“When I was seventeen years old, my parents took a skiing trip. I stayed with my grandmother while they were gone. Driving back down the mountain afterward, they ran into a patch of black ice, and slid off the road. They were both killed. That was thirteen years ago.”
Her voice cracked and she paused, and Kyle wished he could take away her pain. She continued. “I married in an attempt to recreate a family around me, but he wasn’t family material.”
“He made some cute family members, though.” Kyle’s father smiled sadly as he pointed at Trista and Steven. “It seems you have spent your entire life creating family. In your work, you create family. You create family for our family, even.”
“I struggled with my pain for a long time. And I’ve struggled to support my family after my husband left. Ever since my parents died and especially after my grandmother died, I have wished with all my heart for a family. And I see your family and I think it’s wonderful. But, no offense intended, all of you except Alyssa are too afraid to move past the pain to the joy of family you once had. That you could still have.”
His father asked, in a small voice, “But how do we do that?”
A tear ran down Lexi’s cheek. “I don’t have all the answers. I would just like to share with you something about my parents and my loss.”
She squeezed Kyle’s hand. He squeezed back.
“I wish I could have my dad call me his little princess just one more time. And I’ll always regret that my mother wanted me to go with her to choose a new outfit for their trip, but I was too busy with my friends and so I put her off. And now I can never help her choose anything again.” She sighed, a wistful sound in the quiet room. “Sometimes I feel her here, with me, watching over me and the children, like a guardian angel. Everything I learned about celebrating for the holidays, I learned from watching my mother. I decorate for her.”
The room was quiet for a long time. Finally, Alyssa said, “I remember the wonderful meals Mama used to cook. I used to love when you guys would invite me over for dinner. And, oh, her singing. I got my love of opera from your Mama.”
Kyle would burst if he didn’t speak of Mama. His voice cracked. “I miss having her tuck me in. I realize that I’m too old to tuck in now--but I missed that for so many years, growing up. I miss having a mother to call when I have good news--or bad, either one.”
Sadness overwhelmed him, but this time he let it well up inside him instead of pushing it down. He was tired of fighting it.
Lexi squeezed his hand and he glanced up at her, grateful. Trista put her head on his shoulder. Steven took hold of his sleeve.
Kyle took another deep breath and decided to face the pain. To remember. To talk about her. Finally. “I remember going hunting with Grandpa the day before Christmas. When we got back, the ambulance was in the driveway, and they took her away.”
Tears slid down Kyle’s face, and he let them flow. He’d held them back for twenty-two years. Keefe was right. That was long enough to mourn. Too long. He spoke again. “And I remember Mama telling me that I needed to grow up just like Papa, because he was such a good man.”
His father put his hand up to his chin, trying to regain control over his emotions, and not succeeding.
Keefe said, quietly, “I regret that I didn’t put Mama’s angel on the tree when she asked. By the time I put it up, she wasn’t here to see it.” His voice choked up and he began to cry.
After a moment, through his tears, he watched the corners of Keefe’s mouth slowly curl up. “And I remember Mama’s Christmas Eve dinner, and I miss having her cook all that food for us. And I remember her singing, too. She had such a lovely voice.”
Alyssa took her husband’s hand and leaned her head against his shoulder.
Kenneth sighed and shifted in his seat. “I remember opening my gift from Mama, and how weird it was, with her already gone, but there I was, opening her present.”
The emotion in Kenneth’s voice and the memory tore at Kyle’s heart, and he said, “Me, too.”
“And I remember,” Kenneth continued in a shaky voice, “how she would always write a note and put it into my lunch box. Every day. Some silly thing that I would have died rather than let any of my friends see. I still have some of those notes.”
Kyle cried. So did Kenneth. And Keefe. They all had those notes of love from long ago.
Finally his father spoke, his voice halting and cracking. “She wanted us to go to church that Sunday before Christmas, but I said I wasn’t in the mood to go. And then the next week we were all in church for her funeral.” His voice broke. “And I remember how beautiful she was. My beautiful Gabriella. I miss her so much.”