I remembered him rubbing his palms against his trousers again and again.
“You’re shaking,” I had told him.
“I’m dying. I think I’m allowed to shake.”
At the time, I accepted that explanation.
Now I wondered how many things I had accepted simply because asking another question had seemed unnecessary.
At the records counter, someone pointed me toward an older woman wearing red glasses.
“Margaret?”
She looked up.
“Yes?”
“My name is Sarah.”
I hesitated.
“I’m Larry’s wife.”
Her hands froze above the keyboard.
“Larry?”
I nodded.
Her chair rolled backward.
“Oh, sweetheart.”
Before I understood what was happening, she walked around the counter and hugged me.
I stood stiffly in her arms.
When she stepped back, her eyes were wet.
“When did he pass?”
