Total pages in book: 64
Estimated words: 63052 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 315(@200wpm)___ 252(@250wpm)___ 210(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 63052 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 315(@200wpm)___ 252(@250wpm)___ 210(@300wpm)
I force a deep breath. Feel myself shudder with it. Feel the whiskey burn when it does, finally, go down. It reinforces me and I steel my spine because I have work to do.
Setting the empty tumbler down, I reach beneath the desk and feel for the scroll. I pull it out, unroll it, mechanically open it on the desktop and set the bottle on one corner, tuck the other beneath the base of the desk lamp.
I survey the images, the boxes, scanning the names as I open the drawer and take out his pencils, dulled by use, the eraser worn to a nub. I rub my thumb over it. Try to feel him.
Dragging my attention from the sheet, I search deeper in the drawer for a ruler. That’s when I come across the other sheet there. This one lies flat. I take it out, set it on top of the parchment so I can study it under the light of the lamp.
It’s me. My face. At least a partially sketched image. I see smudges from his effort to perfect what he saw, and I swear, I see it too. Like I’m laid bare here. Like he drew my soul.
I set my thumb over the print of his bigger one and smear it across my cheek, like he has before, and the moment I do, every hair on my body stands on end and all at once, he’s here. He’s here with me. Behind me. Holding me. One hand closed over mine, his thumb on mine, his other arm wrapped around my middle, hand flat on my belly, and that’s when that sobbing begins again except that this time, he’s holding me. He’s holding me as I fall apart. As I weep loudly, with a voice not my own, with anguish that can’t belong to me. That I don’t want.
“It’s not fair.”
It’s stupid, but it’s all I can say. Because it’s not. We were supposed to have time. We were supposed to have a little bit of time.
And I feel his arms squeezing me, cradling me against his chest, holding me so tight that for a minute, I just close my eyes and imagine it’s real. Imagine he’s real.
“Come back,” I sob.
He can’t, though. I know that. I watched them put him in the ground.
The high-pitched wailing is me, I realize. And even as I feel the feather light kisses on my temple, even as the hair on the back of my neck stand on end at his touch, I wail. Because this is it. This is goodbye.
I hear his words inside my mind. The whispered “I love you.” Feel one final squeeze of his arms, the flat of his hand on my belly. The scruff of his jaw on my cheek.
And when I’m able to breathe again, I whisper those words back as he slips away. Sergio gone. Sergio gone from me. Gone from this world forever.
I don’t know how long I sit there in the near dark staring at nothing. My face sticky from tears. My vision empty. It’s when I hear the lock of the front door open that I move. That I shift my gaze to the partially closed study door.
“Natalie.”
I startle. They sound so alike.
Footsteps approach the study and a moment later, the door is pushed open and Salvatore stands in the doorway and I realize the night is over because the warm glow of the morning sun surrounds him. It’s strange. Like a halo all around him.
He looks at me. I almost have to smile at what he must see. I haven’t showered in days. Haven’t brushed my hair in that long. I’m still wearing one of Sergio’s T-shirts I’d dug out of the laundry hamper.
Salvatore takes in the contents of the desk. Eyes the empty glass of whiskey. He steps inside.
“You don’t look so good, Nat.”
The way he says it, leaning against the door, taking off his gloves, one eyebrow raised and one side of his mouth quirking into a lopsided smile, it makes me smile, actually.
“Is that yours?” he asks, gesturing to the whiskey.
I shake my head. “It’s his.” I touch the pattern on the crystal. “Was his,” I correct.
He takes off his coat, sets it and the gloves over the back of the chair.
“You’re not drinking, are you? He wouldn’t want that. With the baby and all.”
“I’m not drinking.”
“Good. When’s the last time you ate?”
I shrug a shoulder.
“Called your parents? Called Drew?”
I shake my head. I don’t know. I know they’ve called. I’ve seen the countless messages but I switched off my phone a few days ago.
“Drew called me this morning. Said you haven’t been to school.”
“I don’t think school matters right now.”
“Well, it does.” He shifts his gaze to the parchment, steps closer to get a better look. Gives a shake of his head. “Fucking Sergio. Leave it to him to draw a fucking graveyard.”