Messages to the Living

Mom had always been superstitious.

Whenever there was talk of upcoming plans, particularly something we were excited about, she would rap her knuckles on the nearest wooden surface. Tap, tap, tap. 

Like when I was eight and Adam was five, and she broke the news we were going to Disneyland. “The tickets are booked!” she’d beamed, smiling wide at us. “Oh, we’re all going to have such a good time.” 

And then quickly, before the universe could mistake her enthusiasm for overconfidence: “Knock on wood.” Tap, tap, tap on the coffee table.

Then, there were the black cats. If one crossed our path, we were turning around. It didn’t matter where we were or whether we were running late for something: if we saw one, we were turning around. Mom did not play when it came to black cats. 

It definitely didn’t help that our elderly neighbor Susan had a black cat named Taffy who enjoyed frequent, leisurely strolls up and down the street where I grew up. 

And then there was the number thirteen. An unlucky classic, of course. Mom would not schedule so much as a dentist appointment on the thirteenth of the month, and most certainly not on a Friday the thirteenth.

I distinctly remember being invited to Cynthia Chan’s birthday sleepover in the fourth grade. That year, her birthday just so happened to fall on a Friday the thirteenth. All the girls in my class were invited, and Cynthia’s mom was famous for letting everyone stay up late watching movies and painting their nails. 

I begged and begged to be allowed to go, but Mom wouldn’t budge. Oddly enough, I still had to go to school that very same Friday. Apparently, the same calendar-induced bad luck that could find me at Cynthia’s house could be swiftly neutralized by the front gates of my elementary school.

When I pointed this out, Mom scowled at me and told me to go do my homework.

***

One spring day, when I was in the fifth grade, Grandma died. 

It came as a shock to all of us. She had only been sixty, and an incredibly active sixty at that. Her heart had given out.  

I think we’d all assumed we had a lot more time left with her than we got. There would be another birthday, another Christmas, another Sunday playing cards at the kitchen table after a warm, home-cooked dinner.

We were all devastated, but Grandma’s passing affected Mom most of all. The sudden grief turned my mother into someone I couldn’t recognize. 

For days after the funeral, she stayed in bed. I’d see Dad try to coax her out. He would linger hesitantly outside their bedroom, his hand on the doorknob, as though he was arguing with himself about whether to turn it. Sometimes he would, only to be met with silence and his wife’s turned back. Other times, he would let go of the knob and walk away.

Every couple of days, Dad managed to persuade her to come downstairs for dinner. She would have a few bites without saying a word, then go back upstairs. My heart would sink whenever I’d hear her door click shut.

One night, after Mom had already gone back upstairs, Adam and I lingered at the table with Dad, half-heartedly twirling the spaghetti on our plates. 

“Will Mom be like this forever?” Adam asked, breaking the silence. My chest tightened. The question had crossed my mind, but I’d been too afraid to ask it. 

Dad looked startled. For a moment, he seemed unsure what to say. Then, his face softened, and he gave a small, sad smile. He rose from his chair and knelt beside us, pulling us both close and gently stroking our hair. 

“No,” he promised, cradling our little heads against his chest. “She misses her mom. She just needs time.”

***

Exactly ten days after Grandma’s passing, something miraculous happened.

Dad had just brought Adam and me home from school. He reached into his back pocket. “Damn it!” he swore.

Adam and I giggled. Dad gave us a sheepish look, then sighed. “I think I forgot the house keys inside.” 

He hesitated before pressing the doorbell. I knew he was anxious about waking Mom up, but there was no other way in. I had my doubts, though. Would she even come downstairs? Would she bother to come out from under the covers and realize she had family that was still alive? 

Dad rang the bell again, then again. I felt myself getting impatient. Two minutes passed, then five. He was about to reach for his phone to call a locksmith when the door finally swung open.

For a moment, Mom stood frozen. Then, as if in a trance, she pushed past us and knelt down to examine something. We crowded around her to see what had caught her attention.

A single, pink tulip. Right there on our porch, steps from the front door.

Grandma had loved tulips. She grew them in her garden, and every spring we would watch them bloom. The pink ones had been her favorite.

“Mom,” my mother whispered. It was the first word I’d heard her speak in ten days. She gently picked up the tulip and stood. “I can’t believe this.”

She looked at my dad. “Rob, it’s her. I know it’s her.”

Her eyes brimmed with tears, but the faraway numbness that had frozen her features in place since Grandma’s passing seemed to lift. She looked happy, alive again. In that moment, I saw the same Mom who’d told us we were going to Disneyland so long ago, in what felt like another lifetime now. 

Dad smiled. He’d always been a rational man, never one for Mom’s superstitions. But in that moment, I don’t think he cared. He was just happy to have his wife back, just as Adam and I were happy to have our mom.

Mom looked at us and laughed, pulling us all in for a hug. “Oh my goodness, do you know what this means? It’s a sign. Grandma is still with us.” 

I closed my eyes and melted into her embrace.

Over the next few months, pink tulips continued to make surprise appearances. Mom saw a message in every single one, no matter how far-fetched or coincidental it might seem to a non-believer.

Once, it was a handful of soft pink petals on the balcony as she was drinking her evening tea. Another time, a pink tulip lay carelessly beside our minivan in the Walmart parking lot. Some days, she swore she could smell them even when there weren’t any around.

It seemed to comfort her, the thought of Grandma’s spirit cloaking her gently like a faint floral perfume. And it comforted me that it comforted her.

Dad was skeptical, but I could see him biting back his tongue. For Mom’s sake, mostly. Still, even he admitted it was strange that pink tulips were showing up everywhere. 

There were times he couldn’t help himself, though. 

“But are you sure those were tulip petals on the balcony? There are plenty of pink flowers—” 

“They were tulip petals, Rob.” 

The edge in her voice was enough to make him drop it. 

“I like thinking Grandma’s still around,” I offered quietly. “It’s like she’s letting us know she’s okay, and that she’s looking out for us.”

“And it’s not just a thought, baby,” Mom said, smiling. “The world works in mysterious ways. The ones we love never truly leave us. They’re just in a different place, a better one. And they try their best to reach us. But we have to be willing to listen.” 

Mom slowly thawed back to life. As the months passed, the pink tulips appeared less and less often. She brought it up over dinner one evening. There was a wistfulness in her voice, but she seemed to have made peace with their waning presence.

“I think Mom is ready to move on,” she said. “I think she knows I’m ready, too.”

***

I think we all need something to believe in. Dad relied on his rationality, Mom her superstitions. I don’t quite know where I fall on the spectrum. Maybe a little bit of both? Mostly, I think I just believe in what we can do for each other. Maybe we can fill in each other’s gaps, like liquid gold filling the cracks in kintsugi. 

Back then, the gold for me was Dad holding Adam and me at the dinner table, promising us it would all be okay. The gold was Adam’s little hand gripping mine at Grandma’s wake. It was Mom coming downstairs to open the door, even when her body and heart felt like lead. 

***

Twenty years later, Dad died. And so began my second encounter with grief.

I’d been living in Seattle for years, far from our family home in Iowa. When Adam called with the news, I scrambled to book the next available flight to Des Moines. 

When I stepped through the front door, Mom and Adam wrapped their arms around me. We held each other and sobbed.

Dad’s funeral was well attended. Extended family came from all over town, and some of his college friends had flown in from out of state to pay their respects. Dad had always been a rock for the people around him. Now that he was gone, I felt like we owed it to him to hold on to the strength and steadiness he’d gifted us over the years.

I watched Mom closely all day, worried that she would retreat into that dark place in her mind as she had all those years ago. But she proved me wrong. She greeted the guests with grace, accepting their hugs and condolences. At Dad’s grave, she cried and held our hands. Adam and I cried, too.

Maybe it helped that Adam and I were both adults now, and she trusted us enough to let us see her vulnerability, to let herself lean on us. She didn’t disappear on us this time. She let us lean on her, too. 

Still, I wanted to do something more. On the way home from the funeral, I stopped by the florist to pick up a bouquet of pink tulips. Mom’s comfort flowers. I pictured them on the kitchen table, a little reminder of what she’d told us all those years ago: the ones we love never truly leave us. We just have to be willing to listen.

When I walked into the kitchen with the bouquet in hand, Mom looked surprised. Then she smiled gently, a quiet sadness in her eyes. 

“Here, give me those,” she said.

She took a vase from the cupboard, unwrapped the flowers, and arranged them neatly, setting them at the center of the table.

We both sat down. For a while, she just looked at them.

“They’re lovely,” she said. “The ones you brought me when Grandma died were such a bright pink, though. Do you remember?”

I froze.

When I was in fifth grade, my elementary school had started a community garden. We planted all kinds of things — vegetables like lettuce and radishes, herbs like mint and parsley, and flowers like roses and yes, those beautiful, bright pink tulips. Grandma’s favorite. 

Ten days after her passing, I asked my teacher if I could pluck one to take home. I tucked it into the little mesh pocket on the side of my backpack, where my water bottle usually went. I was so excited to show it to Mom. Maybe it would make her feel a little better.

That afternoon, Dad had forgotten his keys. Somewhere between ringing the bell and waiting for Mom to answer, the tulip must have slipped out of my backpack. When she finally opened the door, she saw it before I could explain.

“It’s a sign!” she said. I remember how her face lit up, the way she smiled at us after ten cold, long days. And I knew I couldn’t tell her. 

So I didn’t.

Every few afternoons, I brought another tulip home. Some days, I scattered petals on the balcony. On others, I left a flower on the porch. Once, I dropped one beside our car in the Walmart parking lot on an after-school grocery run. As for her smelling the tulips, I couldn’t have explained that to you. Looking back, it was probably psychological.

Slowly, instinctively, I could feel Mom healing. As she began coming back to us, I did it less and less. Eventually, maybe about a year after Grandma’s passing, I’d stopped completely.

I took a deep breath. “What do you mean?”

Mom gave a little wave of her hand. 

“Oh, baby, I know I was a wreck. And I know I have my superstitions.” She looked at me. “But after a while, I figured it out. I knew my little girl was trying to make her mother feel better.” 

Her eyes filled. Mine did too.

She reached for my hand and said again, “They’re lovely.”

***

Mom came with Adam to take me to the airport. I hugged Adam goodbye, then Mom. As we parted, she gently touched my cheek. 

“I still stand by it, you know. The world works in mysterious ways. There are signs, if you’re willing to see them.”

It was dusk when I reached Seattle. Outside my apartment door, I stopped to rummage through my purse for my keys. A cool gust of wind lifted my hair, and something caught near my temple. I reached up to brush it away. 

When I lowered my hand, I saw the pink petal resting on my palm. I gasped.

Another gust lifted it from my hand and carried it out of sight.