In the Distance There Is Light (4 page)

“Thank you.” Out of gratitude for Dolores asking me, I shovel some eggs into my mouth. “I’ll get my things from Jeremy’s today.”

“I’ll drive you,” she says, with that commanding tone she gets sometimes, and which Ian used to mock her for, straight to her face.

I easily agree. I want nothing more right now than for someone to make decisions for me, to make things as easy as possible, so I can focus on dealing with the really hard stuff.

Chapter Six

Jeremy’s eyes grow to the size of saucers. “You slept in Dolores’ bed?” he repeats.

I’ve met him for lunch, another pointless affair where I stab at food but don’t swallow a whole lot of it. Instead, with a strange but welcome sort of amusement, I watch his ever-shifting facial expressions.

“You know I’m not one to judge, but it just sounds so odd,” he says, recovering quickly.

“And you’re invited to dinner at your earliest convenience.” I look away from his gaze.

“Don’t change the subject. You can’t tell me you slept in Dolores’ bed and then follow up with a dinner invitation. It sounds… like you’ve all of a sudden become a couple.”

I chuckle. For the first time since Ian’s death, a genuine laugh escapes me. Then I shake my head. “I know it sounds weird, but it felt strangely comforting to sleep in her bed. There was a tenderness between us that soothed me. It’s hard to explain. It just felt good. And I’m currently not in a position to walk away from anything that will even remotely make me feel good.”

“I agree, darling, I do. But you must admit you derived some glee from telling me you shared Dolores’ bed. For which I’m very happy, by the way. Anytime you want to shock me for your sheer amusement, be my guest.”

In the seven years I’ve known Jeremy, there aren’t a lot of things I haven’t told him. He’s the only person who knows about that time I was so close to breaking up with Ian, I had already started looking through apartment listings. He’s the one who talked me out of it. Not because he’s so skilled at relationships, but because he’d glimpsed the possibility of me, of the person I could grow into, with Ian.

“She asked me to stay with her.”

“Of course she did,” Jeremy says in that quick-as-lightning way of his.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” My voice sounds more wounded than I’d like it to be.

“Nothing, Soph. I’m sorry. I was going to make a really tasteless joke. You know me, so witty I just can’t stop myself.”

“Save it for your podcast, will you?”

“Speaking of, now that you’re staying with Dolores, can you ask her if she’ll be a guest? I’m dying to interview her.”

“Why don’t you ask her yourself when you come to dinner?”

“I just might, but, well, not a lot of people scare me, but she does a little.”

“It’s because she doesn’t like you very much.” My turn to make a joke. It’s the first time Jeremy and I have been able to engage in a bit of mild banter. I’m happy to find out that underneath the dullness that envelops my senses, I have some capacity left for humor.

“Dolores loves me and you know it. I’ve told you before there’s a secret understanding between gay people—”

I hold up my hands to cut him off. “Spare me the speech, please. Just come to dinner.”

“I know she doesn’t wholly approve of what I do, but that’s only because we are from different generations.”

Jeremy’s rise to fame took place in the early 2000s when he started an unscrupulous but wildly popular gossip blog, which he later sold, yielding him a small fortune at the age of thirty-five, a widely-read column in
The Chicago Post Magazine
, and, for the past three years, a twice-a-week podcast in which he grills Chicago’s prominent about their personal lives and habits. The sponsorship he gets for one episode of his show is double what I make for a freelance piece of ten thousand words that I typically work on for almost a month—we did the math once.

“Yes, that’s all it is.” I smile at Jeremy, because I’m grateful to have him in my life. Grateful that he’s so different from everyone else I know. I could never tell Alex or any of my other friends about sharing Dolores’ bed, no matter how innocent.

“I’m just glad you’re finding some sort of comfort,” Jeremy says. I think he’s about to reach for my hand and take it in his, but that would be too out of character. “By the way, Jackie O.’s been asking about you. She was very delicate about it, but, you know just as well as I do that freelance investigative journalism is a cutthroat business and it’s important to remain in the good graces of certain people, like the editor-in-chief of Chicago’s biggest newspaper.”

Jacqueline O’Brien is the deciding factor on the biggest part of my income. I write almost exclusively for
The Post
, but worrying about money hasn’t made it through the fog of grief I’ve been shrouded in.

When I just shrug, Jeremy says, “At least you have a sugar momma now.”

Because only Jeremy would ever have the audacity to say something outrageous like that, I burst out in an uncontrollable fit of laughter which soon morphs into real tears of anguish and acute loneliness again.

“Fuck, Jeremy, I’m such a mess. What on earth am I going to do?”

“If you don’t want to work, that’s fine. But you should find something to occupy yourself with. Don’t just sit around all day doing nothing. It will drive you mad.”

“I, er, I’ve been thinking about something.”

“Spill.” Jeremy adopts only a slightly softer tone of voice than the inquisitive one he uses on his podcast.

“I’ve been thinking about… writing to him. To Ian.” It sounds so crazy when I say it out loud. “I never even got to say goodbye. So much remains unsaid. It’s not because I believe in life after death or anything like that, but just because it would make me feel connected to him again. I don’t know. It sounds silly now.”

“Soph, come on. It’s not silly. If it helps you, it’s great. Necessary, even. Do it.”

I push away the plate of food I’ve barely touched. “Okay then, I will.”

Chapter Seven

As we watch television in the living room, I work up the courage to ask her. Because all I can think of is her arm slipping on top of me again, soothing me, giving me that feeling of being loved again. I glance at Dolores while I scroll through the dozens of messages offering condolences on my phone, flipping through pictures of Ian and me, checking Facebook for distraction.

Dolores sits in the couch with a straight back, her shoes still on, as though she’s visiting with someone instead of relaxing in her own home. I wonder if this is how she always sits or whether she’s doing it on account of me being here.

We’re watching
Grace & Frankie
on Netflix, a show Ian and I tried, but didn’t think funny at all.

“If I have to watch one more minute of this, my eyes will actually roll out of my head, babe,” Ian said, rolling his eyes in an exaggerated fashion, which was much funnier than any of the jokes on the show.

Dolores gives a mild chuckle once in a while. She seems especially fond of the Jane Fonda character, always shifting her position a little when she’s on screen.

I was glad when, after dinner, Dolores offered to turn on the television. She’s Ian’s mother. She’s family. But that doesn’t make it so we can easily indulge in the silence that falls between us. Most of what I know about her is what Ian told me. Before Ian’s death, I hardly ever did anything alone with her. I’m not the type to call up my boyfriend’s mother and ask her to go for coffee. Besides, Dolores works all the time. If she’s not at one of her galleries, she’s looking for new artists to represent, networking with other gallerists, or attending some high-society reception. Until Ian’s death, Dolores and I lived in vastly different worlds.

Once the credits start rolling, I grab my chance. I’ve learned to ask things of people now without much qualms. Life-altering grief will do that to you.

“I slept surprisingly well in your bed last night,” I begin. “I think it might have been the proximity to another person.”

Dolores looks away from the screen and rests her gaze on me. “My bed is big enough for both of us,” she simply says. “We can watch another episode in it, if you like.”

It’s as though, in her glance, and in her words, I can already see the tenderness she will bestow upon me again later. This thing we have between us that succeeds in, however slightly, alleviating our grief. This new closeness. This wordless understanding of each others’ needs and feelings. At least, that’s how I feel about it, and I’m not going to disturb the fragile air between us by asking her how she feels about it.

Once we’re in bed, me in the pajamas I brought over from Jeremy’s—together with a bottle of Ambien stashed away in my toiletries bag in the bathroom, just in case—and Dolores in her tank top-shorts combo, which baffles me again, I think of how loudly Ian would have laughed at this. Me sharing a bed with his mother. He wouldn’t have questioned it, nor have searched for any deeper meaning to it, but just mocked it endlessly.

“Some more
Grace & Frankie
?” Dolores asks.

I nod because I don’t have the heart to tell her it’s not a show I enjoy. It doesn’t even matter what we watch, as long as there’s noise to drown out the whimpering voice in my head.

Dolores doesn’t press Play immediately, but runs her fingers over the space between us in the bed. “This was Ian’s spot when he was little. He loved crawling into bed with us.”

“Did you let him watch television in here?” I ask.

“I only got a TV in here after Angela died. To mask the silence, I guess.” She takes a few seconds to swallow something in her throat. “Ian dragged it up the stairs for me, asking me whether I really wanted to go down that road. ‘Once you get a TV in here, Mom,’ he said, ‘it’ll be forever.’ When he said things like that he reminded me of Angela so much. Physically, they didn’t look much alike, but character-wise they were so similar.”

I have to stop myself from grabbing her hand that’s still stroking the sheet, and then I wonder why I would even bother stopping myself. I put my hand on hers and give it a gentle squeeze.

Dolores looks at our hands, but doesn’t say anything, just inhales deeply—as though she’s counting her breaths—then exhales. “I’d like to believe I shaped his character a little as well. He was only five when I moved in with Angela.”

“Of course you did.” I don’t even need to think about this. I never knew Angela, but I’ve known Dolores for as long as I’ve known—
knew
—Ian. He introduced me to his mother barely two weeks after we met. “I saw so much of you in him, Dolores. He was such an endlessly kind, optimistic, sweet guy.”

“He was a beautiful boy who turned into a gorgeous man.” Her voice catches in her throat.

“Inside and out.” I give her hand another squeeze.

“He could also be annoyingly stubborn and a pestering know-it-all, but let’s not speak ill of the dead.” Dolores’ chuckle transforms into a little yelp. With her free hand, she brushes some tears from her cheeks. “Goodness, I think you’ll have to hold
me
tonight.” She looks at me.

“I will,” I say, meaning it from the bottom of my heart.

Chapter Eight