My Ocean

In November of 1971, Wilson David Maxwell, III died of a heart attack. He was sitting in his study, reading glasses perched on the end of his nose, when it happened. He’d fallen from the chair and managed to take a lamp with him. The crash alerted Mrs. Maxwell, who knocked on the door. When there was no reply, she rattled the doorknob but Mr. Maxwell had locked it. Not knowing what else to do, she called Teddy. He broke every speed limit getting there and busted open the door. He called me later and told me it was terrifying, seeing his father dead on the floor. He told me that he never wanted to ever see me that way.

The funeral was held a week later, on the second of December. It was cold in Kansas. Cold and snowy. It had transformed the city into a winter paradise but no one felt in the mood to celebrate the beauty outside except for Will. At three, he was in his second year of the terrible twos. Since Reed was less connected to the death of Teddy’s father, he was in charge of taking Will outside and making snowmen. Evie kept busy making tea for Mrs. Maxwell and I, cocoa for herself, and refilling her father’s glass of whiskey. I’d tried to get her to stop giving him more alcohol, but she’d firmly told me that Dad was hurting and if he wanted to drink himself stupid, she’d let him.

We were staying at the Maxwell’s mansion. I hadn’t been here since the day Teddy told his parents he was marrying me. After they’d made up, they always came to visit us. It felt weird being in this house. It was so big and empty. I couldn’t imagine how anyone could stand being here by themselves.

The day of the funeral was unfairly bright. After nearly two days of straight snow and overcast, the sun made an appearance. Evie told everyone that it was Grandpa Wilson, smiling down at us. Teddy had sullenly replied that Grandpa Wilson never smiled. He was acting like a teenager all over again, angry at his father and depressed over his death. He hadn’t been sleeping well and grew restless during the night so that I wasn’t sleeping well by default.

Mrs. Maxwell had a small bottle of wine in her bag that she kept staring at. She was 24 years sober but so far she hadn’t opened the bottle. Teddy, meanwhile, was making his way through a bottle of whiskey. I grabbed it from him when we got to the church.

“Stop,” I said.

He glared at me, his eyes glazed over. He reached for the bottle. “Gimme that,” he slurred. He stumbled as I pulled the bottle away from his grasp and took a step back.

“No,” I told him. “I let you drink as much as you want the last few days but I’m putting my foot down now. You’re not going to be drunk during your father’s funeral.”

“Why not?” he demanded.

“Because! Your family is here. They’re hurting, too, Teddy. But they’re not drunk.”

“They wish they were,” he mumbled. I unscrewed the cap of the bottle and dumped the contents out into the snow. Some of the snow melted, revealing gray concrete. “Hey! You had no right to do that, Del!”

“I’m your wife. I have every right in the world to do that.”

Teddy was getting angry. Evie was watching us from the church entrance. The funeral was about to start. The sun made the snow around us sparkle like a small child had dumped glitter everywhere. The sky was robin’s egg blue.

I reached for Teddy’s hand. “Teddy, I love you,” I said. “I love you more than life itself. And Evie loves you. And Will loves you. And your mother loves you. And you father loved you. All these people love you and we’re hurting because you’re hurting.” I reached up to touch his face. He turned his head away but let me cup his cheek. “Let us be there for you.” Teddy looked at me and his body seemed to sag. He let me lead him into the church.

Evie had pretty much planned the whole thing. Mrs. Maxwell (who had asked me to call her Gwynn after I kept calling her Mrs. Maxwell. “You’re not a child anymore, Delilah. You can call me Gwynn.”) had been very quiet since her husband’s death. She mostly just sat around drinking tea and looking at bottles of alcohol.

The church was white. In the summertime, it probably was a very beautiful, clean white but against the pure snow, it looked dirty. Someone had cleared the sidewalk and the steps off and you could see the long cracks in the concrete. Evie was waiting for us in the doorway. She looped her arm through Teddy’s other elbow and we helped him inside. We sat in the back because Teddy didn’t want to get any closer.

“Mom,” Evie whispered. I looked over at her, leaning forward around Teddy. “Can you go sit with Will? Reed probably needs help.” I knew that Reed didn’t, of course. He had turned out to be a good father to little Wilson. But Evie wanted to be alone with her father so I kissed Teddy and then slid out of the bench and went to sit by my grandson.

“Grammie!” Will said happily when he saw me. He crawled over Reed’s lap and into my arms as I sat down.

“Hello, baby,” I whispered, smiling. Will had two parents with curls so his red hair was out of control. Evie liked to leave it long, too, because she thought his head looked too big when his hair was short. His dark brown eyes were always sparkling with happiness. He was a happy toddler.

Beautiful organ music started playing. It filled the room with a rich sound, the notes evoking an array of emotions. It made you feel sad and then wholesome and back again. It told a different story to everyone, the woes of life or of marriage or of love. I looked back at Evie and Teddy. She had her head resting on his shoulder. Teddy was staring straight ahead but his gaze flicked over to me. He gave a small smile. I returned it and then faced the front again.

There was a large stained glass window at the front of the church. It was a cross, some darker color like dark purple or dark blue, surrounded by brighter pieces of glass. It faced the west, though, so the sunlight would only cascade through it at sundown. But I could imagine how beautiful it would be. It was like, there was darkness but there was still beauty. The rainbow around the cross. The light surrounds the dark. There’s always that light, that beauty, even in the worst of times. Maybe it’s the sound of your grandchild’s laughter. Or the look between your daughter and her husband. Maybe it’s the smell of flowers in the springtime or the colors of a sunset. But that beauty, it’s always there if you can look for it.

As Teddy and I were leaving the church, we were stopped by an older but familiar looking man. It was like the party 25 years ago all over again. Teddy stiffened. The alcohol hadn’t completely worn off yet and he was still unsteady and disoriented.

“Alex, Marilyn,” I said politely, addressing the man and the blonde woman at his side. Just like before, she smiled at me, friendlier than her husband. There was a gold band around her ring finger, above what I assumed to be her engagement ring that held a diamond large enough to be skating rink for tiny mice.

Alex smiled at me. It was still a slightly elitist smile but it wasn’t as arrogant as before. “Delilah, my, my,” he said. “So you guys did tie the knot after all. Congratulations.”

I nodded towards Marilyn. “You, too.”

“Marilyn is the love of my life,” Alex said. It seemed that he directed this at Teddy, who was trying very hard not to make eye contact with him. He was examining the dark, plum colored carpet beneath our feet. “I wasn’t about to let her go. It seems to have worked out with you two. I’m glad.” The smile he gave this time was more genuine. But it was still aimed towards Teddy who was still ignoring him. I nudged him gently. Teddy raised his head and gave a small nod of acknowledgement.

Alex reached out and placed a hand on Teddy’s shoulder. “I’m sorry about your father,” he said. Teddy looked up and met his gaze. It was like magic. One minute, Teddy was rigid with hostility. The next, the two sworn enemies were embracing and Marilyn and I were staring at them with confused looks on our faces.

But then Marilyn came and stood by me. She took my hand. “I’m glad that Teddy found you,” she said. “It was about time they made up.”

Later that night, as Teddy and I readied for bed, I asked him a question that I’d had for 25 years. “Do you remember at the party, the night we…” I blushed, which was stupid because I was a forty-year-old woman and I’d been married to the first person I’d had sex with for nearly 24 years. But still, the thought of that first time made me as giggly as a schoolgirl.

Teddy looked at me like I was crazy. “Of course I remember that,” he said.

“We saw Alex that night and he asked to talk to you for a moment. What did you guys talk about?” I asked.

He was quiet for a moment, deep in thought, with his brow furrowed. Our room was lit only by the bedside lamp on my side. Teddy never used the lamp on his side. Pictures of our family hung on the walls and sat on the tops of dressers. It was a small bedroom, painted a soft peachy color that made it seem warm and cozy. It suited us.

“He wanted to talk to me about Marilyn,” he said. “He apologized but I could tell he wasn’t really sorry. And then he said that if I was with you now, then why did it matter if he was with Marilyn?” Teddy shook his head. “I was a proud kid, Del. This whole thing should have ended then.” He crawled into bed and I scooted close to him, laying my head across his chest.

“Well, it’s over now,” I said.

Teddy leaned down and kissed my temple. “Why don’t we relive what happened after we ran into Alex that night?” I laughed as Teddy rolled me over onto my back and silenced my giggles with kisses.

Teddy’s mother passed away almost three years later. She asked to be cremated and have her ashes spread in a field somewhere. I’d grown up with a field so we packed up our car, loaded in seven-year-old Will and his parents, and drove to my parents’ house. My own father, getting up there in age, hadn’t harvested yet so we were able to traipse through the golden stalks up to a small hill that I’d spent many hours playing on as a kid.

“Look, Mommy!” Will said in an excited whisper. “A deer!” The doe’s ears pricked forward and she stood still for a moment before darting away. Teddy and I looked at each other and smiled. He hadn’t touched alcohol this time and I was thankful. But he hadn’t let go of me since he found out about his mother’s death.

Evie took the box of ashes from Teddy’s hand and carefully opened the box. The wind was blowing like crazy. Some ash flew away of its own accord.

“Would you like to start us off, Daddy?” Evie asked, holding the box out to him. With his free hand, he scooped a handful of the ashes and held them out to the wind. It blew it away, swirling it around in the sky before it disappeared from sight. We each gave a handful of ashes up and then Teddy dumped the box. The ashes made a gray cloud in the air. Against the shiny gold of the wheat and the crisp blue of the sky, the cloud looked drab but then it was mixing with all those colors and Gwyneth Rose Maxwell blew into the only heaven on earth I’d ever seen.