Leaving Home: Short Pieces Read Free Page B

edges a little more each day. He found himself spending hours in her bedroom, inhaling the smell of her strawberry-mango shampoo still trapped in the fibers of the pillowcase, or poring through the books on her shelves and trying to see them through her eyes. He went so far as to open her fingerpaints, stand stripped to the waist in front of her tiny mirror, draw her heart on his chest.

    Although Sarah’s M.O. was usually to do the opposite of whatever her mother told her to do, this time, she took her advice. She showed up at the church, shuddering as she remembered the hymns that had been played at her daughter’s funeral; steeling herself for the absence of the coffin at the altar. She knocked on the pastor’s office door, and he ushered her inside and gave her a cup of tea. “So,” the pastor said, “your mother’s worried about you.”

    Sarah opened up her mouth to say something snippy and typically awful, but she caught herself in time. Of course her mother was worried. That was the job description, wasn’t it? That was why she had come.

    “Can I ask you something?” Sarah said. “Why her?”

    “I don’t understand…”

    “I get the whole God thing. I get the Kingdom of Heaven. But there are millions of seven year olds out there. Why did God take mine?”

    The pastor hesitated. “God didn’t take your daughter, Sarah,” he said. “Illness did.”

    Sarah snorted. “Sure. Pass the buck when it’s convenient.” She could feel herself dangerously at the edge of breaking down, and wondered why on earth she’d thought it was a good idea to come here.

    The pastor reached for her hand. His were warm and papery, familiar. “Heaven’s an amazing place,” he said softly. “She’s up there, and she’s looking down on us, right now, you know.”

    Sarah felt her throat tighten. “My daughter,” she said, “can’t ride a ski lift without hyperventilating. She panics in elevators. She doesn’t even like bunk beds. She’s terrified of heights.”

    “Not anymore.”

    “How do you know that?” Sarah exploded. “How do you know that there’s anything afterward? How do you know it doesn’t just…end?”

    “I don’t know,” the pastor said. “But I can hope. And I truly believe that your daughter is in Heaven, and even if she does still get scared, Jesus will be there to keep her safe.”

    She turned away as a tear streaked down her cheek. “She doesn’t know Jesus,” Sarah said. “She knows me.”

    Abe found himself defying gravity. He’d be standing in the kitchen, getting a glass of water, and he’d find himself rising to the balls of his feet. He could not walk fast down the street without starting to float between strides. He started to put stones in the pockets of his pants, which were all too long for him now.

    He was sitting on his daughter’s bed one Saturday, remembering a conversation they’d had. Can I still live here when I get married? she’d asked, and he’d grinned and said that would be perfectly fine.

    But what about your husband? he’d asked.

    His daughter had considered this carefully. Well, we could set up the cot, like when I have a sleepover.

    The doorbell rang, and when Abe went downstairs, he found the little girl his daughter had considered her best friend – the last one who’d used that cot, actually – standing red-eyed beside her mother. “Hi, Abe,” the woman said. “I hope this isn’t too much of an imposition.”

    “No!” he said, too brightly. “No! Not at all!”

    “It’s just that Emily’s having some trouble, with, well, you know. She drew a picture, and wanted to bring it here. She thought maybe you could hang it up.” The little girl thrust out a piece of paper toward Abe: a crayoned drawing of two little girls – one dark haired, like his daughter, one fair, like Emily. They were holding hands. There was a melting sun overhead, and grass beneath their feet.

    Abe realized he was nearly at a level with Emily; he