maintained her parents’ apartment. Coco asked her if she would babysit for Bethanie for her, and Theresa was thrilled. She couldn’t wait to see them both. Coco had sent her a photo of the baby when she was born.
Ian had spent the night with her, but she didn’t go back to bed after Sam’s call. Instead, she packed quietly in her dressing room. She took several black dresses, and a nice one for the funeral, and she packed for the baby too. She called the airline, and there was a flight to New York at noon. She had to be at the airport to check in at ten, and leave her house at nine.
She slipped back into bed with Ian then, and he woke up at five, as he always did to go to the gym. She told him she was leaving for New York that morning. She told him about Sam’s father. “I’ll be back in a few days.”
“I’ll be here, waiting for you.” He smiled at her, and pulled her into his arms before they got up. “I’m sorry you have to do that.” He knew it would be painful for her and bring back hard memories.
“He’s always been there for me. I can’t miss it. And Sam’s going to have so much responsibility on his shoulders now.”
“Just like you,” he said sympathetically, and then they got out of bed, and she went to make him the tea he liked. She kept a stock of it at her house for whenever he spent the night.
“You’re a good friend,” he said, as she poured coffee for herself. The baby was still asleep. She had just stopped nursing her. She and Ian were at ease with each other, as they sat at the kitchen table, waking up.
Ian kissed her when he left, and she heard him drive away on his motorcycle, slow enough for Bruce to follow him the short distance to his house. It was going to be a sad few days for her in New York. Then Bethanie started to cry, and she had to feed her and dress both of them, in time to leave for the airport. She was juggling the diaper bag, her purse, the baby, a stroller, a car seat, and a suitcase when she got in the cab. It was the first time she had traveled with Bethanie. She felt like an octopus trying to keep track of it all.
She managed to keep the baby entertained before they boarded the flight, and they both slept for half the trip. Then the baby cried for a while, and Coco apologized to the passengers around her. She got a porter at JFK, and managed to get through customs with the baby, the stroller, and all their bags, got a cab, and headed to her parents’ apartment in the city. She hadn’t been there in two and a half years. She had gotten married and divorced and had become a mother since she’d left. So much had changed in her life. And now Sam’s was about to change too.
Theresa was waiting for them when she got to the apartment. With the time change, it was four-thirty in the afternoon in New York, and nine-thirty at night for them on London time. Theresa couldn’t believe how beautiful the baby was, and said she looked just like her grandmother. There was something comforting about that too, as though her mother lived on in her daughter.
She handed the baby over to Theresa, and told her when to feed her from the stock of formula she had brought. She dressed quickly to go to Sam’s apartment.
When she got to Sam’s in a plain black wool dress and wool coat and flat shoes, there were about two dozen visitors milling around the apartment, and the family was seated around the dining table, speaking in soft voices, as people came to greet them. They had buried Sam’s father that morning, according to Jewish law.
Coco went to speak to Sam’s mother first, and she hugged Coco, and thanked her for coming.
“She came from London, Mom,” Sam said, suddenly standing next to her, and Coco looked up at him and smiled and hugged him too. Coco noticed immediately that neither of Sam’s sisters was there, and remembered that their mother had forbidden them to come to Chanukah, since both of them were converts to Christianity now. Sam’s brother was wearing a yarmulke and a big black hat, like the one the