Damn These Uncontrollable Tears

Chapter 2: Coffee After the Service

I followed Camille into the fellowship room because my legs were too unsteady to carry me back into the rain alone.

The room smelled of coffee, wet wool, and the buttery cookies someone had laid out on paper plates. A dozen mourners stood in little knots. They spoke softly, their voices dropping when Camille passed.

I kept expecting someone to ask who I was.

Nobody did. They assumed I belonged.

A gray-haired man in a navy suit touched Camille's shoulder. "Your mother would have loved the music."

"She did," Camille said.

"I'm sure she heard it."

He offered me a sympathetic glance and moved away. I wanted to tell him I was not family, not a friend, not even a former neighbor. I said nothing.

Camille poured coffee into two paper cups. She handed one to me.

"Cream?"

"No, thank you."

"I'm not asking you to stay forever," she said. "Just long enough to drink that."

I wrapped my hands around the cup. The heat felt good.

A woman with a silver braid came over and introduced herself as Ruth, Evelyn's sister. I told her my name. Before I could explain the rest, Ruth squeezed my wrist.

"Thank you for coming," she said.

I glanced at Camille. She didn't correct her.

"I'm sorry for your loss," I managed.

"Thank you, dear." Ruth reached for a cookie. "Evelyn always liked a full room."

That seemed to be true. People kept arriving, offering condolences, telling stories. I learned that Evelyn had been a school librarian, that she had once taken a bus four towns over to return a book she found in a grocery cart, and that she'd spent her retirement volunteering at the harbor literacy center.

"I don't understand why she didn't tell us she was so sick," Ruth said at one point.

Camille's eyes dropped to her cup. "She didn't want people fussing."

I felt the words land somewhere inside me. Owen had said I made everything bigger. I had spent years trying to make my feelings smaller before they inconvenienced anyone.

Camille seemed to notice my expression.

"What?" she asked.

"Nothing."

"People say that when they mean something."

"I'm not sure I'm allowed to have an opinion about your mother."

"You're allowed to have an opinion about people hiding pain."

I looked at the coffee. "My fiancé thought I did too much of the opposite."

"Did he say that today?"

"Yes."

"Then maybe he wasn't the right person to judge you."

I pressed my lips together. The words were kind, but they felt too clean, as if they could cover a mess I hadn't started cleaning yet.

"He said I turn every hard conversation into a situation where he has to comfort me."

"Do you?"

The question caught me.

"I don't know. Maybe." I stared at the cup. "I cry when I'm angry. I cry when I'm relieved. I cry if someone else is crying. I've cried at commercials about rescued dogs. It happens before I decide whether I want it to."

Camille studied me, then nodded. "That sounds exhausting."

It did. I had expected her to tell me that crying was nothing to be ashamed of. I hadn't expected her to acknowledge how tiring it could be.

"I've tried breathing exercises," I said. "Cold water. Counting things. Looking at the ceiling. None of it works once it starts."

"Mom used to say you can't stop the tide by yelling at the water."

I laughed once, and the laugh turned into another wet breath. I had to press my thumb against the paper cup to steady it.

"I'm sorry," I said.

"You keep apologizing for having a face."

The sentence stayed with me.

I took out my phone. There were three messages from Owen. The first asked if I was safe. The second said he was going to give me space. The third said he'd like to talk about the apartment when I was ready.

I locked the screen.

Camille saw the motion. "You don't have to tell me."

"I know."

"Do you want to go?"

"Yes. No. I don't know." I swallowed. "I don't want to sit here pretending I belong."

"Then don't pretend."

I put the cup down. "I'm Lena Brooks. I came in because I was crying about my own life. I didn't know your mother. I'm sorry I took up space at her funeral."

Camille let the words settle.

"Thank you for telling me."

"I should go."

"You can. But before you do, can I ask you something?"

I nodded.

"Would you come back tomorrow? I'm sorting through Mom's things at her house. It would help to have another person there."

"Why me?"

"Because you didn't try to make me feel better by telling me everything happens for a reason."

I looked away. I didn't know what to do with the tenderness in her voice.

"I can come for an hour," I said.

"An hour is fine."

Camille wrote an address on the back of a funeral program. The house was a small blue place on Harbor Lane, near the old lighthouse.

I tucked the paper into my coat pocket. As I walked toward the door, Ruth stopped me.

"Evelyn would have wanted you to take a cookie," she said.

"I don't want to take anything from the family."

"Then take one for the road."

She wrapped two cookies in a napkin and pressed them into my hands.

I carried them outside with the envelope from Owen and the address from Camille. The rain had stopped, but the clouds hung low over Bellwether.

For the first time that day, I wasn't crying.

It lasted until I reached the bus stop.