“Come here, honey,” Mom said, pulling me into a hug. She moved on to Neil, who for once didn’t look vaguely uncomfortable when my mom put her arms around him. Then, she stepped back. “Sophie, let’s talk a minute.”
I looked to Neil, and he nodded in response to the questions I hadn’t spoken. Is it okay? Can I leave you? Will you be all right, just for this minute?
Mom and I walked outside, and the January cold was a relief after being crammed in the tiny vestibule with the body heat of so many people. Nearby, a few men had grouped together for cigarettes, which struck me as morbidly funny. Smoke, outside a crematorium. I was a total sicko for internally laughing.
“How are you holding up, sweetheart?” Mom couldn’t resist straightening the shoulders of my dress. “You look good.”
“I look good. I feel like shit,” I said with a half-hearted laugh.
Mom’s brows drew together in sympathy. “How’s Neil? Tell me the truth.”
“Scary. Neil is scary.” At Mom’s alarmed expression, I clarified, “He’s so stoic. I get why. He’s private, and he doesn’t like showing a lot of emotion. But I’m worried about him. After what happened when his mom died…”
“Do you think he’s going to hurt himself?” she asked, her voice low.
I answered her honestly. “I don’t know. I’m worried that it’s a possibility.”
“Maybe not. You two have Olivia, now.” Even she didn’t sound convinced.
“I don’t know if that will be enough.” God, what if he did… My stomach roiled. I’d already almost lost Neil once. There was no way I could let something as horrible as suicide happen to him. “I’m keeping an eye on him. I’ve got this.”
I so didn’t have it.
After most of the mourners left, Valerie’s car arrived. She turned to Neil. “We’ll see you at the dinner, then?”
He shook his head. “No. I’m staying here with her. Until…”
Valerie nodded. She looked down at her hands. “I just… I wanted to say…” She pressed a tissue to her nose.
“Oh, Vee,” he said softly, putting a hand on her upper arm.
She raised her head. “Thank you. For our daughter.”
I had to turn away, my ribs aching from holding my breath. If I didn’t breathe, I couldn’t cry.
When it was just Neil and me left, we went back into the sanctuary. The lights in the chapel had been dimmed, and the musicians had left long ago. The curtains were open. Michael and Emma were gone.
Neil seemed to deflate as he sat down, like there was nothing left in him. I stood beside him, my hands on his shoulders, which were hard as iron beneath his suit. I kneaded his neck gently. When he’d been in the hospital recovering from his scary post-transplant crash, he’d gotten horrible tension headaches. I would rub his neck and try to soothe away the pain, and it had always seemed to help. But there was nothing to be done for the emotional and psychological agony he was going through, now.
After a while, he reached for one of my hands and brought it to his lips to kiss it. When he released me, I stepped away, taking the hint. He loved me, but he didn’t want to be touched, right now.
I wandered the chapel, forcing myself to be interested in the architectural details that made the whole place look like a cross between Independence Hall and the interior of a half-cut up birthday cake. The silence was overwhelming, so I listened to the ticking of my heels against the floor to break the monotony.
“I held her before she was a minute old,” Neil said softly.
I turned, startled by the sound of his voice after such a long time. I couldn’t think of anything to say, other than, “Yeah?”
“I was there when they delivered her. And they put her in my arms, and I held her up to Valerie, so she could see her while she was still under the—” He made a cutting-off motion in front of his chest to indicate a surgical drape. “I carried Emma from the surgery to the nursery. And, today, I carried her here.”
“You were there for the whole thing.” I didn’t want to sound like I was trying to put a positive spin on his daughter’s death, or cheer him up. I knew he saw himself as a failure because he hadn’t been able to protect Emma. No one who knew him, who really knew him, would have to ask him to know that was true. “You were full time. If she needed you—”
“When I wasn’t working.” He scoffed. “God, I was a fool. All that time she spent with nannies, with tutors, at camp and at school… I could have had them all.”
“And you wouldn’t have been able to give her the amazing life that you did. You and Valerie both. You made a person who was the very best parts of both of you. Without your influence, she wouldn’t have been as driven, or as kind or…” My chest squeezed. “You did what you were supposed to do, and she turned out…she…”
All of the emotions I’d been carefully packing down to deal with later were like, surprise, bitch! Later is now! The tightly compressed ball of hurt trapped in my ribs let go, and a shocked wail burst from me. All at once, the horrible realization that this was it, that Emma and Michael were really dead, knocked the wind out of me. This wasn’t a matter of a few shitty days, and then it would be over, and eve
rything would be back to normal. Emma and Michael were gone forever. She would never roll her eyes at me, again. He would never surprise us all with a rare comeback to Neil’s fond hostility.