Sister Packing Dad’s Ashes into a Cardboard Box Under the Library’s Dim Light Early on a Sunday
It was quiet in the house that morning, like it always is on Sundays. The kind of quiet where even the refrigerator hum feels too loud. I was sitting at the kitchen table, the one with the water rings and the chipped corner from when Dad tried to fix it and gave up halfway. A bowl of cereal was getting soggy in front of me, but I wasn’t really eating. I was just stirring, thinking about how long it had been since he died. Nine days. Not long enough to feel real, but long enough that people had stopped calling.
My sister, Jenna, came downstairs still in her pajamas—some old college sweatshirt and leggings. Her hair was tied up, not neatly, just enough to keep it out of her face. She didn’t say anything to me. Just walked past, carrying that small black urn like she was holding a box of crackers. I watched her from the kitchen as she went into the library, the room Dad used to call his “study,” though it hadn’t been used for books or thinking in years. Mostly just dust and boxes now. The curtains were still drawn, so it was dim in there, lit only by the gray morning light coming through the cracks where the fabric didn’t fully meet the wall.
I felt like I should go in, maybe help her or at least be there. But I didn’t move. I just listened. I heard the rustling of cardboard, the sound of packing tape peeling. The kind of noises that feel too loud when they’re the only ones. Eventually I stood up and walked to the doorway. Jenna was kneeling on the floor, the urn open beside her, and an empty Amazon box in front of her. She was lining it with an old towel. I leaned against the frame but didn’t step inside. She glanced up at me, then looked back down without a word.
I hadn’t touched the urn since the day we picked it up from the funeral home. It sat on the mantel for a week, and then Jenna moved it to the hallway table. I didn’t ask why. Every time I walked past it, I felt like I was walking past something I wasn’t ready to deal with. Like he was still in there somehow, waiting to talk to me, maybe say all the things we never said when he was alive. But mostly I just felt numb.
Jenna placed the urn carefully into the towel-lined box and folded the flaps over, pressing down gently like she was tucking in a baby. Then she reached for the tape and sealed it shut. I heard that ripping sound again, final and ugly. She sat there for a minute, staring at the closed box. Her face was blank, but I could tell she was holding something in. She always had that look when she was trying not to cry. It was the same one she wore at the hospital when they told us he didn’t wake up. Same one at the funeral home when they asked if we wanted to see the ashes.
I finally stepped into the room and sat down on the edge of the couch. I didn’t say anything. I just sat there, looking at my hands. I noticed they were trembling a little, so I tucked them under my thighs. Jenna stayed on the floor. She pulled her knees up to her chest and rested her chin on them. We just sat like that for a while. The silence didn’t feel peaceful. It felt heavy. Like the air between us was full of everything we weren’t saying.
We had to pack up the house. That was the reason we were doing this. Dad had rented, and the landlord wanted the place cleared by the end of the week. Jenna had driven in from Vermont, and I had taken time off work. We’d been going through his things for three days. Clothes, old papers, kitchen junk, even a box of cassette tapes he probably hadn’t touched in twenty years. But the urn… that was the thing neither of us talked about. Until today, when Jenna just decided it had to be done.
I wanted to be angry with her. For doing it alone. For not asking me. For being able to touch it when I couldn’t. But I couldn’t even manage that. I think I was more ashamed than anything else. She had always been the one who took care of things. When Mom left, when the bills piled up, when Dad started drinking again. She was the one who stayed calm, who figured out what to do. I was the one who made excuses, who left, who came back too late.
Dad and I weren’t close. Not really. We had a few good years when I was a kid, but most of what I remember is the yelling. Him being tired or drunk or both. Him missing birthdays. Him asking for money when I was in college. And then silence for years. I only started talking to him again when he got sick. Stage four. Too late for anything.
When I visited him in the hospital, he looked smaller than I remembered. He tried to smile when I walked in. I just stood there, holding a paper coffee cup, not knowing what to say. I think he apologized, but I don’t remember the words. I just remember nodding and saying it was okay, even though it wasn’t. Not really. But I didn’t want him to die thinking I hated him.
Now here we were, packing him into a box. Jenna finally stood up and carried it over to the hallway. She set it down near the front door, next to a stack of other boxes. She looked at me again, this time for a little longer. I gave a short nod. That was all I could manage.
Later that afternoon, we loaded the car. She drove, and I sat in the passenger seat with the box on my lap. We were taking him to the cemetery. Not to be buried, just to put him in the columbarium wall like he wanted. Some niche with a plaque. No ceremony. No speeches. He didn’t want any of that. Just to be put somewhere quiet. Jenna said it was fitting.
I looked down at the brown cardboard resting on my legs. It felt wrong to be holding him like this. I kept thinking about all the times he carried me as a kid—on his shoulders, through parking lots, up the stairs when I fell asleep in the car. And now I was carrying him. I didn’t cry. I thought I might, but nothing came. Just this dull ache, like someone pressing on a bruise.
When we got to the cemetery, Jenna did most of the talking. I stood back and let her handle the paperwork. The man in the office opened the wall and placed the urn inside. He asked if we wanted to say anything before he closed it. We both shook our heads. I think if either of us spoke, we would have lost it. He sealed it up, and just like that, it was done.
We stood there for a few minutes. The wind was cold, and I hadn’t brought a jacket. Jenna offered me hers, but I shook my head. I deserved to be cold. I deserved worse, probably. I kept thinking about all the things I didn’t say when I had the chance. Not just “I forgive you,” but “I loved you,” too. Because I did. Even with everything. I just never figured out how to say it while he was alive.
On the drive back to the house, Jenna turned on the radio. Some old song Dad used to hum when he was doing yard work. I glanced out the window and swallowed hard. I didn’t want her to see my face.
That night, we slept on the floor of the empty house. Everything was packed up, and the air felt hollow. Jenna fell asleep quickly, wrapped in a blanket. I stayed awake for a long time, staring at the ceiling. Listening to the quiet.
I don’t think grief is just about missing someone. It’s about all the chances that are gone. All the things you can’t fix. In the end, we packed him into a box because that’s all we could do. But somehow, it felt like we were packing away everything we hadn’t said, too.
The next morning, I made coffee in a paper cup and stood by the window. The sun was coming up. It looked like any other day. But it wasn’t.
I think I’ll always carry that box with me, even if it’s not in my hands anymore.
