was going to get her son. The idea of romance had never occurred to either one of them. They loved being best friends.
* * *
—
The memorial service was at Congregation Ohab Zedek on the Upper West Side the next day. It was as long as Sam had said it would be. The cantor sang beautifully, and the congregants knew all the prayers. She stood quietly remembering his father, and her parents, and hoped they were in a better place where hearts didn’t get broken and people who loved each other didn’t lose each other, and no one got disappointed. She hoped that Bethanie and Sam’s son would make it a better world one day that was a little closer to Heaven than what they had now.
* * *
—
Coco spent four days in New York, and didn’t visit his apartment again. She didn’t want to wear out her welcome with his mother, or crowd Tamar, who looked nervous when Coco was around.
She and Sam met for a walk along Central Park West the night before she left. There was no reason for her to stay, and it made her too sad being at the apartment. It seemed so empty now, with both of her parents gone. London was a clean slate for her. It was easier.
“Do you think you’ll ever go back to school?” he asked her.
“I don’t know. I don’t know that I need to. I’m enjoying the business with Leslie and it’s doing well. I can’t see myself in journalism anymore.”
“I can’t see myself in accounting anymore either. But it’s my show now.”
“Maybe you can make the changes you wanted to, and he wouldn’t let you.”
“That’s what I’m hoping. Tamar said she’d help me, but she’ll be busy with the baby. My mom said she’d babysit. Sabra is having a baby too, but my mom wants nothing to do with them. She’s a stubborn woman. Rebecca is thinking about becoming a nun. That even shocked me. She’s more religious than my mother. I think my whole family is a little crazy,” he said, grinning. “I don’t think my mother would survive having a daughter who’s a nun.”
“There were some very interesting Jewish activists who became nuns in World War II, like Saint Edith Stein. I was always fascinated by her. She saved a lot of people and died in Auschwitz. I thought she was much more worthy than the traditional saints. I read a book about her.”
“At least you didn’t become a nun.” He smiled at her.
“Maybe I should when Bethanie grows up. I can’t see myself in a traditional couple anymore. The ones you tell me I should be with bore me, and the intriguing, unusual guys, the flash, as you put it, burn you every time.”
“Just make sure that Ian Kingston doesn’t burn you. I worry about that. He’s damaged and dangerous.”
“Maybe that’s what makes him so interesting. Maybe I’m like that now too, after my parents, and Nigel, and having Bethanie on my own. I’m not exactly traditional anymore either.”
“You’re reliable. I know I can always count on you. You’re just traditional enough for the right man. A little eccentricity adds some spice to life.” She couldn’t see how Tamar added spice to his. She was as spicy as rice pudding. But it was what he had chosen, and it was too late to challenge it now. She was a bright girl, she just had no personality and no style and he did. In biblical terms, Coco thought he was hiding his light under a bushel. And Tamar was the bushel. But it was no longer up to Coco to question it, with a baby on the way. He thanked her again for coming all the way from London.
“Maybe I’ll come back and visit when you have the baby. I can’t wait to see him,” she said, and they hugged when she left him, and she waved from the cab as they drove away.
She was awake for most of that night in her parents’ apartment, thinking about them, and looking at old pictures that were still in frames around the apartment. She put several of them in her suitcase to take with her. She didn’t know why, but when she left for London the next morning, with her baby, she had the feeling that she wouldn’t be back again, or not for a long time. She had finally accepted that her parents weren’t coming back again. They were gone. In a strange way