My Diane was 43. He looked at the television though he wasn't seeing it. There's no good age for it. People say young is worse. I think loss is just loss.
The math doesn't make it better. No, Marcus said it doesn't. You have a daughter. Amara, she's eight. Emily told me she's sharp.
She's the sharpest person I know. And I say that including every adult in my life. Something shifted in Richard's face. something quiet and warm, like a light coming on in a room that had been dim. She sounds like Emily at 8, he said. Emily at 8 used to correct my grammar.
I'd say something and she'd go, "Dad, that's not actually a word. 8 years old. She still does it." Emily said from across the room. You're better at it now, Richard told her. Sneakier.
I learned from the best. He looked at her with the unguarded tenderness of a father who knows exactly what he's looking at and knows he might not have as long to look at it as he'd like. Then he looked back at Marcus. You're good for her, he said. Marcus blinked.
Sir, she talks differently now than she did 2 months ago. He said it plainly without decoration. Emily talks differently when she's carrying something alone than when she's not. I've known her 32 years. I know the difference.
He looked at Marcus. You're the difference. Emily had gone very still across the room. Marcus didn't know what to say to that. He said the true thing.
She's been good for me, too. Richard nodded like the matter was settled. The Reds are going to have a better rotation this year, he said, returning to the television. I don't care what anyone says. I'll take your word for it, Marcus said.
Smart man, Richard said. Emily, get him some of that coffee. the good kind, not the hospital stuff. The hospital stuff tastes like a parking garage. They left together at 4:30. Emily was quiet in the elevator, which Marcus had come to understand as her processing mode.
She went inward when something had moved her, pulled it apart, and looked at the pieces before she'd talk about it. He waited. They walked through the lobby and out into the December cold, and he was reaching for his keys when she said, "He likes you. I know that wasn't a foregone conclusion. He once made my ex-boyfriend sit through a 40-minute interrogation about his credit score.