Roll up into the heavens.
I have been there, with you.
It is not big, although not too small.
Perhaps you could perch a house on its width,
But we have never considered it.
What would be the use?
We already live there.
When the night closes
And the city stills,
I am there, with you.
Our mouths laughing, our heads vacant
Of all but what is.
And what is? I ask.
This, you say. You and I, here.
We are all silent after she finishes. I know what place. It is a field, surrounded by mountains and fog, where a river runs through. It is quiet and peaceful and eternal. It is that apartment.
I pull my coat tighter around me. It’s cold, but the cold feels good. It reminds me for the first time in a week that I am here, that I have flesh, that I am real. Berg steps forward next. He reads from Chaucer, a favorite stanza of hers from graduate school. He puts on a voice. Everyone laughs.
There is champagne and her favorite cookies, from Birdbath on Seventh. There is also pizza from Rubirosa, but no one has touched it. We need her to return, smiling, full of life, gifting us back our appetites.
Finally, it is my turn.
“Thank you all for coming,” I tell them. “Greg and I knew she’d want something with the people she loved that wasn’t so formal.”
“Although Bella loved black tie,” Morgan chimes in.
We laugh. “That she did. She was a spinning, spiraling spirit that touched all of us. I miss her,” I say. “I will forever. “
The wind whistles over the city, and I think it’s her, saying a final farewell.
We stay until our fingers are frozen and our faces are chapped, and then it’s time to go home. I hug Morgan and Ariel goodbye. They promise to come over next week and help us sort through Bella’s stuff. Berg and Carl leave. The gallery girls tell me to come by—I say I will. They have a new exhibit going up. She was proud of it. I should see.
Then it’s just the two of us. Aaron doesn’t ask if he can come with me, but when the car arrives, he gets in. We travel downtown in silence. We speed across the Brooklyn Bridge, miraculously devoid of traffic. No roadblocks. Not anymore. We pull up to the building.
They keys, now in my possession.
Through the door, up the elevator, into the apartment. Everything I’ve fought against, now made manifest at my very own hands.
I take off my shoes. I go to the bed. I lie down. I know what is going to happen. I know exactly how we will live it.
Chapter Forty-One
I must fall asleep because I wake up, and he’s here, and the reality of it, of Bella’s loss, of the last few months, swirls around us like the impending storm.
“Hey,” Aaron says. “Are you okay?”
