0001: Drive to Tarry Ridge tonight. Write down this address: Beth Shalom Cemetery. 1561 Woodlawn Ave.
0001: Park across the street from the cemetery NO LATER THAN EIGHT THIRTY P.M. TONIGHT, and watch the entrance.
0001: A bald white man—approx. 5’9”—will leave the cemetery and cross the street between 8:40 and 9:00. Do not leave your car until you see him exit the cemetery. Act as if you are making a call. When he is in the middle of the crosswalk, look up. MAKE SURE THAT HE SEES YOU. Then SAY HELLO.
I wait, but the screen stays blank. Free of ellipses. Finally I type.
0417: Then what?
0001: That’s all.
0417: Just hello? That’s all I’m supposed to say?
0001: DO NOT speak to him until he is crossing the street. Understood?
0417: Yes.
0001: And do not move from where you are standing.
0417: OK.
As soon as my message is gone, this pops onto my screen:
0001: SCRIPT: You’re going to a grief-counseling group that meets at 9:00 p.m. It’s at St. Frederick’s Church on Peach Tree St. You saw an announcement for the group on an online forum. You are a first-time attendee. Use your real name.
I check the time on my phone. I have just about two hours to get to Tarry Ridge. I change out of my sweats and into a pair of jeans and boots and a dark turtleneck sweater. Then I throw on my coat, pour some coffee into my to-go cup, and grab a bottle of water, a banana, and a bag of chips on my way out the door so that I can eat dinner behind the wheel. I stopped for gas on the way home from the funeral, and I’m glad for that. I can hit the thruway right away and, barring unforeseen tie-ups, I’ll make it there with plenty of time to spare.
As I start up the car, I think about how I haven’t had an assignment since the night of Gary Kimball—not even a random purchase at a hardware store or a quick trip to a post office—and even though it’s only been four days, it’s made me feel a bit anxious and adrift. There’s a weight to having a destination and a purpose, even if that purpose is saying hi to a stranger as he’s leaving a cemetery. It tethers me, the way being a mother used to. It makes me feel as though I’m part of something more important than myself.
When I’m leaving Mount Shady and pulling onto Route 28, the sun is setting. It’s beautiful, the sky shot through with veins of purple and orange. I turn on the radio, but I don’t search for the news this time. I want music. I find a song I used to love in high school and start to mouth the words. “Just like heaven,” I whisper, my pulse quickening, that gorgeous bloodshot sky above me, the thruway entrance so close, I can nearly read the signs.
THE OLDIES STATION loses its novelty before it loses its signal, and so by the time I reach the exit for Tarry Ridge, I’ve been shifting back and forth between three commercial news stations, and an ad for an incontinence clinic is stuck in my head. I’ve been listening for information about Gary Kimball and Harris Blanchard, but I’ve heard nothing. Nothing new, anyway—just the same story about the search for Kimball continuing, played on two of the three stations twice within the hour. Harris Blanchard, it seems, is no longer big enough for radio news.
I drive past a row of Tarry Ridge businesses—a bagel place, a Mexican restaurant, a high-end boutique, a gym. What strikes me most about this ride is the loneliness of it—an entirely different experience than my ride with Wendy. It makes me long for her company, for company of any sort, really, even texts on a burner. Now that I know the collective is real, there’s something anxiety-producing about doing the work solo, and when I turn the radio off, the silence roars at me. I took my pills this morning; I’m sure of it. But it feels as though I haven’t, as though I’m not living but reliving this moment and there’s something inside me clamoring to escape. . . .
“Call Luke.” I say it without thinking. My phone dials his number, and he answers before I have time to think better of it, the warmth of his voice lassoing me back.