The day goes by as days at work do. I find myself enjoying the camaraderie of my job for the first time in months. I like being needed here. I like talking to people about books. I like it when kids ask where to find something and I can squeeze in a mini-lesson on the Dewey decimal system.
Around noon, the boxes of books are delivered and brought to my desk. I don’t have the shelf set up yet, so they sit on the floor, burying my desk. I recognize some of the titles. Ben used to have some of them before I gave them to Susan. Others look new to me. Some look pretty interesting; others look mind-numbingly stupid. As I take stock, I laugh about the fact that my husband used to love to read children’s books. Life never turns out like you think. You don’t think you’d end up with a man that likes to read literature aimed at twelve-year-olds; you also don’t think you’ll lose that man so soon. But if that’s the case, I have many more surprises left in my life, and they can’t all be bad.
I call Susan and tell her about the books. I can’t tell if she’s laughing or crying.
“You actually said to them that the books can’t get musty?”
“Yep,” I say from my desk. “They have to donate them someplace else.”
She laughs, even if she’s crying. “I might finally take out a library book then,” she tells me. I laugh. “Actually,” she says, “I want to do it too. I’ll add to the fund. I don’t want them to ever run out of fresh-smelling books.”
“Really?” I ask, excited. “Oh, man! We can make it the Ben and Susan Ross Young Adult Section.”
“No, your name should be there too. Oh! And Steven’s! It should say The Ross Family Young Adult Section. For the four of us. Cool?”
I try not to acknowledge the tenderness of the moment, but I can’t help but be overwhelmed.
“Okay,” I say, my voice small and quiet.
“E-mail me later and tell me where to send the check, okay? I’ll call you this weekend.”
I hang up the phone and try to go back to work, but my mind is fluttering from one thing to another.
Mr. Callahan doesn’t come through the doors all day. I ask Nancy when she saw him last.
“Oh, geez,” she says. “It’s been at least two months.”
When five o’clock rolls around, I excuse myself and head to Cedars-Sinai hospital.
I ask the nurse at the front desk where I can find Mrs. Lorraine Callahan. The nurse looks her up in the computer and says there is no Lorraine Callahan currently admitted. I get back in the car and drive down the street from the library. I find the house I think is Mr. Callahan’s.
I walk up to the front door and ring the doorbell. It doesn’t seem like it’s ringing so I knock on the door. It takes a few tries before he comes. When he does, he opens the door and looks at me through the screen.
“Elsie?” he says, disbelieving.
“Hey, George, can I come in?”
He opens the screen and makes room for me at the door. The house looks disheveled and sad. I know that Lorraine is not here.
“How are you, George?”
“I’m fine,” he says, not really listening to my question.
“How are you?” I say, this time more sincere, more pointed.
His voice turns to a quiver. “I can’t even get out of bed most days,” he says. “It’s not worth it.”
“It is,” I say. “It is worth it.”
He shakes his head. “You don’t know,” he says. “No one does.”
“No, you’re right about that,” I say. “You two were together for so long. I can’t begin to imagine how lost you must feel. The thing is though, George, you may be old, but you have a lot of fight in you. Lorraine wouldn’t want you to go down this easy.” I grab his shoulder and focus his eyes on mine. “C’mon,” I say. “Let’s go get a beer.”
And just like that, I am there for someone. I am not the one in pain. I am not suffering. I am helping. My life without Ben felt like it was nothing, but here I am, doing something with it.