by Victoria MacDonald
Arriving early for a group therapy appointment in a beautiful home on Lake Promenade in Toronto, I park my car and decide to meander across a grassy patch to the water’s edge. The early evening sun caresses my shoulders as I gaze at the distant sailboats bobbing up and down on Lake Ontario. Gentle waves kiss shoreline rocks. My grief is validated, soothed, its weight somewhat lightened by a soaring seagull.
Oh, how I miss my Peter. He is absent, stolen by prostate cancer on April 15, 2012, at the age of sixty-two. I had believed we’d have more time for our karaoke dates, our mutual love of movies, sumptuous food, decades of shared memories, and the support we provided one another when we worried about our only adult child, a son we both loved fiercely. Russell suffered with addiction and we agonized, rescued, detached, rescued yet again, and clung to each other in the midst of our powerlessness. Our “date nights” were an escape from the pain.
Now who do I lean on? Bereft, an abandoned single parent, I struggle with ongoing crises, feeling so alone.
Inhaling deeply, I turn to head back across the fresh emerald-green field toward the house where I will find some solace. It is my safe space to grieve.
Out of nowhere, a gentle male voice whispers, “If you don’t look too hard, you’ll find them.”
Find what? I stop in my tracks. There is nobody in sight. For absolutely no conscious reason, I look down at my feet, and right there, nestled next to my sandal, are three four-leaf-clovers. I stoop in wonder, gently releasing these treasures from the soil. As I do, I flash back to my childhood, hiking with my father through High Park, occasionally squealing with delight when he spots a lucky charm and hands it to me.
I behold my three treasures. One is big, the second a medium size, the third smaller. I recall the days when Russell was a small boy and I held such high hopes for our family-of-three.
I rush into the therapy session to show off my beautiful souvenirs, omitting the part about hearing a distinct and mysterious voice in my left ear. Grief can play tricks with the imagination.
Later, when I show the clovers to my son, he cries out, declaring, “They’re from Dad!”
His certainty is intense. He is sober on this particular day, and I embrace his clarity during this reprieve. A serrated knife of worry has carved my heart, as I have witnessed his escape into alcohol and drugs to escape the intense pain of his grief. I refrain from dismissing my experience as mind trickery, and open my heart to possibility. Placing the clovers on a white card, I write WE ARE FAMILY at the top, record the date, laminate the keepsake, and put it on my fridge.
A few days later, I Google four-leaf-clovers and learn that they sometimes grow in clusters. There’s my explanation. I return to the field and begin a meticulous search. There are none to be found. Somehow, I am relieved.
For the next five years, I witness my son’s battle as he moves from utter despair, to surrender, to glimmers of hope in recovery, only to cycle back down into the fierce jaws of addiction.
On November 8, 2019, I come home to a door slightly ajar. The kitchen tap has been left on. There is silence when I call out. A giant centipede of terror skitters up my spine.
I gallop down the hall and find Russell lying face down. Blood trickles from his mouth, and for a crazy moment, I worry about his teeth. His teeth, for God’s Sake! Reality breaks through, and I hear a distant howling as I race for the Naloxone kit and try to roll him over. He is dead weight. I call 911 and am told to get a neighbor, who helps me turn my boy over and I scream because I am too late and he has turned blue. My shrieks echo the cries of four decades ago during child labor.
Paramedics, police, and a coroner arrive. Hours later, I hear the sound of the zipper on the body-bag, the heavy footfalls as they carry my baby away from me. I am flat-lined, screamed-out, for now.
Weeks later, the voice-mail of the coroner, a faraway foghorn, emerges from the density of a grey cloud to tell me my boy has died of a fentanyl overdose.
I trudge through molasses as I try to resume routines. I have to take care of my son’s old and sick pussycat. Paying for items at the counter of the pet store, I see three dimes at my feet. I am compelled to stoop over and pocket them. Two days later, a parking machine that accepts only loonies and toonies, spits out three dimes. For the next month, my bathroom light flickers and hisses, like radio static. Eventually, I have to put my son’s cat to sleep when he can no longer eat or walk. After that, the bathroom light returns to normal.
Time stretches toward tomorrows as the grief attacks ever so gradually ease. In February of 2020, during a blizzard, I hear robins singing outside my kitchen window. Impossible! I peer outside to see three of them, perched on a nearby roof, fat and puffed out, drizzled in snowflakes. I love that they have visited, but worry about their survival. Robins have always been a special source of joy in early spring, and I marvel at this unusual sighting.
A “Doubting Thomasina” and “One Who Believes” battle within me. So, sixteen months after my son’s death, I arrange to have a reading done by a well-known psychic. He will phone me long-distance from thousands of miles away on the prearranged date.
The day arrives. I hear that my parents, my husband and my son are coming through. Their deaths are described with startling accuracy.
“Your son passed very suddenly. It was an accident. He didn’t feel pain. He is telling me he never meant to hurt you. It was a slip. I see him riding on the back of a dragon. He is laughing. Does this mean anything to you?”
I explain the phrase “chasing the dragon.” Opiate addicts use it to describe the horrors of withdrawal and the relentless craving for more. The psychic has never heard this expression. In a moment of clarity, I realize my son is no longer chasing or trying to slay the dragon. He is at peace.
“I am being shown a flock of robins,” the psychic continues. I feel my heart open like a tulip in spring.
“Does the number fourteen mean anything?” he asks. “I am seeing this number over and over.” I draw a blank.
“What’s with the three four-leaf clovers?” he suddenly queries. I gasp. Remnants of disbelief dissipate like early morning fog. I tell him my story. He laughs and says, “Bingo!”
The next morning, after a sleepless night of rumination about the number fourteen, I rush to look at my good-luck charm on the fridge. The date I had written on the card was June 4, 2014.
Since then, my kitchen light flickers on and off, usually in the morning, sometimes in the evening after a busy day. I welcome the hellos with an open heart.
Life is full of mysteries. I have come to believe. Do you?
The following is a poem dedicated to my son:
The Flying Dragon
Russell rides a dragon-beast.
It’s big and green and scaly.
He laughs because his newfound pet,
Isn’t one bit scary.
Instead of breathing deadly flames,
This would-be monster sings,
Of winning awesome video games,
And other happy things.
Like chocolate bars and candy-canes,
Or swimming in a pool,
Or jumping up and down in puddles,
Acting like a fool.
“You’ll never need to chase me.
Climb aboard and take a ride.
I’ll carry you above the clouds,
And always be your Guide.”
Victoria MacDonald, a retired special education teacher, has published a memoir about inter-generational addiction entitled Coming to Terms, available at Amazon. Her short story, Open-Concept Teaching, won the Editor’s Choice Award and was published in the 50th Anniversary Issue of Inscape Magazine.