I opened it up and I thumbed to the last page I had read.
June 1st,1968
They have demolishedRadio City to build it. The glass building my uncle was going to make the glass for. But he is dead. I saw it in the newspaper, a small mention that he had died. Alone. In his apartment. A neighbor eventually found him. The article didn’t say how. I could imagine some horrible ways.
Vic had been right. I never had to see my uncle again. I might have even missed the article if I hadn’t been lazy and reading the paper when I should have gone to work. He will not live to see the glass in those buildings. Someone else will do it. That feels… right somehow.
I’m not pregnant,and I am going to stop thinking I might ever be. Birth and death and everything in between.
I don’t even knowwhy I’m writing today. I am sad. I am happy most of the time but today I’m sad. I think that Robert just noticed.
DL
Fuck. That was apropos. I closed my eyes. I needed to keep going.
June 1st1968
I’m writinga second time today. I picked a fight. With all four of them. I have no idea why. I picked a fight. A big one. They’ve all left the house, and I can’t blame them. Maybe forever. I don’t even know. I’m a terrible wife. Maybe a worse person. It’s debatable.
DL
She picked a fight.It was hard to imagine.
“You don’t have to do that right now.” Julian sort of fell into the room, finally sitting down next to me at the counter. “You really don’t.”
I rose and went to get him some coffee. If he was going to be awake, he was going to need some caffeine. I poured it and put some cream in it. When we went to coffee houses, he got more complicated things, but at home this was how he drank it.
I slid it over to him, and he smiled at me. “Thanks, Baby.”
“How are you?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know.”
Well, that was a true answer. I didn’t know either.
I hada black dress because Dina had bought me one, and I was wearing it, standing in the living room watching people talk. It was funny because none of them really knew Dina. These had not been her people, and from all accounts she had never really dove into knowing them very well or trusting them at all.
There was always the other side of the lake… that was what she had said to me. I had the smallest headache forming behind my eyes. As for my guys, they were holding up really well. EvenPhoenix was chatting with people around him. Sally was in the corner with Sam’s family. She had come by to hug me and then whispered in my ear that she had figured things out. So, that secret hadn’t lasted very long.
We needed to talk about it, but I was more comfortable not talking today. It had been my default response for years. Maybe it was my trauma response to death. I didn’t care right then. I sipped my water as Barrett eyed me from the corner.
The door opened and closed, more people entering our open house to visit with the Lents. For all the years they hadn’t come down, they still had friends here. I watched all of them. It felt like Dina whispered in my ear that I shouldn’t trust anyone. It didn’t matter. I had thought maybe I would play detective, but the energy for that had fled with the kidnapping attempt and death.
I could barely get through reading and typing up the journals. My head itched, and I hoped that it was because my hair was growing.
It was Dr. Trevor and his family that came through the door. I’d not met his children, but I recognized them from the photos in his office. There was a man with him, too. It must be one of the other husbands. The door opened and closed again, and a third man came in. It was his co-husbands. Joint husbands? I smiled. I would need to ask how they referred to themselves.
It was hard to stand at Dina’s funeral when I was currently reading how unhappy she was. It wasn’t just once that she had picked a fight. The guys were pretty unhappy with her right now.
Phoenix walked over, scratching the back of his neck. “I am… I’m not sure.”
Sam was in the corner. “Do you need to talk to Sam?”
He shook his head. “No, it’s not that kind of thing. I don’t know. Just off.”
I leaned against him. This was his Granny’s funeral. If he was feeling off then, it was probably to be expected. I imagined we were all feeling off. Rosalind had never looked paler than she did right then.
He squeezed my shoulder. “You’re quiet.”
