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“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.
Bridget stood in agitation by the kitchen window. She moved in agitation to the doorway of the bedroom and watched him sleep. She couldn’t get in the bed. It looked like a prison cell to her. She retrieved her hiking pack from her closet. She brought it into the living room and transferred about half of the things from her suitcase into her pack. The apartment felt like a prison to her.
She tied her sleeping bag to the pack
and left it by the front door. She grabbed her cellphone from the front table and stuck it in her pocket. She went to the side of the new bed and leaned down to kiss Eric on the temple.
“I can’t do it. I’m sorry,” she said, too quietly for him to hear.
She jotted a note and left it on the table.
I can’t stay. I have to keep moving. I’m sorry to go. I love you.
With her pack on her back and an ache in her chest, Bridget walked across the city. She walked down through Cole Valley and up into the Haight, through the disaffected late-night hordes. She walked all the way down Fulton Street to the ocean and stood on the dark beach. She took off her shoes and socks and walked to the edge of the surf. The Pacific was mighty. It could swallow anything. She took her cellphone out of her pocket and threw it as far as she could into the waves. She’d offer that for starters.
