I laughed because by then I understood something he did not, which was that the house was never going to make him a wealthy man. That is not where this story started, though, as it actually began months earlier with a deep grief moving into my bones so quietly I did not realize it was living there. My name is Gwen Parker and I am fifty two years old with a son named Hudson and a daughter named Paige who are both grown and living on their own. Both of my children are decent people, which is a blessing I did not appreciate enough until I found myself surrounded by individuals who were quite the opposite. For most of my life, I believed I had something ordinary and steady because I was not glamorous and I did not have a dramatic marriage.
I married Russell when I was thirty years old because he was stable and polite in public, so I never questioned what sat underneath his mask of a dependable man. We built a life in the quiet suburbs of Ohio while living in a corporate townhouse tied to the regional construction supplier where Russell worked as a senior manager. It was not our dream home, but it was practical with low rent and enough room for the four of us to live comfortably. Russell was an only child, and his parents made it clear from the beginning that they considered our life temporary until we eventually folded ourselves into theirs.
His mother, Brenda, liked to call herself direct while his father, Don, liked to call himself traditional, but the truth was that they were simply selfish people. For many years, life moved in a straight line as the children grew and we talked sometimes about buying our own place. Russell always said there was no point when his parents had a perfectly good house and expected us to live with them eventually anyway.
I did not love that idea, but I did not fight hard enough either because at the time I thought compromise was the same thing as peace.
I know better now after everything that has happened to me.
My parents lived forty minutes away in the split level house where my brother and I grew up, which featured cedar siding that had faded to silver over many years.
It was a modest home with a dogwood near the driveway and a line of lilacs along the back fence that smelled like heaven in the spring.
The kitchen had yellowed vinyl flooring that my mother always meant to replace, and the upstairs bathroom door always stuck when the weather became humid.
It was not a fancy house by any means, but it was the only place that truly felt like home to me.
My father worked in an office for most of his life and my mother did too, so while we were not poor, every dollar we had was given a specific job.
My brother moved across the country for work years ago, which meant I was the one who checked the furnace filter and noticed when my father began looking older.
Then one winter afternoon, my father died quite suddenly in a crash on an icy road while he was driving home from the store.
The doctor’s mouth kept moving while my mind stalled out somewhere between hearing about the accident and the finality of his passing.
My father was only sixty eight years old and he was supposed to have so much more time with us.
My mother folded in on herself after that happened, and she would sit at the kitchen table with a cold mug of tea while staring at his empty chair.
She stopped finishing her meals and eventually stopped starting them at all because she said food felt heavy in her throat.
Three weeks later, her jeans hung loose on her hips and she looked like someone the wind could easily move.
I took her to the hospital where the oncologist delivered the brutal news that she had advanced cancer that was already inoperable.
I sat in the parking garage for twenty minutes with both hands on the steering wheel because I could not believe life was coming for my second parent so soon.
My brother wanted to come back to help, but he had a mortgage and teenagers in school, so we worked through our options like heartbroken children doing math.
In the end, there was no real choice because I was the person who could stay and care for her.
That night, I told Russell that I wanted to move into my mother’s house for a while to be her primary caregiver.
Russell looked at me as if I had announced I was adopting a tiger and asked why he should be dragged into another year of my family’s problems.
“She is very sick, Russell, and she simply cannot be left alone right now,” I explained while trying to keep my voice steady.
Russell laughed and asked who exactly was going to cook and do the laundry for him if I was not there to handle those tasks.
That was my husband in one sentence, as he was not worried about me or sad for my mother, but only concerned that his socks might become his own responsibility.
I softened my own pain so the room would stay calm and promised him that I would handle what I could for our household.
“Fine, but I am not helping with any of it, so do not come crying to me about medications or hospice,” he said while crossing his arms.
I thanked him for his permission, and I hate that I thanked him, but I was conserving my energy for the person who was dying.
My mother cried the first night I stayed with her and told me that I shouldn’t have to do this because I had my own life to lead.
“I am doing my own life right now, and you are my life,” I told her while we both sat there and wept together.
The next year became a blur of pill organizers and insurance calls as I learned how to time nausea medication and make a bed with a body still in it.
I learned how to smile in front of her and then sit in the garage afterward with both hands over my mouth so she would not hear me breaking apart.
