I tug my hand gently away from hers, leap up from the couch, and begin to pace my living room.
“There’s something else, something that began to crystallize for me earlier this morning,” I say. “The suicide theory doesn’t make sense on a whole other level.”
“What do you mean?”
“Even if Jamie was more distraught about the breakup than anyone knew, and my presence at the party totally threw him, are we supposed to think he popped out of the house and on the spur of the moment shot himself? Don’t people—especially careful, methodical people like Jamie—plansuicides?”
As I turn back toward Megan, I catch her letting out a gust of air. She glances over at me, her expression pained.
“What?” I demand for the second time.
“Okay, I’m going to continue to be straight with you. Yes, some suicides are planned, but believe it or not, the majority are impulsive. A person experiences something he views as catastrophic, finds it unbearable, and then takes his own life. Research shows that when people decide to attempt suicide, they might follow through within thirty minutes, in some cases as few as five.”
As I’m digesting her words, it’s beginning to feel as if a hand has gripped my heart and is squeezing it hard.
If there’s nothing at all preposterous about what’s happened, it means that seeing me at the party and exchanging a few words might have been enough to push Jamie over the edge. And he did all the planning he needed on the five-minute walk to his car.
6
FINALLY, THE TEARS COME, A SUDDEN GUSH THAT GIVES NOsign of stopping. I know that by laying it all out like that, Megan was only trying to help, but her comments have left me feeling even more unmoored.
“It’s all my fault then,” I manage between sobs.
Through my tears I see her quickly fish a few tissues from her purse—she carried them with her even before she trained to become a therapist—and jump up from her seat. She hands me the tissues, then wraps me in a hug.
“Oh, Kiki,” she says. “You can’t blame yourself for this.”
“How can Inot?”
“You didn’t feel the marriage would work, so you did the right thing by breaking off the relationship. Plus, as I said before, if Jamie really was depressed, there might have been other reasons for it. You said he had an illegal gun, which means he could have been having suicidal ideations for a while.”
Or maybe just since March, I think.When I pulled the rug out from under him.
“Right.”
“Please, tell me what I can do,” she says. “Can I fix you something to eat?”
“Thanks, Meg, but I might just lie down and rest now. I’ll eat something later.”
“You want me to hang around? I could read here in the living room and then fix you a late lunch when you wake up. Or order something in for us.”
“No, that’s okay. I so appreciate you coming over and being straight with me, but I’ll be okay on my own for a while.”
Megan nods reluctantly and grabs her purse from the couch. We hug once more at the door and I promise to check in this evening. Though I do feel completely frayed and desperate for rest, I can tell within seconds of Megan’s departure that I’m too wired to sleep. Plus, there are calls to make, and at some point I need to prep further for the two client Zoom sessions I have scheduled for tomorrow—though right now I’m dreading the very idea of them. I locate my phone and return to the couch.
I’ve yet to hear back from Drew’s wife, Heather, and I try her a second time. When this call goes to voicemail as well, I leave another message, saying that I not only want to offer the family my condolences, but that I’d like to know when and where the funeral will be held.
Next, I call my mom and break the news, which triggers another wave of tears—on my part and also on hers. She always adored Jamie, and though she supported me during the breakup, she’d been shocked when I told her I was ending things.
“Oh, Kiki, I’m so terribly sorry,” she tells me. “This must be devastating for you.”
She asks a few questions about the party and aftermath, and though there’s no judgment in her tone, I can’t help but think she’s wondering why I attended the party to begin with. My mom has awonderful laid-back manner, but she’s also practical and wise. If I’d thought to ask her advice beforehand, she surely would have advised me to stay home, give Jamie his space, and find another way to meet the literary agent.
“Honey, I’m coming to New York,” she says once I’ve answered her queries. “I need to be with you.”
“Mom, I’d love that more than anything, but there’s no way your doctor would want you to be navigating airports so soon after your knee surgery.”
“What if I could find someone to drive me?”
