“You okay?” he asks, his brow furrowing when he sees a tear roll down my temple into my hair.
I nod and bury my face in his shoulder as he rolls to the side and rolls me with him. “I’m good,” I say, my voice squeaky.
“Why the tears?” he asks gently.
“I don’t know.” I can’t explain it. It’s just overwhelming. “I missed you.”
He kisses me and pulls me on top of him, where he starts to kiss me again, and then he’s hard again, and then he’s inside me again, and again he doesn’t pull out. He comes deep inside me and when I collapse on top of him, I know that we are going to be okay.
41
Eli
Thirty-one days after Aaron gave us the cat, he came to us with all this paperwork. He had made an iron-clad will, leaving the proceeds of Lynda’s life insurance for us, as well as his own. He had sold his house and put the contents in storage—prepaid for two years—so we could get the kids’ things when they wanted them. He had made arrangements with his in-laws so they knew we were to have the children, and they tolerated the idea of it although it didn’t make them happy.
Aaron had planned everything, even going so far as to leave letters for the kids for special days, like the days they got married and the days they got their driver’s licenses. He even wrote silly letters like one for the first time they got drunk, and one for the day they passed an important test. He left a book of memories for them of that summer, filled with photos Bess had taken of him and the kids during his last days. He’d spent days poring through old photo albums my mom had kept that had pictures of all of us together. He’d explained what was happening in each photo so they would have concrete memories of what had happened in his life.
The early pictures of the summer album showed his smiling face, still looking vibrant and healthy. But as the days went on, his illness started to wear on him, and there were evident lines on his face in the pictures, and a level of exhaustion around his eyes. But still he looked happy and that was all that mattered.
He had told us he didn’t want to die at the lake. He wanted to die in a sterile hospital where no one would associate this happy summer with that awful event. He wanted Lake Fisher to remain a refuge, to be “the happiest of the happy places.” So, forty-five days after he gave us the cat, we moved Aaron to hospice care for his last days. His mom flew down with an aide from the facility where she lived, and she spent quite a bit of quality time with the kids, and in the end she was with Aaron during those last days.
In the days before his death, he’d begun to have vivid dreams about Lynda, even going so far as to tell Bess about the conversations they’d had in his dreams, conversations in which Lynda would ask about the kids or reminisce and laugh about the past. And therefore he loved going to sleep, and when he asked for pain medication, he always woke up with a smile and a new story to tell. He remembered things he hadn’t thought of in years, and the girls enjoyed hearing the stories about their mom.
After we moved him to the hospital, I came and went, but Bess stayed with him nearly every moment, all the way to the end. And when he passed, he was surrounded by love. He had Bess and me, his mother, and Sam had asked to stay too. She had buzzed around, taking care of anything he needed, and she came home tired but content with what she’d done each day.
Fifty-two days after Aaron gave us the cat, he drew his last breath. Bess had sat beside him, counting his breaths the way she did with the kids, and when she got to six, he stopped breathing. No more breaths. Bess had squeezed my hand, and then she’d said her farewell, and we’d gone back to Lake Fisher. We buried Aaron in the tiny cemetery behind the campground, where he’d asked to be buried. His gravestone was simple but elegant. And his daughters hadn’t shed a tear.
I’d once told Sam that I was grateful when my father died because it meant he wasn’t in pain anymore. So when I asked her if she was okay after the funeral, she looked at me, smiled softly, and said, “I feel grateful.” She grew up so fast.
They had all mourned for weeks before his death, as his slow decline began, but after the funeral was over we all refused to mourn any longer. We enjoyed the rest of the summer, and then we packed up Aaron’s van and closed up both the cabins, and we drove the kids and the cat home. We settled into our new life seamlessly. We had the occasional tantrum, but we learned that we could weather any storm as long as we did it together.
Today, it has been exactly one year since Aaron’s death, and we have been at Lake Fisher for the last two weeks. The girls have had a wonderful time, and only Sam’s gaze swings toward the tiny little cemetery. Occasionally, she walks up to leave a posy for her dad, the way Mr. Jacobson does for his late wife. We give her all the time she needs to deal with it in her own way.
Tonight is movie night and the kids are excited. Mr. Jacobson calls us all to attention in the big field where he has set up the movie projector. As it gets dark, he starts a movie, but it’s not a blockbuster. “I thought the campground could use a commercial,” he says.
“What?” Jake asks. Apparently, he didn’t know about this.
“A commercial, Jake. Sit down and be quiet like a good boy.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about this?” Jake asks.
Mr. Jacobson’s eyes meet mine. “Because this was a surprise,” he says softly. “I had a little help with it.”
He starts the projector and we don’t see a commercial. Not really. Instead, it’s our story. It’s random photos strung together of all of us as children, including Jake, Katie, Aaron, Lynda, Bess, and me, along with a bunch of other happy kid faces from the campground. It’s kind of a then-and-now and there are pictures I took that summer of the kids, juxtaposed with pictures my mom took when we were all younger. There are even some home movie reels in there that someone took when we were young, and then more from Aaron’s last summer. There’s even a short video of me tossing that little red ball against the side of the building on the hill. The “commercial” highlights the events that happened and are still happening at Lake Fisher, the campground, the complex, the family atmosphere. It shows it exactly as it is, a place where magic happens.
And at the end, I see Aaron’s smiling face taking up the whole screen. He’s wearing the red shirt that Sam gave him for that last Father’s Day, and it reads My kids think I’m awesome. He smiles into the camera and says, “Lake Fisher is a place where lifelong friendships are made, miracles happen, and love grows. So why would you want to go anywhere else?” He blows a kiss at the camera, and then the screen fades to black as the movie stops.
Bess gets up and goes to hug Mr. Jacobson. He squeezes her tightly, but he’s careful. Even so, when she steps back from him, her gaze looks for mine. “Hey, Eli,” she calls.
“Hey, Bess,” I respond as usual, but I’m already starting across the grass toward her. “Are you all right?”
She nods and smiles, but inside I’m scared to death. “I think it’s time,” she says. She clutches my shirt, her hands shaking.
“Everything will be fine,” I assure her. I motion to Jake, and Jake leaves to get our van, which already has our hospital bag in it. The baby was overdue by five days today, so I was hoping this would happen soon. I hold tightly to her hand as I usher her into the van, and Katie herds our children toward her house as we take off.