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A FINE EDGE

There’s a fine edge to new grief, it severs nerves, disconnects reality - there’s e wears, does the real ache begin

So Charlie was barely even aware of his own shrieks in Rachel’s hospital roo sedated, of the fil he did for that first day After that, it was a memory out of a sleepwalk, scenes filh explanations, accusations, preparations, and ceremony

"It’s called a cerebral thromboes or pelvis during labor, thenoff the blood supply It’s very rare, but it happens There was nothing we could do Even if the crash team had been able to revive her, she’d have had e There was no pain She probably just felt sleepy and passed"

Charlie whispered to keep fro to her He injected her with so I saw hiht her CD back"

They showed him the security tapes - the nurse, the doctor, the hospital’s administrators and lawyers - they all watched the black-and-white i Rachel’s roo to her rooreen They didn’t even find the CD

Sleep deprivation, they said Hallucination brought on by exhaustion Traus for depression, and they sent hihter

Charlie’s older sister, Jane, held baby Sophie as they spoke over Rachel and buried her on the second day He didn’t reements It wasto and fro in black, like tottering specters, spouting the inadequate clich��s of condolence: We’re so sorry She was so young What a tragedy If there’s anything we can do

Rachel’s father and ether in the apex of a tripod The slate floor in the funeral-home foyer spotted with their tears Every time Charlie felt the shoulders of the older ain Saul took Charlie’s face in his hands and said, "You can’t iine, because he was a Beta Male, and iine because he had lost Rachel and now he had a daughter, that tiny stranger sleeping in his sister’s ar her

Charlie looked at the tear-spotted floor and said, "That’s why most funeral homes are carpeted Someone could slip"

"Poor boy," said Rachel’s mother "We’ll sit shivah with you, of course"

Charlie made his way across the room to his sister, Jane, ore a abardine, that along with her severe eighties pop-star hairstyle and the infant in the pink blanket that she held, ynous as confused Charlie thought the suit actually looked better on her than it did on him, but she should have asked him for permission to wear it nonetheless

"I can’t do this," he said He let himself fall forward until the receded peninsula of dark hair touched her gelled Flock of Seagulls platinurief, this forehead lean, and it re forward until his head hit the wall Despair

"You’re doing fine," Jane said "Nobody’s good at this"

"What the fuck’s a shivah?"

"I think it’s that Hindu god with all the ar to sit on it withJewish?"

"I wasn’t paying attention I thought we had time"

Jane adjusted baby Sophie into a half-back, one-armed carry and put her free hand on the back of Charlie’s neck "You’ll be okay, kid"

Seven," said Mrs Goldstein "Shivahfor the dead, praying That’s Orthodox, now most people just sit for three"

They sat shivah in Charlie and Rachel’s apartment that overlooked the cable-car line at the corner of Mason and Vallejo Streets The building was a four-story brick Edwardian (architecturally, not quite the grand courtesan couture of the Victorians, but enough tarty trim and trash to toss off a sailor down a side street) built after the earthquake and fire of 1906 had leveled the whole area of as now North Beach, Russian Hill, and Chinatown Charlie and Jane had inherited the building, along with the thrift shop that occupied the ground floor, when their father died four years before Charlie got the business, the large, double apartrown up in, and the upkeep on the old building, while Jane got half the rental incoe view

At the instruction of Mrs Goldstein, all the e candle was placed on the coffee table in the center of the living room They were supposed to sit on low benches or cushions, neither of which Charlie had in the house, so, for the first time since Rachel’s death, he went downstairs into the thrift shop looking for so they could use The back stairs descended from a pantry behind the kitchen into the stockroo boxes ofto be sorted, priced, and placed in the store

The shop was dark except for the light that filtered in the frontfrohts out on Mason Street Charlie stood there at the foot of the stairs, his hand on the light switch, just staring Amid the shelves of knickknacks and books, the piles of old radios, the racks of clothes, all of thelowing a dull red, nearly pulsing, like beating hearts A sweater in the racks, a porcelain figure of a frog in a curio case, out by the frontan old Coca-Cola tray, a pair of shoes - all glowing red

Charlie flipped the switch, fluorescent tubes fired to life across the ceiling, flickering at first, and the shop lit up The red glow disappeared "Okaaaaaaay," he said to hi was just fine now He flipped off the lights Glowing red stuff On the counter, close to where he stood, there was a brass business-card holder cast in the shape of a whooping crane, glowing dull red He took a second to study it, just to ht source fro him uneasy for no reason He stepped into the dark shop, took a closer look, got an angle on the brass cranes Nope, the brass was definitely pulsing red He turned and ran back up the steps as fast as he could

He nearly ran over Jane, who stood in the kitchen, rocking Sophie gently in her ar baby talk under her breath

"What?" Jane said "I know you have so cushions down in the shop sos" He backed against the refrigerator, like he was holding it hostage

"I’ll go get thes I’"

Jane cradled the baby in the crook of her right arer brother "Charlie, you are on antidepressants and antianxiety drugs, not acid Look around this apartment, there’s not a person here that’s not on soh: wo their heads,roo into space

"See, they’re all fucked up"

"What about Mo the other gray-haired women in black because she was draped in silver Navaho jewelry and was so darkly tanned that she appeared to beinto her old-fashioned when she took a sip

"Especially Mo to sit shivah on I don’t knohy you can’t just use the couches Now take your daughter"