I drove up once, in January, to go through the things she’d set aside — items she thought I might want. Some things from the study. A few books she’d known I was fond of. The photograph albums, which she’d packed into two boxes and labeled in her handwriting, which was neat and distinct.
We worked in the same house for most of a day without fighting. This was not nothing. We were careful with each other in the way of people who’ve reached an understanding that doesn’t require articulation. She made coffee. I found an old board game in the back of a closet and we both said “oh” at the same time, which was funny for a second in the specific way that grief makes unexpected things funny.
The board game had his writing in it — score tallies from games he’d played, years ago, before the divorce, when we were small. He’d kept score meticulously in the margins of the paper insert. The dates were there too, because he was the kind of person who dated things.
Vanessa looked at the dates. She said: “I don’t remember this game.”
“Me neither,” I said.
We looked at the score tallies for a while. Then I put it in the donation box, because neither of us needed a board game, and neither of us suggested otherwise.
We hugged before I left. A real hug, not the kind that’s just a social formality. I’m not sure what it meant, exactly. I think it meant: we are still here, and our father is not, and we were the two people in that room who knew him, and that is something.