For Tamara (2 page)

A few days before this / your Father and I argued about him leaving (again). / Love someone for who they are. / That was part of who he is / to deny him that would be cruel. / And yes, I miss you, Husband of Mine. / Every single fucking day.

You want to be forgiven, but you did nothing wrong. / Nor did Mum or Dad. / This just happened. / Shortwave radio.

I've never missed you more / the day I met you.

Your grandparents taught me how to be strong enough to do this. / And meds, electricity, space, and cooking, and. . . . / I wish they were here.

You work in an underground lab that has a near-100% divorce rate. If you don't think I knew what I agreed to, you're just a sillyhead. / And how I miss that head, My Beautiful Idiot.

How to do
cpr
. / Cancer runs in my paternal line. / Grow potatoes. / Find a great partner. / How to make a poached egg: get water to a slight boiling temp., add a bit of vinegar, crack the egg into water and coax it together.

Thyroid meds. / I'm so proud of you.

Even though I'm the woman who loves you regardless: / call home. / Magic a way. / I don't care. / T. is only going to get so many more stories.

I so do not want to tell you about making babies and birth. / But I have to.

Get the kids Tamiflu (
oseltamivir phosphate)
and Cipro (ciprofloxacin). And no, thanks to genetics, I don't hallucinate until at least 104ºF/40ºC. Take care of them before that.

Part of me doesn't even want to tell you about what it was like.

Husband of Mine, you need to figure out how to make a beacon for other survivors. / I'm dealing with these ones, can you do it?

I never cried until I lost my first love. / There was never a fight, / just an agreement.

We made up in a movie theatre. / Our hands slowly holding. I'm sorry I won't always be there to help you.

Secret: your Mum hates being understanding all the time. / So she knows you do too. / But do it anyway. / Like vegetables.

I have this dream where you and I are sleeping / and T. jumps into bed / and we can't even pretend to ignore her. / I think that is the memory I'll write for her.

Lick your wrist / then smell it. / Fruity equals infection, / that sort of thing. / Our bodies are better machines than we will ever be. / They will tell you what you have to know.

Why doesn't matter anymore. / They're dead and we're not. / So do your job.

Because it starts on a normal day.

Mum wants you to write books. / She wants you to have the time. / Eat bananas.

Darling, I hope to do this for you, but if I don't have a chance / I need you to calculate how much water everyone needs /wk, ok?

We need to set up a perimeter, fortify it, and set up an alarm system that runs back to the house. / Not just noise, we need advance warning.

I wish I could come up with something less cheesy / tell your grandparents.

As a baby you weren't as quiet as your grandmother said I was. / And you did grow up to be so headstrong. / Whenever I asked my parents about why they let me go out so late / they just said “because you wld have done it anyway.”

There was never a first time we held hands. / It was you / buttoning a shirt / wrong side up.

The well-water here should be okay. / I wouldn't wish your job on my worst enemy.

And that was me. / But without you I couldn't have come as far as I did.

I'm drawing you pictures of how it used to be. / But you save those 'til the end.

There used to be these cities and they were remarkable. / They had parks and hot-dog vendors. / And buildings so tall. / Much taller than you.

I was built to care about/for these people. I hope you are too. / Either way you're strong enough to do it.

I want to tell you how it was. We'd get cranky about the wrong temperature of water. But still / sit up straight. / You sure are pretty.

Don't tell anyone, but sometimes Mum wants to give up too. / Go practice your letters.

This house isn't built to deal with the cold without a furnace. / We'll figure something out. / And wear layers. / Corn stalks.

Chop down trees to make the barrier. / Yes, so: everything / one, in a sense. How I do not want to give that order.

No, think like protecting a manageable unit of people: family vs insane commune. Every other group either wants what you have or you have to have a treaty. Going into all that is again a novel. I'm going to hope my audience gets this bit.

I know you're busy, but I want you to plant flowers, ok? Try tulips. / They're easy.

I saw whole cities being destroyed. / T., I never want you to see that, ever. / Rebuild, always. / At least my thumb is healing.

Tamara, I never wanted kids and then all this happened and you were here. / Thank-you. / Remember what I look like.

Mum doesn't want to have to teach you to fight, but she will. / And you will teach others.

I realize I haven't taught you much history. / Part is that I don't want to remember what it was like even a few years ago. / Part is where to start. / And no idea if that will change a thing.

Stockpile paper. / I'll teach you to make more, but it is going to take some time. / And ink, of any kind.

To triage you have to rule in/out the worst fırst: head wounds,
fever. . . . / I would love to teach you how to fly a kite instead. / To open a jar that has a seal: rubber gloves and/or turn it upside down and hit it against something hard. / It will pop right off.

The best thing you can do about the weather is understand it.

Use that table, I don't care. / Keep the globe. / It never rains this much.

Celebrate Earth Day and your birthday. / I'm making time to write you fairy-tales. / Don't overcook your vegetables.

I watched the windows blow out. / I used to watch romantic movies on Valentine's Day. I hope you get to eat watermelon.

Weaving. / There are paper, and if yr lucky, electronic copies. / How to protect yrself.

Find yr grandfather's radio that says “Fisher-Price” on it; those things will outlive most other tech. / Good luck with finding batteries.

Tamara, ppl are going to have all sorts of mental problems. Just figure out if they are dangerous. / Most of the time they are just hurt ppl.

This isn't how I pictured things. / Not for you or me. / This is the last sheet of paper until I teach you to make more.

Maybe when we write the screenplay. That said, making paper is relatively easy.

In this house / right now / all I can to not cry: you & your Dad. / This house had a
tv
. / I wish I could check to see if your Father even tried to contact us.

In some ways this is the best love letter / I could have ever given you, My Beautiful Idiot / I know it is supposed to be for T. / But you are her / and don't ever forget it.

I don't have the ability to write you a surgical textbook. / I'm sorry, b/c you're going to need it. / Sterilize, everything.

Types of plants. / Some plants that grow here are medicinal. / I'll make a list.

How to nurse a baby. / Don't worry if you can't, or it is hard. / This is common. / You find someone to do it for you.

Husband of Mine, when I want to scream about your absence, / I remember that 1) I love you 2) You're in a bunker somewhere & too busy saving us all to call. 3)
btw
your legacy is safe here. 4) Carrier pigeons.

Don't think yr Mum didn't cry when she saw all this. / You have the strength she had to help and salvage and make the best of it.

I need you to loot a hospital. / For any and all supplies: gauze to analgesics to anesthetics to needles to basic surgical equipment. No, I don't know where Dad is, but I know him. / He is safe and helping. / Maybe not the way we are. / But he is helping. The only person who got my hatred of the sound of a vacuum.

Earth was green and famously blue; white clouds. / But we have brown and red too. / And neon yellow, don't go near that.

Do what you may — no, you have to just destroy the dead. / Too many diseases. / I'm sorry. / Fire.

Burn them / downwind. / And burn them as hot as you possibly can.

We're not sure what happened. / The lack of airborne diseases spread leads us to think probably nuclear attack. / Airborne diseases don't spread like this. / No idea from whom. / There was a light.

T., you need to make sure you quarantine parts of the house for the dying.

Mum wishes she could have a glass of wine. / That doesn't mean you shouldn't brush your teeth.

Dad's in some gov't bunker somewhere. / He wishes he could be here. / He has really important things to do. / Just like us, but “classified.” / Trust me as I trust him.

Tamara, while I want you to be understanding, set boundaries.

You put your fingers in everything. / You want to be a part of everything. / I think yr grandparents would be proud.

Mum doesn't want to work until 4
am
/0400. / But she has so much to tell you, and it isn't like a baby book. / It is how to survive. / I should be making ink prints of your feet or some crap.

A government is like when Mum and her friends decide what food to grow, but bigger. / We try.

What you love becomes a part of you. / Yes, that sounds like a Hallmark card (I don't even know if you'll get that). / But I have to go feed people.

Tamara, you're going to see so much death.

Be careful with your water supplies. / Clean, at least. / Dying of dehydration is both ugly and unpleasant.

I taught you to spell on a Scrabble set. / I didn't know which way the wind was blowing that day. / I'm sorry.

Try not to be too hard on them. / And listen to other ppl. / Mums used to luxuriate in making their own organic baby food.

There are things I will never get back. / This is the love letter you never wrote me.