A Widow's Awakening

by Maryanne Pope

  Silence.

  “What if Sam really is working in heaven?” I ask.

  “Huh?”

  “St. Michael is the archangel! Sam died on the Catholic celebration of St. Michael’s Day and his forty-day ceremony fell on the Greek Orthodox celebration of St. Michael. What if Michael needed Sam to help fight the bad guys?”

  “Uh…”

  I laugh nervously. “I’m losing it, aren’t I?”

  “Not necessarily. I mean, I suppose anything is possible.”

  I give the water fountain a wave. “Nah…I’m just making all this up because I can’t accept Sam’s death.”

  “But you have accepted his death,” she says. “And now you’re just trying to figure out why.”

  “I got my pictures back from our vacation.”

  “Oh man, that must’ve been tough…”

  “Yeah. But there’s a great shot of Sam on the merry-go-round at Disneyland—and he’s on a white horse.”

  No reply.

  “What if Sam is the rider on the white horse who’s gonna save the day?” I ask.

  Pause. “What day?”

  “Judgement Day!”

  “I honestly don’t know,” Jodie replies carefully, “what I’m supposed to say.”

  IN BED, numerology on my mind, I do an Adri-style calculation by adding up the digits in Sam’s regimental number. With his badge clutched against my chest, I turn out the light and whisper “eleven” into the darkness.

  SAM’S BUDDY, Wayne, visits the next afternoon and we sit at the kitchen table, reminiscing about his and Sam’s college days. We get on the subject of Noam Chomsky and Wayne asks me if I remember how fascinated Sam had been with his work.

  “Yeah,” I reply. “But now I can’t remember why.”

  “Because Noam exposed the shitty track record of U.S. foreign policy,” he says. “Sam couldn’t believe what was going on behind the scenes all around the world.”

  “Right…”

  “It was as if Noam Chomsky opened Sam’s eyes to what was really going on.”

  I nod, recalling Sam’s passion for learning and justice, so similar to mine. How had we both gotten so off track in terms of believing we could make a difference?

  Wayne leans toward me. “I think differently since Sam died.”

  “How so?”

  “Well, you know how he was always so damn righteous about things being good or bad, right or wrong?”

  I laugh. “It was either black or white for him. There was no gray area.”

  “I know. So, now when I’m faced with a moral dilemma, I find myself thinking about how Sam would behave. It’s almost like he’s become my conscience.”

  Sasha gets up from where she’s snoozing under the kitchen table and walks to the fridge. Wayne had given Sasha to Sam and me as a belated wedding gift.

  I look at Wayne. “What do you think is going on?” I ask.

  “Whaddya mean?”

  I wave my arms in a circle. “You know, like in the bigger picture.”

  Sasha whines, pawing at the fridge. Wayne watches her.

  “Her treats are up there,” I say, standing up. “I mean, don’t you think the way Sam died was pretty fluky? He only fell nine feet.”

  “I know.”

  I give Sasha a cookie then look at Wayne. “So?”

  Wayne shifts in his seat, uncomfortable. “This is gonna sound kinda weird…”

  I laugh. “Oh, I wouldn’t worry about that.”

  He clears his throat. “Well, it’s almost like on the day Sam died, there was a funny…blip in the universe—like a bright light went streaking across the sky.”

  I smile. “That is kinda weird. But I think I get what you mean.”

  Sasha finishes her cookie then stands up on her back legs so that her two front paws are touching the upper part of the fridge.

  “She’s acting strange, Adri.”

  Sasha whimpers and scratches at the fridge. I gently lift her down, which is when Wayne and I see that where her paws were is a photograph of Sam.

  Wayne looks at me, rather wide-eyed.

  “Your new conscience,” I say, “may not be just inside your head.”

  TONIGHT IS the annual Christmas party for Sam’s team and Tom invited Nick, Angela and me. I said yes, thinking it might be nice to carry on the tradition—and because I should go. For I am The Cheerful Widow whose job it is to make everyone else feel better by pretending I’m A-OK. In public, I’m the smiling little trooper who asks lots of cute questions. Back home, I’m weaving the answers into a dangerous rope into which my own neck might fit quite nicely.

  Half an hour before Nick and Angela are to pick me up, I find myself in front of the bookshelf, staring at the box of love letters Sam and I had written to each other when I was traveling for seven months. I open the box and read a couple of letters and what strikes me most is what a spoiled princess I’d been, traveling on an inheritance while bitching about atrocious living conditions that were the everyday reality for the locals. Back then, I could have hopped on a plane and gone home to Canada—and Sam. This is no longer an option. There are no return flights to visit the dead; it’s a one-way ticket and there’s no guarantee you’ll see your loved one.

  The doorbell rings so I stuff the letters back in the box and am placing it on the bookshelf when a title catches my eye: A Widow For One Year by John Irving.

  I shake my head. “The deal is seven months.”

  At the Christmas party, I soon realize that being the widow of a fallen officer watching her dead husband’s teammates trying to party is a like a drug addict in rehab, watching other addicts shoot up. I’m not emotionally equipped to observe the reality that life is going on without Sam. So off to the buffet I waddle.

  With a heaping plate of food in one hand and a beer in the other, I find a seat in the living room and a woman I’ve never seen before sits beside me.

  “And who are you?” she asks.

  “Umm…my husband was the police officer who just passed away.”

  “Oh now, which one was that?” she says loudly, waving her wineglass. “There’s been so many lately, I get them all mixed up!”

  Her callous reference is to another young police officer who died three months before Sam. He’d been struck and killed by a drunk driver on his way home from work, leaving a young widow and two-month-old daughter behind. Both Sam and I had been working the night that officer died. I’d taken a report from the officer over the phone a few hours before his death; Sam had attended the scene of his crash.

  “When they pulled him from the car,” Sam had said to me the next day, “and I saw his uniform, it was brutal. I was so angry.”

  When Sam had first arrived at the collision scene, it was believed there had been two people in the vehicle that hit the officer. Sam and several other officers had searched for that possible second person. As it turned out, there was only the one person in the vehicle: the drunk driver who died at the scene.

  “You thought there might have been two bad guys?” I’d confirmed with Sam.

  “Yeah,” he’d said, “and I totally wanted to catch whoever had done that to him.”

  Recalling this conversation now makes me realize that the “bad guy” isn’t always a person. Just because the drunk driver died didn’t mean there wasn’t a bigger issue to be addressed. One less drunk on the road isn’t the end of impaired driving. I think about the map in Sam’s duty bag, folded open to the location of his death. Maybe it is a clue pointing me in the direction of the “bad guy issue,” whatever that might be.

  After the party, Nick, Angela and I trundle clear across the city to yet another one. I still haven’t mastered the use of the word “no.” Friends and family are obviously concerned about me, judging from the number of social invitations coming my way. But the busier I allow myself to be, the more anxious and upset I am when alone again.

  THE FOLLOWING afternoon, I’m walking up the stairs from the basement to the family room when each step t
akes exponentially more effort than the last. I can scarcely make it up five stairs—the weight of sorrow I’ve been carrying has become a physical entity. In the family room, I stumble over to Sam’s couch and fall into it, face first. I scream into the pillows, pound my fists and kick my feet in the air. For just a moment, instead of thinking about how best to avoid the hurt, I allow myself to actually feel it.

  However, considering this sensation is similar to a stake being driven through my heart, it’s no wonder I’ve been avoiding the experience. At least with a stake, death comes quickly. I hear Sasha whining and open my eyes. She’s up on her hind legs again, this time scratching at a shelf directly below a photo of Sam and Stan as teenagers. She’s never before shown any interest in this shelf nor are there any cookies or pig-ears around.

  “Sam?” I say quietly.

  Sasha looks at me then lets out a groan as her paws slowly slide down the wall.

  Maybe Sam really does exist outside my imagination…

  “But that’s not good enough!” I scream at the photo. “I want more! I don’t wanna be married to a spirit. I want my husband back.”

  “At least, I think I do,” I add. “I mean, you might not be looking so good right about now…”

  I shake my head. “But that’s OK. Of course, I want you here, Sam—in any condition.”

  How Adri?

  “Jesus rose up from the dead,” I say to the shelf. “Why can’t you?”

  Because he’s not the Son of God, you idiot.

  “Or maybe you are!” I cry.

  Don’t do this.

  I nod. “You’re right…that’d be a public relations nightmare.”

  IN BED, I fall asleep with Sasha curled up beside me. My subconscious mind goes to work, and I dream of Sam. He’s lying on the operating table in the OR, just as he was in real life when I last saw him alive. But in my dream, I don’t leave the operating room before his surgery begins. Instead, I watch the surgeon make incisions in his body, except that wherever he cuts, tiny red particles of light float up—like the magic dust from Tinkerbell’s wand.

  MY DAD joins Sasha and me at the off-leash park the next morning. A walking encyclopedia, my father has become a handy reference for my historical, religious, philosophical and scientific questions. But his honesty and skepticism are really starting to piss me off.

  “I can’t get it out of my mind,” I say, “that there has to be a reason for Sam’s tragic death.”

  My dad doesn’t reply immediately. “Please don’t take this the wrong way,” he finally says, “but I don’t think Sam’s death was a tragedy. I think it was an accident.”

  I stop walking. “Pardon me?”

  “What you do with your life from here on in, Adri, is what will determine whether Sam’s death was a tragedy or not.”

  The gentle truth smashes against my forehead like a two-by-four.

  “Fine,” I snip. “You might be right about that.”

  “And at some point, you’re going to have to move…”

  “But what you’re not right about,” I say, surprised at the clarity of my thoughts considering the psychological quagmire I’ve been in, “is using the term ‘accident’ to describe Sam’s death.”

  “Oh?”

  I make mock quotation marks in the air. “An accident is something that could not have been prevented—like getting hit by a meteor. Sam’s death was a case of cause and effect: no safety railing, no husband. I would appreciate you not using the word accident because it’s not only a misnomer, it’s a cop-out.”

  “I’m sorry, I…”

  “Calling his death an accident just gives people an excuse for their apathy.”

  My dad doesn’t say anything, which is fine by me because I’m not ready to go down this road yet. We resume walking.

  “You seem very interested in physics these days,” I say, redirecting the conversation. “Why is that?”

  “I just find it a fascinating subject.”

  “What are you reading about now?” I ask.

  “Well, I don’t think this is up your alley, Adri, but…”

  I stop walking and glare at him. “How do you know?”

  The poor guy scratches his head. “I just assumed…”

  “I’m not an idiot, Dad. I’m an emotional and mental basket case at the moment but at some point, I will get through this.”

  “I know,” he says softly. “I’m sorry.”

  We resume walking and I listen as he rambles on for twenty more minutes about time, space, energy, matter and light.

  “Uh dad?” I finally interrupt.

  “Yes?”

  “In light of the circumstances, moderation might be prudent.”

  He laughs. “You’re right.”

  “Why are you telling me all this?”

  “I don’t know,” he says. “I just get off on these tangents…”

  But I no longer believe in random conversations: if one is happening, there must be a reason for it. Although Christianity is currently blooming in the garden of my mind, I suspect the seeds of science are dormant, not dead.

  ON THE last Sunday of November, I again find myself in the front pew of Sam’s church. His parents wanted me to come today because members of the Greek community are concerned about me. I bring Harry along for back-up.

  I’m reading the English pamphlet that explains the service and I can’t help but notice that the content of the Orthodox service is basically the same as the Anglican one—it’s simply the means of delivery that differs. I have another moment of fury recalling the fuss made over our wedding. We’d wasted our engagement bickering over Orthodox regulations, particularly about baptizing children. The attitude of Sam’s church had infuriated me: nobody was going to tell us which religion to raise our kids. Likewise with the ridiculous notion that if we didn’t get married in the Greek Church, Sam couldn’t have an Orthodox funeral.

  I lift my head and stare at the panel with Jesus hanging from the cross. We’d not produced any offspring and Sam had been handed an Orthodox funeral on a public silver platter, thereby making the stress of our engagement and subsequent strain on our marriage a complete waste of time and energy. Is all this water under the bridge—or am I supposed to be noticing that when religious beliefs take precedence over common sense, good people get hurt?

  I look at the pamphlet again. The phrase “Pay Attention” jumps out at me.

  I lift my head and meet the martyred gaze of Jesus. I am paying attention—but I seem to be the only one who is. Like a terrified kid on the first night at summer camp, wide-awake in the middle of the night and longing to be home in my own bed, all the other kids around me are sleeping soundly. But it’s been nearly two months: is everybody else really sleeping or just pretending?

  After the service, Harry and I are in the foyer greeting Greeks when a voice rasps in my ear, “You’re going to hell if you haven’t been baptized!”

  I whip around to see the speaker is an old lady, dressed all in black with a black kerchief on her head. I stare at her, dumbfounded, and she disappears into the crowd.

  Then another woman kisses me on both cheeks. “God bless you, Adri.”

  “And God bless you,” I say.

  “You’re so strong,” another lady comments.

  “We love you,” says the next. “Thank you for coming today.”

  On the drive to Sam’s parent’s place, I tell Harry what the nasty lady said.

  “Remember to use your bullshit filters,” he advises.

  “I’m trying. But it’s getting kinda confusing. On the one side, I’ve got an atheist father telling me about the dual nature of light, and on the other, there’s a shitload of Christians who seem pretty damn sure of their beliefs.”

  “And the truth,” Harry says, “is probably somewhere in between. Just because a person speaks with conviction doesn’t mean they speak the truth. Most of the time we say things because we want to believe them, not because we really do.”

  “You sound like
Dad.”

  “Just be very careful about believing what you’re told because I highly doubt anybody knows what’s going on.” He glances over at me. “And your guess at this spiritual stuff is just as good as anyone else’s.”

  I laugh. “Thanks for the vote of confidence.”

  For lunch, we have fried chicken at Sam’s parents’ place. Sam loved the stuff, so I eat a couple extra pieces for him, in addition to my own three, potato salad, plate full of fries and two slices of chocolate cake. Being strong is requiring a great deal of fuel.

  CASSIE, CAM and their daughter sleep over in my spare bedroom tonight. Just after midnight, I wake up to see the reddish-orange light again. But this time, it’s hovering to the left of my bed, above the miniature shrine to Sam. I blink to make sure I’m really awake and the light begins drifting toward me. This scares me, so I shake my head and the light slowly dissipates.

  At breakfast, I tell Cam and Cassie about the light.

  “Do you think it was the same one you saw right after Sam died?” Cassie asks.

  I butter my toast. “Yup.”

  Cassie nods expertly. Cam’s eyes expand.

  “What light?” he asks.

  “Adri saw a red light in her window on the morning of Sam’s surgery,” she says. “Right around the time his heart was removed.”

  I nod. “And I had a dream the other night that I saw Sam in the operating room. It was just like in real life except that I stayed for his surgery and when the doctor made the incisions in his body, tiny particles of red light came floating up.”

  “Wow!” is Cassie’s response as Cam gives us his rendition of the goldfish.

  AFTER THEY leave, I call the Hope chaplain to brainstorm about the red light.

  “What often matters most about our dreams,” he says, “is the feeling we have when we wake up from them.”