A sneak peek into Tanita Rose’s:
I met her about two years ago, but I was too grief stricken at the time to really notice how beautiful she was. She was twenty years old and studying child care at the local college. You see, a little over two years ago my wife died in a car accident, drunk driver missed the red light and hit her side of the car. The front side of the car was totaled and she died on impact.
When I got the call from the police I thought someone was running a practical joke on me. I just couldn’t believe it. It wasn’t possible. I just talked to her on the phone to tell her I was running late, because of a meeting I had at the office, some financial differences between the clients, but I managed to sort it all out to everyone’s satisfaction.
She laughed, saying I always did have a way with words. That I always solved every problem that came my way, if I couldn’t do it the nice way, I would just bulldozed my way through it. And that it was just one of the things she loved about me.
She said she was leaving the house to go to the store, because we ran out of diapers, but I told her I would get them on my way home. She laughed and said she would already change three by the time I got home, and besides she had Nick strapped to the seat already. She said by the look on Nick’s face she would start smelling something pretty soon.
I laughed, picturing our son’s little scrunched up face in my mind, he made the same expression every time, just before we started smelling things coming out of his diaper. I told her I loved her and to drive safe. She grunted, because we both knew she was the worlds slowest driver, said “love you too” and hung up.
I went back to work happy, with a smile on my face, looking at the picture on my desk of the three of us. I was a lucky guy. I had everything I ever wanted. A beautiful, loving wife, whom I loved very much, an amazing little one year old son, who I thought was perfect in every way and my own company, which was very successful and growing more so every day.
Indeed, I considered myself lucky and reaching for the stars. Little did I know that in an hour’s time my whole world would come crashing down around me.
One phone call and life changes forever.
I remember running out of my office, my secretary asking me what was wrong, but I couldn’t answer her. I drove to the crime scene, I don’t remember driving, I was in a fog, but somehow I got there. The officers stopped me from entering their crime scene, but I yelled that it was my wife who was in an accident and I needed to see her and my son. I kept screaming their names, until two detectives told the uniform officers to let me through.
They led me to the side and explained what happened. How my wife was in an accident, how a drunk driver ran a red light and drove directly to the door on the driver’s side of her car and killed her instantaneously, because her head hit the glass with such force at a particular angle.
I almost crumbled to the ground, barely keeping my legs from giving out. My wife was dead, how the hell could this happen to us. We were happy dammit. So happy. We had everything we ever dreamed about, and now this.
I couldn’t believe it. I refused to accept, until they showed me her body.
She was so still. Just lying there. Her face was ashen, but there was so much blood. It was a stark eerie contrast that woke me from my fog of denial. And then a thought jumped into my head and I was ashamed of myself that it didn’t come to me sooner. But the thought of never again seeing my wife, hearing her laughter. It shook me so badly I couldn’t process one conscious thought after that.
But now I remembered. There was one other person that meant everything to me. Nick. My one year old son. He was in the car with her. I remembered her telling she was strapping him in his car seat.
Oh my god. Was he dead too? They didn’t say anything about him. What if he was somehow ejected from his car seat and they didn’t even know he was there? This and all the other crazy scenarios were running around in my mind a mile a minute.
No, this wasn’t happening. I couldn’t lose my wife and my son in one night.
“What about my son? Where is he? Is he… alive?” I was almost afraid to ask. And much more afraid of the answer I would be given.
The detectives looked at me and I could see the relief on their faces. Oh my god. He was okay. He had to be.
“Your son is fine. Remarkably so. Just a little scratch on his face, but he’s otherwise unharmed. Of course we recommend the EMTs to take him to the hospital for a full checkup anyway, just in case. But they assured us they thought he was completely fine. Let us take you to him sir.”
Thank god. I wanted to weep I was so grateful for that news.
They led me to an ambulance and the EMT handed me my son was sleeping, blissfully unaware that his life has changed forever. That he will never see his mother again, hear her singing the lullaby he liked when it was time for sleep.
God, who would sing to him now? He couldn’t go to sleep without. I can’t sing worth crap. Shit. Shit. Shit.
I held my son in my arms and promised him I would do everything in my power to ensure his happiness and safety. Nothing like this will ever happen again. Not if I have anything to say about it.
I admit, after that, my life spiraled a bit. It all became about my son and work. I didn’t care about anything else. Nick was the only bright spot in my life, otherwise I was miserable. Wallowing in my grief and becoming a bit of a shut in. Even work took a back burn at first. I decided to take some time off. To grieve and to be with my son.
The day we lowered my wife into the ground was the worst day of my life. But somehow I got through it. With the help of my family and hers.
They all stayed with me for that first month after she was gone. They tried to keep an eye on me and help out anyway they could. I knew they meant well, but it was starting to grate how they pushed their own opinions on every little thing. Even when Nick cried at night and I held him until he would fall asleep again, and try to sing to him, badly, but my little one didn’t seem to mind, it gave him comfort, so I did it.
The moms, mine and hers, they were constantly on me, because I moved his crib in my room. They were saying he needed to sleep in his own room, like he was doing so far, but I was having none of it.
I needed him by my side as much as he needed me by his. I had to have him where I could see him at all times. So I could reassure myself he was okay, that he was still breathing and nothing and no one was going to take him away from me.
That was also one of the things that bugged the crap out of me. They kept insisting they take him for a little while, to give me time to get back on my feet, to get back to work. It was only a freaking month and they were acting as if I’ve been wallowing in self-pity for a year or a decade for god’s sake.
Also, they kept rearranging my stuff. Every time I open a cupboard in the kitchen I can’t seem to find what I’m looking for, because they’ve put it somewhere else. Somewhere more easy to reach or in a more efficient spot. I hated it. My wife arranged everything the way she liked it and moving it so soon after she was gone seemed disrespectful to her.
I know it was crazy to think that way, but still. I liked things the way they were. Why the hell did they have to change things? And without asking. Come on. I don’t go to their house and just start rearranging things, because I might like them better that way.
I’ve had it and I told them so. I put things back the way they were for the last time. I appreciated their help, but enough please.
I knew I had to go back to work so them being there did help, a lot. They arranged dates on when they were there, because they had lives too and couldn’t just abandon everything for me. Not that I asked them to. They just sort of ended up staying after the funeral and I didn’t tell them to leave.