We Didn’t Know It Was the Last Time

Last December, a couple of weeks before Christmas, I left my water bottle at the gym. As we drove home, my husband said, “Do you want to go back?”

“No,” I said. “I’ll get it tomorrow.” But I was angry at Eric for not turning around. A minute later, I was crying.

“I’m going back,” he said.

“No!” I said. Because my anxiety wasn’t about the water bottle. It was about the fact that our daughter had died, and some days I just couldn’t take any more loss.

Earlier, leaving the gym, we had seen a long-limbed and messy-haired young woman who looked to be in her mid-20s, as our daughter, Kiki, had been.

“That girl reminds me of Kiki,” Eric said.

I had seen her in the gym, noticed how she was trying to get a broken treadmill to work before she threw up her hands and made a frustrated but cute face, sort of laughing to herself. Something Kiki would have done.

And then, in the gym parking lot, a memory from my old life: the feeling of picking my daughter up somewhere, seeing her walk toward the car, anticipating the moment she would get in — the smell of her hair, the sound of her voice. I could touch her then, put my hand on her arm, feel her soft sweater. There would be things to tell, to laugh about. Somewhere to go, together.