A few minutes later, Reva was knocking on the door.
“I brought you some quiche,” she said. “Can I come in?”
Reva now wore a big red fleece robe. She had done her hair and makeup already. I was still in the towel, under the covers. I took the quiche and ate it while Reva sat on the edge of the bed. She prattled on about her mother, that she never appreciated her mother’s artistic talent. It was going to be a long afternoon.
“She could have been great, you know? But in her generation, women were expected to be mothers and stay at home. She gave her life up just for me. Her watercolors are amazing, though. Don’t you think?”
“They’re decent amateur watercolors, yeah,” I said.
“How was the shower?”
“No soap,” I said. “Did you find any shoes I can borrow?”
“You should go up there and look yourself,” said Reva.
“I really don’t want to.”
“Just go up there and pick something. I don’t know what you want.”
I refused.
“You’re going to make me go back up there?”
“You said you’d bring me some options.”
“I can’t look in her closet. It’s too upsetting. Will you just go look?”
“No. I’m not comfortable doing that, Reva. I can just stay here if you want and miss the funeral, I guess.”
I put down the quiche.
“Okay, fine, I’ll go,” Reva sighed. “What do you need?”
“Shoes, stockings, some kind of shirt.”
“What kind of shirt?”
“Black, I guess.”
“Okay. But if you don’t like what I bring down, don’t blame me.”
“I’m not going to blame you, Reva. I don’t care.”
“Just don’t blame me,” she repeated.
She got up, leaving little bits of red fuzz on the bed where she’d been sitting. I got out of bed and looked inside the bag from Bloomingdale’s. The suit was made of stiff rayon. The necklace was nothing I’d ever wear. The Infermiterol seemed to ruin my usual good taste in things, although the white fur coat was interesting to me. It had personality. How many foxes had to die, I wondered. And how did they kill them so that their blood didn’t stain their fur? Maybe Ping Xi could have answered that question, I thought. How cold would it have to be to freeze a live white fox? I tore the tags off the bra and panties and put them on. My pubic hair puffed out the panties. It was a good joke—sexy underwear with a huge bush. I wished I had my Polaroid camera to capture the image. The lightheartedness in that wish struck me, and for a moment I felt joyful, and then I felt completely exhausted.
When Reva came back with her arms full of shoes and shirts and an unopened package of flesh-colored nylons from the eighties, I handed her the necklace.
“I got you something,” I said, “to condole you.”
Reva dropped everything on the bed and opened the box. Her eyes filled with tears—just like in a movie—and she embraced me. It was a good hug. Reva had always been good at hugs. I felt like a praying mantis in her arms. The fleece of her robe was soft and smelled like Downy. I tried to pull away but she held me tighter. When she finally let go, she was crying and smiling. She sniffed and laughed.
“It’s beautiful. Thanks. That’s really sweet. Sorry,” she said, wiping her nose on her sleeve. She put the necklace on and pulled the collar of her robe away and studied her neck in the mirror. Her smile turned a little phony. “You know, I don’t think you can use ‘condole’ that way. I think you can ‘condole with’ someone. But you can’t ‘condole’ someone.”
“No, Reva. I’m not condoling you. The necklace is.”
“But that’s not the right word, I think. You can console someone.”
“No, you can’t,” I said. “Anyway, you know what I mean.”
“It’s beautiful,” Reva said again, flatly this time, touching the necklace. She pointed to the mess of black stuff she’d brought down. “This is all I found. I hope it’s okay.”
She took her dress out from the closet and went into the bathroom to change. I put the pantyhose on, picked through the shoes, found a pair that fit. From the tangle of shirts I pulled out a black turtleneck. I put it on, and put the suit on. “Do you have a brush I can borrow?”
Reva opened the bathroom door and handed me an old hairbrush with a long wooden handle. There was a spot on the back that was all scratched up. When I held it under the light, I could make out teeth marks. I sniffed it but couldn’t detect the smell of vomit, only Reva’s coconut hand cream.