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Margaux’s jaw falls loose. “No way.”
“Way.” I cross my arms, leaning against her doorframe.
“I’m so sorry. Why didn’t you say something when I told you his name earlier?”
“What would it have mattered? You needed me to go on this date so you can get that promotion . . . I wasn’t going to screw you over last minute.”
Margaux exhales, her head tilting. “I owe you big.”
“Yes,” I say. “Yes, you do. Still waiting on that firstborn child you promised me back in college . . .” Gifting her a wink, I yawn. “I’m going to bed. The sooner this night is over with, the better.”
“It’s barely nine o’clock . . .”
Nine o’clock to me is the equivalent of 1:00 a.m. to my sister.
I can’t remember the last time Margaux was home on a Friday night. For someone who knows everything about me, who shared a womb with me for nine months and a bedroom with me for eighteen years, she seems to have forgotten that I live for my quiet Friday nights. It’s how I unwind after a whirlwind week in a fast-paced city working alongside art hustlers who never sleep. I’m all about balance, and that requires making time to be alone with myself. My biggest fear is burning out doing something I love. I don’t know what I’d do if I didn’t have my love of art keeping my soul ablaze.
“Well aware,” I say. “It’s what us boring people do on the weekends.”
With that, I make my way to the hall bath, strip out of Margaux’s frilly fashion, and wash up for bed.
It’s only when I’m lying wide awake a half hour later, replaying the strangeness that was my evening, that I decide to search up Roman’s late wife online. After a fruitless twenty minutes on Google, I run through my contacts and shoot out a dozen text messages to my art-world friends, asking if they know anything about the infamous Roman Bellisario’s late wife.
Almost all the responses I receive are to the tune of I had no idea that guy was ever married.
Except for one.
Her name was Emma, my friend Carina writes. Emma Whitfield. I don’t believe she ever took his last name. She was cousins with my college roommate, believe it or not. I met her a couple of times. So sad about her passing. She was super sweet. Gave me her shoes once when we all went out for New Year’s Eve one year. Mine were giving me blisters, so she traded with me.
No wonder the man can’t get over her.
She sounds like a damn saint.
With that, I run a search on Emma Whitfield + NYC + obituary, and I click on the top result.
Emma Whitfield of Manhattan passed away Sunday, June 28, 2020. Emma was born in Boston, Massachusetts, the only child of Warren and Laurel Whitfield, on January 2, 1990. Growing up, Emma excelled in language arts and broke several girls’ lacrosse records at her high school. She went on to attend the University of Massachusetts on a full lacrosse scholarship, where she majored in English literature with a minor in printmaking. Upon graduation, Emma moved to New York City, where she worked as a private tutor and freelance copywriter. Soon after her move, she met her future husband and soulmate, Roman. They bonded over their love of all things fine art and were inseparable from the moment they met.
Emma and Roman were united in marriage August 15, 2015, in a beautiful ceremony at her grandmother’s summer home off the coast of Narragansett. They exchanged vows in front of over four hundred beloved friends and family members before spending three weeks touring much of Europe for their honeymoon.
Emma is survived by her husband, Roman, and their daughters, Adeline and Marabel, her parents, grandparents, and countless loved ones. She is preceded in death by a cousin, Deirdre Allison, and her beloved rescue cat, Karma.
Please join us in celebrating Emma’s life at the Saint Paul Memorial Center at 2:00 p.m. Wednesday, July 1.
I scroll down to a video at the bottom of her obituary, one filled with assorted photos of a beautiful existence cut short. Every image of her bears three things in common—she looks happy, beautiful, and overflowing with life. A bittersweet song plays along with the slideshow, one that’s somehow both uplifting and sorrowful at the same time.
I watch the whole thing.
Twice.
By the time it’s over, my cheeks are damp with tears, and my heart is full of something that wasn’t there before—compassion for Roman Bellisario.
Darkening my screen, I put my phone aside and close my eyes.
His wife’s death coincides almost perfectly with his campaign to have me fired. Could it be he was simply having a bad time? Grief stricken? Angry at the world? They say hurt people hurt people.
All these years, I thought he was heartless.
