Gabriella

Harrison and I lie and talk for about an hour, drinking wine and picking truffles from a box he bought, I think, especially for me. We make love again, slowly and luxuriously, making me feel as if all the truffles have melted and filled the room with chocolate, and I’m lying there letting it flow over my skin as Harrison worships my body.

Afterward, we lie there, exhausted, but neither of us wanting to sleep. I don’t know what to make of this, and I’m afraid to study it too hard, in case it’s like one of those pictures you stare at where you’re sure it’s a face, but when you look closely it’s just squiggles and lines and the brain is filling in everything else to make it complete.

And anyway, there’s no need to analyze it. It is what it is. It’s like a bird of paradise—I don’t need to know every detail of its feathers and understand the physics of how it flies to appreciate its beauty.

Still, I can’t help but wonder what’s going to happen after I get up and leave tonight, or in the morning. I’d assumed he didn’t want more, but quite clearly, I was on Harrison’s mind as much as he was on mine. We’re both about to take big steps toward our futures, him with his career, me with my travel plans—is it possible that this fling is born out of fear or apprehension of all the change to come?

Possibly. Lying in my chocolate-and-sex-induced haze, I don’t really care.

“I liked the chicken,” Harrison says. I presume he’s talking about dinner, because as far as I know we haven’t attempted sex in any position named after poultry.

“Cajun rules,” I agree, sleepy but not sleepy. Contented, maybe.

“I think it would have gone better with the penne.” He studies the ceiling with a frown. I love that he’s so serious about what kind of pasta we should have eaten several hours after the meal.

“And possibly a touch more Parmesan,” I agree.

“Yeah.” He turns his head and looks at me with a wry smile. Our eyes meet and our gazes lock, and my breath catches in my throat. There’s fondness in his eyes, and something else—an understanding, maybe, that this is something. Neither of us knows what, and it’s far too soon to give it a label. But it’s not nothing.

He opens his mouth, and my heart skips a beat as I realize he’s going to comment on it, but at that precise fucking moment, his phone rings on the bedside table. He blinks, distracted, and looks at it, and I bite my lip and beg him silently to ignore it, but he sighs, rolls over, and picks it up.

He stares at the screen, but frowns, apparently not recognizing the number. It’s late now, nearly eleven p.m.—who would call him that late from a number he doesn’t know?

“Hello?”

I prop my head on a hand to watch him. If he turns away from me, I’ll know he wants to take it privately, and I’ll slip out into the kitchen.

He listens, still frowning. “Yeah… yeah…” His expression turns reluctant, even irritated. “Yes, he’s my father.” He listens again, and then he sits bolt upright, staring in front of him. “What?”

I push myself up, my pulse beginning to race. Harrison has gone completely white. He listens a bit more, then runs a hand through his hair. “Yes, of course. Around eight a.m.? Sure. It’s okay. Yes, thank you, I appreciate that. Goodbye.” He hangs up.

I stare at him, knowing it’s not good news. “Harry? What’s happened?”

He turns his shocked gaze to me. “Holy fuck. My father died.”

*

Neither of us knows what to say or do. He’s told me a little about their relationship, so I know that his grief is going to be complicated and confused. If it was a woman who’d made the announcement, I’d throw my arms around her and we’d sob together, but I can’t imagine that Harry wants to be comforted like that. He looks bewildered and angry, not upset, staring off into the distance, and for a moment I wonder whether he’s forgotten I’m here.

“Do you want me to go?” I ask softly.

He turns his gaze to me and stares at me for a long moment. Then he shakes his head.

I blow out a silent sigh of relief, and decide that the best course of action is to be practical.

I rise and, pulling on one of his T-shirts, make us both a cup of strong coffee, and we take it out onto the balcony to drink it. It’s cool out here in the spring night air, so I duck back in, dig a couple of blankets out of a cupboard, and bring those out with me. Harrison’s sipping his coffee, having hardly said a word. I shake the blanket out and put it around him. He looks at it, puzzled, then gives me a small, curious smile, as if to say So this is what people do when a parent dies?

I slip into the chair beside him, draw up my legs, and tuck the blanket around me. Then I sip my coffee, and we listen to the sounds of the city at night—the cars, the occasional siren, the raucous calls from one drunk group of friends to another, the sound of Stevie Wonder’s Superstition in the distance blaring out from one of the nightclubs.

Should I say something? Whatever happened in the past, the man was still his father. Do I say I’m sorry? Should I ask what happened? Or should I just sit here and wait for him to talk, or not, until the sun comes up?

I’ve never been very good at not talking, so eventually I whisper, “I’m sorry.”

He leans his elbow on his chair and rests his fingers on his lips. “I keep thinking I imagined it,” he says. His voice sounds as if it’s coming from far away, as if he’s down in the nightclub, calling up to me. “Am I dreaming?”

I know it’s a rhetorical question, so I don’t answer. “How did it happen?” I ask instead.

“She said it was a heart attack. Possibly drug-related.” He says the words easily, as if this kind of thing happens to him every day. None of my family has ever done drugs, to my knowledge, so this sounds as alien and exotic to me as saying his father was a Russian spy who’d been shot by the FBI.

“Was it your mother?” I ask.

He shakes his head. “A police officer. She’s going to call back in the morning to discuss the funeral arrangements.” His brow furrows, and he leans forward and puts his cup on the table, then rests his elbows on his knees and sinks his hands into his hair.

“Aw, sweetie.” I move closer and slide my arm around him. “It’s okay.”

“I’ve spent over twenty years hating him.” His voice is hoarse. “He was a pathetic human being, an evil man.” Now venom seeps in, almost making me wince. “He fucking deserved to die. I’ve told him that more than once. I should be laughing. I should be shouting thank you to the heavens and dancing on his fucking grave.” He clenches his hands in his hair. “But my chest feels as if someone’s reached in and squeezed my heart. Why?”

“Because he was your father,” I say simply, and I lean forward and kiss his shoulder, willing all the grace I possess to pass into him.