"A Story Worth Telling"

A phone call came from my obviously distressed sister-in-law, Leonie, - "Go and check your email!" she pleaded with me. Looking at it I felt numb.

It came from one of my sister Heather's friends, Jo Cassidy. It came via my brother Ross. Not knowing who Heather's brothers were, she brought a dreadful report:

I told Julie, my wife, but I didn't know how to tell the kids - my big babies and my little scallies, Emma and James.

Calling my big kids, who are spread across the nearby suburbs, I tried to not sound frantic; 'Come over here now please - No, I will explain when you get here." Then I called my big kids' mother, Denise, and asked her to come over too. "They will need you; please come."

They all arrived and wondered what was going on. I wouldn't say anything until I could tell them all at once. I was afraid of having to say it more than once and losing the control I had. I showed no tears, no fear or any major emotion. I just wanted to get this finished and tell the kids; look after them and their Mums. I knew I have to find hope for them!

There was much crying and much laughing; laughing at the way she was at times; then came the family story telling. You know the story telling that families immerse themselves in when they all get together? "Remember when....."

Then something would trigger the tears again. A thought, a word or a photo. We searched and found many of them, but few of Heather in recent times. This is one we found.

The beginning of sadness

"Look, it's Emma, where did that photo come from?" said Rebecca.

"No, it's Heather when she was about 12 (almost Emma's age)" I said, despondently.

Emma cried then. She hardly knew Heather but she ached. Her sisters and big brother were aching so she knew it was right to ache with them. How she loved them.

James was stoic, as he always is. Although, looking into his eyes I could see he was pained inside.

Luke was quiet and angry. He has his own demons he is fighting and this is a curse, a fight he didn't want.

The 'big girls' as Meagan and Rebecca are known in the family, reacted as they would to any disaster. Meagan is concerned for others and Rebecca cried - she feels so deeply. Meagan wanted to help; she always wants to make it 'right'.

The tears streamed and then are staunched by a brave face or a hug. I almost burst sometimes, because of a brave face or a hug. There was no rhyme, no reason...

It was so sad for my babies, so sad!

"How are you Daddy?" asks my beautiful Rebecca Kate.

"Good, I'm fine," I responded.

Did I say that or not? It's what I would normally say and I am aching for things to be normal; to be able to sit around and laugh like we did on all of those family dinners; like we did on picnics when Heather would visit.

"Remember how she would get on her high horse!" someone called out.

"Yeah!!!!!" they chorused in unison.

Then we laughed, and then cried a little more.

I write in my journals about things like this. I talk to God and wonder where He is. I wonder at how things lack coherence at times of great tragedy, yet communities and families gather and strive to make sense of things. We were doing that. We had gathered together, shared and wept, but the pain wouldn't go away. This wasn't restoring what we had lost; it was just numbing it for a time.

"She was always so good to me." My Rebecca was so terribly upset.

My beautiful babies, so innocent and worldly wise, all mixed together. There was nothing I could do to help them.

Meagan sat with the tears just running down her cheeks. She is always the strong one, the eldest and sure of her role and now so weakened in her position by the abject sadness that flowed through her.

So sad...

Luke, my beautiful big boy; what was he thinking? I scanned them all and I could see that he was beginning to boil. He's squeezed the cup he was holding - "anyone for a cuppa?" - and he shook with anger and got up to 'check the paint on the house across the road' – the big kid's euphemism for having a smoke out the front of the house.

Emma was crying so hard. I looked in her eyes and I could see she was thinking, "Daddy's sister is dead - my poor Daddy."

James was adrift in his emotions for he had, like Emma, no memory either. It seemed as if he wasn't sure how to feel and I ached for him, my precious little boy who was becoming a man. Things like this can drag you kicking and screaming into adulthood - and he didn't know how to feel. He had to protect his sisters and his Mum, he's unsure of how to protect his Dad.

Then there were the mothers, the guardians of these babies, desperately sad themselves, aching to protect their babies from such pain. Bless them.

It's such an impotent feeling.

Such a tragedy.

Such a waste.

All of the things that were said at times like that; the 'considered' words to help each other grieve, the 'have-to-say' phrases to lift each other up - all less than adequate; such a waste of energy trying to find the words. All we do is just hug each other; just cry together.

How would Mum have felt - our beautiful Lucy? She tried to protect Ross, Heather and me, just like my kid's mums are desperately striving to protect them. I burst into tears at the thought; her precious little girl. Gone. Dead. Wasted in pain. I am so pleased Mum does not know this agony.

"Don't cry Ralph" I told myself. "Not here. You must be strong and ache alone. Your babies need you to be strong." Why did I talk in the third person about myself?

So many things - so much humming and pounding in my head. No time for tears, no time for grief, no time for brooding just time to get on with it. I moved into my organisational mode. "What needed to be done to see that she was looked after? Who needed to be contacted? How are matters going to proceed here? What about my trip to the USA - it's just days away?"

The big kids went home, the Mum's hugged them all and each other - and me. It was time to go to bed.

But was so terribly sad!

The following days passed so very slowly and then there was more news. An email came again through Ross and his wife, Leonie. They had contacted Heather's friend Jo and set up a link. I am the eldest but there is no sense of "I have to do this", it was all about just getting things done.

How is Ross? And Leonie and the boys - big boys now but still little tots in my mind. Heath was named for Heather - oh! There is, was, such an affinity between Ross, Leonie and Heather. She had been in their lives a lot, Heath and Ben; Ross and Leonie...

"How is Ross?" I asked myself again.

The email...

She's dead, Ralph!

She had tried to kill herself all those years ago and you and Ross had missed it; well, you had!

Remember the car accident and what the doctor had said?

She's dead Ralph and you couldn't protect your little sister!

POINTLESS MAN!