the mourning routine of a grieving person

After a fitful night of sleep, or a dreamless one (as it seems to vary between the two), you wake up. Every morning, your eyelids slowly close again and again, trying to convince you of just five more minutes between your sheets. Your sheets, warm with the presence of your body. But whether or not you stay five, ten, fifteen minutes, at some point, you must lift yourself from the bed, greet the chilled air with your prickled skin, and turn on the lights.

You know your bed will be cold when you return to it in the evening, but the mattress will still hold the memory of you in its embrace.

When you leave the bedroom, you might eat breakfast, if your body asks it of you. But most days, when you wander down the hallway to the kitchen, even the thought of food makes you nauseous. Instead, from the cabinet you take his (yours now) moka pot to brew a cup of coffee. You listen to the coffee bubble up from the small column, thinking about how the hygienist last Friday made a note about the staining on your teeth: something you would have in common with him still. That is, until she buffed the stain out, complimented the natural color of your teeth: something you have little control over. And you realize, then, as you sip the bitter cup of coffee, that she has stolen something from you.

The dining room chair groans as you sit with your cup, which is so warm in your hands. Most days, you might be able to pick up your book and lose yourself for an hour or two between the pages. But on other days, like this one, your thoughts wander off toward him, what you did or didn’t do, those things you did or didn’t say. All the while, your fingers absent-mindedly turn each page, and you absorb nothing, but feel everything. And on particular days during this ritual, like today, you think back to that specific instance, at his brother’s funeral (your uncle’s), where during the eulogy he delivered, he said that his brother seemed to be the only one who cared about his diagnosis.

And then, you think back to the time, where he sat across from where you stood in the kitchen, and he broke into tears. He cried right there in front of you. But what did you do? You did nothing. You stood there silently and watched as she (your mother) moved from the kitchen and asked him what was wrong, held him while he cried. And you watched.

And you did nothing.

You remind yourself that she told you not to cry, not to cry in front of him; it would make him feel hopeless. But now you know, uselessly to late to change anything, that she was wrong. You were wrong. He’s gone now. You know this; you were the one whose jeans were stained from kneeling in the mud to lower the impossibly small box into the earth. Not because you wanted to, but because no one else knew what to do.

He died thinking you didn’t care about him.

Suddenly the book is on the table, you’ve left the coffee behind, and you’re walking to the bathroom. You brush your teeth. You try to wash your hands of it, your face. It doesn’t work. It’s not dirt on your jeans; it’s blood in your veins. As you peel your clothes off, you think back to when you confessed it to her, and she (your friend) assured you that you had come to the wrong conclusion. A part of you thinks (hopes) that she’s right, but another part of you thinks (knows) that she isn’t.

You remember the others (your family) sharing the last words they were given. But you couldn’t partake, could you? You weren’t given any. The last time you spoke to him, he was there in his bed, wide-eyed, gasping for air. You told him you loved him. His eyes met yours, and he turned to his side, his back to you. And said nothing.

Was he angry at you then? Did he hate you for what you did, for what you didn’t do?

The shower hisses on, steam rises, and you might suffocate on it. You might burn in it. But you don’t, at least, not yet. And you think to yourself, as you scrub your skin raw, how cruel it was of him, to turn away, to say nothing, even though you did the same. And in that moment you hate him for what he’s done, for his silence, but mostly for leaving.

Maybe if you had one more hour, one more day, you could have said all that you needed to say.

But you had that hour, that day. You knew, the doctors told you, when it would all end.

It’s an impossible thing, that. It’s impossible because there are simply not enough minutes in an hour, nor hours in a day, that would leave you satisfied. Because as time passes, you realize, you just continue adding onto whatever speech, to this imaginary conversation you’ve been writing since the moment he left.

Instead, all you have are the memories, the photos. The text messages, the singular voicemail that he left where his voice sounds so far away as he says, I don’t have your brother’s number saved on this phone, how is that possible?

As you lather your hair, you wonder how others bear it, how she (your mother) bears it. All those who have gone through it, once, twice, several times. Does it ever get better? you want to ask, but you never will. Because why has it taken this particular death (you have experienced others before already) to finally ask, Do you miss them, even still? Why has it taken a loss of your own to finally think of others? Is it because this thing, this thing that wasn't supposed to happen (even though it is quite literally the most natural, obvious conclusion to every living thing) is so incomprehensible until you are in its direct proximity?

If someone were to ask you, even as the months slip into years, and those years into decades, the answer is so obvious that broaching the question at all becomes barbaric.

Yes, I still miss him. No, it doesn’t get any better.

You might cry less often. Like now, in the shower you aren’t crying at all, are you? But you still cry. If not now, then tomorrow or a week from now. Years have passed and you still set the dinner table with one too many plates. You book one too many tickets. You go to make a phone call.

How is that possible?

You don’t know.

When you leave the bathroom, tying your robe, wringing out your hair, the air in the house is cold. And so is the coffee now, there left on the table. It’s cold to the touch.

You shouldn’t have wasted so much time.