Mt. Moriah's Wake by Melissa Norton Carro

Author:Melissa Norton Carro
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: She Writes Press
Published: 2021-09-14T16:00:00+00:00

Two days after Christmas, the salt trucks had cleared enough that the delivery trucks could get through. On a Saturday morning, a FedEx driver handed me a box at the door. Before I could open it, Tom rushed into the room and grabbed it from my hands.

“That’s definitely bigger than a breadbox,” I said. Indeed, it was a large flat carton.

“I’m sorry it didn’t get here in time for Christmas,” Tom called from the kitchen where he was opening the box so I couldn’t see. “Doro had to help me with this one.”

“Doro?”

He sauntered back into the living room, the mystery box behind his back.

“Yep, it’s a little project we worked on together. It’s not wrapped but, well, here.” And he lay the feather-light box in my outstretched hands.

What could Tom and Doro have been working on together? Inside the box lay an eighteen by twenty four canvas collage of Grace and me over the years. Dressed as sheep for the Christmas pageant. Trick or treating at age nine. On our bikes in the driveway. My eleventh birthday party, her fourteenth. Eating ice cream on the steps with Tuck. In our waitress uniforms at the Inn, sticking our tongues out at the camera. In prom dresses, hands on hips. Arms linked in our caps and gowns. I was looking into the distance; Grace was smiling directly at the camera.

My feet threatened to buckle, and I sat down hard on the sofa. My face must have registered my feelings. Months of relegating Grace to the deepest corners of my mind, of being a Rivers and not a Wilson, months of pushing Mt. Moriah to the farthest reaches of the earth. Gone. I was back in June 1997, and Grace had just died.

“Thank you,” I whispered, so quietly I wasn’t sure I had uttered it out loud.

“I know how much you miss your friend,” Tom said. He looked intently at my eyes, where tears were gathering. “I thought it was a good idea—kinda bring good memories back to you.”

“Yes. It’s a really sweet idea.” I kissed him lightly on the cheek. “I’m going to make breakfast.”

But first I carried the canvas to the guest bedroom, where I slid it, photos to the wall, behind the coats and summer clothes. Then I moved to the bathroom, opened my cosmetic bag and took a strong sip of courage.

That night I couldn’t sleep. Since Tom and I had been together, my dreams had slid away like the memories that haunted me. Unlike many wives, I liked my husband’s snoring. The syncopated rumbles were soothing, a gentle percussion drowning out my own thoughts. Often I would slide my hand under Tom’s pillow, knowing his hand would be there. Linking thumbs or whole hands with him, I would fall into peaceful sleep.

But not on that Christmas weekend. The canvas in the closet taunted me like the porcelain clown on Doro’s dresser when I was little. I was so frightened of it Doro put it inside the china buffet.

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