Dear Donna and Deborah, wrote Jane.

I love you both so much. I am bursting proud to be your mother, and consider myself particularly lucky to have gotten to raise two such fantastic human beings. Raising you two is the best thing I did with my life, and I don't regret the decision for a second (that wasn't entirely true, but Jane wouldn't dare burden her children with her own small regrets and what-ifs).

I know he didn't say it very much, but I know with absolute certainty that your father feels the same way. He was always so proud of "his girls." I don't think that he ever wished for a son, he was so smitten with you two.  

Now that you both have children of your own, you will know how a parent feels about their child. Think about how you would feel about your kids without the grind of daily life, if you didn't have to set their bedtime, monitor their grades, or make endless brown bag lunches; if they didn't resent being spoken to 'like a child' and think that their parents were the only thing standing between them and complete, joyous, freedom.

Now that you are grown, now that you make your own choices and your own lunches, I feel all of the love and delight that you do, but my love, and your father's, is now uncluttered by having to be the one in charge.  

Saying goodbye to him will be hard for you. I don't want to do it, either. I want to rant, scream, shake him, and flat-out refuse to watch him die, but it won't change the fact that he is dying, and soon. He hasn't spoken for some time, but I can tell that he is suffering, both in body and in spirit. In my heart of hearts, I think that the only reason he is still with us is that he is afraid of the pain that his passing will cause us.  

This disease (she couldn't bear to write the word 'Parkinsons') has been taking him from us, piece by piece, and he has been grieving each small loss just as we have, though he tries so hard not to show it. He doesn't want to be pitied. He lived a good life, and now it is at an end.  

Neither of us will be remembered beyond our family and a few friends. Our lives were small, but we tried to live them well, and we were happy, truly happy together. Not every moment of every day, of course. I think you both remembered the tension in the house after he and I ... On second thought, I don't want to put it on paper. Either you remember well enough, or I don't want to tell you. Anyways, we survived the rough patches, decided that we still liked each other, and moved forward, again and again, and lived out our lives together. 

I don't know what lies beyond death, but I do know this: the body crumbles, memories grow dim, details vanish, but love remains. 

I lost my mother many years ago, as in time you will lose yours, too. I was angry at her for many things over the course of my life, but anger eventually burns out. I hope you can forgive me for any pain that I have caused you. Please know that I have always tried to do what was best, even if it meant that you were unhappy with me in the short term. I think that most everything I did was either out of love for you, or out of fear of worse pain in the future. 

Please forgive me. And remember, 

I love you always, 

Mom 

Jane took out a second piece of paper, and wrote "Account Numbers" across the top. She listed every company that she had an account with, and her account number for each. The list was surprisingly short: bank accounts, property taxes, utilities, phone, one credit card. Not wanting to be out of touch, even for a moment, she kept a cell phone, but was on a pay-as-you-go plan. She had cancelled the newspaper and cable when she decided to sell the car, again blaming her failing eyesight. She didn't need to tell her children the obvious: Chester wouldn't need them anymore, either.

When she was finished, she read over her letter once more. At the bottom of the letter, she wrote:  

P.S. Donna, I'm sorry that your Dad blamed you for breaking Grandma's mantle clock. You and I both know that it was Deborah. But I'm not sorry that you got grounded for the week because, later that day, I saw you spit in your sister's linguine. Deborah, I'm sorry I didn't tell you about the linguine. I was really angry about the clock.  

She considered leaving the finished letter where it lay on the kitchen table, but thought of how many times she had admonished her daughters for not putting things away properly, and tucked the pages into her filing cabinet in a folder marked: "Important Papers: Wills, etc." 

The dryer dinged and Jane folded and put away her clothes. She decided against making her bed, instead leaving the folded sheets in a neat pile at the foot of the bed. Seeing the bed made up, knowing that Chester would never again complain about her cold feet, or keep her up half the night with his snoring, made her ache with grief. She left the room without a backward glance. 

Jane ducked into the bathroom to retrieve some pills, and returning to the front hall, tucked them into her purse. She was just packing a few more items into her purse when the phone in her pocket began to ring. She pulled the black plastic handset from her pocket and looked at the small screen, squinting a little to make out the tiny, glowing characters. Her stomach clenched and cold sweat prickled her sides as it always did when the caller ID read "Hospital".