Chapter 52

Chapter 52
"Yes? Yes, I hear him talking. Yes. Right away. We're at the cafeteria. We're going up now. Sure. Sure. Wait there. Yes, we're coming now. Wait Elio. Ciao. We have to hurry, "he's looking at me.
"Did something happen?"
"He just told me to go up. Now, he's putting his hand behind my shoulders. Do you want me to hold you? Kassie?"
""He gave in, didn't he? I'm starting to cry. That's why. Why else would he call us? And he told you. I know he told you because you're so... By the way you look at me.
I think I'm shaking. I think he's scared or that if he answers me, he's doing it too quietly for me to hear.
"Go away, that's all he dares to tell me. Please. I don't want to be the one to give you news like this."
Can't you see that he already gave me the news?
"Is he dead? Insist that I know. Travis! Look at me, damn it! I wake up and burst."
"Yes. Yes, he whispers and grabs the bridge of his nose between his fingers. Yes, he repeats cruelly, pulling me closer. Yes. Damn it Kassie, Gerald was a better friend to me than anyone else, he hisses and for a few moments I think his eyes are getting wet too."
Travis wouldn't cry for Dad. None of them would, not even Harold. Not in public. Not as a sign of weakness. They wouldn't risk anything like that.
"Repeat, I whisper to him as he holds me in his arms and we watch him cover it. What you said earlier, in the cafeteria. Repeat."
"I want to make love with your love?"
I approve. It's warm in his arms and I feel like I'm suffocating when he pulls me closer again. I could die in his arms and I don't move at all, not even when the rest of the family comes, not even when they take my dad out. I've soaked his shirt with tears and he kisses my forehead almost continuously. He's glued to me and he doesn't move. He doesn't flinch. Stay. Stay. As if it's his sacred duty to stay here, with me.
Harold dressed Dad in a shirt I gave him for Christmas. Dad hates this shirt. I stare at him, a mountain of a man in his coffin with his hands on his chest and his eyes too closed to look back at me. His skin is suspiciously pale. I can see his purple veins, his fingers, his lips. I stroke him and he's cold. Dad was always hot. If I look closely I can see the marks from the autopsy on his neck. I don't look. I refuse to see him like that and stare, like an idiot, at Mom. He's next to me and I can see his fingers twitching. I know he wants to touch her. Or touch me. He looks, Now at me, Now at him. I reach out to her. I cup her palm. With all the love I'm capable of right now. It's tiring me. Just her presence here is tiring me. I run my hand over Dad's hand.
"Stay with him, I beg. Stay, I insist. Dad would have wanted you to have a few moments of intimacy."
She approves. She wipes away some tears and approves and I pull away from the coffin. Dad wouldn't have liked so many tears. I see Mina. Mina is shaking and crying and I know how she feels because I would feel the same way if something happened to Harold or Athena. She loves Dad like Harold and unlike me, it's easier for her to express her emotions. I walk next to her, next to Hades. I have to admire her makeup, because it doesn't spread or get ruined by tears as much as Timo does when he wipes it away with his hand. I squeeze his hand in mine and try to smile as warmly as I can. I can't. I close my eyes when Hades touches my cheek. He looks and I already know where. To Travis. He slips a note between my fingers.
"It's a warehouse, he whispers to me. Art. It's not in my name and no one knows about it. If you need to talk to someone, write to me. Or look for me there. Okay? Come and... Express yourself. Whatever is easier for you."
I feel like I don't understand anything he's saying while Tim puts a glass of water in my hand. I sit down next to Grandma. I rest my head on her shoulder. Delilah is next to me too. I look at Rory. At Draco. At Travis. Travis has work to do. Ted. David. Apollo. Harold. Harold. I want to tell them that everything is fine. I want to ask them to stop looking at me like that. I don't need their pity. I don't need their care. I'm going. I'm waiting. I won't sleep until they bury him and I'm functioning on coffee and Anna's antidepressants. Calming. I stare, like an idiot, at how they cover him and lower him into the ground without knowing whether to cry or not. Dad always joked that he wanted a grave. Dad deserves the best. Dad will get the best.