Identity

“He seemed like a really solid guy.”

“Transient—he was up front on that at the start. But solid in the moment.” She shrugged again. “Gone now. It doesn’t matter,” she said, and meant it. “He doesn’t matter.”

Before Sam left he checked the locks on the back door, as he always did.

“I’ll see you tomorrow. Or I can pick you up, take you if you want.”

“I’ve got Bill’s car.”

“I’ve never been to a funeral Mass.”

“Me neither.” And even the idea had her stomach churning. “We’ll stick together.”

“Right.” He hugged her, as he always did. “Lock the door behind me.”

She knew he waited until he heard the locks click, just as she knew she’d obsessively check the back door locks again. Then the front door before she went to bed.

Alone, she walked into Nina’s empty room, where the cheerful walls showed their deeper shades where pictures had hung.

Flower posters—always flowers for Nina. And the faded square where she’d had her corkboard to pin up drawings from young cousins, her nieces and nephews. She’d pinned up notes to herself, appointment cards.

Nothing left but those shapes to say Nina Ramos lived here.

She’d have to get another housemate. She couldn’t really afford the mortgage and everything else without that income. But she didn’t know how she could bear having someone else in this room.

She shut off the light, closed the door, and told herself she’d deal with it because she had to.

At ten the next morning, she sat with Sam in a pew behind the rows of Nina’s family.

Her parents, grandparents, siblings, cousins, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, some who’d traveled in from out of state and as far away as Mexico.

Family, friends, coworkers, others she’d gone to school with, customers from the garden center, packed the church. One of her cousins sang, and beautifully.

Though her sister gave the core eulogy, others spoke. Since Nina’s mother had asked Morgan to speak, she slid out of the pew, walked by the flower-draped casket, and talked of her friendship, talked of how Nina had helped her make her first home a home, taught her how to plant her first garden, had given her family when she’d been so far away from her own.

It was all like a dream, the ritual, the music, the flowers, the words—even her own words.

When it was done, she wondered why she felt no different than she had when it began. As she drove with the others to the cemetery, she thought that after the burial, after that ritual, those words, she’d feel some lessening of grief, some sense of closure—or the inching toward it.

But when again she sat beside Sam, this time gripping his hand as if she’d float away without that anchor, nothing changed. The priest said more words, and she sensed comfort in them even if she couldn’t feel it.

She felt the cool April air on her face, saw the green of the grass, the grays and white of marble headstones. The flowers, so many flowers for Nina.

Somewhere—not far—a bird sang.

The sun dashed off the polished wood of the coffin. It illuminated the blanket of white roses over it.

She thought of Nina inside it, in the pale pink dress her mother had chosen. They’d had no viewing, but Mama wanted her to wear the pink dress, to have a white rosebud in her hair.

But she wasn’t in there, Morgan realized. Nina wasn’t inside the silk-lined box in her pink dress with a rose in her hair.

She’d gone to wherever those who leave us go. She’d gone before Morgan had come home to find her lying on the floor.

Already gone.

Graves and stones and words and music weren’t for the dead, but the living they left behind.

Somehow, believing that, she allowed herself to sink, for a moment. For a moment, she pressed her face to Sam’s shoulder, let the grief take her under.

When she could breathe again, feel that cool spring air again, she’d inched, just a little, toward closure.

She embraced the family, one by one. She gave and exchanged condolences through a headache that came on like a storm.

As she walked back to Bill’s car, she thought, one more part. One more left in the ritual for the living. Back to the family home for food, for community.

It helped, more than she’d anticipated, that community. With the food, the drink, the tears, some laughter as people shared stories and memories.

Still, she slipped away after an hour as the headache raged and fatigue set in. She wanted nothing so much as to take off the black dress, one she knew she’d never wear again, then to lie down and sleep.

To be alone before she had to face what came after.

She’d have to face life again.

As she pulled into her driveway, two people got out of a car parked at the curb. She paused as they started up the walk in their black suits.

Not reporters, she thought. She’d learned to spot and avoid them over the last week.

More cops? she wondered. Insurance people?

Why now? What more did they want from her? What more could she say?

“Ms. Albright?” The male suit, graying hair, compact body, held up a badge. As did the woman, dark skin, hair in short, dark coils, deep brown eyes oddly cool.

“FBI Special Agents Morrison and Beck. Could we speak with you?”

As the headache pounded, pounded, Morgan stared at the identification. “FBI? I don’t understand.”

“We know you’ve had a difficult day, but if we could come in and explain.”

“It’s about Nina?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

She felt that tiny inch toward closure slide away again.

“All right.” She led the way. “I’ve talked to the police, and gave a statement. I honestly don’t know anything else.”

She unlocked the door, went inside.

“I can make coffee,” she offered, only because she thought she should.

The woman—Beck—nodded slightly. “If it’s not too much trouble.”

“No, it’s okay. Sit down. It’ll only take a minute.”

Instead of sitting in the living room, Morrison followed her, stood just inside the kitchen. “You have a nice house.”

“Thank you.” She saw his gaze shift to the back door as she started the coffee. “Bill, my boss, fixed the door. The police—the detectives that came after the other police that day, and the crime scene people—they said it was okay to fix the broken glass and put in the dead bolt.”

“Of course.”

“It just had the thumb lock before. He broke the glass, and just reached in and flipped it open.”

“He?”

“He, she, they, I don’t know.”

“She was home unexpectedly from work?”

Again, she thought. She had to say it all again.

“They sent her home sick. She had a cold, and it got worse at work. The coworker who drove her home because her car was in the shop said they stopped so she could buy some DayQuil. She must’ve been in bed because the bottle was on the nightstand, and a box of tissues on the bed.”

She kept her hands busy, got out mugs, creamer, sugar, spoons, a tray.