Today would have been her birthday.
I watch Lando, unsure of what I should say or do. I’ve never had to deal with grief of this magnitude before, and I can only imagine how he feels right now.
“What are you reading?” I ask instead.
He shows me the front of his book.Pride and Prejudice. “She loved Jane Austen,” he says, and then without warning he bursts into tears.
I’m beside him in an instant, wrapping my arms around him, collecting his tears on my white shirt.
“I’m sorry.” He sniffs and swipes the damp from his cheeks with the back of his hand.
“No, kindly fuck off. Don’t apologise for your emotions.” I squeeze him tighter, crying because my heart is aching for his. “One of the shittiest things in the world happened to you; you’re allowed to feel things.”
I hold him. And I let him cry, and cry, and cry.
Until it feels as though the tears come to a natural lull. I wait for the rain and the thunder and lightning to arrive, but it never does. Lando pushes away from me, and I give him space while he blows his nose.
“It’s been six years. It shouldn’t still hurt this much. I miss her so fucking much.” He looks up to the sky. Tears roll down his cheeks. “And not just her, but . . . what could have been. You know? I’m nineteen. I should still have a mother. I should still have her. Everyone else our age does.”
My hand is still on his back, stroking soft circles. I keep it moving because I want him to know that I’m still here for him . . . feel that I’m still here.
It’s easy to forget about touch if we’ve been static for too long.
“It’s not fair,” I say. I want to offer him advice, sage words of wisdom, but I’ve never been in his position before. I have no idea if it’ll hurt this badly forever, or if it gets easier with each passing year. Maybe it never gets easier.
“If you want to tell me about her, you can. If you don’t want to, that’s also fine,” I say.
“I’ll cry again.”
“You’re already crying. And so am I,” I say, which sets him off in a fresh wave of tears.
“Okay. Yes, I would like to talk about her. Thank you.” He wipes his eyes again.
I hand him a clean tissue in anticipation.
“She loved Jane Austin.Emmawas her favourite, but I couldn’t find it this morning. She loved history in general. We’d always go to different historical places on the weekends to explore. Her favourite was Hampton Court Palace. One time . . .” He laughs. “One time the actor playing Henry the eighth dragged Mum out of the crowd and pretended she was Jane Seymour and I was Edward the seventh. It was so funny. She was so good at acting like a Tudor queen. She loved the theatre . . .”
A sob cuts off Lando’s speech and he’s quiet for a moment. Even in distress, he’s achingly beautiful. Ethereal, like an elf or a fairy, or some mystical creature from a video game.
I swipe a bead of moisture from his damp cheek, and he watches my thumb move away.
“It was always just us. Me and her. My dad would usually be off in whatever country he was in securing his super fucking important business deals, but I loved that it was always just us, like we were two people against the rest of the world. You know?
“She was a proper hippie too. She’d make honey from dandelions and cordial from elderberries, and she’d always press flowers inside books. Like . . . I’m still finding random flowers between the pages of books.”
He flicks to the centre ofPride and Prejudiceto show me the colourful imprint of a bushy purple flower and its green stem.
“Verbena,” he explains, and now for some reason we’re both laughing through our tears.
“Her favourite ice cream was pistachio, but she couldn’t eat it often. She had IBS too. In fact . . .” He pauses and wets his lips. “I think if she didn’t have IBS they wouldn’t have dismissed the symptoms of her cancer until it was too late.”
My hand is on his shoulder. I’m not rubbing it, I’m squeezing as though clinging onto him will keep him by my side. I hadn’t known until now how Lando’s mother had died.
He breathes a shaky exhale. “I want to tell you more.”
“Okay,” I say, even though my heart feels so splintered it might shatter into a thousand pieces any second. “Anything you want.”
“Her favourite colour was black. She used to say it was the classiest colour, and if you ever wanted to look expensive just wear all black, and preferably something with lace or silk. Perfumes as well. I get my love of scent from her. The top shelf in my cupboard holds all her perfumes, but she only ever wore just one. Shalimar by Guerlain.
