Seeing Through Ice
Husbands have never been part of our Halloween tradition, so it’s normal for me to be heading to the party without Walter, repeating this annual ritual in order to resurrect past joy. Harry Potter in the Boston Common makes me realize I’ve forgotten a costume, but it’s too late to go back, so I continue, hopping with feigned lightness over a puddle which should be frozen by now.
My friend cheers at her condo door like she’s welcoming a big party, even though it’s just me. Soon another friend arrives, fanning her cleavage. Her one daughter wears face glitter, while the other in silver pants stands tall with a confidence she must’ve found in nursing rotations. Our daughters are acquiring jobs, apartments, partners, and experiences, so for them the future looks more promising than the past.
It’s just the five of us this year. All the other mother and daughter party-goers—including my twins—have moved away, and raucous group laughter has been replaced by reminiscence of the old days with our little ghosts and fairies. We used to wear glowing necklaces and wigs as we tripped along the packed cobblestone streets of Beacon Hill, trick-or-treating at stately manors, tiptoeing through shrieking haunted houses, and running into friends by the streetside cotton candy stand. Walter always took our boys on his moped for Halloween out in the suburbs where the oversized candy bars made up for the lack of housing density.
The young women hover over the hummus and crudité.
“Girls …I have a confession.” I pause for effect, then bite a carrot stick. Glitter Face leans in, sipping tequila through a straw clamped by her front teeth. Silver Pants looks into my eyes as I continue. “Remember how all the moms had pumpkin sippy cups?”
They nod.
“Those were cosmos.”
Their laughter doesn’t hide the dismay in their eyes which makes me regret rescripting their memories. We weren’t as we seemed. Why did I just tell them that?
Our host interrupts to drop an ice tray onto the counter. “Check this out!” She pulls out an ice cube and holds it up with two fingers. “It’s totally transparent!”
She shows us the comparison with a foggy ice cube from her freezer’s ice machine.
“Why is that?” I ask.
She shrugs, dropping the clear cube into a glass, and suggests we stay in this year instead of trick-or-treating. Campari sloshes over the ice, turning it invisible in the red pool. I try to figure out the ice while squeezing lemon to soften the bitter taste with sour. I never had such curiosity before marrying Walter, a former Thermodynamics professor with an answer to all scientific questions, including those about phase change, like water transitioning to ice. My impulse to ask him is immediately followed by recollection of his stock quips: There’s no magic. Santa isn’t real. Ghosts are pretend.
Out on the deck during dusk, we feel guilty celebrating the unseasonably warm weather, as if our appreciation might worsen climate change. As the others tell stories from Halloweens past, I read on my phone that clear ice is made by freezing water from one side, pushing impurities out the other side. Truth is, I don’t actually care. The fun of these questions was never the answer but the sharing. Fog rolls by, across the moon.
By nightfall, the ninjas and mermaids go home with chocolate stomach-aches, leaving the dark streets below to college co-eds. A sexy nurse laughs with the devil under a cloud of sweet-smelling weed as a buzzing motorcycle reminds me of stepping off Walter’s moped and into fancy Back Bay restaurants holding our helmets. I shiver and grab my leather jacket, wishing for a carnival mask.
To crush my yearning, I recall Walter’s grumpiness—like when my comment, What a beautiful day, made his nose flare.
It’s not beautiful. It’s too hot. Turn on the AC.
At that moment, as happens occasionally in any long marriage, I would’ve welcomed his absence. I strive now to resurrect that feeling and appease my chest’s soreness.
Instead, the ache sharpens, constricting my breath. That exchange happened a year ago, on another unseasonably warm fall day, before Walter realized that cancer had saturated his blood. He didn’t know that he had only eight weeks left, yet he must have felt his vitality fading.
I stir the Campari with my finger. The invisible ice cube is melting, shrinking like the polar ice caps, chilling the red liquid and freezing my skin.
