Page 47 of Lily In The Valley
“You not staying?” My dad’s voice cut through everything. It was coarse. Demanding in the way it’d been all my life.
I looked at him. His eyes were still bloodshot and hollow, like he still wasn’t fully inside his body. He’d been that way when I walked into the family room at the hospital. He hadn’t even noticed I was there. Were it not for Aunt Viv telling him I was there, he’d still be crying on Uncle Doug’s shoulder, inconsolable.
“I–yeah, I’ll stay awhile,” I relented.
His mouth trembled. “Your mama wouldn’t want you off somewhere alone.”
I nodded because anything else would’ve taken too much energy. He patted his knee like I was five again and he was calling me over for a story. Everyone looked on, an audience to our own Greek tragedy. As I walked toward him, their eyes tracked me like my mother’s ghost was walking alongside me.
When I made it to my dad, he stood, wrapping me in his arms. But this time, I could feel how much of it was for him, not me.
“You know your mama was my whole heart,” he whispered in my ear. “She ain’t even tell me goodbye.”
My hands tightened on his back. “I know, Daddy.”
His breath caught. “I can’t do this without her, Kelly. I swear to God I can’t.” I nodded again, but it felt like my throat wasclosing. He pulled back, his face wet. “Promise me you’ll help me figure this out. Be strong for me, alright?”
That made something twist in me. Because of course I could. Of course I would. I always had. I didn’t answer, just squeezed once more then kissed his cheek, and stepped away before I could drown in his sadness.
Vanessa stood up and took a few steps toward me. “You need anything? Water? A shot?” she laughed.
I shook my head. “I just need to go upstairs for a minute.”
Khalil stepped to me. He hadn’t shed a tear all day, yet the tears lingered in his eyes.
“You sure? I can come with you.”
“No, I just–just give me a second.”
I felt everyone’s eyes on me as I climbed the stairs. My hand hovered above the banister before pulling back. Touching it felt like a disturbing memory. Each step creaked like it remembered me. It’d been months since I’d been to my parents shared home. My childhood home for as long as I could remember. My mother took her time filling every nook and cranny with trinkets and nonfunctional decor pieces just because. With her gone, and all her touches still here, it felt disrespectful. How dare they be here while she withered away in a funeral home.
When I pushed open the door to my old bedroom, I half-expected her to walk out of the closet, holding old clothes she’d collected to donate. I thought she’d stand up from fluffing the pillows on my bed or vacuuming the room that was already in pristine condition. But there weren’t piles of clothes in the center of my room, or a bed in disarray, or the loud hum of a vacuum cleaner.
Silence.
That was all. Save for a glass vase housing a lone plant on my old desk by the window. A single lily, pinkish-white. Just as there’d always been one waiting for me each week. I’d comehome from some school event and see a fresh flower waiting for me with a note. “For my sweet girl. Just because. Mommy.”
I stared at it for what felt like forever. Then, I sat on the edge of the bed, and before I could brace myself, the first tear dropped. Quiet, simple. Then the second. Then a hemorrhaging of pain I couldn’t stop. My chest caved. My body folded forward. The air felt too sharp to breathe. All I could do was cry. Not the kind people heard and rushed to comfort like I had in the hospital lobby. This wasn’t that. This was the kind of crying that stayed low and buried, like it didn’t want to be seen. I held my face in my hands and let it happen.
A knock came, soft and distant. Then the door creaked open. “Kelly?” Vanessa’s voice. “You alright?”
I couldn’t answer. Silent streams poured from my eyelids. The air in my lungs seemed thin. She stepped in, followed by Lynn. Nyah slipped in after, shutting the door, locking it behind her. She knelt in front of me and took my hands from my face. Her eyes welled up again when she saw mine. She stood and sat behind me, wrapping her arms around my shoulders, grounding me, empathizing with the pain in my soul. The missing piece that’d never grow back. Lynn and Vanessa sat next to me, completing the full circle embrace, resting their heads on my shoulder.
“You don’t have to talk,” Nyah whispered. “Just breathe.”
I couldn’t speak. I didn’t want to. I wanted to scream. Shout. Yell at God for putting me through this. But I couldn’t. No sound left from me aside from the small huffs of air as I struggled to catch my breathing. The room had gone blurry. And through it all, my friends held me.
In the hallway, I could make out a few soft strains of gospel playing from downstairs. I caught a few lyrics drifting under the small gap under my bedroom door. Something about having strength. Something about home.
But Mama wasn’t coming home.
And I didn’t know how to be strong anymore.
I looked over at the lily in the vase again, trembling in its glass enclosure like it wasn’t sure it belonged in this world anymore. Maybe it didn’t.Maybe I didn’t. Outside, thunder cracked once, low and distant. I didn’t flinch. Because the storm hadn’t started yet.
But I knew it was coming.
Chapter 15
