Betty Taylor had been driving home from work one evening when her tire suddenly blew out. Her car had spun across the double yellow line, where it was hit by a speeding truck coming from the opposite direction.
It was Tami's turn to comfort Eric upon the loss of a parent. She sat next to him on the living room couch in the Taylors' El Paso house with her arm firmly around his shoulders. The company had finally cleared out of the house after the three-hour-long wake. For the first time ever, John Paul hadn't flirted with Tami, and Philip Andrew hadn't cracked open a book.
Tami's father in-law sat stiffly in a corner arm chair, next to the unlit fireplace, his jaw set tight, staring out the window at the pool.
Julie climbed into her grandfather's lap and wrapped her arms tightly around his neck. She snuggled her head against his shoulder. "Grandpa," she said, "I'm going to help you cry."
And James did cry, with his face buried in his granddaughter's long, blonde hair.
That night, Julie slept on the couch in the upstairs living room while Eric and Tami took the guest bedroom. Eric lay on his back in bed, tense and silent. Tami put a hand on his chest. "I want to help you, Eric. What can I do? What do you need from me?"
He took her hand from his chest and slid it down.
"Really?" she asked, trying not to laugh at the incongruity of it all.
"Tami, I'm not being flippant. I need you."
"Of course you do." She kissed his cheek and began to stroke him.
He reached for the hem of her night shirt and pulled it up. He tugged at her panties. "Take these off," he ordered, and she did.
"Tell me what you need," she breathed into his ear.
He needed it hard and fast and angry. She could feel his tears wetting her neck as he took her.
Eric groaned out his release and rolled onto his back. He trembled for the longest time. She couldn't tell if it was from the orgasm, or from the anger, or from the grief, but she pulled off the shirt he hadn't removed from her, pressed her naked body against his, and held him until the trembling had ceased.
"I'm sorry," he whispered.
"For what?"
"I was a bit rough with you."
"It's okay, sugar."
"But you didn't…you didn't cum."
She kissed his shoulder. "I didn't need to."
"Do you want me to -"
"- No," she said. "I'm fine. This is your best chance to fall asleep. I just want you to get some sleep, Eric." He'd slept three hours the night his father called, and only two the night before the funeral. "Please. While you can."
She was the one to fall asleep, though, in the warmth of his arms. When she woke up, the clock read two AM. She put on her T-shirt and a pair of shorts and went looking for him. She went past Julie on the couch and down the stairs. She paused in the foyer right before the living room. From where she stood, she could just make out the half empty bottle of whiskey on the coffee table, the two glasses, and her husband's head.
Two glasses. Strange, because her father-in-law didn't drink.
"Do you remember…" But it was her father-in-law's deep voice, all right, rising from the living room. "…summer, and your mother insisted on that family photo…"
"…those awful costumes," Eric said. "We tried to stop her."
James laughed.
"And do you remember," Eric said. "That one Thanksgiving, when Mom…."
Tami crept quietly back to the bedroom.
[*]
The next morning, Julie was singing at the top of her lungs in the kitchen at 6:00 AM. The girl always woke up at the crack of dawn, even on Saturdays. Eric had sworn that when she was a teenager and trying to sleep in, he was going to stand outside her door on a Saturday morning at 5:55 AM with a pot and a spoon and just start banging.
Tami rushed downstairs to shush her. She put on cartoons for the girl.
Next she filled a glass of water and set it by Eric's bed side, along with two aspirin she fished out of the bathroom medicine cabinet. She'd seen the empty whiskey bottle by the kitchen sink.
He stirred, groaned, opened one eye, and looked at her.
"I'm taking Julie out," she said, "So y'all can sleep. There's water and aspirin when you're ready for it."
He groaned and closed his eye.
When her hand was on the bedroom door, Eric said, "Tami, I love you. So very much."
[*]
When Tami and Julie got back, Julie saw the neighborhood kids playing outside and asked to join them. Tami let her and went into the house. She could hear the shower running upstairs and guessed Eric must be in it. Her father-in-law was sitting alone at the kitchen table with a glass of water and a cup of coffee, both untouched. He was staring at the stove.
She sat down across from him. "You're going to get counseling, James."
He looked at her. "I don't need counseling, Tami. I have a priest."
"You're going to see a grief counselor," Tami insisted. "A trained psychiatrist. And if you need medication, you're going to take it. And it's fine that you and Eric shared a bottle of whiskey last night. You guys needed to share that, to share that bottle and to share those memories, but you're not going to start drinking now to drown your sorrows."
"I don't intend to."
"I did some research, and I found the best grief counselor in El Paso. I'll leave you the information before we go back to Macedonia."
She could see him tense all over, starting with his jaw. She waited for him to tell her no, to scold her for being meddlesome. But he didn't. He closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them, the tension began to drain out of his body. "Betty was fond of you," he said when he finally spoke. "She was very fond of you. I suppose she'd want me to listen to you about this."
Tami nodded. "She would." She stood up. "Now I'm going to cook you and Eric some good hangover food."
[*]
They stayed with Mr. Taylor for three more days. The hardest part for Tami was cleaning out and packaging up Betty Taylor's clothes for charity. James had asked her to handle the task.
Half way through, Tami sat down on the floor of the walk-in closet and cried.
Her father-in-law found her there. She heard his footsteps approaching and hastily wiped her arm across her face and stood up.
Mr. Taylor looked down at the carpet when he realized she'd been crying. "I…uh…I forgot to tell you…the ankle-length blue dress…Betty's sister-in-law wants that one. If you haven't already packed it up."
"I'll find it," Tami said.
He cleared his throat. "You loved her, too," he said, still not meeting her eyes.
"I did." She wiped a tear from beneath her eye with a thumb.
Her father-in-law finally looked up from the floor. "I'm not sure…what I'm supposed to do now."
"Live. Go on with your life. You have to."
"No, I mean…about you crying. Am I supposed to…hug you?"
She laughed. "You don't want to hug me, James."
He took in a shaky breath. "She loved you, too, you know. Betty was so grateful Eric found someone who could love him the way you love him. She knew that's not an easy thing to find." He choked and looked down at the floor again. "I know it's not an easy thing to find." He turned his back to her. Before he walked away, he said, "Thank you for doing all this."
[*]
Around lunch time, the doorbell rang. There was a woman, maybe ten years older than Tami, at the door. She'd brought James a casserole, and it was clear that he wanted her to leave, but she kept touching his shoulder and pouring out her condolences and telling him to call her up anytime. Tami noticed she didn't have a wedding ring. James kept trying to make an excuse to shut the door, and the woman kept ignoring his social cues, so Tami intervened and, in that sugary blunt way of hers, got the woman off his stoop.
Thirty minutes later another woman came by with another casserole. This one was closer to Mr. Taylor's age, but she, too, was not wearing a wedding ring. Twice she reminded Mr. Taylor that she had unexpectedly lost a spouse three years ago, and Mr. Taylor looked to Tami with pleading eyes.
"We're so grateful for the food," Tami told her with her sweet southern smile, "but we really need to be going now to handle some…family affairs." She shut the door.
Twenty minutes after that, the doorbell rang yet again.
Tami joined Eric on the second story balcony that overlooked the rock garden and driveway, where he had retreated to drink a beer. He was watching the latest woman drive off in her car.
"My mother was buried three days ago," he said, "and already they're coming out of the woodwork."
Tami sighed. Mr. Taylor was a handsome man who wouldn't turn fifty for another week, a relatively young widower with a well-paying job. She knew it was bound to happen eventually, but Eric was right about the timing. "It's crass," she agreed. "They weren't very subtle."
"That first one couldn't be more than forty. And my dad's fifty. Almost."
"Well, a lot of women like older men. Experience is sexy to a lot of women. And your dad looks pretty young for his age. But I'm sure he won't think of seeing another woman for a couple of years."
Eric leaned against the rail. "He'll never think of seeing another woman."
Tami didn't dare disagree with him. She stepped forward and put a hand on his back.
He turned slightly to look at her. "Some guys find older women sexy too," he said and smiled. It was the first time she'd seen him smile in days. "Experienced women."
"I'm only nine months older than you, sugar. And I wasn't that experienced."
"But you taught me a thing or two. Remember?" He bent his head to kiss her. "You were a good tutor."
She kissed him back, deeply enough, she hoped, to make him forget his pain for a moment.
