Tessie D

Sorrow was creamated. 

I still don’t understand what happened. She was here, we heard her crying, cooing, and laughing throughout the day, even the day before she got sick. The walls in our house are so thin that she could be heard in every room of the house. She commanded our attention at all hours, day and night. 

But now the house is quiet, and everything is different. I understand what people mean when they talk about ghosts now. I don’t believe that ghosts are real. But I understand why someone might think so. I can feel her presence. I expect to see her everywhere. Almost nine days since her passing, and my breasts still ache even though my milk has begun to dry up. I feel pulled toward her crib to check on her during the night, into the kitchen in the morning to make her bottle, sitting in her high chair, slamming the little table. I expect to see her in every room I walk into—it feels like she’s still there. I know it’s just a sense memory, but I can’t comprehend that she’s not there. It’s all too sudden, and I still walk around the house expecting to find her in every room before I remember again that she’s gone.

I didn’t have enough time with her. I keep thinking about that final day, the ordinaryness of it. Feeding, cleaning, bathing. The day was the same as any other until it wasn’t. Wondering if there was some sign that I missed. That if I’d just taken her to the hospital sooner. Did we pick up the virus the day before when we were grocery shopping? Was someone in the store sick? Did she get it from the shopping cart handle? Was it when we went on our walk at the park? Was I sick and didn’t know it and I gave it to her?

I tried to have her buried, but it was going to be too expensive. The funeral director, a short man with a round face and flushed cheeks, was sorry for our loss. Momma and Daddy stood beside me as he looked us over. He wore a black suit and a sympethic smile. 

He could offer us the most affordable burial. But, he couldn’t do much else. He could suggest cremation. It was what many families in our situation choose. 

So, in the end, I had her creamated. Maybe it was for the best since I couldn’t stand the thought of her small body, cold and alone in the dark underground. But, then I keep thinking about those sermons from church about the resurrection and how, if Jesus comes, she won’t be there. Her body is just ashes and dust. The thought leaves me feeling anxious, like I could burst into tears at any moment, and I have to talk myself down from the panic. 

When I picked up her ashes a few days ago and the black, plastic box sat in the middle of the dining room table for a few days. There isn’t going to be a memorial or any sort of service. Momma and Daddy said that the only people who’d come were in the room already and we might as well just save the money. We could remember her ourselves in our own way. 

I scattered her ashes early in the morning, as the sun was coming up, in the field. I didn’t tell anyone. I got up by myself before dawn and carried her down to the big tank in the back. The sun was just coming up by the time I got down there, and the morning air was cool. I cut a path through the pasture, the dew glistening on the costal hay, tall in the field. I walked down to the water’s edge, the tank buzzing from the dragonflies and midges hovering and darting along its surface. The sun was creeping up on the horizon, pink and purple light growing slowly in intensity, and I could hear warblers and mourning doves cooing in the distance.

 I opened the box and pulled out the small bag of grey ash. I was suprised again by how light they were. I don’t know why I thought her remains would have been heavier. She couldn’t have weighed more than twenty pounds when she was alive, so it made sense that she’d only be a few pounds of dust now that was was gone. 

I wove some twine around two sticks to make a cross and shoved it into the ground with some yellow wildflowers that I’d picked in the field. 

Neither Momma or Daddy said anything about how the box wasn’t on the table any more. I don’t know if they didn’t notice or just didn’t want to say anything, relieved that they could start to move on.