The reaper left us to pick up the pieces of our broken lives, but we were frozen in that spot. All we could do was cry and cling to each other. We cried so long, I felt like we’d never stop. Like, this was our life now, crying until the reaper returned for us. But eventually, we stopped crying. Pretty sure our bodies ran out of water or something. Still, we couldn’t move. Less and I just stared at each other with the droopiest of eyes, communicating a message only we understand.
“Luca,” she moans. “We don’t have parents.”
I’m painfully aware of this fact, but hearing it causes my body to start up the emotion factory again. I feel pressure building up everywhere, and I’m not sure how or where it’s gonna come out. But then someone upstairs starts making a racket. It’s one of Alessia’s, but I go up anyway to check on Desi. Everyone but Arvin is sleeping peacefully, unaware of how our family has changed. Luckily for them, they’re much too young to even remember meeting her. That saddens me as much as it relieves me.
Less picks him up and tries soothing him to coax him to nap like everyone else. I take that moment to go make the food I was going to prepare before my life was so rudely interrupted. She eventually gets him to sleep and joins us outside, just as Sophia and I sit down to eat. Forks clanging against porcelain plates fill in the gaps where conversation usually exists along with water lapping against the pool, shrieks from children at the park a few blocks away, the random whoosh of a car passing, and rapid footsteps of joggers. We finish our food and stare at the empty plates as if looking to them for answers. After a moment, Sophia gets up and takes the leftovers inside. She doesn’t come back, so I assume she went to check on the kids.
After all that crying, my voice didn’t work very well, so I clear my throat to ask if she ever thought about moving to San Sequoia. I know it’s not the right time for that conversation, and she probably never thought about it since Dad died the very next day after suggesting it, but I don’t know what else to say. And I feel like she needs to be close to us right now. Yes, it’s irrational to think she’d be willing to uproot her life on the heels of losing both parents, but I can’t talk about Mama right now. Not yet.
