“Savannah? Where are my parents?”
She seems confused, too, looking behind me. “They’re not with you?” She turns her attention back to me. I hear others questioning the same thing when a sinking feeling lodges in my stomach.
“No.” I shake my head. “Mom called, and she said they were running late, but shouldn’t they have been here by now?” I gulp. “Right?”
Savannah shrugs. “I’m not sure,” she offers. “Maybe your dad had to work late? That’s common for him.”
I nod. She isn’t wrong. If my parents had any disagreements, it was because of his schedule.“He’s working late again,”my mom would reply whenever I asked about him during our weekly calls. My head tilts from side to side, pondering her question. “Yeah. My mom did say that she was waiting for my dad.” I bite my lower lip, trying not to jump to conclusions.
“See?” She sends a smack to my arm with the back of her hand. “That’s probably it.” Her smile widens as she laces her arm through mine, marching me into the familiar sea of faces.
“Maybe,” I reply, not sounding as convincing as I’d like. My eyes shift around through the crowd of people, angling my head and glancing around again as if my parents are going to magically appear by my Aunt Nora. I'm taken into the crowd as everyone present walks up to me for welcome-home hugs and warm birthday wishes. I begin to lose track of time, but the door starts to slide open, and I stop talking, turning abruptly from a family friend, muttering my apologies, to walk over and finally greet my parents. But as the hostess steps through, two police officers are behind her instead.
She must see the confusion on my face, and I recognize the look on hers. I step away. “Nadia,” she says, grabbing my arm and halting my retreat. I shake my head, my eyes widen in shock, and my skin feels clammy. “There are some officers here asking for you.” I look from her to the officers. Her hand is constricting, and my forearm begins to feel numb. “Nadia,” she repeats, more forcefully this time. The hostess shakes my arm, but I don’t hear what she says. Her words are muffled, as if I am underwater, drowned with the imminent news.
Savannah walks over and places her arm around me. “Breathe, Nadia. Take a deep breath in.” I do. “Now another. Good, slow your breathing.” The spots begin to lessen before my eyes, and my vision clears a little more. “You got this.” She looks away from me and back to the officers. “What is going on?” I continue taking deep breaths and clear the haze-like fog invading my senses. She looks behind her.
The officers walk over and stand there, watching me. “Are you Nadia Kennedy?” the tall, younger man questions. He watches me warily, and I nod once. I look briefly at the other middle-aged officer at his side before returning my focus to him. “I am,” I say, struggling to get the words out. He looks over at his partner but doesn’t look back at me, immediately setting off my nerves.
The older officer steps toward me, lowering his gaze. “I’m sorry to have to tell you this,” but I cut him off.
“No,” I say softly as Savannah squeezes me tightly.
But he continues to speak, needing to get the words out. “Your parents were involved in an accident on the way over here.”Savannah gasps, and I shake my head fervently, not wanting to hear what they have to say because I know it will forever change me. My hand goes to my mouth, stifling the cry that threatens to escape. “Are they?—”
“They were pronounced dead at the scene.” I can’t breathe. “They didn’t make it.” This time, my knees buckle with the weight of his words, and I fall to the floor, cradling my face. A wail erupts from the depths of my soul, and a searing cry leaves my lips.
“No! No!” Guests start coming out of the reserved room, and other patrons dining at the restaurant turn to see what is happening. Savannah drops to the ground with me, holding me tightly as I break apart in front of everyone.
“Oh my God, Nadia.” These are the last words I hear as I mentally and physically shut down. I don’t know how I get home. I vaguely remember Savannah pushing two pills into my mouth as I chased them down with a glass of water. But that’s it.
I wake up sometime in the middle of the night, groggy. I see a glass of water on the side of the nightstand as I swing my feet over the side and pick up the glass, draining the entire contents. My head feels heavy, as does my heart, but I stand up and walk out of the bedroom into the living room, where I find my best friend curled up on the couch.
She sits up immediately when I walk past her. “Nadia,” she calls out, but I don’t stop. I stride past her and open the door to my parents’ room. “Nadia,” she calls out again, her footsteps quick behind me. I take in the scene before me. The bed is made?—
The scent of my mom’s perfume suddenly hits me. The fragrance is overwhelming. My eyes water as I follow the strong floral tones toward the bathroom, where the elaborate vanity mirror once stood. The glass is shattered, and large shards surround the counter and floor. A perfume bottle is also broken on the floor, the presumed cause of the mirror’s destruction. No doubt, it was catapulted into the reflection of my mother, who once stood here in this exact spot. Its potent scent hangs in the air like a perpetual, dismal cloud in the wake of all the destruction. The glass immobilizes me from taking another step. I look at the now-broken bottle my father bought her last year. My mother always wore this scent. It was my father’sfavorite; he bought it for her every year on Valentine’s Day.
Savannah follows me around, looking at everything I already see, and I wonder if she sees it, too. The scene plays out before me: my parents fight, and my mom is upset with my dad before they leave. I stop to turn around to look at her. Her eyes are sweeping, taking in the devastation that surrounds us in equal measure. Her breathing is labored as she tries to regain control of her feelings.
“Leave it,” she says through gritted teeth, steering me away from the shattered glass and out of the room. I hear the door click behind her. She clears her throat. “I’m going to stay and go with you tomorrow to the morgue, and then I will help you make the necessary arrangements for your parents, okay?” I look at her and nod. I can’t speak. I think I’m in shock, but I don’t know because I’ve never encountered something like this. I can only presume that’s what this is. I don’t know how I feel. I only sense a numbness, like I am floating and no longer part of my body. I wonder if this could be some sort of cruel joke, but I know it’s not, and I can’t help but wonder what happened.
As if reading my mind, Savannah blurts out, “We will get answers tomorrow.” I nod and continue into the kitchen to grab another glass of water. She scrutinizes me as I wander back to my bedroom, but doesn’t try to stop me this time. “Try to get some sleep. Please, Nadia.” Her voice cracks when she voices my name. I fall onto my bed in a heap, but sleep never comes.
CHAPTER THREE
One Week Later…
Iopen the car door and step out of the vehicle into the bright sunlight. Its penetrating rays directly contrast the grey cloud that emanates pervasively around me. A gentle caress strokes my cheek as the breeze blows my hair back in the open-air expanse of the small town’s woodsy cemetery. I reach in to retrieve the flowers that I had placed on the passenger front seat, shutting the door and pocketing my keys. I open the little wrought iron gate, and the creaking sound is eerie in the way only a cemetery can bring about. I notice lambs beneath willow trees set into elongated and rounded panels on the gate. The scrollwork is accentuated with roses, and the willow trees are bent over as if theyare mourning, too. The gravel crunches under my feet on the path to where my parents now reside. A necropolis of ornate headstones surrounds them now, and nothing more.
Before I step onto the grass, I glance at their burial plots—a stark contrast to the others surrounding their own without headstones. After only a week, the gravesite is plain, lacking the vast array of flowers placed on top after the dual caskets were lowered into the ground and the earth was replaced with discarded, fragmented soil. The wilted flowers were also undoubtedly removed by the facility’s maintenance crew.
I walk up to the disrupted earth, noticing the soil settling and how the surface runs off around the site, presumably from the excess rain this week.
Why does it always seem to rain at or after funerals? Are they my parents’ remorseful tears, plunging from the heavens as a sign of their sorrow for leaving me all alone on this earth? For dying so young, without a proper plan in place to counsel me on how to navigate this life? All that is left is a legal trust. Although I’m no longer a child, they were all I had in this world.
I have no one left—no grandparents, siblings, or even a boyfriend. The burden of their burial and estate falls on me and me alone. I guess I am better off than most. The house, the lake house, cars, and retirement accounts they never got the opportunity to use all passed to me.
“I’d give it all up in a heartbeat just to have them back with me again. I don’t have that opportunity though, do I?” I say, verbalizing every thought, hanging my head as I stand before their graves. The mound of solid earth that hides their new resting spot for all eternity. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do without you guys.” A sob erupts from my mouth as I fall onto the grass. I roll into a ball, grabbing my knees.
