The First Thanksgiving

The woman went through the motions, a half-smile hanging from her limp face. It was a holiday, after all, and she couldn’t let the family down. She needed his help. To reach the pan, high up on the tallest shelf in the garage. To haul the giant turkey from the downstairs fridge. To run to the grocery store with the list of things she'd forgotten.

But he wasn’t there. He would never be there to help again. He was gone. Forever. He was dead. The thought reverberated from her head into the room and bounced off the walls of the kitchen and up the hallway into the bedroom. He’s dead. It was deafening. Her head throbbed with the repeating of the taunt. He’s dead and you’re alone.

The half-smile dissolved into a full frown and pressure built in her chest as hot tears fought their way out. She knew if she gave in and allowed a single tear, there would be no holding back the flood. It would be a flood of fear, regret, loneliness, sadness, frustration.

She had dragged the turkey up the stairs and stuck it in the pan, where it still sat,half frozen, unseasoned, raw, untouched. A pile of potatoes floated in a pan in the sink. She’d forgotten about them. The thought of lifting that bird up to stuff it made her breathless. She needed his help. He always balanced the turkey up so she could spoon the stuffing in. But he wasn’t there. And he would laugh about what she would ever do without him.

She stood in front of the stove, clutching a wooden spoon so tightly her knuckles whitened under the tension of her grasp. Her shoulders ached. Was she having a heart attack, she wondered? No, he had the heart attack. He’s dead. He’s really gone. And the first tear fell.

Muscles began to twitch in her face, her lips quivering and the uncontrollable frown drawing down so deeply that her mouth was forced open. She heard something. What was that sound? Someone was hurt. She couldn’t move to find the sound. The keening was increasing. Who was it? What had happened? Then the next tear fell.

The ache in her chest was severe. The pain in her shoulders and neck had taken over. The wooden spoon seemed to be suspended in air, frozen. She pressed her eyes shut and the video of her life began to play.

She saw him in his too short tux. Handsome and tall. They didn’t make pants long enough for him, but it didn’t matter. They were getting married. Fast forward to the hospital, where he’d held her hand and told her every contraction would be the last. And she’d believed him. And he’d held their first baby girl.

She saw him on the floor, two little girls climbing all over him, tired from working an extra-long night shift, but there he was, letting the girls ride him like a pony. She saw him coaching and teaching his girls basketball moves. She saw him walking down the aisle, leading each of his precious daughters to their new lives.

The keening had reached a peak. She opened her eyes to stop the video and realized she was still standing in the kitchen, wooden spoon in hand. And the keening was her. The memories had forced the tears to break the barrier. She stood, wept, and shrieked. Her muscles melted and the spoon clattered to the floor where she sank to her knees. Sobbing, breathless.

She was living a life she had never imagined. Life without him. Alone in a house that held their most intimate moments. The good ones and the not so good ones. Forty years of history. He was supposed to be reaching her turkey pan for many years to come. They were supposed to retire together and travel and be grandparents together. She couldn’t even stuff the turkey without him. How was she supposed to keep on living and pretending it would all be okay?

With each sob, the pressure in her chest eased, as if she was releasing some of the insurmountable grief. She dragged herself to the couch, exhausted, and curled up. Tears continued to stream and soak the pillow, her collar, the cushion. She didn’t care. Once she started, she didn’t want to stop. She wanted to weep and scream the grief out of her body, mind, heart.

Finally, she became aware that she could feel a breeze from the open window and the pressure in her chest was gone. And the keening had stopped. She closed her eyes to watch more of the video.

She saw his sadness that his mother had never met his daughters because she had been taken away from this earth way to soon. She saw his despondence when he lost his only brother too early. She saw him make mistakes that could have been costly to him; to them. She saw herself standing by him and she saw his relentless love for her.

She saw him making walking sticks for his grandchildren and creating treasure maps for them to follow. She saw his heart becoming weaker and she saw herself not believing he would ever be taken from her.

When she woke up, a small child was peering at her. The tiny girl reached her hand up and wiped her a tear drop from her face, then silently climbed in next to her, snuggling up in the way only a grandchild can do.

She heard sounds from the kitchen, and she smelled things cooking. The sage from the stuffing, the turkey, the potatoes. There was laughter and music playing. Her muscles were soft, and her head was clear. She eased herself up and the tiny girl next to her smiled and booped her on the nose.

A lovely young woman, her daughter, peeked around the corner holding the same spoon she had dropped to the floor.

“We thought you might need a hand today,” she with a smile, trying to hide the quiver in her voice.

Her other daughter plopped down next to her and wrapped an arm around her.

“We miss him, too,” she whispered.

The woman’s forehead creased as she wiped her eyes. “I couldn’t reach the turkey pan.”

But they had reached the pan and stuffed the turkey. They cooked the potatoes, and someone made a pumpkin pie.

When they gathered at the table, there was an empty spot. His spot. She slid into his chair and could feel the warmth of his arms around her. He wouldn’t want them to leave his spot empty. She could feel the pressure beginning to build again when someone spoke.

“Let’s go around the table and share a memory about Grampa. And it’s okay to laugh, but it’s also okay to cry.”

As the woman listened to the memories, she did laugh, and she did cry. Somehow, the holiday happened without him. But he would always be there in the stories. She took a deep breath and exhaled the pressure out of her body. She paused the video in her head and listened to the here and now. The joyful sounds of her family, laughing, talking, crying. And she was grateful that there would never be another first Thanksgiving without him.

After they all left, she climbed the stairs to her bedroom, drained. She carefully avoided disturbing his side of the bed. When the lights were out, her eyes closed. The video started again, and the woman drifted to sleep seeing him walking down the aisle in those too short tux pants.