by Karin Aharon
“Ok, I will do my best to come tomorrow.”
“Good, we’ll talk, goodbye”
I texted Natalie, “I’m on my way home,” to give her a glimpse of hope. ‘Keep both eyes on the road’ kept ringing through my mind. So, I drove carefully. I kept reminding myself that I needed to be careful so that my children don’t become motherless. Like me.
Chapter 64
“I’ll donate for two,” I said to a volunteer waiting at the entrance for the Foundation’s symposium. On my way there I had already decided I would also make a donation in mom’s name.
I walked into the hall, and unlike previous symposiums, the hall was very crowded. I sat at the end of the row so I could slip out if necessary. While I was waiting for everyone to sit down, I looked around me. This time there were more men than last time (perhaps spouses, or also carriers). There were women of all ages. Every now and then I recognized a similarity between two women and assumed they were sisters or mother and daughter. Mom never came with me to these meetings, even when she was doing better. I think she was scared of hearing what was waiting for her. She just didn’t want to know.
I was wondering how many women in this hall were motherless. I had a feeling I would soon feel much closer to this group of people, if that was even possible.
The symposium began and this time was mostly dedicated to questions directed at the specialists.
A young woman, about my age, asked the panel a question that voiced my biggest fear – “I’m supposed to have a surgery, but there was a finding in the MRI that requires further exams. Should I delay the surgery?”
I hungrily waited for the answer. I was well-acquainted with being scared from the possibility of finding something before the surgery and finding out it was too late to have a preventive procedure. I wanted the stressful exam to be over so I could have the surgery on time.
“In that case you should delay it,” the doctor said calmly. “First finish the other exams.”
Some of the people in the audience nodded in consent while others looked at her with grief. She sat down in disappointment. Someone else stood up to ask a question. She was tall and thin, and had a short haircut. I assumed she was after chemotherapy.
“I got sick with ovarian cancer a few years ago, and now they found a c-met in my liver. I wanted to know if I should do the breast surgery.”
I felt like an arrow had pierced my heart. I knew that in her condition, there was no point in having a surgery, but I couldn’t be there any longer. I didn’t wait to hear their answers. I left quickly to the bathroom and washed my face. I took a few deep breaths and looked at myself in the mirror. My hair was pulled back in a sloppy ponytail, and black circles surrounded my eyes. I felt a throbbing pain in my head and decided to go home. This day was enough, I just wanted it to be over.
***
But it wasn’t over. On the contrary. My headache wouldn’t allow me to fall asleep and at some point, I took a painkiller and sprawled out on the living room in front of the TV.
At 3 A.M. I slipped into bed and closed my eyes. My phone rang and I jumped. It was mom’s home number.
“Gabi?” I asked with a trembling voice.
“Shirley, mom’s gone,” Gabi said quietly.
I started crying and couldn’t speak.
“It happened just a few minutes ago. She just stopped breathing. I don’t think she was in any pain.”
“I’m coming.”
“You don’t need to come. Come in the morning.”
“Gabi, I’m coming.”
My next phone call was to Jonathan. We agreed that he would come pick me up and we’d go to mom.
I stopped crying and lay back on the sofa. I tried making sense of what was happening to me. The thing I was most scared of, happened, and I felt I was shutting down. I couldn’t comprehend it was actually happening. That everything was over. Michael was sleeping and I knew I would have to wake him up and tell him, but I couldn’t say it out loud. I couldn’t utter those words. As I lightly napped on the sofa, there were moments in which it seemed it was all a dream and when I’d wake up, I’d find out everything was OK.
But when Jonathan called to tell me he was outside, I realized it was all very real.
Chapter 65
The monitor indicated she had no pulse, as if we wouldn’t have known otherwise that she was gone. But, as they explained to us, that was standard procedure when someone died at their home. First, came an ambulance and then the police. Who would have thought there was so much bureaucracy involved in dying? When the police officers left, we asked Tommy to come back home.
“We need to think about the funeral. Where we should bury her.” Gabi sat by the table with all the forms they had left and looked at me with a puzzled expression.
“I think she would have wanted to be buried in Kibbutz Einat,” I said decisively, although I wasn’t completely sure. Mom wouldn’t speak to us about those things.
She chose Kibbutz Einat for her father when he passed away. A few months ago, she had even told us that Ian took her to find the exact location of his grave. “Olive lane number 1,” she said again and again, and I realized that was something she wanted me to remember, but I didn’t say a word. A silent understanding. She never spoke about herself with regards to the day after she passed. But I assumed that if mom chose that location for her father, it was good enough for her too.
After asking around a bit and pulling some strings, we managed buying companion burial plots in Kibbutz Einat. The funeral was scheduled for 4 P.M.
Gabi went to return all the medical equipment, and Jonathan went to the civil registry office to take care of some more bureaucracy. Tommy was closed up in his room with friends who came to support him, and I was walking around the house, zombie-like. The exhaustion, sadness and pain overwhelmed me.
Her glasses rested by the bed, on one of the books she had once started reading. The drawing that Adam had made for her on Mother’s Day. Her jewellery was scattered by the bathroom sink as if she had just taken if off to take a shower, and would soon wear them again. Every one of these details stung my heart and the pain was excruciating.
“At least she’s not in pain anymore,” people wrote to me in different texts. But she suffered enough pain these last few years and I couldn’t find any comfort in that.
Michael asked Natalie to come over so he could attend the funeral. We decided we shouldn’t tell the kids before the funeral in case they asked to come. They were too young.
Our family started gathering in the apartment. Eric and Ruth came with Grandpa. Gabi and Jonathan came back after running their errands. Gabi kept telling us over and over again what had happened during the night and morning. I simply sat there and tried breathing in and out. One breath, and then another, and another. I wasn’t able to cry anymore, nor smile.
It was noon, and we decided on our way to the cemetery to have lunch at mom’s favorite café. I reserved a table and when we arrived, a round table waited for us at the corner of the room. As we approached it, I passed by all the tables I had once sat with mom and felt the pain choking me up.
We were the quietest table at the restaurant. We ordered some food, and even tried eating some of it, but most of the plates stayed full on the table.
“It’s just tragic,” Gabi said. “When my mother passed away it was sad, but not tragic. This is plain tragedy.” He was right.
Chapter 66
No, the skies did not weep, nor any other such cliché. It was a pleasant and warm summer day. The skies were blue and the birds sang. The world kept going as if nothing had happened. As if this was yet another day. As if our world hadn’t collapsed that night.
When we made our way to Kibbutz Einat, I couldn’t believe it was happening. I felt as if mom would soon call me and ask where were we and when are we coming over, and I would ask her how she was feeling, and she would
say not so great but could have been worse. She would always say things could have been worse, but at that moment I thought it was impossible. This was our worst moment as a family.
We drove through the passageway on our way to the cemetery.
“Can you see the houses they’re building here?” I said to Tommy, “mom has recently signed off on these.”
“Signed off on her own neighbors,” Jonathan said from the front seat.
“Yes… who thought we would be here so soon,” I said, partially to them, but mostly to myself.
I can’t remember much of the funeral. There were so many people from so many different periods of our lives. Julie hugged me tightly and we cried together. Sarah came, after I hadn’t seen her in such a long time, even Nathan was there. All the girls from the office came and so did Alice, wearing her black All-stars. I walked among the people with a tissue in one hand and a bottle of water in the other. If we would have been elsewhere, not surrounded by graves and trees, it would have felt like a wedding, or some other happy event.
Gabi spoke first. He stood in front of the microphone with the paper he had prepared and everyone fell silent.
“This moment is too difficult for me to describe with words,” a cry was heard in the distance, but Gabi kept with a trembling voice, “in the last few years, Cathy’s health deteriorated, at a slow pace, but in the last year, her deterioration was fast and painful. Cathy suffered greatly from the disease, in terrible pain as well as being aware of her condition. Despite all this, she lived as if she wasn’t sick at all. She worked while going through chemo and whenever she could, even a few days before her final deterioration, two weeks ago on Saturday.
“On that day, she woke up early. She wasn’t at her best, but she was at a sound mind, until she asked me why her nurse hadn’t arrived yet to dress her for work. On that afternoon, during her nap, she slipped into a state of unconsciousness, from which she never really woke up.
“We, Cathy and I, have been together for almost thirty years. I think we had a good life together, that only improved with time. Cathy was my best friend. We raised three successful children together, several cats, two dogs and a beautiful garden. We went skiing in the Alps every year, started new careers in Australia, and had true friends who have been with us many years.
“Cathy was everything I could have wished for myself and more. Educated, beautiful and loving. Now, Cathy has left a big hole in my life.
“This is a good opportunity to thank our dear friends who constantly helped her at the hospitals to overcome her challenging, physical struggles. Cathy and I thank you.”
Gabi gave the microphone to the head of the committee, who wanted to say a few words. I cried quietly and blew my nose. Tommy sat next to me with his head down and kept quiet. I hugged him and together we listened to everyone’s eulogies. Jonathan spoke after.
“I have always tried to make mom admit to me, in private, that I was her favorite child,” Jonathan started, showing that sense of humour he was so well known for, “I never succeeded. She always smiled and said she loved us all, and I wouldn’t be able to get it out of her. She really did love us all, and we loved her more than words could describe. I’ve missed you, mom, this last period. Now, I will miss you for the rest of my life. All I have left to say is thank you for everything. Thank you for the time, the warmth, the humour and your wisdom. Goodbye, mom.”
After Jonathan spoke, those who didn’t cry by then, couldn’t hold it in any longer.
It was a respectable civil funeral, just like Gabi wanted it. I stood in front of her grave and watched as they covered her coffin with sand. Maya hugged Jonathan, who couldn’t stop crying, and Tommy stood with his friends. Dan, his boyfriend, stood there and hugged him. I was glad he was there. I couldn’t believe it was all happening, as if it was all happening to someone else. I felt like a zombie, but still did what I was supposed to do, like a good girl.
Michael stood next to me and hugged me, everyone came to say their goodbyes and offered their condolences, and all the other things people said when there was nothing else left to say.
When it was over, it was time for the second challenge of the day, which was equally difficult. It was time to talk to the children.
***
“Oh, sweetie, I’m so sorry for your loss,” Natalie hugged me when I walked in with Michael.
“Thank you dear,” I told Michael to pay her and asked the children to turn the TV off.
I sat between Adam and Ariel and Michael sat Romy on his lap. “You know that Cathy has been sick for a long time, right?”
“She had a wheelchair,” Ariel said, and Adam just nodded.
“Right, she had a wheelchair. But recently, she wasn’t feeling very well and had to be at the hospital. The doctors tried taking care of her, but they couldn’t because she had a special disease that not a lot of people have. So, the doctors didn’t know how to treat her.”
“But she’s going to feel better soon. Right, mom?” Adam asked me with a hopeful look.
“No, my love. She passed away from her disease.” I hugged him as tightly as I could and kept the tears from pouring. I wanted to keep it in a little longer but couldn’t.
“But she wasn’t old,” Adam said. “Only old people die.”
“She was very, very sick.” I caressed Ariel and hugged her too.
“So now you don’t have a mommy?” Ariel asked and hit straight in my wounded heart.
“Right,” but my kids still have a mother, I reminded myself. They have a mother. We sat hugging each other.
“Are you going to be sick like Cathy?” Adam asked after a few moments of silence.
“No, sweetie. I won’t be sick like Cathy,” I said with the most decisive tone I could muster, and could only hope I was telling him the truth.
Chapter 67
“Want to go to a movie?” I texted Anna on Saturday morning. The Shiva was about to start in the evening and I wanted to have a nice day with the kids, after all those weekends I hadn’t seen them.
“Are you serious?” Anna called after a few seconds.
“Yes, I haven’t been with them all summer. I want to have some fun with them. Have your daughters seen the new ‘Ice Age’?”
“No. But are you sure you want to go see a movie?”
“Certain. I need a change of scene before the Shiva. Let’s go, should I buy tickets for 11:30?”
The movie was funny and cute. The children had a good time and enjoyed spending time with Anna’s girls. It felt somewhat normal, which was strange. There were moments when I even felt a sense of relief. I didn’t have to check whether I had any new messages. I didn’t have to call Gabi to ask whether everything was OK. I could just disconnect from everything for a few hours and simply be with my children. Be their mother.
The Shiva started that evening, and it was one of the most exhausting things I have ever experienced. People came throughout the day. When we did have a break, I tried resting, but the moment I heated up some food, someone new would walk in. I ate more cakes and cookies than I had ever eaten in my entire life, and met so many people, that at some point, I stopped trying to figure out who they were and how we were related.
My dad didn’t come to the Shiva. It was probably too much for him. My mother-in-law, Rachel, actually surprised me when she came, since we haven’t been so close before. Who knows, I thought, perhaps now she’ll come back into our lives. After all, she was the only grandmother my children had.
***
“Hello, am I speaking with Shirley?” I had just arrived at mom and Gabi’s apartment. I wanted to clean things up before people started coming in for the Shiva. After the first evening, that was so busy, I realized I should start preparing things before people start arriving.
“Yes,” I replied and started looking for disposable cups in the closets.
“I’m calling
from Dr. Katzman’s office, about the surgery.” I suddenly froze and stood planted like a tree, waiting, “we have a date for your surgery.”
“OK. When is it?” I looked for a pen and paper so I could write down the information.
“October 20th, it’s about a week after the end of the holidays, does that work for you?”
“Yes, that’s great.” I found an old grocery list written in mom’s hand. I turned it over and wrote down the date.
“Good, then I’ll email you all the details. We’ll be in touch before the surgery to make sure you have all the documents. In the meantime, don’t forget contacting an anaesthesiologist and a surgeon, and have all your tests ready.”
“Of course, thank you.”
Things were moving forward. I had a date, and I had less than two months to finish all the procedures before it.
The first thing that crossed my mind was wanting to tell mom. It took me a second to remember she wasn’t lying in her bed anymore, staring at a silly American sitcom. I texted Michael the date, so he could ask for time off.
***
“Gabi insists that we clear out mom’s things,” I told Jonathan when he and Maya came in. It seemed too soon to me, taking out all of her things during the Shiva, but Gabi said he just couldn’t handle having it all in the house. “It’s too painful,” he said.
“Today?” Jonathan asked.
“We don’t have to do it today, but he wants us to use the time we’re here during the Shiva to go over her things. He said that after this we would each go back to our lives and won’t have time to go over everything together.”
“He’s actually right,” Jonathan said and poured himself some soda from the fridge.
“He’s always right,” I smiled. Gabi was always convinced he was right, even when he was wrong (which according to him, never was the case).
“So, just come in later and we’ll start cleaning up.”
