“I said, I’ll try, G.” A wave of desolation overcame her. “She would like you, is the thing.”

There was a rap at the door. Joey struggled up in the bed to see her mother poke her head in. “Mom?”

Bea had never interrupted them like this, especially not in Leo’s apartment. Unlike her friends’ parents who freaked over the topic of sex, Bea felt it was of feminist imperative that Joey own her sexual choices. Yes, there were some key benefits to her mother’s extreme feminism, despite Bea occasionally being embarrassing as hell.

Joey took in her mother’s unusual, tearstained face, a mirror to her own.

“Grandfather died.” Her mother bit down on her lip. “He had a heart attack and died last night.” Bea dove into the bed and clutched Joey with the same intensity that Joey had just clutched Leo.

“No,” Joey whispered as the words slowly sank in.

“Oh God, Bea, that’s terrible! I’m so sorry,” Leo said, amid his tossing aside of sheets to scoot closer. “Jonesey, I’m so sorry. I’m so…”

Joey felt stroking on her back in addition to her mother’s grip that she knew was from Leo.

Her lovely grandfather whom she adored. Her lovely grandfather in his black polished shoes.

“It was fast, baby. He didn’t suffer. But we need to go home now. They’re waiting for us to have the funeral. You know, the Jewish custom is that burial has to happen as soon as possible after the…death. We need to pack up and go home.”

And her mother went off on a fresh spate of tears as Joey sat perfectly still in her mother’s crushing embrace, her tears all dried up.

*  *  *

Later Joey lay on her bed, clutching her teddy bear Nacho Chip, who usually didn’t get much love. Her bedroom door opened, streaming light like shards of glass into her eyes.

“Jonesey?”

Joey wanted to tell him to go away. But more than that she wanted him still, for as long as he would stay.

Leo didn’t seem to know how to approach her. He sat on her bed against the wall but then made a wincing sound. Joey twisted slightly to see what had happened and watched Leo remove a tack that protruded from the wall. With it came the picture it had attached—a Polaroid of Leo from the summer before.