“She’s dying, Mal. You have to.” I step up and hug her. “Go. I’ll wait here.”

I feel her shake as she lets a sob loose into my shoulder. I hold her for a few minutes, until she gets her shit together.

“Okay,” she finally says, peeling herself away and wiping her eyes with the heel of her hand.

I back off and she steps up to the door, hauling a deep breath before walking through.

The guard leaves the door open and stands watch outside. I so want to eavesdrop, but instead, I wander over to the nurses’ desk. “Excuse me,” I say to a middle-aged woman sitting there typing into a computer.

She holds a finger up at me, then types something else before looking up. “Can I help you?”

“My mom, Roseanne McIntyre?” I say with a wave of my hand at her door. “I was wondering . . . are they saying how long she has?”

Her expression goes all sympathetic as she stands. “Not long. Hours, most likely.”

“What . . .” I swallow the pulsing lump in my throat. “What kind of cancer does she have?” I don’t know why it matters, but I want to know.

Her lips press into a grim line before she answers. “Lung cancer, but it’s metastasized everywhere now.”

I turn and take a step to the side so I can see her bed through the door. I can’t see Mom at all, just a mound of blankets, but Mallory’s standing about five feet away, at the bottom of the bed. My heart contracts into a hard knot when I see her shoulders shaking as she cries.

“What are you doing for her? Is she in pain?” I ask, swallowing back my own tears.

“We’re doing everything we can to make her last few hours comfortable,” the nurse says as I turn back to her.

“Good. Is there a vending machine on this floor?”

She points up the hall. “In the lounge at the end of the corridor.”

“Thanks.” I head in the direction she pointed and locate the door marked “patient lounge.” Inside, I find the machine. I dig through my bag for a dollar and feed it into the slot, then push D6 and the Oh Henry! is pushed of the rack and thunks into the tray at the bottom. I grab it and head back to Mom’s room.

I peek through the door again and see Mallory is closer now, at the side of the bed. An arm reaches out of the mound of blankets. It’s bony and it shakes as it extends toward her. Mallory tentatively takes the knobby hand. I watch as she leans closer, as if trying to hear something Mom said. She shakes her head and fresh tears spill over her lashes, but then she sinks into the chair at the side of the bed and holds Mom’s hand in both of hers, pressing the backs of Mom’s fingers against her forehead as she cries.

And that’s it. I can’t stop the tears leaking from my eyes, first a trickle and then a flood. I lean my back against the wall and cover my face as sobs hitch out of my core.

But a second later, Mallory’s at the door. “Someone help!”

The nurse from the station and the guard both rush into the room, and I follow.

Mallory is back at the side of the bed. “She’s not breathing,” she sobs. “Do something!”

The nurse takes Mom’s wrist and checks her pulse. “I’m sorry, honey. She’s gone.”

“No.” I step up to the side of the bed as the nurse brushes her fingers over Mom’s dead eyes. She’s so much thinner than she was even last time I saw her, two months ago. Nothing but skin and bone.

I can’t reconcile the anger I feel that she didn’t wait for me with the grief that wraps around my heart and squeezes, threatening to choke out its rhythm. I convulse with sobs that I can’t control as everything I feel for and about her erupts out of me.

She drank. She let a parade of strange men into our lives. She threw Mallory out. She abandoned me and pretended like none of what happened to me afterward was her fault. She was a horrible mother. But she was mine—the only parent I’ve ever had. I wanted her to be so much more. I wanted her to love me.

The least she could have done was wait to die until I had a chance to say good-bye.

I drop the crushed Oh Henry! in my hand and spin for the door. Mallory calls after me as I bolt into the hall. When I get to the stairwell, I slide down the wall to a sitting position and pull my phone from my pocket.

“Il mio amore,” Alessandro purrs in greeting.

“I need you,” I sob into the phone. I think it’s the first time I’ve ever uttered those words out loud to anyone, but right now, it’s true.


MOM DIDN’T HAVE any friends. She had one brother, but all I know about him is that he lives somewhere else and didn’t want me after Mom went to jail. I didn’t try to find him to tell him Mom’s gone.

We don’t do a service, because there’s no point, but I stayed last night at Mallory and Jeff’s, and we go to the cemetery together when they put her in the ground.

After almost two weeks in Alessandro’s bed, being alone last night was cold and lonely. But Jeff asked me to come for Mallory. She’s still dealing with the emotional fallout of seeing Mom again for the first time in years, just in time to watch her die.

Despite his insistence, I asked Alessandro not to come to the cemetery for that reason. Mallory’s already a wreck, and seeing Alessandro and me together isn’t going to help. I’m finally ready to open up to Alessandro, as soon as I figure out how, but I’m not quite ready to tell Mallory about it. But it’s harder than I thought it would be to do this without him.

The cemetery is a few train stops south of Mallory’s house in New Jersey. I guess it was the cheapest place Jeff could find. It seems a little run down, with patches of weeds between the patches of snow, but overall, not too bad. It suits Mom. It’s quiet right now: only the three of us and the guy with the backhoe.

I shiver under the gray January sky as Backhoe Guy very unceremoniously cranks Mom’s coffin into the hole. No one brought flowers or anything, so when he asks us if we’re ready, we nod.

As he climbs onto the backhoe, I feel Mallory’s hand tighten, where she’s holding my elbow. I look at her and her pale face is pulled tight as she stares through the stumpy, bare trees toward the parking lot.

I follow her gaze and, walking across the grass toward us, is Alessandro. His back wool jacket is closed over black slacks and a blue button-down. I’d been containing my emotions pretty well, but when I see him, I feel the dam start to break.

He stops across Mom’s hole from where Mallory, Jeff and I are standing, and there’s a question on his face.

Do I want him to stay?

Mallory splits an anxious glance between us, then drops my arm and grasps Jeff’s hand tightly. Jeff looks from her to Alessandro and his eyes widen in understanding. There’s no way anyone close to Henri is going to miss the resemblance.

I walk slowly around Mom’s hole and stop in front of him. He reaches for my gloved hand and squeezes. “I’m sorry. I couldn’t stay away.” He bites the corner of his lower lip. “I can’t stand the thought of you in pain.”

I sink into his arms. “It’s okay.”

Alessandro glances at Mallory as Backhoe Guy cranks the engine loudly to life, then says into my hair, “Would you like me to say a word?”

I look at Mallory and her face is paler than it was a minute ago, her mouth fixed in a tight line. “That would be great. Thanks,” I tell Alessandro.

He lets go of me and crosses himself then bows his head, suddenly looking very priestly. I bow mine too. “Oh God, you do not willingly grieve or afflict your children. Look with pity on the suffering of this family in their loss. Sustain them in their anguish, and into the darkness of their grief bring the light of your love. Through Jesus we pray, Amen.”

When I lift my head, Mallory is curled into Jeff’s arms, sniffling into his shoulder. We all step back as Backhoe Guy starts plowing dirt on top of Mom, and I feel my throat thicken with tears. I swallow them.

“You need to let yourself grieve,” Alessandro says, softly into my ear.

I bite my lips between my teeth and I continue to fight the tears.

He smooths a hand over the back of my hair. “She was your mother, Hilary. No matter what happened between you, you wouldn’t be human if you didn’t hurt.”

A single hot tear trickles over my lashes and courses down my frozen cheek, and he pulls me to his shoulder. And that’s all it takes for me to totally lose it. He holds me close and hands me a tissue when I start to snot all over his jacket.

When I get my shit mostly together and peel myself off Alessandro, Mallory and Jeff are already walking back to their car.

“Are you going back to your sister’s?” Alessandro asks.

I shake my head and look at him with pleading eyes. “Take me home?”

He takes my hand and we start toward the road. “I expect the taxi I took from the train station is long gone.”

I lean into him and he wraps an arm around my waist, pulling me close, knowing I need his support without my having to ask. “There’s a bus stop just up the road,” I tell him. I look toward the parking lot and see Mallory and Jeff waiting at their car. Mallory is glaring so hard, I’m surprised it doesn’t cut Alessandro down on the spot.

Alessandro must see it too, because he squeezes my waist. “I hope didn’t create a problem by being here.”

“I’m glad you came.” And it’s true. But it’s also hard, because it means I have to come clean with Mallory. I was hoping to put that off as long as possible.

Alessandro lets go of me before we reach Mallory. “I’m very sorry for your loss,” he tells her.

She huffs out a derisive laugh. “You can’t lose something you never had.”

Jeff’s grimaces and he grasps her elbow. “Mallory.” His tone is low and soft, the voice he uses when he’s trying to talk her off the ledge.