All the kids were home for Christmas. The grandkids, too. He’d had a fainting spell, but that was over now; the tingling sensations hadn’t been back for two weeks. It was great having them around, with all their noise and joy. The littlest one loved to run from the top of the stairs down through the living room and stop at the fireplace. He was a bundle of energy.  Everyone was here but his wife, who died in August, but nobody acted like she were gone. Roland hated their boisterous laughter, but he also didn’t want them to cry. He wanted their joy. It was a reprieve from the empty bed he woke up to every morning,  cold and his face wet. Their laughter soothed him.

It was dinnertime. Roland sat at the head of the table. In the prayer, he thanked God for togetherness, thanked God for his wife and their many years together. His voice broke and his throat burned. He noticed his oldest granddaughter tear up and felt a rush of gratitude towards her. But then, dinner began and everyone ignored him. He pulled out his phone and adjusted his hearing aids. Being deaf in his left ear, the hearing aids were supposed to send all the sound to his good ear, but the damn things never worked properly. The hearing aid folks in town didn’t know what they were doing. Roland told him he wouldn’t see them in heaven, but then he felt bad.

Heaven, where his wife of sixty-four years was now. Well, he hoped. No, he knew. She was looking down on him and the children, all seated around the table. Damn it, he was crying again. He tried to focus on the salad his daughter made. Cucumbers and tomatoes and dill. He hated cucumbers; they smelled like dishwater, but he ate them anyway. Mother taught him that. He tried to instill it in his own children, but his littlest grandchild refused to eat the cucumbers.

“Want some more casserole, Grandpa?” said the person on his right.

He took the dish, scooped some more onto his plate. No one noticed him crying. They were too busy with their noise, their joy. No one asked him about his fainting spells; he hadn’t told them. No one mentioned his wife.

After dinner, they all gathered around the Christmas tree in the living room. Roland watched them open presents. A grandchild played the piano. This grandchild, Roland knew, was having problems. Wanted to be called something different, be called They or something like that. All Roland knew was that he loved this grandchild, even though this grandchild was gay. Or They. Or something. Roland wasn’t sure. Damn it, the piano was loud. He couldn’t hear anything. His daughter leaned forward and said something to him. She had a piece of dill in her teeth. Roland smiled at her, nodded, then got up and went to the office. He turned on his laptop and pulled up his favorite program: the family tree. There was his wife’s name, right next to his. He hadn’t entered her death date yet.

He clicked on the icon of his wife’s name and the image of them on their wedding day came up. Yes, they fought and had rough times, but in the end, Roland considered himself the luckiest man in the world. God blessed him with his wife and three beautiful children, and then six beautiful grandchildren. The tears came again. He wiped his nose. He could still hear them all, laughing and chattering, and assumed the littlest one was running through the house and stopping at the fireplace. So much energy. The noise from the safety of his office was pleasant. He wished his wife were here to experience it with him. They would have laughed at their wonderful, absurd life, but she was gone.

Someone said something to him. He hadn’t heard anyone enter the office, but here was his oldest granddaughter, and she put her hand on his shoulder. He didn’t want to cry in front of her, wanted her to leave, but he couldn’t stop the water leaking from his eyes. Her hand was warm and made him realize how cold he’d been these last several months. It reminded him of his wife’s warmth when they shared a bed, how they would wake up in retirement and stay under the covers for just a little bit longer, grinning like kids. His oldest granddaughter looked like his wife—curly hair, crooked nose. He loved his oldest granddaughter. She was the only one who seemed to remember.

He stood up and hugged her.

“—in the living room?” she said.

“Sure, sure,” he said. With the piano playing done, he returned to the living room and sat next to the fireplace in his wife’s spot, the armchair she always sat in, right next to the glittering tree. The chair sat low to the ground, forcing his knees high up in the air.

“Dad, tell us about Mom’s turkeys again,” said his daughter, loudly. She was the only one who remembered to speak up. Sometimes she spoke too loudly and it embarrassed him.

He told the story of his wife’s turkeys and didn’t cry. He even managed a laugh. She hadn’t been forgotten; she was there, in the room with them, looking at them fondly. His heart swelled.

After the story, they all moved on and left him alone again. Their noise and their joy was wonderful. It was. The little one ran to the front of the fireplace and stopped. He clapped his hands, then turned around to do it again. Roland looked at his knees, high up in the air. They reminded him of his fainting spells. They started in his left calf, then spread to his stomach before reaching his head. The tingling moved quickly, and he barely had time to sit down before the dizziness overtook him. He hoped the fainting spells were done for good, and he worried about them returning, but didn’t want to worry the children. The doctor hadn’t found anything wrong. They started after his wife died.

Someone said something to him. He pulled out his phone, adjusted the hearing aid app, and looked up, but whoever it was had stopped talking. The grandchild started playing piano again. Roland turned his hearing aids down. He watched them all. He knew they loved him. He knew that. He knew that.

Here came the little one, running full speed towards him in his route around the house. His mouth hung open and he whooped with glee. Roland put his arms out, but the little one dodged him, running full speed ahead, and stopping just before the fireplace. But this time, his momentum was off. His forehead collided with the edge of the brick and, suddenly, the room was a flurry. Roland heard his grandson’s cries, loud enough that they hurt his ears. He took out the hearing aid, jiggled it, and put it back on, but the noise remained. The boy’s mother was trying to soothing him, pressing his hair away from a tiny gash across his forehead.

Roland went to get bandages. He knew they were in the bathroom cabinet somewhere, but where had his wife put them? He felt her come up behind him, and he turned to ask her, but it was only his daughter. His wife was dead.

“Here they are,” said his daughter, pulling the bandages from under the sink and rushing back out. Roland felt useless. His left calf started tingling, so he returned to the living room to sit down. The boy and his mother were gone.

“Where’d they go?” he said to one of his sons-in-law.

His son-in-law said something. Roland didn’t know what.

The tingling spread to his stomach, and he realized he should probably tell someone. He turned back toward his son-in-law, said his name, but no one heard him. He looked for his daughter, but she wasn’t in the room. He looked for his granddaughter, who reminded him of his wife with her curling hair and crooked nose, but the tingling spread to the back of his head. He was about to faint in a room full of people and no one was going to notice.

The Christmas tree sparkled. There was laughter, noise, and joy.

Roland closed his eyes.