“Distract me.” The drive to the cemetery is nearly as bad as what’s waiting there. I can’t stand thinking about it—imagining it—anymore.
He pauses, the pressure of his hand holding mine increasing. I dare a glance over and see his eyebrows knit together in concentration like he’s trying to find a safe topic. “In New York, there’s a place called Eataly that’s half a city block of Italian food and groceries.”
“What?” I can’t help laughing at his choice. He grins in response. A real smile from Sterling—not a smirk—is like a rainbow coming out from the clouds. Unexpected. Beautiful. Seeing it can’t help but brighten the day. “Italy? Like the country?”
“No. E-A-T-A-L-Y,” he corrects me. He begins to describe it to me. The fishmonger station piled with crabs and whole fish on ice. Across from that a butcher. The smell of baking bread rising over the crowd and tempting visitors to glass cases full of loaves of every shape and size. Restaurants for pasta and pizza and fish—relaxed or fancy—are tucked around every corner.
“What’s your favorite?” I ask. The warmth of his hand seeps under my skin just like the rest of him is starting to.
“I’ve only ever gotten the gelato and a loaf for Francie,” he says. His eyes dart to the window. I’ve asked the wrong question again, but I’m starting to find my answers in between the ones he gives me. He’s told me before that he’s poor. A foster kid. He wouldn’t have the money to buy all that imported stuff. But I know why he’s shared it with me. It wasn’t only to distract me. It’s because he knows the best distraction is desire. It’s wanting something you can’t have.
With my hand in his, I realize he might be the only distraction I actually need.
“We’ll go there sometime,” I find myself saying, “and eat our way through.”
“You think you can handle that? You just started eating pizza without a fork,” he says.
“I’m all in, baby.” I mean it. “So, who’s Francie?”
I’m a little scared to ask, because her name’s come up before and he didn’t like me asking about her.
“My foster mom,” he says quietly.
“She adopted you?” I ask.
“Nah.” He shrugs like this isn’t a big deal but he’s careful to avoid looking at me and his hand tightens a little around mine. “I’ve only been with her a couple of years. It’s too late to adopt me now anyway.”
Sterling might act like it doesn’t bother him, but it does. I have a million more questions I want to ask about how he wound up in foster care and what happened to his parents, but I know better than to ask. He might be relaxing his guard around me but he still has teeth. I don’t know what will cause him to bite.
“Well, if she likes good bread, she’s alright in my book,” I say, turning the topic back to the subject of food.
“Francie loves to cook,” he says. “She’s taught me how to cook a bunch of stuff.”
“Really? I barely know how to make toast.”
He arches an eyebrow, his lips twitching. “Somehow that doesn’t surprise me, Lucky.”
“And why is that?”
“Do you really what me to answer that question?” he asks.
“Nope.” I laugh, shaking my head. We both know the answer. “You can teach me how to cook.”
“How about I just cook for you instead?”
“Deal.”
The rest of the drive is short and filled with more stories about New York. When I turn the Mercedes into Valmont Memorial Cemetery, my mind is on all the places I want to go now thanks to Sterling. The first headstone reminds me why we’re here, though. I fall silent and Sterling does the same. We don’t speak as I drive slowly down the narrow lanes toward our family’s section of the graveyard. There’s been a MacLaine buried here since 1810. The moss covered mausoleum bearing the family crest has been full since the seventies. I have no idea what to expect when we reach my mother’s grave.
It’s not this.
The gravestone is granite with magnolia blossoms carved across the top and a simple inscription:
Anne MacLaine. Beloved Wife and Mother.
It’s unlike my father to favor minimalism, but he’s done it here. No one consulted me on her tombstone or the funeral or any other arrangements. I don’t even know who handled them, honestly. Daddy hadn’t been available to do it. Maybe Malcolm?
Who thought they could distill her into six words? Where’s the monument she deserves? Or is this just another attempt to prevent unwanted attention? Did Daddy choose it so that no one remembers her? No one asks questions about her death? I want to kick it. I want to cry. I want to fall down and tear up the earth and take my mother back.
Sterling looms behind me, keeping a respectful distance. I need him here next to me. I need to know what to do now. “I don’t know what to say.”
“What do you feel like saying?” He moves closer until we’re side by side, staring down at the resting place of the woman he’ll never know and the woman I’ll never forget.
“Nothing,” I murmur.
“Then do that.” His hand finds mine and in his touch, I find strength. We stand there, leaves blowing all around us, autumn on the wind, until I find my voice.
“I didn’t know. You’re supposed to get to say goodbye. Life isn’t supposed to just snuff you out. She was here and then she was gone—and I don’t understand it!”
He waits for me to finish when I finally pause. “We rarely know when we’re about to lose someone. That’s why it’s called loss. You can’t plan for it. You just live with it.”
“Well, it sucks,”
