Grief Girl (10 page)

If Mum and Dad had been at a pedestrian crossing, the driver would be in big trouble and we'd gets lots of money, but they weren't, so he's not and we won't. I don't know why some people think money makes up for losing someone.

Anyway, the driver will be held accountable in
some
way, and we are to get some form of compensation. “Possibly,” the lawyers tell us.

Maybe the more screwed-up we are, the better off financially we'll be in the future or something. Sick, huh? Or maybe they'll be tougher on the idiot who ran over Mum and Dad if the surviving relatives are fruit loops as a result of his stupidity.

I wonder what this asshole psychiatrist is going to make of me. He's so clinical and impersonal. He doesn't give a shit about any of this.

I never imagined it would be this way. In the movies psychiatrists really look at you, nod a lot, and say wise things. This guy says nothing, he doesn't give a grunt or a “hmmm.” If I stop talking, there's a horrible, uncomfortable silence, and the only way to fill it is for me to keep rattling on (as Dad would say, I'm good at that).

It's a ploy; I'm not that stupid. I don't want to give in to it, but I can't stand how uncomfortable this all is.

I talk and talk; he writes. Maybe he's writing his shopping list. Maybe he's not writing my stuff down at all.

According to the clock I have ten minutes to go, and I don't know what else to talk about. For the first time since it all happened, my head is empty. I have nothing else to say about the great tragedy. Wow, this guy is good. He's dried me up; I have no tears left. As much as I want to think about the agony of it all, I can't. It's just not there. Where did it go?

I'm all better. It must be the great rapport we developed. He's cured me with his shitty demeanor. Is this some new treatment technique, to bore people with their own problems?

Thanks, doc, see ya.

Oh no, I've blown it. I probably didn't seem affected at all. He's sure to think I'm coping brilliantly, like no one he's ever seen before.

There goes the future.

         

I wish I could talk to someone who has been through it, someone who “gets it.”

There's a girl in some of my classes at school whose mother died from cancer just after my mum died. I thought we could bond. I thought we could talk about our pain, but it doesn't work that way.

“Hi, Joanna. I'm so sorry to hear about your mum. If you need to talk to someone, I'm here.”

We tried once, but we couldn't relate to each other. Watching someone die a slow and painful death is different from losing someone suddenly. It seems how they died is just as important as the fact that they're gone. Maybe we have to deal with the
how
before we can even look at the fact of a life without our mums.

         

It's the school summer holidays, which means the end of my holiday from home, and all the memories, seven hours a day. Now there's no escaping.

I'll miss Mrs. Stockbridge, but she said I can call her if I need to. I feel funny and sort of a loser about intruding on her family and home life, so I don't think I will.

Lucky for me I have work every day. My boss said I could work full-time if I want to. I do. We need the money.

I've also got my theatrical career. I don't think it's right to go on the Shopfront England tour after everything that's happened, but Tracy says Mum would be disappointed if I didn't. So now I have a busy schedule, thank goodness. Work, then rehearsals, then bed, then play with Trent, then work, then rehearsals, then bed.

         

I'm now lying on the floor of the theater with a cork in my mouth. Errol, our director, says it's a theater exercise for diction and vocal projection. You put a cork in your mouth, lie on your back, and say certain words and phrases. I wonder if Elizabeth Taylor ever did this. If she did, she probably had that big diamond Richard Burton gave her in her mouth, not some dirty cork from an old wine bottle.

“You're going to be playing in bigger theaters than this, and you want people to hear you in the back row, don't you?” Errol says.

“'Es, Ewal,” we all say loudly through our corks.

Dad will think this is hilarious. He loves telling me to “put a cork in it” when I talk too much, which he says is all the time. Oops! Idiot. He's not at home. Why do I always do that? I have moments of thinking everything is normal. That Mum and Dad are just sitting at home like every other day. I really should just put a cork in my thoughts.

         

Auntie Connie is cooking a nice dinner for us, but I don't want to go. Tracy is angry with me for something. I'm not sure what it is, but the look of thunder says it all. So I tell her I'm staying home.

“God, Erin. Don't be so ungrateful,” Tracy tells me.

“She's doing this for us. Whether I want you there or not, you're coming and that's that.”

We walk up the street. Tracy is carrying Trent and walking ahead of me in a huff. I feel like such a loser and I don't even know why.

When Auntie Connie answers the door, the bright light shines on Trent and a smiling Tracy.

“Come in, darlings,” Auntie Connie says, and hugs each of us.

“Erin, tell everybody about the play.” We're in the kitchen and now Tracy is being so sweet to me. The look of anger has been replaced with a gentle sisterly smile. Tracy turns to Auntie Connie. “We're so proud of her.”

“Um…well…” I'm lost for words.

No. Hang on a minute. I'm furious! I want everyone to see how it really is between Tracy and me.

But they'd have to be behind the closed doors of 6 Knock Crescent, I guess.

         

Christmas is coming.

There is one joyous thing about this Christmas. The paperwork came through. Tracy is now officially Trent's guardian. Stick that where the sun don't shine, Grandma and Grandpa!

“What are we going to do about presents for Trent?” I ask Tracy and Chris before heading out to the theater for rehearsals.

“We'll have to ask Ronald. He can't possibly say no,” Tracy says.

I know Tracy doesn't want to deal with Ronald after the fridge fiasco, so I offer to call when I get home.

“Hi, Ronald?”

I spend time making small talk so he doesn't think I'm just calling to ask for something. After a couple of minutes I ask.

“No! They'll cut my balls off if I give you money every time you want it!” he shouts.

Want it? We don't
want
it. We need it. He hasn't given us any of it yet, and I think Trent's happiness and continuing belief in Santa is a good enough reason. We have no idea who
they
are, but apparently they—the money police, I guess—will make him suffer if he helps us.

“Who will cut your balls off?”

“The lawyers who oversee everything I do.”

“Come on, Ronald. Ultimately, you're in charge of our money. You can do what you want,” I say.

“Presents are a waste! He's too little to notice, anyway.”

How dare he assume that little kids don't notice things. What an ignoramus!

“I'm doing this for your own good,” he says, starting to sound a lot like Ebenezer Scrooge. “I don't like to do this, but…no.”

He hangs up and I call Peter.

“What's wrong with Ronald? He won't even give us any money for Trent for Christmas. Could you talk to him?”

“Erin, you're just going to have to trust him,” Peter says. “He's doing what he thinks is right…what he thinks your mum and dad would want.”

“They'd want us to have the money!” I try to calm down. “Look, Peter, I know he cares and thinks we'll appreciate this years down the track, but—”

“Okay, I'll call and see what he says.”

He does, but nothing changes. Ronald's older, and what he says goes.

So we don't pay the phone bill. Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it, the phone keeps ringing (they don't cut it off straightaway, giving you time to pay) and some other bills don't get paid, and Trent gets his goodies from Santa.

         

I miss Dad. He was always so fun at Christmas. When I was ten, the Lions Club Santa got sick, so Dad had to take over. I wasn't allowed to tell anyone, though.

The Christmas picnic was on the beach, so Dad—I mean, Santa—arrived on a boat ho-ho-hoing. It was exciting knowing my father was Santa Claus. Made me feel like the special-est kid around. I was the kid Santa loved the most, I was Santa's favorite. I wish Trent could have Dad be his Santa too.

         

Tracy and I took Trent to see the Santa at the mall the other day. We dressed him in his red, white, and blue short suit, and Tracy blow-dried his hair. His thick blond hair is now layered and wavy and flips back on the sides. He's a preschooler with a teenage hairstyle.

When we got to Santa, Trent walked straight up by himself. Not like all the stupid kids who were crying and carrying on.

“Hello, little boy,” Santa said as Trent sat in his lap and hugged him.

“Hello, Santa.” Trent smiled.

“And what would you like for Christmas?”

At that point Tracy and I froze. We thought he might ask Santa for Mum and Dad to come home, but thankfully he just said, “A big yellow truck.”

Exactly what we'd bought him.

Thanks to those unpaid bills, we've got him enough stuff to fill a pillowcase. Just the way it used to be for us when we were little. Tracy and I would go to bed early, and I would be convinced that Santa's reindeer were above the house. Dad would leave Foster's beer for Santa and we'd leave cake for the reindeers before trying to get to sleep. Not for too long, though. We'd be up at five a.m. rummaging through our pillowcases, and then it was out to the cul-de-sac for all us kids to show each other what we got. We'd play until our mothers stood on our verandahs and called us in for breakfast. I wish it could be like that for Trent, but there are no little kids left in the street, apart from Auntie Connie's Peter.

We've put a Christmas tree up for Trent, but it's fake. It's made of plastic. Everything seems fake this year. We're really only having Christmas for Trent's sake.

Christmas used to be the best time of the year. Then something horrible happened and the holiday we loved the most became the worst time of the year. And there's no ignoring Christmas. Mostly because of Trent, and because people are singing Christmas songs everywhere. You can't go anywhere without hearing “Joy to the World.”

Whose world might that be, I wonder.

         

It's seven o'clock Christmas morning, and I'm up with Trent looking at what Santa brought him. After about half an hour I tell him to sneak into Tracy and Chris's room so he can wake them and show them what he got. It's a great moment. It's like nothing bad has touched us. We're just a regular family on Christmas morning.

A few hours later Ronald, Peter, Gai, and Frances arrive. Even though I'm angry at Ronald, I'm glad they're all here. I'm tempted to talk to Ronald about the money stuff, but Christmas doesn't seem like the right time. So I show him Trent's presents, saying, “Look what Trent got. Santa's phone and electricity might be cut off, but
Santa
knew it was important that Trent still have Christmas.”

We're all going to Chris's parents' place for lunch. They live five minutes away. I don't want to go, but I don't want to stay here either. Now that Trent's excitement has died down and we're quietly playing with his truck, the house feels sadder than ever without Mum and Dad, and it just gets worse when Grandma and Grandpa arrive to drop off presents for Trent.

“We can't think about Christmas without our Ronnie,” Grandma blubbers while Grandpa scratches his flat bum.

Gee, he was never your “Ronnie” when he was alive. And since when have you given a damn about Christmas? All you've ever given us is blank Christmas cards so we can use them again the next year and save money.

They don't stay long, which I would say is our second Christmas blessing of the day. The first being Trent's not yet asking where Mum and Dad are.

Chris's parents' house is messy and small. It's the kind of house that has a rusty, broken-down car parked on the front lawn and always has too much furniture crammed into it.

I don't know how Chris's dad gets around. He must bump into things a lot. He has MS and is in a wheelchair most of the time. It's strange seeing him get in and out of the chair. He wobbles like Trent did when he was learning to walk. It's sad and just adds to the sadness of today.

Chris's parents also have boarders from Korea and Vietnam. When Chris was living there, he had to sleep on the sofa so the boarders could have his room. His mum is a travel agent and likes the international feel of having Asian students staying there. His dad likes it too.