Zibby Mag

By Mark Massaro

After the grief of losing my mother, I had to wrap my mind around losing her family too.

I was eleven years old when my mom died from cancer and my sister was thirteen.

At that age, I saw my dad’s side of the family — the Italian side — daily. His sister tended to my mom while my dad prepared our school lunches. My uncle mowed the lawn. The older couple that lived next door helped with laundry and would bring us Tupperware filled with home-cooked meals. Even the Hospice workers became a constant in our day-to-day lives.

My dad took care of my mom while trying to maintain some level of normalcy for us — that naïve suburban façade. I still played little league and my sister still did ballet. We were just kids and, despite the fatal gravity of the situation, I knew and felt love and happiness. I saw it every day.

On one particularly memorable night, my dad made me pause my Nintendo game to have a somber talk with me. He asked me to come out onto our screened-in porch that overlooked a vast New England forest. It was the summer of 1994 and all the large windows were open, allowing the crisp evening breeze to move right through the room.

“Mommy is very sick, and we might not have much time left with her.”

“No,” I quickly replied. “She’ll be fine. Can I keep playing Mario Bros.?”

“Sure,” he said, tears in his eyes.

Back then, I didn’t actually think that we’d lose her. What eleven-year-old could wrap their mind around a loss that profound? It was asking the impossible. But my dad was still trying to prepare me.

Throughout the final stretch of her life, I began to notice that my mom’s parents and siblings were not around even though they lived one town away. They’re the Irish side of my lineage. They’d call and say, “The priest prayed for her at mass today. It was beautiful.” Once, I remember hearing my maternal grandfather remark, “Who cares what she wants? Just put her in the hospital.”

I knew that something wasn’t right. When I did see them, they’d find an excuse to leave early or not show up at all. While they were remotely praying over her, everyone else was by her side, making her smile, taking care of her and her loved ones.

In June of ‘94, she finally passed away in her bed at home beside my father.

At the wake, my grandfather said to my dad, “Now you better not keep those kids from us.”

“No,” my dad said. “Not at all. Actually, it’d be great if you could watch them next week.” My grandfather said that he’d think about it but then left early because there wasn’t any booze at the event. When he wasn’t drinking, he’d anxiously stutter and stress about all of the grandchildren simply behaving as kids do.

Throughout the final stretch of her life, I began to notice that my mom’s parents and siblings were not around, even though they lived one town away.

As the years went by, I talked to that side of the family less and less. I slowly began to realize that they operated by ignoring truths: My grandfather was a raging alcoholic, one aunt was “sent away” when she was a pregnant teenager, and another aunt was mentally unstable, often falling in love with priests and, occasionally, being institutionalized.

And yet, none of this was spoken about.

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Even though I was young, I knew something was off, and I had the inchoate sense that suppressing truths was an inherited toxic trait. When November rolled around, my mother’s side of the family told us that they weren’t going to be having Thanksgiving — only desserts — but that we should come over anyway. My sister and I arrived and stared into a sink full of dirty plates, packed Tupperware containers, and piles of turkey bones.

“I thought that we weren’t having Thanksgiving?” I asked my aunt.

“Oh,” she said, rather surprised, “We just thought this would be easier for you both.”

The next year, we weren’t invited at all.

Luckily for me, the other side of my family was a close-knit clan of Italians. I’m thirty-eight now and I can still feel my paternal grandfather’s bear hugs and smell my grandmother’s cooking. Thanksgiving at their home was equipped with a turkey surrounded by lasagna, ravioli, tortellini, and trays of “pro-shoot,” “motzell,” and “pasta-fazool.” Holidays were full of laughter and love.

I always tell people: One side is cold as ice and the other is warm as an oven. I scarcely remember spending time at the other house now; there is only a vague memory of sitting up straight and being silent. On my dad’s side, my grandfather would always say, “I’m the richest man in the world because all of my grandchildren love me.” The dichotomy seemed expressly clear.

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A few years ago, I tried to reach out to my mom’s side on social media, mostly out of curiosity. Hell, maybe they’d even apologize, and we’d all have a good laugh about the past, forging a new bond in the present.

I emailed a few of my aunts and uncles, but no one responded.

A month later, I saw on Facebook that my alcoholic grandfather had passed away.

His obituary made him seem like a saint: the man who “led the family through the darkness and grief” after my mother’s death. It actually said that. This, about a guy who never visited his dying daughter, a man whose main concern of patriarchal worship was actually enabled by his family. I remember crying into my Irish grandmother’s bosom after he screamed at me when I interrupted his nightly prayers because I wanted to show him my drawing. She rocked me in her arms and said, “He didn’t mean it.”

I remember that night. He entered the room — after he finished his prayers, of course — and asked, “Is the boy okay?” while leaning on the doorframe for balance. I started to see the distinction between “goodness” and “religion” that night. Praying made him feel like a good person, while he nervously shook, poured his scotch, and lashed out at others. The only things that growing up within a religious context taught me were hypocrisy and gaslighting. It probably didn’t help that this was around the time when the abuse by a cabal of Boston priests was finally being brought to light.

His obituary made him seem like a saint: the man who “led the family through the darkness and grief” after my mother’s death. It actually said that.

But a priest said my mother’s name in church on every anniversary of her death. That’s what mattered to them. I never understood why they thought it would comfort her two children. They’d give us rosaries and a prayer card, smiling through their teeth, when we just wanted hugs. Besides the hypocrisy, I learned that actions, not intentions, define character. They’d probably be able to justify the nefarious priests too.

My dad told me to stop having hope in them, but I couldn’t despite their paradoxes, muddled virtues, and secrecy. Suppression becomes chaos very easily.

Despite losing my mother, my father, sister, and I turned out great. The three of us became extremely close over the years, closer than most families. My wife throws around the word “co-dependent” a lot, but it doesn’t matter. We’re stronger and closer because of the loss because, in a way, everything we do is to honor my mother.

Before she died, she told my dad, “The kids will be fine. And you’ll be ok.” He nodded in agreement, almost believing her conviction.

After the grief of losing her, I had to wrap my mind around losing her family, too. I didn’t want to join them behind their corrupted veneer. But I often wonder what my mom would think of all this. Would she be disappointed or would she be proud that I separated myself from the situation?

I’m not sure, but I remember my mom asking, “Where are they?” during her final days while staring at the silent rotary phone on her bedside table.

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Mark Massaro received a master’s degree in English Literature from Florida Gulf Coast University with a focus on 20th Century American Literature. He is a Professor of English at Florida SouthWestern State College. When not reading and writing, he can be found at a concert or with his wife and son. His writing has been published in Dash, The Georgia Review, Litro Magazine, Rain Taxi, Jane Austen Magazine, Los Angeles Review of Books, The Sunlight Press, and others. Follow his literary adventures on Instagram at @bostonmahk4