Steve looked at his phone.
"Hmm," He said distractedly.
"What?" I said back. He raised his eyes from his screen and stared at me. He seemed concerned.
"I just got a voice mail from the Bend Police Department. Do you want me to play it back for you?"
"No!" I cried, my voice shaking with disbelief.
We had been eating lunch on the patio of our favorite restaurant with Steve's Mom, who had recently celebrated her ninety-sixth birthday. The weather app on our phones predicted that the high temperature for the day in Corrales, New Mexico, would approach 100 degrees. A strong wind blew across our table's red sun umbrella, shaking it in its stand and causing our napkins to blow away; we caught them and placed them under our iced teas.
"Why would Bend be calling us? I inquired anxiously. "We don't know anyone in Bend."
But we had.
Sebastian had died by suicide outside of Bend at Smith Rock.
It would be eight years in September.
Immediately, I was transported back to that first day. The police arrived, and all those horrible feelings that were once so raw and had eventually faded into the background of my daily life sprang up suddenly as if they had never left.
"But what do they want?" I was now shaking in my chair. Steve's Mom was asking what was wrong. Her short-term memory had been declining in recent years, and I didn't want to have to keep repeating this conversation.
"The message only left a phone number and a case number." Steve read from his phone.
"A case number?" My brows scrunched together, causing my head to hurt. "it has to be about Sebastian. We don't know anyone else who lives there. Why would they be calling us about Sebastian after all this time."
"Do you want me to call and find out?" Steve asked just as our salads were brought to our table by a friendly waiter.
We held hands and bowed our heads, and Steve prayed for our food and about this mysterious phone call.
"OK. You call." I blurted out, shoving a piece of salad greens into my mouth. "But don't put it on speaker phone."
Steve’s Mom was happily eating her enchiladas, but I couldn't eat another bite. The lettuce leaves seemed to curdle in my stomach, producing sludgy knots; this glutenous mass pushed up into my esophagus, and I swallowed hard to keep it from spewing out of my mouth. My clammy hands stuck to my thighs despite the hot air enveloping us.
Steve dialed and waited to be connected. He was silent for a moment and then said to me,
"It's the evidence department at the Bend Police department. That case number is Sebastian's."
A deafening roar of unbelief and pain filled my head, and my heart raced.
We weren't done. I thought this was finished.
Why is this happening eight years later?
Steve said the nice-sounding lady on the phone had reported that the evidence department still had Sebastian's clothes in their possession from the night he died.
His shirt, jeans, socks, boots, and cell phone charger.
I'd find out later from a conversation I had with Isabel that it was usual for the police to hold onto physical evidence after a suspicious death for a certain number of years (usually seven), just in case new information came to light.
Steve leaned closer to me so his Mom wouldn't notice. "They want to know what we want to do with his clothes. Do we want them back?"
"Want them back?" I blurted out again. "Aren't they covered in his blood and other stuff? Did they wash them?"
In my mind's eye, I had a hideous picture floating in my brain of Sebastian in those clothes at the bottom of Smith Rock.
We never saw him after he died.
I didn't want his clothes back. They didn't contain Sebastian.
"No," I said firmly. Steve nodded his head in agreement and began instructing the unknown woman on what to do with Sebastian's possessions.
After hanging up, he said, "She apologized for the call, but she was required by law to try and contact the surviving family and see if they'd like the personal items back before disposing of the items.
After the initial shock had worn off, I noticed my heart had calmed down, and my palms weren't so sweaty. As my stomach felt better, I resumed eating my salad while discussing the rising temperature, and then waited.
I waited to see if I would cry once again or if those intense feelings of grief from Sebastian's death would resurface as they often did in the first five years. But these feelings didn't occur. In some strange way, somewhere in my head, I thought I had to "react" in some "expected" mournful way to this unexpected intrusion into my otherwise peaceful meal.
But I didn't.
Yes, in that instant, I was filled with sadness and upset. On the one hand, I was momentarily angry that the Bend Police Department called and told us about Sebastian's clothes. I thought we were "done" dealing with his death. On the other hand, they were only doing their job, albeit not a happy one.
But unexpectedly, I realized I had finally come to terms with my grief. I found myself smiling at memories of Sebastian rather than crying, and I had developed a sense of peace during moments that had once brought me pain.
I had moved on without even realizing it. I had noticed subtle changes in how I was grieving in the last couple of years. Don’t get me wrong, I will always miss my son, but he is home with Jesus. He is healed and whole, free from the mental anguish that plagued his life. His life on this earth is over, and yet mine continues to move forward undeterred. Sebastian is never far from my mind, but he's not center front anymore. I am living my life once again; I'm creating, writing, gardening, and investing in the lives of others. I find myself wanting to know Jesus more. Through daily prayer and Bible reading, I have felt a profound sense of comfort and guidance that has helped me navigate my messy mourning.
In the time I have left on this earth, maybe only twenty or thirty years, I want to live a life that honors God, not by doing great things, but through simple acts of love and obedience, knowing that Jesus deeply loves me.
And when my time is done, and I stand before Jesus, he will greet me and say, "Well done, good and faithful servant! Come and share your master's happiness!" (Matthew 25:23)
My heart has broken for you and Steve many times since that day. I have done a horrible job of letting you all know just how close you've been to my heart and my prayers. I can't wait to read your book; I would love to come have dinner with you and catch up and discuss the book once I've read it. Much love to you all.
Oh Jackie. God has carried you through the worst and now, again, when an abrupt hard call comes, he’s got you. What a gift to have Steve as the other half of your heart. He loves you so well.