Sisterhood Everlasting (10 page)

She hung up the phone. Her heart kept on with its same heavy thud. She listened for the sounds of Carmen’s and Bee’s footsteps even though they were gone and had been since that morning.

They hadn’t been able to look at one another to say goodbye. Between them was a seething, putrid mess of blame and fear and recrimination:
What have we done? How did we let this happen? What did you know? What did I know? What didn’t you tell me? What didn’t I tell myself?

They had let Tibby slip away from them into complete darkness and
not even known
.

What does this mean about us? Who are we now? Who have we become?

When Bridget called Eric from the airport in Athens to let him know when she was getting in, he told her he’d take the afternoon off work to pick her up from the airport and to spend some time with her. She landed at SFO and saw his anxious face the moment she passed through the doors from the terminal into the baggage claim.

He took her in his arms right away. “I’m so sorry,” he murmured in her ear. He rocked her, saying it over and over.

But no matter how many times he said it, no matter how much she knew he meant it, the words stirred around in her ear but didn’t get into her brain. Sometimes he could comfort her. Sometimes he said what she needed, but today he couldn’t reach her. Nothing could.

She stared out the car window on the way home. She watched the brown hills, wondering when they would be green again. Eric didn’t try to make her talk.

As they headed into the Mission she experienced a stretch of time when she couldn’t remember where she lived. She kept picturing the place they’d had when Eric had first moved out here, when they’d first moved in together, the little place on Oak Street. She couldn’t remember anything of what her life was after that.

When she stepped into the apartment, it didn’t seem to belong to her, though she’d picked it—even forced Eric into it. She saw that Eric had laid the table with things she loved: a black bean burrito from Pancho’s, a sliced ripe avocado, a bowl of cubed mango, a plate of oatmeal cookies, and a pitcher of lemonade made with seltzer. She turned to him and thanked him by putting her arms around him. She was grateful, she really was. Even if none of it seemed to relate to her anymore. Even if she couldn’t eat any of it.

“Okay, here’s the big surprise,” he announced, throwing open the bedroom door.

Bridget stared into the little room in disbelief. There was a bed. A big wooden four-poster job riding high with its box spring and mattress, its fluffy comforter and pile of pillows.

“Brand-new sheets and everything,” Eric declared proudly. He walked toward it and she followed, slowly.

“I realized we’ve never had a bed,” he said, admiring it, patting it with his open hand. “We always sleep on a mattress on the floor or a futon or something. I feel like it’s time for us to have a real bed, you know? I took a while picking it out. There were a lot of different kinds. I hope you like it.”

He turned to look at her. She couldn’t say anything. She sat on the floor in the doorway and burst into tears.

“Bee, what?” Eric asked, kneeling down next to her. “What is it?”

She couldn’t catch her breath. He put his arms around her, but she couldn’t settle her gasping.

“Please. Tell me what’s wrong.”

“I—I don’t want that b-bed,” she sobbed.

“Why not? What’s wrong with it? I thought you’d like it.”

She looked up at it. “It’s n-not a b-bad bed. B-but do you have any i-idea—” She stopped and again she tried to catch her breath. “H-how hard it will be to m-move?”

“I don’t want to move. I want to stay here. I want to settle down with you. I can take care of you, Bee.”

She felt like her lungs had turned inside out. They wouldn’t fill with air. It was urgent, what she felt, but she couldn’t explain it. She could never make him understand.

Lena believed it was the afternoon after the day Carmen and Bridget had left for the airport. She calculated it was the day after she’d spoken to the coroner and left a message for Kostos. She’d sat for a long time at the kitchen table and then she lay on the couch in the dark while some amount of time passed. It was probably the next day, but an extra day could have slouched away and a new day could have slipped under the door, and she might not have noticed it.

She believed, though, it was the day after they’d left that Kostos arrived.

She heard the knock on the door, and she gathered herself up off the couch and opened it. She didn’t expect it would be him. She didn’t expect it would be anybody. It used to be that a knock on the door indicated someone was almost definitely there, but just as time had gone haywire, her mind had shrunken away from most matters of cause and effect. Occurrences just kind of bubbled up in front of her eyes and either stayed there for a while or disappeared again. The occurrence, in this case, was Kostos.

He opened his arms to her, and she walked into them. He wrapped her tightly and she felt her face pressing into his cotton shirt. The smell in his collar was very familiar. He’d somehow fallen
back down into the world where she lived. She sensed the emotions, the surprise and strangeness of this, but she couldn’t quite feel them.

“Come in,” she said, and she led the way to the couch. She’d forgotten how dark it was, that all the shutters were closed, until he was sitting next to her and she couldn’t see his face.

“I guess it’s dark in here,” she said wanly, walking to a front window and unlatching it. The sunshine crashed through, more of it than had been invited.

His face was sad, she realized. He picked up her hand and held it. She thought to ask him what was wrong. She was confused, forgetting where she was again. And then she remembered. On the whole, forgetting was easier, but it never stayed away long.

“Tibby’s gone,” she said. She had no idea there were tears leaking out, but there they were. Her face was wet; they had to be hers.

He nodded. Somehow he knew about it already. That was a relief in a way, because she wasn’t sure she could put enough words in a row to explain it.

“She drowned.”

He nodded again.

“Here.”

“That’s what I heard.”

“I thought you would probably be in London.”

“I was.”

“How did you get here?”

“On a plane.”

She nodded in spite of her confusion. Did that mean he’d come here because she’d called him? Did that make sense? This and other possibilities hovered in the air, but she couldn’t consolidate them. “I felt like I should be able to handle the police and the coroner and the embassy and everything else, but I haven’t done very well at it.”

“I hope I can help.”

She nodded. “They’ve all gone back. Tibby’s parents and Carmen and Bridget. They were all gone by yesterday morning. I think.” She paused. She was going to say something about Tibby going with them. Tibby’s body going with them. But she couldn’t figure out the way you said it. There was a way you said things like that. “I think it was yesterday morning.”

“I see,” he said.

“At first we thought it was an accident, but now it seems like she knew she was going to drown.”

He tipped his head; his eyes registered confusion. “What do you mean?” He looked not just sad but surprised now.

“It seems like she brought us here to say goodbye.” These were things Lena had not dared say out loud to anyone or even fully think, and here she was saying them to him. She who usually did so much thinking and considering for every word that left her mouth, she didn’t think at all. She just opened her mouth and these were the words that came out.

“Why do you think that?” His face was tender. He was still holding her hand.

“Because she left things for us. To say goodbye.”

Kostos nodded. He was quiet for some time. “Are you sure?”

She shook her head. “Not of anything anymore. But she wrote to us about getting along without her. She left us envelopes of things to be opened later, when she said she knew she couldn’t be with us.”

“Could she have been planning to go somewhere? To move away?”

Lena considered. “She wrote to us about how she wanted us to remember her.”

With the hand that wasn’t holding hers, Kostos rubbed his eyes. “It does seem like she knew something was going to happen.”

“Yes.”

“And you are afraid that if she did, then maybe she meant for it to happen.”

That was the step Lena couldn’t follow. You would think that, but she couldn’t have meant for it to happen.

“Did anyone talk to the police or the coroner about that?”

She shook her head, stricken. “Because I just can’t imagine it.” She didn’t remember crying, but her face was wet again. She hoped he wouldn’t notice.

“But that’s how it seems.”

“That’s how it seems.”

Bridget sat down at the laden kitchen table and stood up again. She paced the sunless room. She ate half a slice of avocado and felt it curdling her stomach.

She couldn’t seem to focus on Eric’s face, or really on anything. Her eyeballs seemed to vibrate in their sockets. She tried to sit down again, but she couldn’t. Her legs would not be still. She felt Eric’s concerned eyes on her and tried not to let the panic show. He was expecting her to tell him about Tibby, but she couldn’t do it.

“I’m going to walk,” she announced. “I need to get something at the drugstore.”

He stood. “I can get it. I don’t mind.”

“No, thanks. I need to move around a little. I was on a plane for a lot of hours.”

“But you didn’t eat yet.”

She grabbed half the burrito in its foil to eat on the way. “It’s a girl thing I need. Can’t really wait.” She was halfway to the door before he could stop her.

“Do you want company?” he asked, following her.

“No, no. I’ll be back soon.” She didn’t even look behind her. She stumbled down the stairs and let the big door close after her with a bang.

She walked. She walked quickly without thinking of where to go. She paused long enough to drop the half burrito into a garbage can. She would have liked to have her bike, but she didn’t want to go back for it. She didn’t walk to the drugstore. She didn’t get or need girl things. She needed to keep moving.

She walked up Divisadero Street and saw the sunset. It was a beautiful pink, orange, and deep gray sky, but the beauty of it didn’t enter her eyes. It stayed on their surface, a reflection.

She would have kept walking down into the Marina and into the sea, but the thought buzzed and nagged every few minutes like a clock-radio alarm set to snooze that just would not leave you alone: Eric was waiting for her. Eric was sitting with a table of her favorite food. Eric was worried about her, and the thought of him wouldn’t leave her alone.

At last that alarm nagged so loudly she stopped and turned
around and walked straight back down Divisadero. She walked all the way home, harnessing her panic to propel some kind of plan. A bad plan, a wrong plan, but the only plan she could tolerate.

“I was starting to worry about you,” Eric said as soon as she walked in the door.

She went directly to the bathroom and closed the door. She hadn’t been sensible enough to bring home a bag. “You shouldn’t worry,” she called through the door.

She sat on the closed toilet and put her head in her hands.

This is the man you love
, some part of her felt the need to say.

I don’t even know what that means
, the rest of her responded.
I don’t know how to do that now
.

She thought of the bed. The four posters. She came out of the bathroom when she could.

Eric was reading legal papers at the kitchen table. He’d put away the food.

She stood sheepishly in the doorway. She touched her fingers to the messy part in her hair. She hadn’t washed it in days. “Hey,” she said quietly.

He smiled at her, but his smile was uncertain. “Do you want to watch something? A movie?”

She nodded. It seemed easier than talking. He spent a lot of time perusing their small library. She knew he wanted to be careful. Nothing with death. Nothing dark or challenging. At last he put on
The Princess Bride
. He knew she loved it. It would be distracting if not captivating.

He sat on the couch and she sat between his knees on the floor, trying to figure out some way to settle her restless legs short of chopping them off.

The movie was neither captivating nor distracting. By the time they got to the fire swamp, Eric was yawning and Bridget could no longer pretend to sit still. She reached for the remote and turned it off.

“You go to bed,” she suggested. “I know you’re tired. I’ll unpack for a few minutes and then I’ll join you.”

“I wish you’d come now,” he said, but with a look of resignation.

“I need to unpack a few things. I’m on Greek time.” She stopped herself before she added a third poor excuse.

He went into the bedroom and she went through the motions of opening her suitcase in the living room and pulling things out of it. Soon enough she heard the rhythmic sound of his breathing.

Eric always fell asleep quickly, in the way of a good person. He slept deeply, the reward for innocence and hard work.