The day passed as if in a dream. We drank sherry and Mrs. Martin cried. We stood in the dining room and talked about the paintings. We went to see the body. We talked about what the body should wear. We decided on a pale blue suit. We dug it out of the crowded closet. The smell of Betadine was everywhere.

Later, Malcolm and I went off with Minx and Henry to their apartment in Buckhead. Henry put on a velvet smoking jacket and mixed martinis and we drank them. Malcolm fucked me in the guest room with his cousins in the next room and I let him. We drank more martinis. We cried and listened to phonograph records and I told Minx and Henry the story of my life. We went back over to Aunt Gaye’s. We smoked and smoked and smoked. We cried and talked and touched each other’s arms. We were engaged in timeless ritual. We were burying our dead.

About twelve Malcolm took me back to Minx and Henry’s to spend the night. He left me at the door. For the first time I realized the inconvenience of not being married. Here I was, with a dead body in my brain, and I was going to have to sleep alone in a dark room. “You aren’t going, are you?” I asked. “You aren’t going to leave me?”

“I have to go back over there,” he answered. “I have to spend the night with them.”

“With your momma and daddy?”

“I have to. I told them I’d come back. I’ll see you in the morning.” He was standing in the door. He was leaving.

“Jesus Christ. I can’t believe you’re going to leave me here.”

“I have to. They wouldn’t like it. I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Okay. Go on. Who cares? Who gives a damn?” I walked away and he didn’t move to follow me.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry I can’t stay.”

“It doesn’t matter. Go on and leave. Get out of here.” I walked across the room and turned and looked at him. He shook his head and left me there. I went into the bedroom and tore off my clothes and got into the bed and rolled up in a ball. Who gives a damn, I told myself to lull myself to sleep. He’s not even very cute. I don’t really even like him.

The funeral was the following morning. Malcolm came over at nine and we drove to the funeral home with Minx and Henry. “The story in the papers made it sound like she’d been in bed with him,” Minx said. “Has Miss Rose seen it yet?”