Sisterhood Everlasting - Ann Brashares [29]
“Do you understand? Do you understand?” the woman kept saying.
Lena held the phone with both hands. “I really don’t,” she said.
Lena found the number through the operator and called it that afternoon. Once she thought of it, she didn’t hesitate. It was a local number, picked up by voice mail after a few rings.
She listened to his voice, his outgoing message, which was in Greek. “Kostos, this is Lena Kaligaris,” she said in English, in a voice she hardly recognized. “I am in Santorini and I’m sorry to bother you, but if you are in town I need your help. Please call me at my grandparents’ house if you get this message.” She left the number in case he had forgotten it.
She hung up the phone. Her heart kept on with its same heavy thud. She listened for the sounds of Carmen’s and Bee’s footsteps even though they were gone and had been since that morning.
They hadn’t been able to look at one another to say goodbye. Between them was a seething, putrid mess of blame and fear and recrimination: What have we done? How did we let this happen? What did you know? What did I know? What didn’t you tell me? What didn’t I tell myself?
They had let Tibby slip away from them into complete darkness and not even known.
What does this mean about us? Who are we now? Who have we become?
When Bridget called Eric from the airport in Athens to let him know when she was getting in, he told her he’d take the afternoon off work to pick her up from the airport and to spend some time with her. She landed at SFO and saw his anxious face the moment she passed through the doors from the terminal into the baggage claim.
He took her in his arms right away. “I’m so sorry,” he murmured in her ear. He rocked her, saying it over and over.
But no matter how many times he said it, no matter how much she knew he meant it, the words stirred around in her ear but didn’t get into her brain. Sometimes he could comfort her. Sometimes he said what she needed, but today he couldn’t reach her. Nothing could.
She stared out the car window on the way home. She watched the brown hills, wondering when they would be green again. Eric didn’t try to make her talk.
As they headed into the Mission she experienced a stretch of time when she couldn’t remember where she lived. She kept picturing the place they’d had when Eric had first moved out here, when they’d first moved in together, the little place on Oak Street. She couldn’t remember anything of what her life was after that.
When she stepped into the apartment, it didn’t seem to belong to her, though she’d picked it—even forced Eric into it. She saw that Eric had laid the table with things she loved: a black bean burrito from Pancho’s, a sliced ripe avocado, a bowl of cubed mango, a plate of oatmeal cookies, and a pitcher of lemonade made with seltzer. She turned to him and thanked him by putting her arms around him. She was grateful, she really was. Even if none of it seemed to relate to her anymore. Even if she couldn’t eat any of it.
“Okay, here’s the big surprise,” he announced, throwing open the bedroom door.
Bridget stared into the little room in disbelief. There was a bed. A big wooden four-poster job riding high with its box spring and mattress, its fluffy comforter and pile of pillows.
“Brand-new sheets and everything,” Eric declared proudly. He walked toward it and she followed, slowly.
“I realized we’ve never had a bed,” he said, admiring it, patting it with his open hand. “We always sleep on a mattress on the floor or a futon or something. I feel like it’s time for us to have a real bed, you know? I took a while picking it out. There were a lot of different kinds. I hope you like it.”
He turned to look at her. She couldn’t say anything. She sat on the floor in the doorway and burst into tears.
“Bee, what?” Eric asked, kneeling down next to her. “What is it?”
She couldn’t catch her breath. He put his arms around her, but she couldn’t settle her gasping.
“Please. Tell me what’s wrong.”
“I—I don’t want that b-bed,” she sobbed.
“Why not? What’s wrong with it? I thought