Cleo

Alternatively, perhaps our visitor was one of the people who’d brought food. Countless plates laden with sandwiches, muffins, roasted chicken, food for uncertain appetites had appeared on the doorstep over the past three weeks. I was grateful to those cooks for their practicality and restraint. Their anonymous gifts were a welcome relief from emotional confrontation. Even though food was of no interest to me the meals seemed to disappear.

A guilt-inducing pile of empty plates was growing taller on our kitchen counter. I had no idea who had brought them. Perhaps the visitor was one of those benefactors, with sufficient courage to revisit a house of sorrow and reclaim her plate.

No, I wouldn’t open the door to whoever was hovering behind the frosted glass. He or she could leave the food, flowers or sympathy card oozing saccharine prose on the mat and retreat to a life without pain.

As I stepped backwards to the safety of the kitchen, the figure tapped on the glass. Rata leapt to her feet and let out a simultaneous bark. It was the first time we’d heard her emit anything other than a whine since Sam’s death.

“Good girl!” I said, stroking the lovable rug of her back as she lunged towards the front door, her tail wagging.

The head behind the glass shifted expectantly. Whoever it was had heard both the bark and my response. There was no choice now. Refusing to open the door would be plain old-fashioned rudeness.

Looping Rata’s collar through my fingers, I turned the latch. Sunlight stabbed my brain. The graceful figure belonged to Lena. Attached to her long elegant arm was her son, Jake, who was the same age as Rob.

Most people had kept their children away. All except one or two of Rob’s closest friends had maintained their distance. Understandably. The death of a grandparent is enormous enough for a child to encompass, let alone the annihilation of someone their own age. Who knows what effect the sudden departure of someone from their own generation could have on their unformed nervous systems? And there’s no proof tragedy isn’t contagious.

I wasn’t confident about my reactions to other people’s children yet, either. When names were mentioned, especially boys Sam’s age, vengeful rage would boil inside. What right has your son to be alive when mine is not?

Lena’s son stared up at me unblinkingly, then at Rata joyously bursting to escape my grip on her collar. Jake peered around me into the hallway. Perhaps this was going to be a half-normal visit after all, refreshingly free of the old “I’m so terribly sorry. Please let me know if there’s anything I can do.”

“Would you like to see Rob?” I asked the child, in case Lena wanted to express the platitudes I’d learned to expect. “He’s building a city on the moon.”

Jake stood still, a smile flickering on his lips.

“You could use the toilet if you like,” I blabbered, trying to stop Rata’s flailing tongue drowning him in saliva. “Except it’s not very private at the moment, I’m afraid. They said they’d need two weeks to strip the door, but it’s taking forever. We’re in a bit of a mess…”

Lena bent like a willow over her shoulder bag, a huge patchwork sack, flamboyant and colorful enough to have been made by the artist herself. Reaching into the bag, she excavated a small creature with large triangular ears. It was black and not so much furry as sprinkled with occasional hairs. Perhaps she’d stitched together some kind of toy to comfort a boy grieving for his lost brother.

I was alarmed when the tiny thing’s head moved. Its eyes bulged like a pair of glass beads. A set of impossibly dainty feet draped themselves through Lena’s fingers. I was reminded of those photos of premature babies whose miniature scale is demonstrated alongside an adult human hand. An organism so helpless it would surely have difficulty supporting its own life.

“We’ve brought the kitten,” said Lena, smiling steadily.

The kitten? What kitten?

“Sam’s kitten!” said Rob, running down the hall and squeezing around me.

Rata barked loudly and sprang free of my grip. Jumping on her haunches, she almost knocked Lena over. The kitten recoiled into Lena’s breast. Our dog must have seemed a monster to the little thing. The two animals obviously loathed each other.

“Down, girl!” I growled. “She’s not used to cats.” Grabbing the dog firmly by the collar again, I led her inside and back down the hallway.

“Don’t worry, old thing,” I said, rubbing a hand through her coat. “We’ll sort this out.”

Rata seemed to understand that being jailed in the kitchen was a temporary inconvenience. The kitten, Sam’s kitten, didn’t belong in our house. It had arrived like E.T. in a spaceship (disguised as Lena’s patchwork bag). The kitten was from another time. We were different people when Sam was with us and our lives were whole. Now that we were broken, frayed remnants of our former selves there was no place for a kitten. Not with us.