Winter Passing

by Cindy Martinusen-Coloma

“I will be with you always—don’t let me go. But you need more than me inside that heart of yours. I couldn’t really find God until I lost my husband. Not that I think God wanted me to lose Gunther—I still don’t understand all the workings of God. Of course, I couldn’t. Though soon, I will know him, even as I am known.” Grandma smiled, though her voice grew raspy. “I do know that when I was weak, the Lord made me strong. People are for loving and for loving you back. But God is the place to put your heart, soul, and mind. He’ll never let you down, I promise.”

  Grandma closed her eyes for a long time. Her hand weakened its hold on Darby’s. Her voice was low and labored, barely above a whisper. “This ring is part of my last story for you. And my story now becomes yours. But, my little one, I’m not going to finish it. You must.”

  “Do you need your oxygen?” Darby asked while reaching for the mask on the nightstand and turning the valve on the tank.

  Grandma accepted the mask and took two or three breaths before setting it on her chest. “Can’t explain now. Trust me. You’ll know when you get there.” Her eyes opened as she took several more breaths, and she smiled weakly. “You’ll discover more than I can imagine. And it becomes your life after mine—new journey, unraveling past secrets, and making injustices right.” Grandma inhaled a long, full breath. “Your future will change. I pray you will choose the right path when the time comes. I’ll go soon. I’m ready. Then you’ll find your start in the safety deposit box. Your mother has the key.”

  “Grandma, I don’t understand any of this.” Darby’s body trembled.

  “I know. I know, my dear.”

  Darby could see her grandmother desperately needed rest. Yet there was so much she needed to know. What did her grandmother want from her? How could she finish a story she knew nothing about? And what had her grandmother meant about Tatianna needing her name?

  Darby grasped her grandmother’s hand. She opened her mouth to allow the flood of questions, but Grandma Celia held up a hand to stop her.

  “Not now, little one. In time. It will all be revealed in time. For now, this is all.”

  “But, Grandma . . .”

  “Trust me?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then, trust me. You will know. Step-by-step. Very soon.”

  Darby wanted to argue and to stop the motion of time for just a little while—to pause this moment.

  She knew they would not speak like this again.

  Sometime in the morning, voices reached her. Darby awoke in her own room and tried to remember when she’d moved there. Her feet shuffled along the carpet in weary motion, stopping at her grandmother’s doorway. Her mother was holding Grandma Celia’s hands. A tear dropped from Carole’s face. Again, her mother was in tears. Darby’s legs felt like cement blocks of fear. But then she heard her grandmother’s voice—so slow and labored between breaths. Darby remembered the hospice list and “fish-out-of-water” breathing.

  “I must say sorry,” Grandma Celia was saying, then a breath and a slower breath. “No matter w-what you say.”

  “I love you, Mother.”

  “I wish. I wish I had done better by you.” Grandma’s eyes were closed and only lifted now and then. Darby knew she should leave them alone in their moment. But her feet wouldn’t move, her hand wouldn’t release the doorway. She knew little of her mother’s childhood. What had it been like in a postwar world with an immigrant mother and a father lost across the sea? And what had later led her mother to drop college for a man who ended up dropping them?

  “It took long—too long—for me to be strong,” Grandma said in a whisper. “I leaned too much on you.”

  “Mother, you had to reinvent yourself. Even your language wasn’t the same.” Carole drew closer. “I wondered what you lost by giving up your native tongue. Words in English that took too long to think up. Stories that could never be translated correctly. I saw you make your change and grow into something new.”

  “At your expense.”

  “No, I admired you—even if it took awhile to realize it.”

  “You wanted a father. And I made you hate Austria, our home.”

  “You didn’t make me. I hated it because it took everything. I didn’t want to hear about alpine sunsets when all I could see was the missing face of my father and the grandparents I’d never have. It wasn’t you. It was reality that makes me still turn cold at the thought.”

  “But God gave more—more than I had. Though I was very slow to find it. But you—my daughter. You don’t need to live your life that way. Embrace God, and he will help you find healing, so you may be spared some of the hardness I faced. I don’t want Darby to go through life that way, either. That’s why I’ve made the special request of her that I talked with you about. . . .” Saying the words seemed to drain all of Grandma’s energy. Darby stepped forward, but her mother saw it too. She shushed her gently.

  “Rest now. Just rest. If it helps, know that I forgive anything you feel you’re sorry for. But I think you are a wonderful woman, and a wonderful mother.”

  For the next few days, Grandma Celia remained more unconscious than awake. The hospice nurse stopped by daily, and Darby and her mother kept watch—every missed breath brought fear. But her grandmother rested soundly, her medications helping with the pain and coughing fits. Several times she wrestled, fitfully mumbling words in German—the language she’d forbidden from her life long ago.

  One morning as the light began to touch the darkness, Darby wearily glanced toward the bed. She bolted upright and looked at Grandma’s chest. Her grandmother’s eyes were closed; the painful sound of struggling breath was silent. Grandma Celia was gone.

  Chapter Four

  Darby produced a smile at the appropriate times. Words of comfort to family and friends somehow came to her lips. The checklist she’d prepared with her mother had lines drawn through it—words like Lincoln Funeral Chapel, visitation times, Deb’s Florist, burial clothes.

  Conversations with relatives she hadn’t seen in years, arrangements with the funeral parlor, even the stories she told her two nieces, all seemed to take place somewhere outside her being. She could hear herself speak and her mind registered, but everything seemed distanced and misplaced. Inside, Darby kept a surreal hardness to bring herself through that first week after Grandma’s death.

  Tatianna, what about Tatianna? The question weighed on Darby’s mind, while the greater sense of loss made her withdraw into a shell. She wanted to question her mother about Grandma Celia. She wanted to discover the contents of the safe. But the mysteries would have to wait, at least until the details of the funeral were completed and the visiting family departed.

  During the funeral dinner, Grandma Celia’s closest friend, Maisie Hansen, pulled Darby aside. Darby looked across the room at the empty punch bowl, wanting to fill it, but she knew she should take a moment with Maisie. The elderly woman had been a friend of the family for years and would soon be returning home. Darby pried her eyes from the drink table in an attempt to give Maisie her full attention. There was just so much to do.

  “Darby, I’m so sorry about Celia. A blessed many years she lived, though.” Maisie placed her hand on Darby’s arm. “She was the sister I never had.”

  “I know, Maisie.”

  “Life passes you by. Take my word, your days of youth should be cherished.”

  “Yes, I know.” Darby thought about the two casseroles she had left in the oven. Hopefully Mother had gotten them out.

  “This may sound petty, but . . .”

  “What, Maisie?”

  “There was a mistake in the pastor’s eulogy and in the obituary. I wanted you to know.”

  “A mistake?” Darby heard the words while looking at her two nieces trying to scrape a last scoopful of punch from the bowl. “I checked everything myself.”

  “It’s Celia’s p
lace of birth. She wasn’t born in Vienna, Austria, but in Hallstatt.”

  Darby’s eyes flickered back to Maisie. “That’s not what her papers said.”

  “Well, I’m certain she was born in Hallstatt. She told me herself. All of her mother’s family was born in Hallstatt. Your great-aunt even traveled in her last month of pregnancy from Salzburg to deliver your cousin Henri in the family birthplace. It was tradition—well, at least until the war changed everything.”

  Darby’s mind spun with Maisie’s words. Grandma Celia had told her many stories about Hallstatt, the village she had grown up in. But when she read in Grandma’s personal papers that her birthplace was Vienna, she assumed they had moved to Hallstatt when Celia was young.

  “Thank you, Maisie, for bringing this to my attention.” The older woman appeared relieved. “I’ll check into it, okay?”

  “Good. I was hoping maybe the newspaper could print the correction or something.”

  “Yes, maybe.” Darby moved away, back to the busyness of the funeral plans. But her mind kept returning to Maisie’s words.

  Eventually the phone calls slowed, and the relatives said their good-byes. Darby’s sister, Maureen Lamont, and her twins left for Sacramento. The refrigerator still overflowed with the food prepared by friends. Darby had been surprised by the people Grandma Celia had influenced over the years as they came to bring food comfort—though Darby hoped never to eat another casserole again. With the funeral over, the silence in the house seemed to shout, What now?

  Darby observed her mother and realized they were alike in one way. Both tried to keep busy when tragedy came. But what would her mother do now?

  “You know you can move up to Redding with me.” Darby brought up the subject as she helped her mother unload the dishwasher. “I’ll have that extra room in my apartment when the school semester is over and Clarise’s niece moves out.”

  “Thanks, honey. Maureen offered for me to move to Sacramento. And Aunt Helen and Uncle Marc invited me to Southern California for as long as I like. To tell you the truth, I don’t know yet.”

  Darby glanced at her mother, who’d never looked so vulnerable and frail. Darby felt a sudden urge to wrap her arms around her but continued, instead, to put the plastic bowls away.

  “It’s not like this was unexpected,” Darby’s mother said, staring outside past the tree-lined street to the sloping vineyards beyond. “I’ve thought about this. But now that Grandma is really gone, I don’t know what direction I should take. It’s a strange feeling having your mother die. No one loves you like a parent. Well, except for the Lord. I guess it’s time for me to ask God about my future.”

  Startled by her mother’s words, Darby almost dropped the bowl she was holding. Though they all attended church fairly regularly, only Grandma spoke about her faith. To the rest of them, it was just another part of their lives, like grocery shopping or going to the movies. Well, maybe more, but then maybe less too. Darby remembered the words she had spoken so long ago. Forgiveness. Surrender. Come into my heart. But somewhere along the way, the words merged into her being and became a hidden part of her life. Hearing her mother talk about God left a strange sensation within her. How many times had she heard Grandma speak in such a way? My prayers are surrounding you, Darby. God’s not finished with you yet. Darby had heard her mother say religious words a few times prior to Grandma’s death, but not like God was part of her daily life.

  The dishes were finished without further talk. Mother stacked the clean cake pans and casserole dishes, then set them in a box to return to friends and family. Darby decided now was the time to ask. The questions had waited long enough.

  “Mom, Grandma Celia told me some things before she died. She wanted me to do something.” Darby watched her mother stop and turn toward her.

  “I know. Grandma and I discussed it before you came down. I guess today is the day. I’ll call Fred to see if he’s available. He said he’d like to make a house call to go over the will since Grandma was such a good friend. And I have the key.”

  “To the safe?”

  “Yes.” Carole patted Darby’s hand. “I wish Maureen could have come back for the reading, but this will have to do. Could I have until this afternoon?”

  “Okay, this afternoon.”

  Darby paced the house. She wanted answers, and she wanted them now.

  She wandered the rooms of the home she’d spent much of her life in. Little had changed on the surface—Grandma and Mother’s Victorian decor remained the same, and Maureen’s room still had a Bryan Adams poster on the wall, though it was currently the sewing room. Darby’s room had been converted into neat guest quarters with her same violet-and-white comforter. Everything looked normal, like any other house on rural Poplar Way. But now it felt different. How could such a normal appearance hold so many hidden secrets? Darby knew that, like specters, the ghostly questions had been lurking, waiting to be answered.

  Unable to stand the thoughts any longer, Darby knew where to go. Through all the busyness of the funeral and company, she had veered away from saying good-bye to Grandma. Now it was time.

  In the back shed she found the clippers and walked straight to the neglected flower garden. Grandma had designed the garden in a circular path with her favorite bush in the very center. Darby stood before the rosebush and cut the best flower the autumn bloom had given. She stripped away the lower leaves and left their remnants on the ground as she walked toward her car.

  The gate to the cemetery driveway was closed when Darby arrived. She parked and went through the walk-in entrance.

  Grandma’s grave was easy to find. The plot she had chosen years ago rested beneath one of the few great oak trees.

  Darby stared at the mound of green sod with fresh, black dirt along the edges. It seemed unreal that her grandmother rested somewhere beneath that plot of earth. The fingers that had caressed her cheek since childhood now were cold and dead. How long until flesh returned to the earth? That thought pricked a chill from her scalp down her back. Not Grandma, not my Grandma Celia. But death was as natural as birth, right? The body was just a shell for a spirit that would live on. Next came heaven, angels, God. For Grandma’s sake, Darby willed it to be true, truer than life. But heaven was so distant and far away as she stood there, staring at the place where soon only a headstone would mark an entire life.

  Celia Rachel Müller. Beloved Grandmother and Mother.

  The woman she loved so deeply would be another name among the long rows of granite stones, in just another cemetery, in just another place.

  I hope there’s more after this life.

  Darby knelt in the grass to feel closer. The cold dampness pressed round, wet circles through her pants and around her knees. She scooted forward to run her finger along the dirt edging. Grandma Celia’s ring tumbled forward, suspended in the air by the gold chain around her neck. As Darby held the ring, tracing the circle of warm metal with one finger, a few oak leaves drifted down.

  Is my life drifting apart and away like those leaves? she wondered. She’d built a wall that was nicely kept around her life. Now that wall was crumbling. What had Grandma said the last night they talked? Something about this last story becoming part of her future too—about Darby needing to make certain decisions—hopefully the right ones? It shook her to the core, touching inward places she’d never dared to think about because if she did, she didn’t know what she’d find. Maybe she didn’t want to move into this place of mystery and the unknown. Darby had always planned her own course, and as a result, things worked out perfectly. At least that’s what she continued to tell herself whenever the doubts arose. And now this. Tatianna. Secrets. Shadows. Perhaps the truth would destroy everything she knew, everything she was. But there was no turning back. The first step would be the safe. From there, she didn’t know.

  Darby placed the single flower on the new sod.

/>   “I came to say good-bye. Yet even now, I can’t stand the thought that you are gone from me. But I know and vow, whatever you want of me, Grandma, I’ll do my best. I promise you that.”

  She stood and began to walk away. With one last backward look, Darby thought how pleased Grandma would be with the flower on her grave. Her favorite, a pale yellow rose, shone in the late-morning light.

  Chapter Five

  Brant stared at the black-and-white photograph. In the many years he’d known Gunther, his mentor had never shared this picture with him.

  He settled back in the leather wingback. Gunther’s chair. Just sitting here made Brant feel closer to him. The light scent of apple pipe smoke lingered in the soft leather and further reminded Brant how much he missed spending time with the old man. He knew this would be one of the last times he would sit in Gunther’s study. After today, the room would never be the same without his dear friend’s presence. And once it changed, Brant would not often travel from Salzburg to his old summer home next door to Gunther’s. With Gunther gone from this place, there was nothing but memories to bring him back to Gosau. How he hated changes—especially ones this severe and permanent.

  Brant’s gaze returned to the aged photo. “So this is your long-lost love,” he muttered, looking at the two faces. “Yes, and his only love too.”

  Startled, Brant turned to see Ingrid, Gunther’s wife, in the doorway. He started to speak to somehow take away his words. He wouldn’t have spoken had he known she watched him.

  “Don’t look so surprised.” Ingrid moved into the room. She walked up beside Brant and gazed at the beaming smiles worn by the young man and woman in the picture. “Gunther only married me because I needed his help. Postwar Europe wasn’t exactly a safe place for an unwed mother of two. Gunther took pity on me, which was enough at the time.”

  “I’m sure he grew to love you,” Brant said quickly. When he slid the photo back into the manila envelope, he felt something at the bottom. But with the ever-watchful and acidic Ingrid in the room, he ignored it.