Solace

The past week was a difficult one for Lanie and having Javier to lean on had been
a comfort. She could only imaging how she would have coped on her own. It would
have probably involved a lot of drinking, bar hopping and waking up next to a
nameless stranger in her bed. She was glad those days were over.

The tragedy had caused her relationship with Javier to take a sudden turn. He had
stayed at her place the first few nights for mutual comfort, but he had remained out
of need. They needed each other. They needed the open loving relationship that
their friends had failed to find.

The first few days at home she spent crying and clinging to him. By the third day she
was missing Kate terribly and needed to be close to her again. She changed out of
the pajamas she had been living in and slipped into her street clothes. Grabbing her
purse, she stopped at her dresser long enough to pull a solitary key from the top
drawer. Javier was surprised when she walked into the living room looking like she
was dressed to go somewhere.

"Hey baby, where you goin'?"

She glanced at him, trying to contain a fresh batch of tears. "I'm going to her place."

"You don't want to go there; it'll only make it worse."

"I have to, I miss her so much. I need to be there…in her home, to feel her around me,"
her tears were loose again.

"Don't," he begged. Just stay here with me, it'll be ok."

"No, I have to go…please…I have to," her eyes pleaded and his heart broke.

"Ok, but I'm taking you."

Lanie nodded in agreement and waited while he changed his clothes.

…

The cool fall air slapped her face as she stepped out of the warm building and onto the
sidewalk. Javier wrapped one arm around her shoulder to protect her from the chill and
signaled for a cab with the other. They arrived at Kate's building after a short trip and
headed upstairs. As they exited the elevator, she noticed an echoing silence as they
made their way to her door. It would sound the same inside. She unlocked the door,
hesitating before she crossed the threshold. Javier was behind her and he reached up
and placed his hands on her shoulders.

"I'm right behind you."

As she entered into the living room her hand flew to her mouth to stifle a small cry. Her
feelings overwhelmed her. She made her way to the couch to sit down for a moment.
She noticed a magazine lying open on the coffee table, a moment in time interrupted.
Maybe it hadn't been such a good idea to come over, she was sure to fine more moments
as she wandered around. She was content to remain on the couch in Javier's arms until
she could find the courage to continue.

When her need for Kate returned, she asked Javier to wait for her while she went into the
bedroom. She wanted to be alone, just her and her girl. She lay down on Kate's bed and
had another cry. It felt good, as if she were sharing her grief with her absent friend.
Finally spent of tears, she sat up wiped her damp cheeks.

As she stood up to return to the living room, she stumbled over something next to the
bedside. She looked down to see what see what she had stepped on and discovered
a pair of shoes. Not just any shoes, but a pair of men's shoes.

It took her a moment for her brain to put this information into some kind of context. What
were men's shoes doing in Kate's apartment? Josh was the last man she'd dated and that
was over, ages ago. Kate had always told her everything. Maybe it was just a quick fling
and the shoes were forgotten. Maybe, or maybe not, she couldn't leave it unanswered.
She looked around the room for more clues. Something on top of the dresser caught her
eye, cufflinks. She made her way over and put her hands on the knobs of the top drawer.
She felt a little uneasy looking through Kate's things, but she had to know if there had been
someone in her life. If there was, he needed to be told what happened.

She slid out the short top drawer. I held mostly jewelry and photos. She continued to the
next drawer down and pulled it open. She was surprised to find men's boxers neatly folded
and nestled next to Kate's underwear. That meant this man was important. In all the years
she had known Kate, she had never made a place in her home for one of her boyfriends.
She lacked the commitment. Who was this man?

Lanie was beginning to feel a little hurt. She was the one friend that Kate had trusted with
her private life. Why had she shut her out this time? She was determined to find out.

Her investigation led her to Kate's closet. She opened the door and her eyes were immediately
drawn to several men's suits hanging among her clothes. For a moment, she doubted her eyes.
She doubted the fact that her eyes recognized them. She pushed back one of the suits so
that she could see the label. Fioravanti, New York was stitched into the neckline. There was only
one person she knew that could afford a three thousand dollar hand made suit and it was the
last persons clothes she expected to find in Kate's closet. As she backed away in shock she
noticed more men's dress shoes and tennis shoes at the bottom of the closet. She let out a cry
of joy, shock, surprise and confusion that brought Javier running in from the living room.

"What's wrong?"

He saw her standing there, eyes wide with her hand to her mouth. She was pointing. He followed
her hand and her gaze and found himself baffled by what he was seeing.

"Aren't those...isn't that…don't those belong to…"

"Yes, they are." Lanie said quietly, as if any loud noise might wake her from the dream she was having.

She needed more confirmation, so she quickly headed for the bathroom with Javier on her heels.
There on the counter she found two toothbrushes in the holder. She opened the medicine cabinet
and there on the third shelf from the top she found men's deodorant, shaving cream, a razor and
a bottle of cologne. She pulled the expensive looking bottle from the shelf and opened it. It was him.
It was that distinctive smell that fragranced the morgue every time he arrived. She stood there,
transfixed by the memories the scent evoked, so real and vivid as they emerged genie like from the
bottle. She stood there lost in her memories. Eventually, Javier took the bottle gently from her hand,
replaced the top, returned it to the shelf and closed the cabinet door. He led her back into the
bedroom and she wandered over to where her discoveries had started. She looked down the shoes
and then at the nightstand next to the bed, on it was a pen and a legal pad filled with writing. She
read a little of what was written and then looked at Javier.

"It's Nikki Heat. It's his next story," she could only stand there, dumbfounded. Javier was still having
trouble putting his question into a coherent sentence.

"When did they…how did they…why didn't we know?" He shook his head in disbelief. Looking at Lanie,
he saw that she was smiling and crying at the same time. He reached for her and they laughed and
cried together. They never imagined that today would be a good day.