When he reached Section C, he saw Eleanor and June already there, not arm in arm, not sentimental, simply standing near the headstone while Eleanor adjusted the ribbon on a bouquet and June held two paper cups of cemetery coffee. Michael slowed before they noticed him. In that unguarded second, he saw the arrangement he had wanted all along and had never known how to ask for: not harmony, but mutual acknowledgement. Not a rewritten past, but a survivable present.
June handed Eleanor one of the coffees.
Eleanor accepted it with a slight nod and said something Michael could not hear. June smiled faintly. Then both women looked up and saw him. Michael lifted a hand, and for the first time in years, no one looked at him like a referee.
They looked at him like family.
The hardest work, Michael discovered, was not performed in cemeteries.
It was performed in ordinary rooms with ordinary objects once the drama of public grief had passed. In October, June finally decided to sell the condo. The mortgage was manageable on her salary, but every room still held Thomas in ways that no longer felt comforting. His reading glasses remained on the side table. His Army mugs took up space in the kitchen cabinet. His tan windbreaker still hung by the coat closet, one pocket containing a grocery receipt and the little hardware-store pencil he always carried.
Michael offered to help clear the place out on Saturdays.