entire letter out loud to Dillon and Leah, and as I finished I felt like I’d just woken up in the hospital after a ten car wreck. Although I was certain that Marissa had meant for the letter to be positive, it was devastating. How had she gotten so far away from life in her mind that death seemed the better alternative? What had happened to the girl that told me that our lives were a reflection of our thoughts?

The idea that she had been lying to me the entire time was gut wrenching. Was I doomed to live a half-life, unable to be touched? I’d never contemplated suicide before but now I had to wonder; over time, would my inability to be physical with someone lead to a depression that would claim me? The idea terrified me.

Each of us seemed to retreat within after I finished reading, which was clearly because the whole situation was so horrifyingly overwhelming. I’m not sure how long we sat there in silence before Dillon spoke, announcing that Leah and I both needed to get some sleep. It was a relief that it was assumed that I would spend the night as well because there was no way I could go home in my current condition. It would send up red flags all over the place to my family.

“I don’t think any of us are capable of going into Marissa’s room again and no one wants to sleep with Lee in the guest room because she’s a kicker. You can crash in my bed, and I’ll take the couch.”

I protested immediately.

“Dillon, that’s ridiculous. I’m at least a foot shorter than you-the couch would be a much more comfortable fit for my size than yours.”

“No… Minnie… I need different. Does that make sense? I don’t even know. I can’t explain it, but I just can’t sleep where I slept last night, back when I thought that maybe everything was going to be okay. It will make me feel better to know that you and Lee are both comfortable.”

Naturally I acquiesced. I could understand needing space and wanting something different. Leah lent me a pair of pajamas that made all of us crack a smile for the first time in hours since I had to fold the legs up a ton to even be able to walk in them. Leah was tall where I was petite, so sharing clothes wasn’t something we would ever be able to do regularly.

I was beyond sad when I finally got into Dillon’s bed to try to sleep. I couldn’t imagine sleeping, mostly because I was freaked out by the idea that Marissa was gone and I would never speak to her again.

How many long talks had we had? How many secrets had I confided in her? How many times had she made me laugh? It felt like the answer to each question was thousands. My best friend was gone and I’d never see or speak to her again. The weight of that thought was soul crushing.

I lay there for hours, remembering the hundreds of things about Marissa that I had loved so deeply. Eventually I drifted off to sleep where I was plagued by dreams where I would see Marissa alive and discover that the entire thing had just been a misunderstanding.

Just before dawn the following morning, I woke up disoriented. A million thoughts ran through my mind in under two seconds and I started to panic, but I calmed down when my senses processed Dillon’s scent. For a moment I felt like a hideously terrible person for taking any kind of comfort at being wrapped in his comforter and sleeping in his bed. My best friend was dead, and I had no business having any gooey feelings toward her husband, regardless of the fact that their marriage hadn’t been traditional.

I needed to get up and do something normal, so I snuck into the hallway bathroom and took a shower. Leah had lent me a tee shirt the night before to wear today, and since I washed my underwear in the sink the night before I was at least presentable. After braiding my damp hair, I curled back up in Dillon’s bed with the note that Marissa had left me, trying to find the strength to read it. I wrestled with it for the better part of an hour but in the end I just couldn’t do it. I wasn’t ready, at least not yet.

Dillon and Leah were both up and sitting on the couch when I wandered out into the living room. The good news was that they weren’t sitting in silence. The bad news was that the only noise came from the TV and it was tuned to the weather channel. They clearly weren’t focusing on the television, instead just sitting side by side as they held hands. Overall it was an improvement from the night before, so I felt a bit of relief. Every day would be another step forward but, somehow, we would all get through this. There wasn’t any other option.

We spent the morning choosing a funeral home and dealing with all of the details. Dillon said very little at the funeral home, but I could tell he was worried about something. When we left, Leah cornered him and got him to admit that he was currently in no position to put out thousands of dollars for Marissa’s cremation and services since all of the money that they had in savings had been eaten up by the move. Leah told him that she would give him all of the money that she had in savings to help, but he immediately shot her down.

“Absolutely not, Lee. This isn’t your responsibility. I’ll talk to the funeral director later about a payment plan or I’ll get a credit card. I didn’t say I couldn’t do it, I just said that it was going to be hard because the timing is bad.”

The sheer fact that we could see that he was worried, compiled with the fact that he admitted that he was, told me that while he could figure it out, he shouldn’t have to do it at the spur of the moment.

After we were finished at the funeral home, Dillon drove us to the spot that we now knew that Marissa had left her car. We all did our best not to look around for any visible signs that something horrifically terrible had happened the day before. I volunteered to drive her car back to Dillon’s, but since we had agreed earlier that I would be the one to tell everyone at work that Marissa had died, I told them it would take me some extra time to get there.

I fully planned to go to work, but my first order of business was to go back to the funeral home to pay for the funeral. Although I was allowed to, I had never spent any of the money I made working at the bookstore. In addition to my work earnings, I had money in my account that was an accrual of the trust fund my grandfather had left. To me, to all of my siblings, that money was blood money. None of us had ever touched it. Dante and Damien had already given their trust fund money to charity and Delilah and I will follow suit as soon as we turn eighteen.

The funeral director was surprised to see me back, but once I explained that I wanted to anonymously pay the bill in full, he understood. We agreed that if Dillon pushed for answers, he would be told that an adult friend had paid for the services with instructions not to reveal who they were. After I finished writing the check, I asked him to wait until the end of the day and then to call Dillon to tell him that the funeral cost had been paid in full.

After I finished at the funeral home, I stopped at a small restaurant near Dillon’s house and set up the funeral luncheon. I pre-paid for the luncheon and got the owner’s word that Dillon would never be told who had paid.

My last stop of the day was the flower store I’d come to the day before to get Marissa sunflowers. What a difference one day made. I ordered a ton of sunflower, daisy, rose and hydrangea arrangements for the service. Marissa had always loved flowers but over the course of the last month the only thing that really evoked a spark in her was getting her to talk about the love garden that Dillon had been working on. She was obsessed with the beauty of both the flowers and the gesture. Dillon would have planted a love garden in their backyard for her just to see her smile, had even offered to do so, but she had told him that it would ‘taint’ what the love garden stood for. I’m not sure what she meant by that, but what I am sure of is that for her funeral service I can provide a small version of a love garden in her honor.

I just hoped that somehow, someway, wherever she was, she saw and understood the gesture for what it was.

Being inside the small church where we were holding Marissa’s service was the most surreal experience of my life. The realization that my wife really was dead, and that I was now a widower, was staggering. Who had ever even heard of a twenty-four year old widower? It was so wrong that it felt obscene.

The service was small and intimate. The owner of the bookstore where Marissa had worked came with five of the employees, my boss came with his wife and then there was Marissa’s therapist. I felt horrible for her-the guilt she felt about not having Marissa hospitalized that day was really doing a number on her, even though she didn’t say much. I had found out from her just prior to the service starting that she had received a suicide letter in the mail from Marissa a few days ago beseeching her not to blame herself. I’m sure Marissa meant well in trying to absolve her of guilt, but I also knew that only time could make that wound hurt less.

Leah and Dominique sat on either side of me in the front pew, each with a hand clasped in one of mine. Dominique had been our rock for the last few days, cooking, cleaning and keeping us on track. She showed up each afternoon once her college classes let out and left just before bedtime each night. Leah leaned on her like a crutch, and I was beyond thankful to Minnie for being there. I shuddered to think about how much worse off Leah would be if she didn’t have someone besides me to turn to, because I wasn’t doing the great job I normally did of being the rock that she deserved.

I was holding on to the hope that I would start to feel more normal once the funeral was finished. Just knowing that the funeral was coming had left me in a cold sweat, the idea of saying goodbye almost more than I could bear. How the hell was I supposed to say goodbye to someone that I’d built my life around? It was terrifying, so alien to me that I didn’t know how I would do it. How would I learn to live my life completely differently?

In some ways it felt like I had lost a child. I felt guilty for thinking that but it was the only comparison I could come up with. For years my life revolved around taking care of Marissa-worrying about her and making sure that she was provided for, that she had what she needed. I lived and breathed to make her life better, to see her thrive, and now… she was gone. I have no idea where that leaves me, or what my future looks like.

Living in the house without her is going to be too much, I can tell that already. We had only been there for a few weeks before she died, but it’s just not going to work. I can’t bring myself to go into her bedroom, the sight of her car in the driveway makes me unbearably anxious and I can’t stop remembering the last time I saw her, when she stood in the hallway and told me she would look after me.

I’d been hit with another big surprise in the last few days-every part of the funeral had been paid for by someone who wanted to remain anonymous. It could only be my boss or the owner of the bookstore because they were the only two people I knew who could afford to make such a lovely gesture. I wanted to talk to each of them and find out which one had done it, but I had been given stern instruction from the funeral director that the person who paid for the funeral insisted on confidentiality and did not want to be acknowledged in any way.

“Mr. Cooper, the party that paid for this instructed me to tell you that you aren’t to try to figure out who they are. They’ve asked that you understand that this was done out of love for Marissa, and they hope you will accept the gesture with no questions asked.”

My pride chafed a bit at that. I’d always taken care of people and now someone who wouldn’t even allow me to thank them was taking care of me. I couldn’t bite off my nose to spite my face though because there was no way that I could have afforded to do it myself right at the spur of the moment. My credit rating was excellent and I could have gotten a credit card or a bank loan, but it was a relief not to have to. In the end, I bit my tongue and didn’t ask any questions.