Dad put his arm around me. He was shaking, his whole body an earthquake. I turned in my chair to hold him, and the landslide of his grief overwhelmed me. My father wasn’t supposed to cry like this, not in front of me. I didn’t know how to react. Was I supposed to comfort him? I couldn’t breathe.

Analemma came into the kitchen, nosing at Dad’s knees. Every day since Joan went to the hospital, Analemma had repeatedly gone upstairs looking for her. Every time she’d come back down sniffing, sniffing, as if she couldn’t accept that Joan wasn’t in the house somewhere. Now Analemma sniffed Dad more and more insistently, until he dropped his hands from his wet face and started to stroke her ears. She nosed her way closer and closer, and finally with a short laugh he got out of his chair and knelt on the floor, and Analemma pressed her head against his chest, a faint whine coming out of her.

It was the whine that did it. There was no way to tell Analemma what had happened. Joan had disappeared with no explanation, and Analemma would never see her again.

I would never see her again.

My eyes were burning hot, spilling over.

I got down on the floor, too, and Dad put his arm around me, pulling me close. Analemma was warm and muscled and solid between us, and I still remember the scent of her—a toasted, earthy liveness—and I buried my head in her neck, my tears soaking into her silken black fur.

Chapter 46

Aunt Tammy came home from the rehab facility before noon with a suitcase of Joan’s things. After Grandpa died, my grandmother had written out explicit instructions on what she wanted to happen after her death. Grandpa had been cremated and his ashes were scattered in the Marin Headlands; she wanted the same thing.

“We’ll have the private memorial service a week from Saturday,” Aunt Tammy said, drinking another cup of coffee in the kitchen, where we had gathered to discuss the funeral plans. My father had become alternately quiet and angry, and Aunt Tammy had turned into an efficient planning machine. “Almost everything is booked up with gay weddings, but I was able to rent the Fairfax Women’s Club, and I’ve contacted the Buddhist teacher Mom specified for the service. I have to go back to Pasadena after that but I should be able to get some time off in September when we do the public memorial at her gallery in San Francisco. Matt, if you can come out for a week, we can try to get the house in shape to put it on the market.”

“I’ll work it out,” Dad said. “Are you taking Analemma with you?”