So instead, Rachel thought, you robbed us of each other.
Rachel sat at his grave for the better part of an hour. She waited to hear his voice in the wind or the trees.
And it came, it actually came. But it wasn’t pretty.
You want someone to tell you why.
Yes.
Why there’s pain and loss. Why earthquakes and hunger.
But mostly:
Why no one gives a shit about you, Rachel.
“Stop,” she was pretty sure she said aloud.
You know what the answer is?
“Just stop.”
Because.
“Because what?” she said to the quiet of the cemetery.
Because nothing. Just because.
She lowered her head and didn’t weep. Didn’t make a sound. But for a very long time, she couldn’t stop shaking.
You’ve come a long way to get this answer.
And here it is. At long last. Right in front of your face.
She raised her head. Opened her eyes. Stared at it. A foot and a half tall, twenty inches wide.
It’s granite and dirt.
And there’s no more to it.
She didn’t leave the cemetery until the sun fell halfway down its black trees. It was close to four in the afternoon. She’d arrived at ten in the morning.
She never heard his voice again. Not once.
On the train back north, she looked out the window, but it was night and all she could see of the cities and towns was the blur of lights and the dark in between.
Most of the time, she couldn’t see anything at all out there. Just her own reflection. Just Rachel. Still alone.
Still on the wrong side of the mirror.
II
BRIAN
2011–2014
9
THE SPARROW
Rachel and Brian Delacroix crossed paths again six months after their last e-mail contact, in the spring, at a bar in the South End.
He ended up there because it was a few blocks from his apartment and that night, the first of the year to hint of summer, the streets smelled damp and hopeful. She went to the bar because she’d gotten divorced that afternoon and needed to feel brave. She worried her fear of people was metastasizing and she wanted to get on top of it, to prove to herself she was in command of her own neuroses. It was May, and she’d barely left the house since early winter.
She’d go out for groceries but only when the supermarket was at its emptiest. Seven o’clock on a Tuesday morning was ideal, the pallets of shrink-wrapped stock still waiting in the middle of the aisles, the dairy guys talking smack to the deli guys, the cashiers putting their purses away and yawning into cardboard cups of Dunkin’s, bitching about the commute, the weather, their impossible kids, their impossible husbands.
When she needed her hair cut, she always scheduled the last appointment of the day. Same for the rare manicure or pedicure. Most other wants could be satisfied online. Soon, what started as a choice—staying out of the public eye to avoid scrutiny or its bedfellow, judgment—grew into a habit that bordered on addiction. Before Sebastian officially left her, he’d been sleeping in the guest room for months; prior to that, he’d slept on his boat in the South River, a tidal flat that emptied into Massachusetts Bay. It was fitting—Sebastian had probably never loved her, probably never loved any human being, but, man, he loved that boat. Once he was gone, though, her primary motivation for leaving the house—to escape him and all his toxic disregard—was neutralized.
But spring hit, and she could hear voices, unhurried and pleasant, return to the street along with the shouts of children, the clack of stroller wheels along the sidewalk, the squeak and snap of screen doors. The house she’d purchased with Sebastian was thirty miles south of Boston in Marshfield. It was a seaside town, though their house sat a full mile inland, which was fine because Rachel wasn’t a fan of the ocean. Sebastian, of course, loved the sea, had even taught her to scuba dive back in the early days of their courtship. When she finally admitted to him that she hated being submerged in liquid as potential predators watched her from the depths, instead of being flattered she’d temporarily conquered her fear to make him happy, he accused her of pretending to love the things he loved in order to “trap” him. She’d retorted that one only trapped things one wanted to eat and she’d lost her appetite for him a long time ago. It was a nasty thing to say, but when a relationship collapsed with the speed and severity of hers and Sebastian’s, nasty became the norm. Once the divorce was final, they would put the house on the market and split any profit to be had, and she’d need to find another place.
Which was fine. She missed the city, had never taken to having to drive everywhere. And if her notoriety was difficult to escape in the city, it was impossible in a small town, where gazes came steeped in gradations of provincialism. Just a couple of weeks back, she’d been caught out in the open while pumping gas; she hadn’t realized until she pulled in with a bone-dry tank that the station was self-serve only. Three high school girls, reality-TV-ready in their push-up bras, yoga pants, satiny blowouts, and diamond-cut cheekbones, exited the Food Mart on their way to a boy in a skintight thermal sweatshirt and distressed jeans, who pumped gas into a pristine Lexus SUV. As soon as they noticed Rachel, the trio started whispering and shoving each other. When she looked over, one of them reddened and dropped her gaze but the other two doubled down. The dark-haired one with the peach highlights mimed someone guzzling from a bottle and her honey-blond partner-in-bitch screwed up her features into a pantomime of helpless weeping, then wrung her hands in the air as if freeing them of seaweed.
The third one said, “Guys, stop,” but it came out half lament, half giggle, and then the laughter broke from all their pretty-ugly mouths like Friday-night Kahlúa vomit.
Rachel hadn’t left the house since. She almost ran out of food. She did run out of wine. Then vodka. She ran out of sites to surf and shows to watch. Then Sebastian called to remind her the divorce hearing was scheduled for that Tuesday, May 17, at three-thirty.
She made herself presentable and drove into the city. She realized only after she’d gotten on Route 3 heading north that it had been six months since she’d driven on a highway. The other cars raced and revved and swarmed. Their bodies gleamed like knives in the harsh sunlight. They engulfed her, stabbing at the air, surging and stabbing and braking, red taillights flashing like furious eyes. Great, Rachel thought as the anxiety found her throat and her skin and the roots of her hair, now I’m afraid of driving.