Moving On: A Rite of Passage

By Bob Hill

Today is Saturday, December 3rd, 1993. I am sitting alongside Meghan’s family in the Wildwood Catholic High School Auditorium. Meghan is sitting with her classmates in the front row.

“A reading from the Book of Ephesians,” a junior named Donna Dipaola declares. Be completely humble and be gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the spirit through the bond of peace. There is one body and one spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called.”

A dramatic pause. The sound of an old man clearing his throat.

I walked to the auditorium this morning from an apartment I recently moved into one block west of here. I am subletting a room in that apartment from a couple who charge me $100 a month. Meghan’s older sister, Lauri, lives across the street from me. Lauri shares an apartment with her fiancé, John. John owns a sandwich shop in town.

Meghan’s Junior Ring Mass ends, prompting families to adjourn onto the high school lawn. I offer to take pictures as an excuse for not having to appear in any. Looking west along the block, I notice an ambulance and several police cars are pulling up in front of the apartment where Meghan’s older sister lives. Rather than alarm anyone, I keep this to myself.

Around noon, I accompany Meghan to her father’s house, where the answering machine is overrun with messages. “Something is happening over at Lauri’s apartment,” I hear someone saying on one message. “You should get in touch with Lauri’s fiancé,” I hear someone saying via another. Meghan’s father makes a few phone calls, and an initial report is confirmed. Meghan’s older sister has been pronounced dead by way of an indeterminate cause.

***

That evening, Meghan follows through with set plans to attend her junior ring dance. She wears an emerald dress with low-cut heels that match her eyes, and I wear a navy blazer with faux-gold buttons that jingle off the cuff. I maintain my distance throughout the evening, allowing Meghan ample room to socialize, or to be by herself. People offer warm wishes and regrets. Meghan and I only dance together once.

The ring dance ends. Meghan and I dig our coats out from a pile. Meghan leads me out through a back-door exit in the school cafeteria. We are wandering east now, toward the boardwalk. Once there, we sit on a bench and we talk.

“Maybe something good will come of this,” I say.

“Like what?” Meghan says. She pulls her collar tight.

“Like, I don’t know,” I say. “Like, maybe there’s an opportunity here, y’know? Like, maybe this is a chance for you and your mom to reconcile. I mean, I know things have been rough, and I know you say a lot of that is actually your mom’s fault. But what if you could just kind of take the first step, y’know? Like, be the bigger person. I imagine your mother’s got to be hurting right now. Maybe if you could just do something as simple as, say – ”

STOP TELLING ME HOW TO DEAL WITH MY FAMILY!” Meghan howls.

Dueling echoes, wall to wall.

“You have no right,” Meghan continues. She lights a cigarette. “I mean, you don’t even talk to your parents, Bob … either of them. In fact, you run away from your parents every chance that you get. And now you’re gonna sit there and condescend to me about how I should work things out with my parents? Here? Tonight? On this night? I don’t think so.”

Meghan is crying.

“I’m sorry,” I tell Meghan. “Everything I just said was out of line.”

“I know it was,” Meghan tells me. She leans into me for warmth. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

And so we sit, and we smoke, and we listen to the ocean’s tide.

***

I arrive at Meghan’s father’s house for Lauri’s funeral the following Monday. I am wearing the same blazer I had worn to the dance. Meghan is still getting ready, so I take a seat in the living room. Lauri’s fiancé is sitting alone at a dining room table, approximately 15 feet to my right.

I ride with Meghan’s aunt to the Church of the Assumption. Once there, Meghan requests that I stand next to her in a receiving line. I spend two hours greeting mourners, the majority of whom have no idea who I am. The viewing is followed by a mass, during which a priest describes Lauri as a remarkable athlete. The mass includes responsorials, and it includes somebody reciting a poem by Lauri’s fiancé entitled “My Princess Is Gone Now.” The service is attended by more people than I can count.

The mass gives way to a procession, a nearby burial, and then a reception at the Peter Shields Inn in Cape May. I eat lunch in the main dining area, and then I go outside. It is Christmastime, and the B&Bs along Beach Avenue have each been decorated with ice-white lights and velvet bows. I cross the street; I cross the sand onto a jetty where I light a cigarette. The ocean seems so sedate throughout winter, as if unphased by the blistering cold. The sun hangs low, and the daylight’s fading. I finish my cigarette, and I hurry back into the inn.

I find Meghan. She is sitting beside her mother in an enclosed porch that overlooks the southern lawn.

“Are you almost ready?” Meghan says to me. She does not look up. Meghan is leafing through an old family album full of pictures of her with her sisters and her mother and her father, all of them existing as a single unit before the divorce.

“Yeah, I’m ready,” I tell Meghan.

It is time to go home now.

Meghan says goodbye to her mother. Meghan’s mother remains seated on the porch.

Day 370

(Moving On is a regular feature on IFB)

©Copyright Bob Hill