Work Text:
Her mothers funeral is a beautiful arrangement.
It’s as extravagant and expensive as any Holidays funeral should be. Carols father had been very particular, had organized it just right to be perfectly lovely and respectful. He hosts the event with the same care and tenderness he’s put into all of his parties throughout the years.
It’s professional, really.
Carol finds it to be an odd way to describe a funeral, but it’s all she can think of. It’s detached, apathetic, superficial. It’s a funeral that has rid itself of all emotion, woefully stocked in family yet overflowing with investors and business partners of her father. Attendees who see her mothers death as an opportunity rather than a loss.
In a way, it fits her mother very well. That leaves a bitter taste in Carols mouth.
She’s here alone. Rudy offered to come along— multiple times, actually. She had rejected his offer. It didn’t feel right. This woman hadn’t even shown up for their wedding. What right did Carol have to drag him to her funeral?
Then, if she brought Rudy, they’d have to bring December, and the idea of bringing little, little December anywhere near a funeral before she was even three just sent a knot straight to Carol’s stomach.
So she’s alone. Sitting in the pew of the church, staring down her mothers casket.
She hasn’t cried once. It’s unfathomable. It’s terrifying. This was the woman who raised her, who squeezed Carol out of her body. The woman who signed her up for piano lessons and debate club, who pushed her towards student council, who dictated her entire life for the first eighteen years she’d lived it.
Now she’s gone, and she will never come back, and Carol felt… Well, nothing.
What kind of daughter was she?
Soon, the greedy little businessmen shuffle out, one-by-one, after expressing their sympathy by attempting to suck up to her father.
It barely works. He’s nearly inconsolable like this. Her parents would fight in Carol’s youth. She’d have to stick her nose in a book just to ignore the frantic, angry screaming matches. But her mothers death moves her father in a way she wasn’t aware he was capable of— until today, right now, of course.
He stands in front of her casket, and Carol watches. Now they must be the only two left in here, she’s sure of it.
Her hand drifts to her stomach. Ah. There’s that too. The nagging little thing she knows she has to tell her father sooner or later. Baby two, who Carol and Rudy are already so sure is going to be another girl. She has to tell him. Maybe the news would bring him some sort of relief.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do without her.” His voice cuts through the air. Hoarse and wobbly, and so unlike the collected and stern man Carol knows him to be.
So she stands up, walks next to him. Looks into her mothers casket silently alongside him.
She looks peaceful. More at ease than Carol had ever seen her alive. In her youth, her mother seemed perpetually angry— or exhausted? She never could tell.
Regardless, her mother is relaxed now. She looks almost happy.
It brings Carol a bit of ease, atleast.
“Listen to me, Carolyn,” Her father begins, voice a little steadier. “never let anyone slow you down. If anyone is holding you, you leave them behind and you don’t look back.”
He turns to her. “Never let yourself get swept away in such vulnerabilities. It’s weak, it’s…” His words are spat like venom, as if he’s angry at her mother, or maybe himself. “It’s useless. It’s just all so useless now.”
Carol's frown deepens.
“I understand.”
“Good,” Her father sighs, shaking his head. “good.”
It’s silent. It’s so silent. Carol can’t remember the last time she’s been in her fathers presence this long without either of them uttering so much as a word. They just stand there. They soak in the loss together.
It heals a small part of her, Carol thinks. This is civil. Almost a peace treaty. It makes her believe in her father for a moment, that maybe he really is a good man. Stubborn and strict, but she loves her father, doesn’t she? When she was little, she’d wait by the window each day for him to come home. She’d peer into his office and watch him make business deals. She’d tug on his sleeve and beg him to teach her more piano because her standard lessons just weren’t enough. He was good to her then, wasn’t he? Could they ever be like that again?
She wonders for a moment what his reaction would be to the news. To know that he’d have another grandchild in nine months time.
She stifles a laugh. At least he’ll be happier to hear that this one will be born in wedlock.
Of course, he can’t read her mind.
“Is this funny to you?” Her father turns to her suddenly, his hand clutching the edge of her mothers casket. “Is any of this funny?”
“No,” Carol retorts quickly. “I just—”
“Your mother is dead.” He hisses out, looking just as intimidating and tall as when Carol was nine. “Your mother is dead and you will never see her again. You will never speak to her again. You will never hear her voice again— and you’re laughing?”
“I—”
“Shut up. No. Shut up.” Her father shuts her down. “You don’t get to say anything. I watched you this entire service and you didn’t shed a tear. You wouldn’t say a word. What’s wrong with you? What did we do to you to make you act like this? Do you hate us that much? Or are you just that frigid, that uncaring?!”
The silence after it is deafening. Pierced only by her fathers ragged, angry breathing.
Carols head is buzzing. She can’t think.
What is she supposed to say to any of that, anyway? What could she say? What is wrong with her? What broke inside of her to make her act like this?
The worst part is that through all of it, through all of the guilt and pain and grief lodged in her throat, Carol still cannot cry.
Her father seems infuriated, that even his own cruelty couldn’t wrench tears out of her.
“I’m going outside,” He cuts the tension, his tone calmer, as if his earlier outburst hadn’t just occurred. “I’ll give you a moment alone.”
Then, he steps away, movements careful and slow and calculated. He turns and walks down the aisle, towards the grand church doors.
“Wait.” Carol manages, her voice strained.
He pauses, but doesn’t turn. He doesn’t give her the dignity of looking her in the eyes, now.
I’m having a baby, her head screams. I’m going to have another baby, and I want you to meet them when they get here.
“Goodnight.” She says instead.
“Goodnight, Carolyn.” He sounds defeated.
Then, he’s gone.
Carol doesn’t even know what time she gets home. All she knows is it’s late and she’s exhausted and she’s praying Rudy’s asleep and won’t prod or question how the service went.
Her family home seems too big now with the exhaustion settling through her. Why on earth did their stupid spiral staircases need so many steps?
She’s at her bedroom door, and a part of her doesn’t want to open it. Her gut tells her Rudy wouldn’t have slept before she came home. He’s too caring, too doting. Sometimes his love is suffocating in that way.
A whine breaks through the air, so Carol redirects herself.
“Shh, shh, shh,” Carol coos almost instinctively as she enters her daughters room, picking up little December, who wails and thrashes in Carols arms. She sits on Decembers guarded toddler bed, contorting her body to somewhat fit into the small, cramped space. She bounces December on her knee.
“Hey, baby.” She hums, as her daughters cries finally still.
“Hey baby.” December repeats back, babbling in her small, tiny voice.
“Yes, yes.” Carol chuckles. “Very good. Say mama though next time, yes?”
“Mama,” December giggles. She’s a smart girl, even at her age. “mamamamama…”
“Well, now you’re just saying nonsense.” Carol can’t fight the smile on her face, even through her own fatigue.
Carol sighs, leaning back against her daughter's bed, laying December on her chest.
“Mama had a bad day today,” Carol frowns. “a really bad day.”
December doesn’t understand. Of course she doesn’t. She just looks up at her mother and smiles.
She looks at Carol like she’s the whole world.
Something cracks and splinters at that.
“Oh, December,” Carol begins, her voice growing strained and shaky. “I’m going to mess this all up.”
Her voice is wobbly, and she can feel it, the burning behind her eyes, the twist in her gut.
It’s grief. It’s grief that hits Carol in a wave. Grief that makes tears well in her eyes. Grief that makes her clutch December just that bit tighter. That makes her body wrack with shakes and chills.
But it’s not her mother that Carol is mourning.
“I’m going to fail you.” She sobs, cupping her daughters little face with her hand. “I am going to fail you.”
It’s a devastating truth that she needs to bear all at once.
“Are you going to do that?” Carol cries. “When I die, are you going to— are you going to stand over my casket and not shed a tear?”
December looks confused, hands reaching for her mothers face, trying to comfort or console even if she doesn’t quite understand what either of those things really are yet. She reaches only in instinct, only in love, only in devotion.
“Will you hate me as much as I hate them?” Carols voice is riddled with hiccups and stutters and sobs.
Then, December succeeds, placing her hands on her mothers cheeks, feeling clumsily around her face.
Carols tears pour, but she stills, as she watches through glossy eyes.
December looks at her, and then, and then…
… and then she grabs Carols glasses right off of her face, and tries to stick them in her mouth.
It’s so jarring, so baffling, that it stuns Carol out of her tears. She reaches out, yanking the glasses away from December. As if it’s routine, her daughter bursts into her own tears, sobbing and wailing for a much smaller, innocent reason.
Carol sniffles, wiping away loose tears as she adjusts her glasses and cradles December close, sinking further into the small bed. Her tantrum continues for a few minutes, but settles the longer her mother holds her. Soon, December is still, silent, and then finally sleeping.
She knows it’s a bad idea to sleep here. She should go back to her own room, lay in an actual proper bed instead of this cramped toddler one. But she’s so tired— and isn’t there something so comforting about a baby in your arms?
Just for tonight, she’d allow herself this.
“I’m sorry,” Carol apologizes before she drifts off, even if December can’t hear. “I’m so sorry.”