Hate You Not

“They make curvy Barbie,” MH hisses.

I shrug. “I didn’t even think about it, but it’s true—I didn’t notice any Barbies when we packed their house up.”

She widens her eyes and looks up at the ceiling, like she’s asking Sutton why. Then she waves me toward the hallway. “Let’s go get the rest.”

We unload a plastic seesaw, a toy kitchen MH found at the Goodwill, and a basket of superhero figurines. Then we hear the screaming.

I rush off first and nearly collide with Margot as she bursts into the living room—in tears.

“Oh no, honey.” I clutch her shoulders. “What’s the matter?”

“Jack!” She wails. “He says my mommy is a zombie!”

“What the hellfire?” I crouch down beside her as the other kids spill into the room. “Your parents are angels, Margot. In heaven with God.”

“Heaven isn’t real.” I look up. Oliver.

“Heaven is real,” I say. “We will talk about that. Jack—”

MH strides over to him and snatches him into the kitchen. Good riddance.

“Jack asked if we saw our Mom and Dad…and if they looked like zombies.” His voice cracks on the word.

My blood pressure shoots up. “Of course they didn’t. They are angels, watching over you two.”

“I want my mommy and daddy to come back from heaven!” Margot shoots off toward her bedroom. Oliver follows.

Jack loses his Nintendo Switch gaming system for the week—apparently he forewarned his mom that he might ask about the zombies, and she pre-threatened him—so MH and her kids run to their house to get it; Margot and Oliver will borrow it as part of Jack’s apology.

I tell Margot and Oliver that sometimes life includes some really awful things along with really great things, and assure them the great things will come. And that their parents will be watching them forever, waiting for them when they die—which I remind them involves superpowers and being happy forever. (Fingers crossed.)

It’s going okay until the conversation’s almost over and Oliver says, “I’m ready to die now. Georgia is boring.”

Margot says, “I want more Barbies.”

I’m wearing my pearl necklace. I clutch it. Does that really help?What helps is wine. Box wine, at 9:00 PM, after I get my two sad sacks to sleep. My bestie Leah brings it over, along with a giant bath bomb—“from Lush at the Perimeter Mall; there’s some kind of fancy jewel inside.”

I take the thing from her. “I hope it’s the swallowable, pharmaceutical kind.”

She arches her perfect eyebrows. “That bad?”

“Oliver wants to die like mom and dad because Georgia is boring. Margot wants her Mommy’s smell back. Then she got the idea that maybe I could smell like Sutton, and—hear this shit—you know what Sutt’s perfume was?”

I cackle maniacally, and Leah widens her eyes.

“That Joy stuff!”

“What?” Leah tilts her head, not understanding.

“It’s called Joy by Jean Patou, and it’s made of—I don’t know, like a whole bouquet of roses or something. Anyway, I can’t smell like their mom because their mommy smelled like money. That stuff costs a thousand dollars.”

Leah whips out her phone to search it, and her eyes widen anew. “Oh. Yikes. Yeah, it’s six hundred. Who even was your sister?”

“Right?”

“Use the life insurance money, Juney.”

“How do I know when to use it? What will actually improve their lives? Margot doesn’t really want me to smell like her mom. Even if I did, I still won’t be Sutt. No one ever will be.” My eyes fill with tears that fall down my cheeks. I wipe at them.

“Shit, June. I’m so sorry.”

Leah hugs me, and I hug her. “I’m not good at this.”

“Yes you are.”

“I’m going to mess them up, I know it.”

“How so?”

“I don’t know. I already un-vegan-ized them at the Steak ‘n Shake.”

She laughs. “Good. Didn’t you go there with Sutton last time she came home? Because she wanted it?”

“Yeah, but still. Her husband was a devout vegan.”

“California people.” I can hear her eye roll even though I can’t see it; we’re still hugging.

“They were weird,” I admit. “His whole family. Sutt said they were real cold fish, especially the dad. Not Asher—okay, maybe Asher; I barely knew the guy—but I’m meaning Asher’s dad. Their mom was dead for a long time, and his brother—Burke? Icy cold stunner. That guy didn’t even show up for the funerals.”

“Geez. That’s harsh.”

“Oh, and by the way. Jack the Brat told Margot today that her mother is a zombie now.”

Leah howls. “Oh dear baby Jesus in the manger! Are you shitting me?”

I fumble with the wine box spout in reply. When I get it open, it sprays on the floor, and I lean under it with my mouth open—mostly to offer amusement to Leah. I start choking, and she grabs the box and flips it on its back.

“You’ll go zombie, too, if you’re not careful, you goose.”

I hear a gasp, followed by a yelped, “No!”

Then Margot is streaking through the living room. From behind the couch. Where she’s been listening to every word.