There are a few things the owner has to get done. Gluing down shingles around the perimeter of the roof, which has something to do with hurricane readiness. There was a minor leak in one of the bathrooms. Having gone through everything at Adeline’s house when she had a leak in the basement and then everything went to black mold, I had the mold people who fixed Adeline’s house come and check out our house before we bought it. They assured me we’re good.
Daddy and A.J. came up with a plan of attack for the backyard. By the end of summer, I will have a house with a terraced backyard full of flowers, and a special area to sit in the morning and have my cup of tea.
It’s funny how different my house is from Teagan’s.
It’s funny that I call it my house, instead of A.J.’s and mine.
We already had that conversation. I wanted to make sure he understood what that means.
Most people would assume when I refer to our place as my house, it’s like I’m totally taking over ownership of the house. That’s not it at all. I still call Mom and Daddy’s house home. My home. The difference? It took me a little while to figure it out.
Before A.J. and I bought our house, I referred to Mom and Daddy’s house as “the house.” It was like the sun to my universe. I’m in the process of reprogramming my brain. Changing from my parents’ house being the sun to our house being the sun.
I know it’s not normal.
But it is what it is.
Liam and A.J. figured out a way to put a door halfway down the hall at the top of the stairs. That way it’s like having an apartment for Suzi and the baby upstairs. When short-stuff is walking — which will happen sooner than any of us is prepared for — we won’t have to worry about the stairs. It also gives all of us some privacy. There’s just something about the ability to close a door that changes everything.
You should have seen the look on A.J.’s face when I said, “Besides, if Suzi has a guy over, who wants to hear all that noise?”
Guys and their sisters. It’s so funny. A.J. never stops to think about the fact that I have brothers who would pull that same exact face if someone mentioned me and A.J. making noise.
It made me laugh.
I love the fact that I’m laughing again.
Maybe not as much as I used to, but I’m working on it.
We pulled out the carpeting on the stairs. Animal print. I’m not sure of the story behind that, since the rest of the house was pretty traditional, but I’m sure there’s a really good story.
When we pulled out the carpeting, we found that the stairs had storage compartments. We found them by accident.
The drama it caused when I decided to go a little bit crazy with the memories from Bernie’s trunk — which I will never forgive myself for — came to mind. I will never forgive myself because some of the last memories of my mother are centered around that unnecessary ugliness. The pictures that Troya found in the floorboards of Bernie’s house? I was almost afraid to open the little compartments. In my experience, hidden things never bring joy. Never.
You know how stairs have the riser between each step? Every other riser can be pulled open. Starting on the bottom of the stairs, you pull the bottom one out at the right, then skip a step, then the next one on the left. A.J. called the previous owner to see if she wanted to be there when we opened them, since it had been her family house for generations. If there’s something in there, it’s probably hers.
She had never known about the compartments and said she’d be over in an hour.
Good news, we have the original blueprints for the house. They were stuffed between tread five and six.
Bad news, no gold bars.
Good news, some interesting old family pictures. The old homeowner was so excited to have them. I’m glad we found them.
We decided not to cover the stairs up with carpet again. Daddy and I are going to refinish the wood. It’s really pretty, and the few areas that have been damaged by nails and whatnot Daddy tells me he can fix.
I’m okay with it if the steps look a little worse for wear. The house is old. It has a history. It’s like wrinkles on a person’s face. I’ve never understood why people try so hard not to get wrinkles or to get rid of them.
My mother used to tell me every line on her face told a story, and every story was a good one. The lines on her face showed her children how often they made her smile. My mom didn’t have a chance to have very many wrinkles.
I’m going to love my wrinkles.
Or they will have figured out how to get rid of them without making people look scary, and I’ll have a flawless face forever.
Well, no more flaws than I already have.
I like the fact we have something that will keep Daddy busy. I worry that he spends too much time alone. After all the years of him and Mom being together basically all the time, losing her has to be really hard on him.
Thank God for his friend Aldo. They’ve been friends — actually more like buddies — for a long time. They really didn’t see each other much. Were just kind of there for each other when needed. Aldo’s roof blew off in a storm, so the O’Flynns were called into service. When his wife got sick, we all took turns checking on her and bringing food, that kind of thing.
And can I just say, now that I have my new kitchen, I’ll be back in cooking mode. The stove is a work of art. I looked it up online. I guess it’s a really big deal. Virtually a commercial stove with a residential look. All I know is I can easily cook a dinner for sixty people in my kitchen. The fridge is so big I won’t have to shop for months at a time.
Teagan came over, and we went room by room to decide what needed to be done home décor-wise. I really don’t want to spend the money to redo everything right now, but I want to redo enough to make it mine. Teagan is really good at that.
I explained to Teagan how we took out the carpet on the stairs and the hallway upstairs. I thought we would be paying for new carpet, but the wood is nice enough to just be rehabbed a little, and Daddy is going to help with that. I thought we would have to paint just about everything. Every room is a different color, and it feels kind of like a bunch of boxes. Teagan thought about it for a while and figured out a way to use specific colors as accents in all the rooms so that it created more of a flow from one room to the next. Instead of painting everything, we’re just going to paint a couple of accent walls and then use some stuff I already have.
We went through the stuff A.J. has had in storage all this time. It didn’t fit in our apartment, but we have plenty of room in the house. He has a beautiful black leather sofa that will be living in the living room.
I was kind of disappointed when I put my dining room table in the house. It was fine for the apartment, but in the house, it just looks silly. I love my kitchen so much, it is sad to have a puny little table in the dining room.
Teagan and I went looking for a table and chairs. I think eight chairs will be perfect. Oh. My. Goodness. I can’t believe the price of a decent table and chairs. We even went to a couple of consignment shops. They were more expensive than the regular furniture places.
I was trying to be happy with what I have.
Mom was whispering in my ear. She kept reminding me that nothing in life needs to come all at once, and a home is something you build over time. If you go out and buy something pretty, that’s fine, but if you wait and allow things to accumulate, they will be things you love and things that have a story behind them.
One thing I learned: A.J. is nowhere near as organized as I gave him credit for. And when he is around Suzi, it’s worse.
They wanted to just throw stuff in their cars, bring it to the house, put it in a big pile in the middle of the room, and put it away as they could.
Have they not met me? Ever?
First, we need to clean. Then we need to do any painting and repair work that needs to be done. Then we organize the apartments so that we bring stuff over in a rational way, and we put things where they belong so we aren’t doubling all our efforts.
What good does it do to make a pile, move the pile, then unpile the pile? It’s like teaching a child baby talk. You are just going to have to reteach them how not to talk baby talk. There’s a difference between cooing at a baby and doing the stereotypical baby talk thing.
Wonder if Suzi is going to do baby talk.
That might drive me crazy.
Our first post-baby roommate hurdle?
That one should be easy. As much as I love Evelyn, she isn’t my baby, and I don’t get a vote.
That sounds reasonable. Hope I can do it that way.
I told Teagan, and therefore my entire family — for the last few months, she seems to be really good at telling everybody everything — that I didn’t want to do a normal family housewarming. In my world, a party like that would just scream for my mom to be there, and it would kill me that she wasn’t.
I haven’t said anything to anybody, but the reason I thought it would be a good idea for me and A.J. to have the room downstairs and for Suzi and the baby move in is that I am insane.
Right now, I can talk myself into believing I’m okay. If A.J. and I move into our new house just the two of us, I don’t think I could survive. Not this soon after losing the baby.
If it were just the two of us, and we were upstairs like a normal couple in their new house, it would be all that much more real to me that we were a little family and that the most important part of that little family, our baby, wasn’t there.
When we have Suzi and Evelyn in the house, and we’re in the room downstairs instead of the master upstairs, I feel like we’re just extending our old life in a new place.
I know it sounds insane.
That’s why I haven’t said anything to anybody.
But it’s working for me.
For now.
Anyway, my unofficial housewarming was on Saturday night.
Everybody just kind of showed up. My brothers were helping move rock from the front yard, where we’d had it dropped, to the back yard. Their wives came by to see how it was going. Teagan and Jessie showed up with about twenty pizzas and soda.
We all sat around and ate pizza and talked, and it was almost like old times. Except my mother wasn’t there to tell me she loved my house, and how we would have a grand life there.
I tried so hard not to think about that.
It would make me cry, and I’m so tired of crying. Besides, you start off with one O’Flynn crying, and pretty soon, well, it’s a snotfest.
I’d almost walked myself back away from that particular cliff when Sinead picked me up and threw me off the edge.
“Mom would love this house, Cara. Everything about it. She’d be so proud of you.”
“Why? Why did you have to go there?” I immediately started to cry and laugh at the same time. “I’ve been so good. I haven’t cried in, like, hours.”
“There is no sin in crying, child.” My dad smiled at me.
“I know. I’ve kind of turned it into an art form lately. Poor A.J.”
Always on my side, A.J. put his arm around me. “Didn’t your mom used to say you can gather your tears for your father’s cup of tea, you can save them for a rainy day when no one will notice them falling, or you can learn what it is the tears are trying to tell you and move on?”
Teagan smiled. “He’s got you, dingleberry. Mom used to say that to you every time she thought you were being a big ol’ crybaby.”
I gave A.J. a look. “What do you think I’m supposed to be learning?”
“Not my lesson.”
The whole family laughed. That would have been my mother’s answer.
“You obviously have an opinion.”
“I always thought the Irish had a really unique way of dealing with death. They celebrate it.”
“We celebrate the life of the person who has passed. Not exactly the same thing.” I didn’t like where this was going.
Jessie jumped in. “Yes, but I don’t think you guys have really done that for your mom. I think it’s part of the reason that it has been so hard on you. I know Teagan has spent at least half her time in tears.”
Howard shared a worried look with Seamus, each of them pointing at their wives in a “them, too” kind of way.
Jessie continued. “Your whole lives, you have been told that you are supposed to celebrate the person who has passed. The person you have lost is the most important person in your lives, and everything was so chaotic you didn’t get a chance to really celebrate your mom. You had a memory dinner, but that isn’t the same thing.”
“Yes, well, it’s too late now.” Seamus clenched his teeth so tight I know a dentist somewhere heard little bells ring. He isn’t good with emotions, and he didn’t relish the idea of our discussion bringing all of this back up again.
Daddy cleared his throat. “It will never be too late to celebrate your mother.”
Teagan smiled. “What should we do?”
It is so strange.
Our whole lives, Daddy was just kind of quiet. Never said much. To have him jump in all the time and give his opinion is great, but a tiny bit unnerving.
Daddy answered. “I know that each of us in our own way is holding on to your mother much too tightly. I know that I’ve not begun to let her go. It is unfair. To her. To her beliefs. To you kids. To me as well. I have always been selfish when it came to your mother. I always wanted her all to myself.” His look went from sad to determined. “We must think of a thing that will honor your mother. Something she would like. I don’t want anyone to bow at the altar of Mrs. O’Flynn; she would hate that. What I want is something more befitting her.”
Teagan smiled. “Something subtle.”
Sinead laughed. “That then whacks you over the head.”
Even Seamus was getting in on it. “Exactly. It has to be something to do with children. The most important thing in Mom’s life — besides you, Dad — was children.”
“We could start a foundation. We could do something with the hospital, maybe?” Valerie looked around the table. She didn’t get an immediate response.
Troya volunteered. “It would have to be something hands-on. Mom isn’t the type to just throw money at a thing. She would have to be in there with her own two hands, checking with her own two eyes, to make sure whatever the thing she was doing was actually a good thing.”
Liam sounded so sad. “Mom always wanted to volunteer at the hospital to rock babies. They had a program. They had a harp player come into the hospital to play for the little ones. They responded much better to the live music than they did to a recording, no matter how good the equipment. Mom said something about a program where volunteers would go in and hold the tiny little ones, skin to skin, and rock them while they listened to the music. She was going to look into it. See if there were any special qualifications.”
“She would have been good at that. She could calm down a baby in a heartbeat and a half.” Rory smiled.
“Babies know who to trust. That’s what she always said.” Seamus was thinking hard, trying to come up with something brilliant.
“We don’t have to figure it out tonight. Your mother would be pleased that you gave it time to form. Just think about it. Talk to each other. When we know, we will know.” My father pushed back from the table.
“Daddy, did you want to do another service for Mom?” I didn’t think he wanted to, but I sure as hell didn’t want him to go through life wishing he had.
“No, there is no reason to do so. Pay for the living. Pray for the dead.” All of a sudden, Daddy seemed tired and a hundred years old.
Everybody collected their stuff and their kids and took off.
As Teagan was walking out the door, she asked, “Do you think he’s okay, dingleberry?”
“As okay as he can be. It’s going to take time.”
Suzi walked in the door not two minutes after the last O’Flynn walked out of it. I had to ask. “What did you do, park down the street and wait for everyone to leave?”
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“My whole family was here. We did a pizza night.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. Nobody told me.” She looked down at the floor. Uncertain.
“I didn’t mean to jump on you. I just wanted to make sure you weren’t staying away on purpose. This is your home, too. You should never feel like you have to stay out just because A.J. and I are doing something. I hope you know that.”
“I know that.” She smiled. “If it was something like that, I would have just hidden upstairs behind my new door. I honestly wasn’t staying away. I was driving around. Thinking.”
“What’s going on?”
A.J. walked up beside me. Concern etched on his face. What did they know that I didn’t know?
“I got a call from a lawyer today. Barry is trying to force me to bring Evelyn to the prison to see him.”
“Can he do that? I thought he’d signed away his rights when you guys got divorced.”
“Yeah, well, he has changed his mind. He’s got a new lawyer. The new lawyer says that he wasn’t represented properly. That he was injured and looking at a long prison sentence, and he made a stupid decision.”
“Is he revisiting all of it? Trying to get his prison sentence turned around, too?”
“No. At least not at this point. Right now, he is just threatening me and Evelyn.”
“What are you going to do?” If she said she was going to bring her baby girl into a prison to visit that monster, I might just have a nuclear meltdown. It’s one thing to keep my mouth shut about basic parenting differences, but it’s a whole other thing when a child’s welfare is being completely put in danger.
“Evelyn will never step foot in a flippin’ prison. If it all falls apart, and I have to go to prison so that she doesn’t, well then, Aunt Cara and Uncle A.J. will just have to raise her until I get out.”
A.J. took a sleeping Evelyn out of Suzi’s arms and headed upstairs.
I put my arm around Suzi and walked her toward the kitchen.
“Pizza or tea?”
“Pizza. I haven’t eaten yet.”
I zapped a couple of slices in the microwave to get them warm, then finished the warming process on a frying pan on top of the stove. Suzi likes crisp crust. She sat at the table, staring into space. “I’ve screwed up my life, your life, and Evelyn’s life. I’m such an idiot.”
Healing Tea Page 12
