- 6.
<
My grief for David’s belated remorse was cut
short by a far greater loss. My mom died. She
lay peacefully in her bed, a bottle of pesticide
and a note beside her. She’d gone quietly,
without disturbing anyone. A sharp pain tore
through me. I watched helplessly as she drank
the poison, collapsing onto the bed. I
screamed, trying to reach her, but my hands
passed through her. Black blood stained her
lips. My mom… my only family… was gone. I
was truly alone now, a ghost tethered to a
world that no longer held anything for me. Her
body lay undiscovered for three days until the
smell alerted neighbors. She was still
clutching my childhood photo, a faint smile on
her face. Why did this keep happening to me?
Was this my fate? What was the point of
existing like this? Mom had no other family.
<
Her body was taken to the morgue, destined
for a pauper’s grave. And where was David?
At the hospital, with Emily. She was having
another rejection episode, a real one this
time. He’d snapped out of his grief for me
and rushed back to his first love. “David, you
make me feel like such a fool,” I thought. But
what could I do? He’d always loved Emily.
The hospital called David’s secretary. Legally,
I was still his wife, and Mom, his mother–in-
law. They needed him to claim her body. The
secretary tried to tell David, but he was
having none of it. “Emily’s critical! I can’t be
disturbed!” He slammed the door. My heart
turned to ice. Love, once misplaced, could
never truly be retrieved. The secretary
claimed Mom’s body, arranging for a simple
cremation. He’d witnessed the slow
disintegration of my marriage, and I think he
pitied me. He was the only one who showed
L
my mother any kindness in the end. I stared
at the ceiling, tears streaming down my face.
If there was an afterlife, I hoped I never met
David again.
