Brielle left him three weeks later.
I heard about it from Mr. Petrakis, who heard about it from Christopher’s neighbor, who heard Christopher yelling into his phone on the back deck.
Apparently when Brielle found out Christopher had paid for their trips with his dying mother’s money, she was done. She told him she’d thought he was a successful executive.
He was a regional sales manager for a medical supply company. He made a hundred and ten thousand dollars a year. The “critical negotiations” were a two-hour sales meeting in Philadelphia that he’d turned into a week in the Caribbean.
He’d been lying to her too.
He’s been making his payments to the estate. Every single month. On time. Harold sends me a little note each time. “Payment four of twenty-four received.”
He hasn’t missed one.
I don’t know if that means he’s changed. Or if he’s just scared.
Maybe it doesn’t matter.
A month after the memorial, I went back to the house on Marlton Pike one last time. While Christopher was at work. Harold arranged it.
I didn’t go to get anything of mine. I’d already taken everything I wanted.
I went to get Gertrude.
I took the white urn down off the mantel. I wrapped it in her favorite crocheted afghan, the yellow one. And I carried her out to my car.
Christopher had left it up there for a whole month. He’d never moved it. Mr. Petrakis said he’d see him through the front window some nights, just sitting on the couch. Staring at it.
I hope it helped him.
But Gertrude didn’t belong on a mantel in that house.
She belonged with Walter.
That Saturday, Dottie and Doris and I drove out to Colestown Cemetery in Cherry Hill, where Walter has been buried since 2009 under a big oak tree.
Gertrude had already bought the plot right next to him. Thirty years ago. She’d shown it to me once, after Walter’s funeral.
“That’s my spot, honey,” she said. “Right next to the old grouch. Don’t let anybody put me anywhere else.”
I didn’t.
We buried her urn beside him. The priest from St. Mary’s said a short prayer. Dottie read a poem. Doris brought a thermos of coffee, and we drank it standing by the graves in the cold.
When everybody else left, I stayed for a while.
“I watered the violets, Mom,” I said out loud. “They’re in the kitchen window. Like you said.”
The oak leaves rustled.
“They’re doing really well.”
Sophia Rivers is an experienced News Content Editor with a sharp eye for detail and a passion for delivering accurate and engaging news stories. At TheArchivists, she specializes in curating, editing, and presenting news content that informs and resonates with a global audience.
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