Grace
I found Meredith online so fast that it made me worry for women in general—how easily locatable we are. Fortunately, I’m not a murderer or crazy or…well, a dude.
I remembered the name of her shop from the bag Henry brought our presents in last week. After knocking out the depressing last fifteen minutes of Edward Scissorhands by myself, I googled “Precocious HQ” and “Meredith,” and there was the shop’s website.
Her name is Meredith Greer and Precocious HQ is her passion project.
On the bio page, she’s wearing a pretty Audrey Hepburn–esque dress.
She’s attractive and tall and has wonderful glasses, and she went to Georgetown.
I saw Brynn earlier on Henry’s phone, and after looking at Meredith, I understood the type of woman Henry was meant to be with.
I put him and Meredith side by side in my mind, and they looked perfect together.
Now I’m just a girl in her closet drinking alone. And as if that sentence weren’t bad enough, the only thing I could find was Henry’s rosé, so I’m just a girl in her closet drinking rosé alone.
Seeing Meredith’s dress motivated me to do an inventory of my clothes, and I’m finding that my wardrobe is pure chaos.
One thing no one tells you when you’re eighteen is that the career you choose will shape your style choices for the rest of your life, which is why I’m surrounded now by casual sweaters, tons of T-shirts, and Ravens and Orioles things with alcohol logos on them from vendors.
The dress I wore to Tim’s funeral catches my eye, as it always does. I hold it by its hanger and run my hand along the hem. The weirdest thing about that day was that people kept telling me how good I looked.
“Wow, Gracey, great dress,” they’d say as they hugged me or did that two-handed condolence handshake thing.
What was I supposed to say, exactly? This old thing?
When I told my mom how inappropriate it was to be complimented on my appearance at my husband’s funeral, she told me that people were just taken aback.
“I mean, maybe if you didn’t dress like a teenage boy with a social anxiety disorder all the time everyone wouldn’t be so shocked.”
“Thanks, Mom,” I said. “Love you.”
You would’ve made a joke I’ll bet, huh?
I ask Tim this because he’s here again, sifting through my clothes with me.
Of course I would’ve.
He puts his hand on my lower back and runs his fingers over the waistband of my yoga pants. I would’ve asked, Is this material felt? And you would’ve said, What? And I would’ve said, Well…it is now.
We laugh, and I enjoy a fleeting moment of forgetting that he’s dead.
Tim started telling dad jokes to make the kids laugh—especially Bella, who loved them—but he used them on me, too, because he said my begrudging laugh was his favorite of my laughs.
Why did the scarecrow win an award?
Oh Jesus, why?
Because he was…outstanding in his field.
I groan and think about how much I miss him.
Oh, and by the way, appropriate or not…you really did look fantastic.
When?
He looks down at my dress.
I know you didn’t mean to, but, when you’re a thing of grace…you just can’t help it.
I smile, and Harry Styles squints up at me.
“Mind your business,” I tell him.
I put the funeral dress back in its spot and push on.
A raincoat I forgot I had, a ski jacket, a doctor’s coat from an old Halloween costume.
Then I pass something very red: a dress I’ve worn two or three times, tops.
I bought it while day-drinking on a trip to Atlantic City with my sister and a few girlfriends before I had the kids.
I take a sip of rosé and wonder how Henry’s date is going. Then my phone rings.