Ana comes in with two pills and a glass of water. “I found these in your medicine cabinet,” she says. I look in her hand and I recognize them. It’s Vicodin from when Ben had a back spasm last month. He barely took any of them. I think he thought taking them made him a wimp.
I take them out of her hand without questioning and I swallow them. “Thank you,” I say. She tucks the duvet around me and goes to sleep on the couch. I’m glad she doesn’t try to sleep in bed with me. I don’t want her to take away his smell. My eyes are parched from crying, my limbs weak, but my brain needs the Vicodin to pass out. I shuffle over to Ben’s side of the bed as I get groggy and fall asleep. “I love you,” I say, and for the first time, there’s no one to hear it.
I wake up feeling hungover. I reach over to grab Ben’s hand as I do every morning, and his side of the bed is empty. For a minute I think he must be in the bathroom or making breakfast and then I remember. My devastation returns, this time duller but thicker, coating my body like a blanket, sinking my heart like a stone.
I pull my hands to my face and try to wipe away the tears, but they are flowing out of me too fast to catch up. It’s like a Whac-A-Mole of misery.
Ana comes in with a dish towel in her hands, drying them.
“You’re up,” she says, surprised.
“How observant.” Why am I being so mean? I’m not a mean person. This isn’t who I am.
“Susan called.” She is ignoring my outbursts, and for that, I am thankful.
“What did she say?” I sit up and grab the glass of water on my bedside table from last night. “What could she possibly want from me?”
“She didn’t say anything. Just to call her.”
“Great.”
“I left the number on the refrigerator. In case you did want to call her.”
“Thanks.” I sip the water and stand up.
“I have to go walk Bugsy and then I’ll be right back,” Ana says. Bugsy is her English bulldog. He drools all over everything and I want to tell her that Bugsy doesn’t need to be let out because Bugsy is a lazy sack of shit, but I don’t say any of this because I really, really want to stop being so unkind.
“Okay.”
“Do you want anything while I’m out?” she asks, and it reminds me that I asked Ben to get me Fruity Pebbles. I get right back into bed.
“No, nothing for me. Thank you.”
“Okay, I’ll be back shortly.” She thinks for a minute. “Actually, do you want me to stick around in case you decide to call her now?”
“No, thanks. I can handle it.”
“Okay, if you change your mind . . . ”
“Thanks.”
Ana leaves, and as I hear the door shut, it hits me how alone I am. I am alone in this room, I am alone in this apartment, but more to the point, I am alone in this life. I can’t even wrap my brain around it. I just get up and pick up the phone. I get the number from the front of the refrigerator and I see a magnet for Georgie’s Pizza. I fall to the floor, my cheek against the cold tile. I can’t seem to make myself get up.
DECEMBER
It was New Year’s Eve and Ana and I had this great plan. We were going to go to this party to see this guy she had been flirting with at the gym, and then we were going to leave at 11:30 p.m. We wanted to drive to the beach, open a bottle of champagne together, and ring in the new year tipsy and drenched in sea spray.