Losses and gains: a family's story [Pt. 6] Jamie deliberated for a long time over whether or not to attend her ex-husband’s calling hours. The circumstances being what they were, she eventually decided to make a quiet appearance. If it were only her, she might have been more inclined to say screw it, but her kids needed to be there, regardless of their part in their father’s death, so for them, Jamie would shove down all the bubbling memories associated with her former marriage to Ross Manger. She would go, and she would be strong.
But strength was hard. She excused herself to the ladies room, not so much because the urge to utilize the facilities was very strong but more for the temporary peace. It was fairly quiet in the funeral home, but it was the wrong kind of quiet. The kind of mourning silence typical to these places, except most people were hard to read, and she couldn’t quite tell if people were really grieving or celebrating. She wasn’t sure how she felt about that.
As she washed her hands, the door burst open, and a woman rushed in. Her face covered by her hands, all Jamie could see was her dark blonde hair. Her sobs, however, were what she primarily noticed. She had no way to tell, having never met the woman before, but she knew instinctively that this was Karen Manger, the second woman to call herself Ross’s wife. She called to her gently. “Karen?”
Karen Manger lowered her hands, leaning against the sink counter. She sniffled as she forced some composure to her voice, blue eyes meeting blue eyes. Both women couldn’t help wondering if that similarity meant something; Karen knew exactly who the dark-haired woman was. She had seen photos, she had heard stories, she had been warned. “Jamie?”
Jamie walked crossed behind her to the paper towels. “Look, I know this is probably… awkward, to say the least,” she offered slowly, drying her hands. “But I’m… I’m sorry for your loss. I really am.” She tossed the towels in the trash and offered a sympathetic hand.
Karen spun around quickly, and her arm moved, but not to shake Jamie’s hand. Her opinion of this woman was poisoned by her deceased husband, and she read the sentiment as mockery, despite the genuineness of the tone. She reeled back her arm, ready to slap this irreverent woman. But the response stalled her, as the color drained from Jamie’s face. She stumbled backward, her arm raising to block her face. She did not miss the way Jamie flinched. Karen lowered her arm slowly, unable to keep ignoring something Desiree had told her, something Arnold had mentioned about his parents’ marriage. It was natural to pull away from a raised hand, but Jamie O’Malley had practically fallen over, panic in her eyes. Karen couldn’t ignore it anymore. “What did he do to you?” she asked, her voice low, surprised and nervous.
Her arm began to fall, exposing her face with meticulous caution. Jamie’s chest rose and fell quickly, but it now started to slow down. She swallowed as she straightened up, looking over this woman incredulously. “He never….?” The sentence died on her lips, a question she was too afraid to ask. The answer was clear anyway. She glanced at her reflection in the bathroom mirror. Her eyes were brimmed with tears. “So why me?”
*~*~*~*
“You look like him,” Sally commented, glancing between the open coffin containing her dead father and Asher Hill, the most recently discovered sibling she had never met. She still held his crumpled letter in her hand, the one his mother left behind, naming Ross as his father. Asher had offered to go through a DNA test when he first introduced himself to her, but Sally felt it was unnecessary. Obviously, extramarital affairs were not beyond Ross Manger’s capabilities. Fathering children with other women was evidently something of a hobby for him. She supposed she wasn’t surprised.
“Yeah… I think I see it.” Asher spoke to his older sister - the oldest of his siblings, a notion that he, raised as an only child, was still working to comprehend - but his gaze remained fixed on the dead man before them. He couldn’t believe that he was too late. Maybe if he hadn’t put off going through his mother’s belongings, he could have been in time, could have met his father. As fate seemed to have it, he wouldn’t have had time for much of a relationship with the man, but he could have had something. He could have heard his voice, hopefully positively intonated, pleased to meet him.
He broke his gaze to look at Sally, to really soak her in. He was decidedly taller than her, just on the grounds of her femininity. If he had to guess, he seemed to be the only one who had gotten much of Ross Manger’s height. The man seemed to be at least six foot, and Asher was six foot one. Sally was the only one of his siblings, from what he could tell at a distance as he had yet to speak to any of the others, who did not have blue eyes. Whether that was a trait from their father or from her mother while the others took after Ross, he could not ascertain. He would have to check the photographs. His own eyes were a greyish brown, just like Sally’s. He wondered what that meant.
“What was he like?” He didn’t mean to ask it, not wanting to upset her, but it came out before he could stop it.
To his surprise, however, Sally did not seem upset, or at least not in the sense people were usually upset at calling hours. She seemed… almost angry, the way she turned away from him. He could not see the way she rubbed at her throat through her turtleneck shirt, but Sally remembered the bruises it hid. “You shouldn’t ask that,” she replied after a pause.
Asher swallowed nervously. “And… why’s that?”
Sally turned back to face him, her face gravely serious. “Because you wouldn’t want to know.”
*~*~*~*
“You could’ve told me,” said Arnold, breaking the silence. He and Desiree had been sitting together by the entrance for some time now, but neither had spoken. He knew there was a lot of hurt on both sides, and while maybe eventually he would settle into some sort of brotherly protectiveness for his sister’s feelings - she was his sister! - but for now he was selfish and considered primarily himself.
She didn’t say anything, so he went on. “At any time. You know that, right? You could’ve told me at literally any time that we were-”
“I was scared,” Desiree interrupted. She kept her gaze firmly on the floor in front of her. “Ross… didn’t speak well of you. Or your siblings. But then I met you in your apartment, and I… I was curious. And even when I realized that Ross was wrong, I didn’t think you’d like me anymore if you knew.”
“Not like you?” Arnold repeated incredulously. “Des, we’re family. You saw how close I am with Jake at the New Years party.” Her eagerness to meet Jake that night made a lot more sense now. “Why wouldn’t I like you?”
“Come on, Arnold.” Her voice was a lot firmer than it had been, and she looked up at him with a facial expression that implied he should have already understood. “Look at the timeline. I’m a year younger than you and a year older than Jake. I’m Ross’s bastard. I probably ruined your parents’ marriage!”
“He ruined his own marriage,” Arnold insisted. “There was nothing good about that marriage except that we came out of it.” Sometimes he wondered if they even counted as “good” enough for what their mother had to go through to get them. He didn’t feel like he was worth that suffering. “He was vicious and cruel and-”
She interrupted again, her voice low. “Are you glad you shot him?”
Arnold swallowed. “Yes.”
Desiree leaned in closer. “I think I might be, too.”
*~*~*~*
Jake couldn’t go up to the casket. He just couldn’t do it. He paced the open circle of the funeral home, each time hoping to build up the courage, but so far, he hadn’t managed it. So he just kept circling, slowly, trying not to be suspicious, pausing occasionally as someone recognized him and offered condolences, at which he would say thanks, bow his head, and scurry away.
On about his fifth time around or so, as he passed by the entrance to the back hallway, a noise caught his attention, something resembling a muffled crying. He broke from his pattern and went down the hall, finding a door that seemed to house the crying person. Crying in a funeral home was nothing new, but Jake felt immediately pulled to the noise by some force he couldn’t quite explain, a kindness beyond his normal kindness.
He opened the door cautiously and found a small room with some toys and a table with coloring pages, a room set up by the funeral home for the children of grieving families. And he found a little girl crying. She looked up at him with blood-stained blue eyes, nervous and unsettled by this arriving stranger. Except he wasn’t a stranger, not really. He knew her.
She was Eden, his little sister.
“Hey there,” he said softly, taking a few steps towards her. “It’s okay.” There was a pang of guilt in his chest, knowing he was responsible for her grief, but he couldn’t worry about his personal afflictions now. He just wanted to see her smile. “My name’s Jake. Um, Manger. I’m… I’m your big brother.”
Eden looked up at him, swiping at her eyes. She rose from her spot on the floor and met him in the middle of the room. They moved at the same time, arms wrapping around each other in the closest thing possible to comfort in these trying times. She cried into his chest, the wetness soaking into his dress shirt, but it felt almost productive. Jake made her feel safe, just like her dad used to.
Their dad.
Once she had composed herself, she looked up at him again, this time with the hint of a smile. “There we go,” said Jake lovingly. “That’s better. Hey, I’ve got a fun idea. Want to go meet our other siblings?” There had been little dialogue - none, in fact, on her part - but Jake could sense what a loving little thing this girl was. She reminded him of himself, in a way. And while he did not know about the surprise of Asher’s existence that awaited them, he knew Arnold and Sally would fall immediately in love with her, just as he had.
Eden nodded and, though their embrace had to end, tucked a hand into his. “Okay.”