Night Road

“What did you see?”

“I saw the girl who killed my daughter … and my granddaughter’s mother and my son’s first love. And … a girl I used to care about. ” Jude scratched nervously at the side of her face. Her skin was crawling suddenly. “What’s wrong with me, Dr. Bloom? I feel like I’m going crazy. ”

“Not crazy. I think maybe you’re ready to try a Compassionate Friends meeting. There’s one today, you know. At two. ”

“That talk again?” Jude sighed and sat down, tapping her foot, fisting and unfisting her hands. “I am not going to go sit in a meeting with a bunch of other grieving parents. Should I talk about Mia? Will that bring her back?”

“In a way. ”

“Spoken like a person who hasn’t lost a child. No, thanks. ”

“The only way to get clos—”

“So help me, God, if you say closure, I’ll walk out. There’s no closure. That’s just a bunch of claptrap. I still can’t listen to music—any music. I still cry almost every time I shower. Sometimes I scream in the car. I talk to my daughter and she can’t hear me. None of that goes away. ”

“You used to say that you felt gray. ”

“I said I live in the gray. A thick ashy fog. ”

“And you thought the rain looked ashy the night Mia died?”

“Yeah, so?”

Harriet peered at her over the rims of her half lenses. Her point had been made. “So if you’re still in the gray, I think maybe you should look around. Maybe you can see something now. Shapes. People. ”

Jude stopped chewing her nail. “What do you mean?”

“I know your pain won’t end, Jude. I’m not a fool. But maybe you’re finally getting ready to accept that there might be more than just pain. That’s why you’re acting like an overbred poodle right now. You’re afraid of feeling, and it’s happening anyway. You opened up enough to let Lexi Baill into your house. That’s a huge step, Jude. ”

“I read Grace a story and played a board game with her,” Jude said quietly.

“How did that make you feel?”

Jude looked up. “Like a grandmother. ” Tears filled her eyes. She hadn’t realized that until right now. “I’ve been hard on Zach. I just … couldn’t look at him without remembering…”

“Remembering is okay, Jude. ”

“Not the way I do it, Doc. It … breaks me. ”

“Maybe you need to be broken a little before you can put yourself back together. ”

“I’m afraid I won’t be able to put myself back together. ”

“You will. You’re on your way, Jude. ”

“What do I do next?”

“Follow your heart. ”

Jude shivered at the idea of that. She’d worked so hard to shut down her emotions; the idea of opening them up again was terrifying. She didn’t know if she could do it. If she even wanted to.

For the rest of her scheduled hour, Jude tried to listen to Dr. Bloom, but that sense of panic was rising again, drowning out everything except the in-and-out strains of her own breathing. What if she opened herself up again and the pain simply engulfed her? What if she lost all the progress she’d made? It hadn’t been that long ago that Jude had been practically useless, a crying gray form that couldn’t get through the day without drugs.

At the end of her session, she said something to Dr. Bloom—she didn’t remember what—and walked outside.

The weather now was both bright and gray. Clouds the color of beach sand hung low in the sky. Sunlight glowed through in places while rain fell in drops so small no local even noticed, but tourists in the market huddled beneath brightly colored umbrellas. She stood at the corner in front of Dr. Bloom’s building, beneath this crying sky, and tried to remember which way to go. It felt suddenly as if any move could be wrong.

“Are you okay, Ma’am?” a kid said, appearing beside her. With shaggy hair and a skateboard clamped under his arm, he reminded her of long ago—or maybe a second ago—when Zach and Mia had been in middle school.