Page 41 of Every Sweet Thing Is Bitter

I start to gather my things and get out of the truck, but Zoe does not let go of my hand. She wants to kiss me. Her lips are parted. Her head is tilted. I know exactly how it will feel: the softness of her mouth, the shyness of her tongue, her fingers wreathing into my hair and drawing me closer, closer, closer, until I drape over the center console. Zoe always kissed me in a frenzy, like the only air she could breathe was that which we had shared. I close my eyes and feel her drawing closer to me, like a planet pulling an asteroid into its orbit.

But at the last moment, I turn my head. The heat between us turns to ice as her lips brush my cheek.

“I thought you wanted me to kiss you,” she whispers.

“Not like this.”

“I’m trying to comfort you.”

My desire for Zoe is sharp, but my grief for my mother is sharper. “Don’t kiss me out of pity, Zoe. I don’t deserve that.”

The rumble of Sara’s car turning onto the driveway draws the moment to an unceremonious end. When I meet Sara on the front porch, she squeezes my shoulder affectionately. The dogs follow us inside, each carrying a toy in their mouth.

“Do you want food?” Sara is already opening the kitchen cabinets. “Maybe a cup of tea?”

“I just want to sleep.”

“Oh, Providence, I’m so sorry.”

“I’ll be okay.” My voice is fragile.

“It’s never easy, losing a parent,” she says. “Take it from someone who’s lost both. Even if you know it’s going to happen, it always feels too soon. It’s like watching a bridge collapse while you’re still standing on it.”

I shower and wash my face. Sara leaves a cup of tea on my nightstand. I draw the curtains, turn off my phone, and collapse onto the air mattress. The sheet I cast over myself is as white as the one covering my mother’s body. I think of her mangled leg when I close my eyes. Every few minutes, I reach for my ankles to make sure they have not spontaneously severed from my body. I palpate my legs and try to guess which tendon was keeping my mother’s ankle attached.

Sara knocks at the door. When she opens it, Zenobia trots in.

“She’s been scratching at your door,” Sara says. “She can tell you’re sad.”

I cannot even bring myself to sit upright. I ache all over. “I’m not sad. I’m …”

“She’ll be good company for you.”

Sara closes the door before I can protest or ask her to take away the tea. Zenobia noses through the pile of dirty clothes onmy suitcase, then hops onto the air mattress. She curls up beside me and presses her back against mine.

Silence suffocates the trailer, heavy and dark like widow’s weeds. Sara has gone to bed. The dogs have purged themselves of their evening barks and howls. Now there’s only me and my white noise machine playing ocean waves on a loop. When I dial Grace’s number, it’s mostly because I’m desperate to hear another human voice.

She answers in a small, muffled tone. “Hi, Providence.” I picture her lost in a puddle of blankets, her hair mussed and her eyes rimmed with salt.

“Hi. I just—I thought I should call. See if you’re okay.”

“I feel like I’m underwater,” she says. “It’s like I can see the surface, but no matter how hard I swim, I can’t break through. She didn’t deserve this, to—to just be left like that. Like a piece of trash.”

“Carrion,” I say, rolling onto my back. My movement disturbs Zenobia, who makes her displeasure clear with a sidelong glare. She licks her chops sleepily before lowering her head back onto the corner of my pillow.

“What?”

“Dead flesh. It’s what vultures eat.”

She chastises me with a temporary silence. “You’re making things worse.”

I read between the lines:if you’d had your way, she would have been carrion thirteen years ago. My heartache will never be pure.

“Is Harmony with you?”

“She stopped by on her way to the bar.” She sounds sheepish, as if Harmony’s desertion is a reflection of her own character. The three of us echo through each other inescapably. “Mitesh and Karishma stayed longer when they dropped off theircasserole. Everyone’s bringing casseroles, like I’ll forget my mom was murdered if I just shovel a few platefuls of tater tots and Velveeta into my mouth.”

“It’s what you do when people die,” I say.

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