Two Cups by the Window
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March 2023

"Your body hasn't gotten the news yet, I think."

I wasn't going to do this one. I've been putting it off. Sarah said I don't have to, and I know I don't have to, but I think, I think if I don't say it now, I'll just keep not saying it. And then what's the point of any of this? So there are sunflower seeds on my counter right now. I buy them every spring. Harold used to buy them, these giant sunflower seeds, the kind that are supposed to grow six feet tall. And his never did. They'd get to maybe three feet and just stop. And every year he'd say, this is the year. And every year they'd stop at three feet. He had a whole war with these sunflowers.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. Harold died on a Tuesday, March 14th, 2023, which I know it's not that long ago. People say it like it was ages ago. How long has it been? And I say, three years. And they say, oh, that's still fresh. And I want to say, it's not fresh. It's not. It's just how the house is now. It's just how things are. I'm not going to talk about the hospital. I was there and David flew in from Portland and Sarah was there and it was, it was what it was. The doctors were kind. That's all I'll say about that.

I want to talk about Wednesday. I woke up and I reached for him, which I knew. I knew before my hand got there. But your body doesn't. Your body hasn't gotten the news yet, I think. My hand went to his side of the bed, and it was cold and flat, and I just lay there with my hand on his pillow for a while. It still smelled like him, sawdust and that soap he used, the green bar, Irish Spring. The hospital didn't smell like him, and the house did, and I just lay there. His reading glasses are still on the nightstand. I should say that. Three years and they're still there. I dust around them. I don't. I can't pick them up. And I can't put them in a drawer. And I know that Sarah's asked about it. And I say, I'll deal with it. And I don't. They're just there.

I got up, I went downstairs. Sarah had stayed the night. She was on the couch. I could hear her moving around. David had flown back to Portland. Lily was sick. He kept saying, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. And I told him, go, it's fine. Go be with your daughter. It was fine. I mean, it wasn't. But what was he going to do? And I made coffee. Two cups. I took two mugs out of the cabinet. His was the blue one with the lobster on it. We got it at some shop on the Cape in the 90s. The handle was chipped from when David knocked it off the counter. Harold glued it back and you could see the line, but he wouldn't throw it out. And I filled them both and I put his by the window where he always stood. I stood there looking at it. Sarah was in the kitchen and she saw me do it and she didn't say anything. She just sat at the table. I drank mine. I didn't drink his. I poured it out around, I don't know, noon. It was cold by then. I washed the mug and I put it back and the next morning I took out two mugs again. I did that for about a week before I made myself stop.

Nobody tells you how quiet it is. That's the thing I wasn't ready for. The fridge hums and the clock ticks, and that's it. No radio from his workshop. He always had the Red Sox on in there. Even in March, when it's just spring training and nothing matters, he'd listen and yell at— About a month in, I was in the kitchen and I heard the back door, that sound it makes, the hinge that Harold kept saying he'd fix. And I, for about one second, I thought, I turned around and I said, Harold, and it was the wind. The door wasn't even, it was latched. The sound was just the frame shifting. Houses do that. But for one second, for one second everything was normal and then it wasn't.

There were seed packets on the counter. That's what I was. That's why I started with the sunflowers. He'd bought them. It must have been that weekend, Saturday or Sunday. He must have gone to Crosby's while I was at, I don't even know where I was. Tomatoes, basil, and the sunflower seeds. His handwriting on the little labels. He'd already written the labels. Tomatoes, south bed. Sunflowers, along fence. I planted them. I don't know anything about gardening. That was Harold's whole— I called Frank Peterson from next door. Frank's a Yankees fan, which Harold considered a personal failing, but he's a good man. And I said, Frank, Harold left these seeds. What do I do? And Frank didn't say anything for a minute. And then he said, well, Maggie, let's put them in the ground. He came every Saturday that spring and showed me what to do. The sunflowers grew to four feet that year, tallest they'd ever been. And I know what that sounds like. I'm not going to make it into something it isn't. Harold would have been furious, honestly. He would have said, oh sure, now they grow.

Tommy called that Wednesday morning. I hadn't called anyone yet. I think Sarah must have. I don't know who called Tommy. But he called at 7:30 and he said, Maggie, I'm coming. That's all he said. And he drove four hours from Vermont. He didn't ask if I needed anything. He didn't say he was sorry. He just got in the car. He was there by noon. He sat in Harold's chair and he didn't say much. And I didn't say much. And that was, that was right. That was the right thing. His jacket is still on the hook by the front door, the flannel one, the terrible one from the dance. It doesn't smell like anything anymore. It just smells like the closet. That happened sometime in the first year, and I don't know exactly when. And that bothers me, that I didn't notice the day it stopped. I'm going to stop now.

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People: Harold, Sarah, David, Lily, Frank Peterson, Tommy