Part 2 — What Danielle Asked Before She D!ed
Danielle Moreau was diagnosed with breast c@ncer when Sophie was nineteen.
The diagnosis was the particular, stage-three, the-staging-is-the-severity, the-severity-is-the-information, the-information-is-the-sentence sentence that a doctor delivers when the doctor’s patient has been tested and the testing has produced the staging and the staging produces the prognosis and the prognosis is the thing the patient carries from the office to the car to the house to the kitchen where the patient calls her best friend and the friend picks up on the second ring.
I picked up on the second ring. Danielle told me. I drove to her house. I sat at her kitchen table. The table where we had been sitting for fifteen years. The table where the friendship was maintained through the particular, weekly, sometimes-daily, the-table-is-the-place, coffee-and-talking practice that two women produce when the producing is the friendship and the friendship is the table and the table is the thing the fifteen years were performed at.
Danielle told me the treatment would be aggressive. Chemotherapy. Radiation. The particular, multi-month, body-altering, the-treatment-is-the-fighting, the-fighting-is-the-only-option protocol that the oncologist recommended and the recommending was the thing the diagnosis demanded.
The treatment lasted fourteen months. I was there for the first ten. I drove Danielle to appointments. I sat in waiting rooms. I helped Sophie with the groceries when Danielle’s energy was consumed by the treatment and the consuming left nothing for the groceries and the nothing was the gap I filled.
During month eleven, Danielle asked me to come to the hospital.
She was admitted for the last time. The particular, the-treatment-has-been-attempted, the-attempting-has-not-produced-the-result, the-result-is-the-admission admission that a hospital performs when the patient’s treatment has been exhausted and the exhausting is the condition the admission reflects.
Danielle held my hand. She told me to look after Sophie.
The asking was performed in a hospital bed. The particular, this-is-what-I-need-you-to-do, the-needing-is-the-asking, the-asking-is-the-promise request that a mother performs when the mother’s time is limited and the limitation produces the asking and the asking is directed at the person the mother trusts and the trusting is the friendship and the friendship is the fifteen years.
She told me Sophie would be alone. She told me Sophie’s father left when Sophie was six. She told me the leaving was total. No contact. No support. No return. She told me the alone would be the condition Sophie would be inside when the treatment’s exhausting produced the ending and the ending was approaching.
She told me Sophie needed someone. She told me the someone was me. She told me the being-someone was the promise and the promising was the thing the friendship required because the friendship had been the fifteen years and the fifteen years had produced the trust and the trust was the thing the promise was based on.
I promised. At the hospital bed. Holding Danielle’s hand. The particular, of-course, I-will, you-don’t-even-need-to-ask, this-is-what-friends-do ease that a promise contains when the promise is made inside the assumption that the promising is the thing the friendship demands and the demanding is the thing the promising serves.
Danielle d!ed three weeks later.
The funeral was on a Wednesday. I attended. David attended. Sophie stood at the front of the room. Twenty-one years old. Alone. The particular, this-is-the-aloneness, the-aloneness-is-visible, the-visible-is-the-standing, the-standing-is-performed-without-the-parent aloneness that a funeral produces when the funeral is for the last parent and the last is the word that makes the aloneness total.
I held Sophie after the funeral. I told her I would be there. I told her the being-there was the promise I made to Danielle. I told her the promise was permanent.
The promise lasted approximately two months.
The withdrawing began in month three. The withdrawing was not a decision. The withdrawing was the particular, gradual, each-visit-is-harder, the-harder-is-the-grief, the-grief-is-triggered-by-the-face, the-face-is-Danielle’s erosion that the grief produced when the grief’s trigger was the proximity and the proximity was Sophie and Sophie was the face that carried Danielle’s face and the carrying was the thing the grief could not absorb.
Every time I saw Sophie, I saw Danielle. The seeing was the particular, involuntary, I-cannot-control-this, the-face-activates-the-memory, the-memory-activates-the-grief response that a brain produces when the brain has associated a face with the loss and the association is triggered by the seeing and the seeing produces the grieving and the grieving produces the pain and the pain produces the avoiding and the avoiding is the withdrawing.
I withdrew. The calls became less frequent. The visits became fewer. The particular, every-two-weeks-became-monthly, monthly-became-occasional, occasional-became-none erosion that a promise undergoes when the promising person’s grief is consuming the promise’s maintenance and the consuming produces the erosion and the erosion produces the nothing and the nothing is the withdrawn.
I told myself Sophie was fine. Sophie was twenty-one. Sophie was an adult. Sophie had a job. Sophie had her mother’s apartment. Sophie was handling the alone the way adults handle the alone, through the managing and the coping and the particular, I-am-not-a-child, I-can-do-this independence that a twenty-one-year-old performs when the performing is the only option the alone provides.
I told myself the withdrawing was temporary. The temporary that was not temporary. The temporary that lasted eighteen months. The temporary that was the breaking of the promise I made at Danielle’s hospital bed.
David told me once, during month six, that I should call Sophie. He told me Sophie had been asking about me. He told me the asking was the particular, why-doesn’t-Aunt-Beth-call-anymore, the-asking-is-the-wondering, the-wondering-is-the-hurting question that Sophie was performing because the performing was the response to the withdrawing and the withdrawing was the thing the asking was about.
I told David I would call. I did not call. The not-calling was the withdrawing’s maintenance. The maintaining was the particular, I-will-do-it-tomorrow, tomorrow-became-next-week, next-week-became-never postponing that a person performs when the person’s grief has made the doing painful and the pain produces the postponing and the postponing produces the not-doing.
David stopped asking me to call. Not because David stopped caring. Because David started doing. The particular, I-will-do-it-myself, the-myself-is-the-response-to-the-not-doing, the-response-is-the-stepping-in decision that a person makes when the person has watched the not-doing and the not-doing has produced the gap and the gap is the thing the person decides to fill.
David filled the gap. Without telling me. For eighteen months.
