Chapter 14 #2
I don’t want to talk about him with Henry.
“It looks like the book and movie sequels are a go.”
“Well, that’s fantastic, Lizzie!”
“I’m still in shock. It’s been . . . well, it’s just been an exciting and unusual day.”
“You know what this means?”
“What?”
“I’m going to have to read the book. I never read anything but legal crap—briefs and case histories. Now I’m doing yoga, so
why not add good old Wuthering Heights? I probably need to dive into that one before I read your book. At least I’ll get to know the characters, like your little
hurricane’s namesake.”
I chuckle, unable to see Henry reading Wuthering Heights out on his fishing boat.
We chat a bit more about lighter topics.
A new fishing pole he bought, Ms. Fernsby’s amazing cooking.
We don’t mention Philip, but I feel him on the margins of everything between us.
We both know Philip would be ridiculously proud of me.
We know we wouldn’t even be friends now if it weren’t for him.
I’m attracted to Henry, and I love his company.
But I’m also confused. Where can this possibly go?
Soon after the phone call, I go to sleep.
I’m in the front hall of the Azalea Dream at dusk. The hall glows with hazy twilight, the long, damask drapes drawn over the
windows. Waning light slips in, streaking across Mirabel’s polished hardwood floors, her pricey oriental vases and the portraits
lining the hall.
“Philip?”
He stands at hall’s end, looking up at his baby portrait. I’ve seen it a million times—a one-year-old Philip holding a stuffed
Winnie-the-Pooh. Baby Philip wears a pressed sailor suit; wispy blond curls spiral out from his head, and he smiles widely,
showing off two brand-new lower baby teeth.
Philip doesn’t seem to hear me, and I can only make out his silhouette.
In that frustrating way dreams work, the hall seems to be getting longer. Space doesn’t make sense. Also, I can’t move quickly—the
sensation is like walking through water.
“Philip?”
He keeps his gaze glued to the baby portrait. What are you trying to tell me?
And I wake up, asking the question out loud in my room, my heart pounding in my chest.
As always, that heavy longing hits me hard after these dreams. He’s always just beyond my fingertips, just out of reach, and
I miss him—the desire something like pain.
According to my phone, it’s one o’clock in the morning. The house is quiet and dark.
What would Philip think of me and how I’m living now?
At once, the previous days fall on me like a crushing weight.
He’s only been dead a little over two months, and I’ve already almost-kissed his best friend.
In spite of all my excuses and justifications, I’m attracted to August Dansworth.
Yet I’m wearing Philip’s hair in the jet necklace, his fingerprint on another chain.
I’m wearing mostly black widow’s clothes.
But I text, and I wear red lipstick, and I lust after insouciant rakes.
I’m a widow failure.
I toss and turn in the bedsheets, trying to go back to sleep. Annoyed, Lucy leaps off the bed and onto one of the room’s upholstered
chairs.
I was a neurotic child and often had trouble sleeping. Mom always told me that middle-of-the-night worries appear bigger than
they actually are. She explained that they’re like monsters under the bed, an utterly ridiculous fear that rears only at night.
She told me that when night worries hit, I might as well get up and do something else until I’m tired again. Warm milk is the antidote to worry, she’d say, and I’d sip her microwaved milk from my favorite cat mug until my anxious brain cooled.
Since Philip’s death, the middle-of-the-night-worries have grown tenfold, and I’ve tossed and turned, but never actually come
back to her advice until now.
Tiptoeing downstairs, I microwave some milk, and sip at the kitchen island. Filtered street light streams through the window
above the sink, and I stare at the shadow of quivering ivy through the curtains.
Soon Ms. Fernsby walks softly down the stairs, hair up in pins. She tightens her robe belt when she sees me and makes a motherly
tsk-tsk sound with her tongue.
“It’s too late or too early for you to be up. Do you mind me asking what’s troubling you?”
“Monsters.”
“What?”
“Sorry, worries—middle-of-the-night worries. They’re just as silly as monsters under the bed. At least, that’s what my mom always said. But she’s not here anymore.”
She shakes her head sympathetically. “Was that Grandma Nora?”
“Yes,” I mutter.
“Even with his corn dog, Heathie asked for broccoli tonight. He told me his Grandma Nora said superheroes always eat vegetables.”
“That was her. She was wonderful. Dad hasn’t been doing too well since her death. I lost her last year and then Philip this
year. It’s been too much.”
She pulls out a plate of her shortbread cookies, removing the Saran Wrap.
“You know, luv, my mum read myths to me as a child, and Sleep and Death were brothers in the underworld. I’ve always thought
when Death pays a visit, Sleep gets out of sorts and can’t figure out his place in a household. Of course, I didn’t have the
same relationship with old Lord Routledge that you had with Philip.” She chuckles, “God knows, he was my employer, a married
man, and even though he could be such a grumpy old codger, I did love him. When he died, I felt grief like never before, and
I couldn’t sleep through the night for a year.”
“It’s just awful, isn’t it?” My vision blurs with tears. “The separation, I mean. I just don’t know what to do with myself.
I miss him so much.”
She hands me a napkin when I can’t hold back the tears. “Heathcliff doesn’t get it. He thought we’d see Philip here when we
got to London even though I regularly show him this.” I pull the bird urn from my pajama pocket, setting it by the cookie
plate. “He asks if his daddy can see Batman from where he is. But I don’t know where Philip is. None of us can. I don’t even know if he is. Like maybe he is just in that urn. Maybe it really is the end. And that’s—awful.”
Ms. Fernsby sips her milk, staring at the urn.
Prince Albert died at about the same age as Philip. In addition to wearing widow’s weeds the rest of her life, Queen Victoria
slept with a plaster cast of Albert’s hand nightly. Most scholars believe she and Albert had an affectionate marriage. As
a widow, she lived under far more pressure than I do. I just have to keep it together for Heathcliff. She had to keep it together
for all of England. Surely, she fell apart sometimes? In those sleepless early hours of the morning, I can’t imagine she didn’t scream into her pillow and
clutch that plaster cast. Surely, she chewed out at least one poor lady-in-waiting for misplacing the plaster hand.
“You’re right, Lizzie.”
“About what?”
“That the separation is awful, and you never—at least on this side—will know for certain where your Philip is. But you’ll
feel a little better each day. You’ll realize you like a song you haven’t liked since losing him. You’ll remember how much
you loved your favorite cake. You will, gradually, in spits and starts, come back to life.”
Come back to life.
“I really think, Lizzie, that’s why you’re here. You think Philip took a bit of you to the grave. Your heart’s broken and
lying to you about that part. But you’re fully alive. Your heart just needs to catch up and realize that grief doesn’t mean
you’re not still living.”
“I really do want to come back to life.”
“I know, Lizzie.”
We’re quiet for a few seconds; I chew a shortbread cookie and stare at the urn.
“I have someone I want you to meet,” Ms. Fernsby says carefully.
“Thank you, but no. I’m in mourning, and I’m really not supposed to date yet . . .”
“What? Who says there’s a proper time frame? Well . . . we can talk about that another time. This isn’t a date. I want you
to meet a friend who I think could help you.”
“A therapist?”
“I suppose you could say that, luv. She works in the same way. I don’t want to say too much else about her now. And don’t
worry about Heathie. My Mabel will take good care of him while we’re out.”
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