Better With You (Better Love 2)

“Sweet boy,” I whisper against his mouth, then press my forehead to his, “some of the most beautiful flowers bloom only at night.”

“How do you deal with it?” he asks, his eyes searching mine as he places his palm over my tattoo. “The pain. It’s so big, I feel like I’m drowning in it. It’s going to swallow me whole.”

“Honestly,” I say with a sad smile, “it never goes away. It never gets easier. But eventually, it won’t be the first thing you think of when you wake up in the morning, and it won’t be the reason you cry yourself to sleep every night. Maybe not soon, but someday, you’ll be able to think of her without feeling your heart break all over again. You’ll be able to say her name with a smile instead of a sob. It might happen gradually, where you can feel the cracks in your heart fusing back together bit by bit, or it might happen suddenly, where one day you wake up and the fond memories are the first ones you recall. But it will happen, Riggs. I promise. And I’ll be here with you through all of it.”

“What if I can’t do it? What if I’m not strong enough?”

I kiss him again, his lips, his cheeks, his eyelids. I kiss him until his tears are mixed and blended with mine, until I’m wrapped up in this pain with him, so he doesn’t feel alone.

“You’ve made it through one-hundred percent of your hard days, Riggs. You have a perfect record—you haven’t given up a single hit yet. You’ll pull through this one, too.”

For the first time in days, a small smile forms on his lips, and it’s like the sun breaking through the clouds. I half expect to see a rainbow form in the steam.

“You talkin’ sports to me, Barnes?”

“Whatever gets through, Stanton.”

* * *

The funeral is on a Tuesday,and there are so many people that they have to stream the ceremony into an overflow room in a banquet hall down the street. It’s absolutely beautiful, and surprisingly lighthearted.

I’ve been to two funerals in my life, and both were depressing and sad. Odette’s funeral is the opposite. It’s a celebration of her life, instead of the mourning of her death. Her family flies in from France, and people from all over the country come. People she’s worked with and went to school with, people she traveled with in her twenties, people whose kitchens she’s blessed and tummies she’s filled. She’s touched so many lives, and I know for certain that she is another person whose beauty doesn’t need to be romanticized in death. I wish so much that I could have gotten more time with her, that I could have gotten to know the woman who is loved by so many.

Riggs’s eulogy is short. A few sentences about how he’ll miss his mother, and then he reads the final stanza of E.E. Cummings’ poem “i carry your heart with me (i carry it in.”

Talia’s eulogy is longer, and wonderful, and there’s not a dry eye or a frowning face in the place when she’s finished. After everything, I’d expected to feel some animosity or maybe jealousy, but there’s nothing there except sympathy and a strange fondness. Talia, like Riggs, was in a difficult position, and all she wanted to do was keep someone she loved happy for as long as she could, even if that meant sacrificing her own happiness. I can’t fault her for that. In fact, just like with Riggs, it makes me respect her more.

When Riggs is shaking hands and speaking with family members, Talia surprises me outside of the bathroom. Her body language suggests she’s unsure of how to approach me, so I offer her a smile and a small, awkward wave.

“Hey, Talia,” I say. “Your eulogy was beautiful.”

“Hi, Bailey,” she says with a soft, genuine smile. “Thank you. It wasn’t difficult to write. Odette was a wonderful person.”

“I wish I could have gotten to know her better,” I confess. “She must have been pretty special to have you and Riggs love her so much.” Talia nods and wipes away a few tears.

“She was.” Talia takes a deep breath and then smiles again. “I, um, I actually have something for you,” she says, and holds out a silver envelope that I didn’t realize she was holding.

I take the envelope and study it, arching a brow.

“I hope it’s okay,” she whispers. “Odette wanted me, well, she asked if I would help her write you a letter. She dictated and I wrote.” She swallows, wiping away a few more tears. “I was going to mail it, but she got sick so quickly after that, I...”

“It’s okay,” I whisper. “Thank you.”

“You have to know,” she starts and bites her lip. “I do love Riggs, but not like that. I haven’t been in love with him for a long time. I’m not sure I ever was, to be honest, and we just got engaged out of some naïve, misplaced sense of duty, you know? My parents aren’t...they’re not...” Talia shakes her head and squeezes eyes closed, her face blurry through my tears.

“Riggs is my family. Odette and Antony. They are my family, and at the time, I didn’t know any other way to keep them. But the way I love Riggs isn’t like the way you do. Or the way he loves you. You guys...you just,” she stutters then takes a deep breath.

In her pause, I’m rocked by her words. I do love him. And he loves me?

“You two just fit,” she continues, “and I want you to know that I am so happy to see it. Just like Odette was.” Talia gestures to the envelope, which I nearly forgot about. “I hope, that eventually, you and I can be friends.”

Instead of replying, I surprise us both by stepping forward and embracing her. She squeezes me tightly, and we hug for a moment, crying into each other’s shoulders, until we both start laughing and pull apart.

“Sorry if I got snot on your dress,” I joke, wiping off my cheeks.

“No more than I got on you, I’m sure,” she says back with a smile.

“Thank you,” I tell her. “Truly. Thank you.”