When the worst has happened – and I cannot honestly think of anything worse than having your child end their own life – I had thought it might alleviate my sense of panic about other potentially frightening life events. After all, what else could go more wrong than that? How much more could I actually hurt than I already do Yesterday, I realized how things could get worse: by losing our other daughter.
I’m a learned optimist, but I believe a born pessimist. Perhaps it’s an intergenerational defect that I inherited or something I simply copied from my cheerful but cautiously optimistic mother. She had a few sayings that led me to believe that she too may have had a marrow of pessimism. The first was erst das lachen, denn das weinen (first the laughter, then the tears); the second was always wear clean underwear in case you’re in an accident; the third was hope for the best, expect the worst. Both my parents are refugees – first generation Canadians who survived the horrors of World War II and along with loved ones lost, probably, some faith in circumstances always working out for the best.
Yesterday, Don and I went to the weekend flea market on Terminal Avenue in Vancouver: he got a bunch of old LPs and I found a rosary with the five stations of the cross. I utter “I love you, Emily, I love you, Emily,” and then when there is a break in the beads, I go on to the next station and say, “I love you, Mama, I love you, Mama,” and in this way we talk back and forth as I quietly flip through the wooden orbs, ending on a smooth wooden cross that has been repaired and feels like a righteous symbol of strength, which I am in need of. The loop of love.
After our flea market venture, we picked up Charlotte at her university and went out for some authentic Chinese dimsum in a boisterous, clattery restaurant where Charlotte already had accrued some happy memories with friends. We were feeling melancholy and grateful at the same time because a dear friend of Emily’s had posted a beautiful tribute for her on her obituary webpage and it had just been passed on to us. We sat in the car and sobbed for a few minutes before ordering our prawn dumplings and pork buns and fried rice and drinking cup after tiny cup of jasmine tea. The rambunctiousness of the eatery buoyed us, but we still felt overwhelmed with emotion.
Our plan was to take Charlotte to her lifeguarding job at five pm. After finishing up our meal, none of us could think of what to do to pass the time until she had to be at work. It was a blustery day and we drove aimlessly, me in the backseat and Charlotte feeling carsick in the front, with Don saying, “Someone just give me directions somewhere.” Yet none of us had ideas or fortitude to think of anywhere we wanted to go or anything we wanted to do. Finally, we pulled over in a residential neighbourhood, Don and Charlotte leaned back in their bucket seats, and we all watched an episode of Friends together on Charlotte’s iPhone. It has been a program that has cheered me up a few times in my life’s journey when I just needed some levity and little less stress. Charlotte, almost unbelievably, had never watched it, and loved it immediately, so I am delighted that I can share something with her that is new for her and already a balm for me.
We lay in the chilly car and laughed at Chandler being caught in a bank vestibule with a Victoria’s Secret model and Ross trying to ask Rachel out during a blackout in New York City as a cat attacked Ross’ head on that envy-enducing balcony of theirs. It was ludicrous and nothing could have been better in that moment.
We like to pick Charlotte up after her evening shifts and drive her back to her dorm or to the house we are still staying at here in Vancouver, but on this day, we collectively decided that she would take the bus back to university after her shift because soon we will be relocating to Vancouver Island and she will need to become accustomed to doing it on her own. Also, the days are getting longer and less chilly so it feels safer, all in all.
Charlotte agreed that she would call us as she was walking from her pool to the bus stop, about 10 minutes away. As we chatted and she walked, a black, collared cat nuzzled up against her legs and began purring and following her. We liked the idea of this being Emily popping in to say, “Hi sister, you’re safe,” and she didn’t want to leave the cat, hence missing the bus and having to catch the next one, some 15 minutes later.
We happily stayed on the line, chatting, and once she was on the bus, Charlotte promised to call when she was safely back in her dorm room. I got involved in my Duo Lingo Spanish and Don in sorting through his vinyls, and we lost track of time. Well after 10 pm, I realized Charlotte had not gotten in touch with us, so I immediately texted her to make sure she was safe. Being a girl who is continuously on her phone, I expected the read sign to pop up immediately, showing that she had seen my message and for the three bubbles to start vibrating, showing she was texting back. Nothing. I called. Nothing. Don called and texted. Nothing. We were able to track her on the find my i phone app and it showed her phone was on Burnaby Mountain, but not in her dorm. My heart rate escalated. We continued calling and texting with no response. I realized that if she had dropped her phone, she would have no way of communicating with us to let us know she was safe, plus she might be roaming about searching for her missing phone; worse yet, I imagined her robbed or raped or murdered.
Within a few minutes, Don and I had decided we needed to drive the half an hour to her university and go looking for her. We were bundling up and as I was grabbing a fleecy blanket for the backseat to wrap her in, in case we found her on the forested mountain, the bubbles popped up and Charlotte wrote, I’m fineeee bruh.”
Call me!! I texted back. Prior to that moment, it had been building adrenaline – cortisone vibrating through my veins – but after profuse apologies from Charlotte who had forgotten and was in the dining hall having pizza with her friends, Don and I both just collapsed. We cried and cried. What if we had lost our Charlotte, too? It would be unimaginable. The worst and then the worst again could happen.
I was unable to sleep without medication and woke groggy and upset. I dreamt that Don wanted to adopt more children to “make up” for the loss of Emily and I was adamantly against it, saying things like, “Haven’t we suffered enough already?” None of it made sense as both of our daughters were alive in the dream and they were still little girls. Also, I was prepared to flee the marriage and my children to avoid any more pain by having yet more children to love.
I got up and moved to the sofa, covering myself in the blanket that I had put aside for the backseat in case we found Charlotte’s lifeless or shivering body. I tried to read for a while to break my mind away from the dream before falling sleep again, but as soon as I closed my eyes, it reoccurred , along with a kinked neck from sleeping on the sofa. Upon waking, I remembered a time many eons ago, in another life and another marriage, when my husband didn’t make it home. My mother got in the car to go looking for him, putting a blanket in the backseat for the same purpose I had. When he was safely found, having spent the night in his office (before the time of cell phones), my mother said quietly, “The funeral would have been on Tuesday.”
And so here I am. Carrying on the legacy. Preparing for the worst, hoping for the best. It’s not the way I want to live my life. I’m not sure I’ll be able to change it now, though. Once the worst of the worst has happened, how can we go on thinking that the rest of life will be fine?
