When they left, I changed into a pair of jeans—an old, soft pair, warm from the sun, and a sweatshirt. My skin was covered with goose bumps, and the touch of the soft fabric on my skin was so good I could have cried. Though the air was warm, I was deeply chilled, shivering from a primal place. I curled up on the blanket and let the air rush from my lungs. Below my heavy, closed eyelids I could feel my pulse, keeping time.
The beach was silent now, the sea quiet, and I lay still, not wanting to disturb any of it, not wanting to turn it to stone.
I gathered my things as the last light faded from the sky. I was light-headed with hunger. I could go to one of the tavernas with the gorgeous views, but the thought of eating alone suddenly felt unbearable. I’d get something at the port. To hold me over I stopped instead at a little bakery, about to close, and bought some sesame cookies and orange juice, like I’d just given blood. Then I got into my car and ate three of the cookies, crumbs falling all over my jeans, the seat. I drank the container of juice all at once, some of it dribbling on my chin, which I wiped with my sleeve. I drove away.
•
Although my parents had died in Chicago, an accident in the snow, in my mind it’s always here, on this stretch of road. I don’t know why. The day they died my father had been driving, though probably because my mother was drunk. He hated driving, and my desire to learn at sixteen baffled him. But once I’d learned, he loved when I’d drive him around. When we’d attend gatherings together he’d tell his friends I had driven, as though he were telling them I’d taken him there in my helicopter, or flown in on a magic carpet.
I was grateful for the dark drive, the ability to see only ten feet ahead. No more than I needed, a need-to-know basis. Still, I kept my eyes sharp for a woman walking as if she’d come from the sea. The darkness was a relief. I didn’t want to be reminded of that spectacular landscape, the twists and turns and gorgeous sea views. At that moment I needed the anonymity of night driving, the near terror of turning a sharp, steep corner and feeling I might fly off the cliff. I needed to feel the dropping heft inside me as I veered straight into the black night sky, only my headlights to remind me of the surrounding darkness.
Wasn’t facing loss the same? Breathe in, breathe out. To see the entire landscape was just too much, the green hills in the distance, the setting sun over the glass sea, the vibrant supermoon. Grief was oceanic; you could get lost in it, as if swimming in deep water while not knowing which end was up. For a moment I experienced the intense sensation of someone next to me, but the passenger seat held only my bag. I thought of the professional mourners, those women hired to lament at funerals, to perform grief, and I finally understood the point. Grief never appeared the way we expected, and it snuck up in terrifying, surprising waves. Others needed to see it translated into something visceral and simple, something that could be read, understood. Because when we’re in its midst it cannot be translated at all.
In the small rooftop shed, I found the furniture I had dragged there a few summers ago, my father protesting that I’d hurt myself hauling it up there but then being delighted by the rooftop sitting area. I pulled out one of the two divans and a small wooden table. Years ago, Aris and I had slept here, beneath thin cotton blankets and the bright night sky. I woke in the middle of the night and he was standing at the ledge, looking out at the view; from there you could see the dark sea. And then I realized he was pissing out onto the narrow alley. I didn’t want to startle him so I just watched, amusedly, and when he turned to come back to bed he saw me sitting up and he shrugged, laughed.
I poured the last two shots from a bottle of whiskey into a glass, took a sip, and set it aside. Before I could change my mind, I emptied out my parents’ closets and drawers—there were not many things—into a separate bag, saving a soft oxford and a gray T-shirt of my father’s, and an elegant trench coat and two silk scarves of my mother’s, all of which she’d had since before my birth. I pulled my wild beach hair back in a scarf and put the oxford on over my hot skin. I tried on the jacket, slipped on my mother’s slippers. In every hiding space, the chest of blankets and sweaters, the linen closet, the bathroom cabinet, there were near-empty liquor bottles. I gathered them into a bag.
Now, the whiskey burned and I enjoyed it. Drink still in hand, I walked back to the dumpster. First I tossed the empty bottles, again satisfied to hear the crash of more glass breaking. Then I was about to toss in the old clothes but instead left them in the shopping bag, on the ground. Perhaps someone would find them. I knew I was about to face another salty wave of grief, and at least I knew what to expect. Its familiarity soothed me. It belonged to me, just the way
