Margaret died suddenly. I knew it was coming, but it still hit me like a ton of bricks and I broke down and wept right where I was (though I can’t remember where). I wept for all of an hour before things started happening that required me to be up and functioning. So I hid my tears, promising myself that when night came I would make everyone leave and then I could walk around Margaret’s store and cry.

Margaret had two heirs: her son, Desmond Middleton, and me, Elsie Riley. Her will read that everything she had owned was to be spilt evenly between the two of us, with the other receiving everything if for any reason one of us was to die or be incapable of accepting. Specific items were willed to Desmond, with others willed to me.

I was honored. I wasn’t related to Margaret in any way, but that one time she’d told me that I was the daughter she’d never had, she must have been serious. As if the memory of her wasn’t enough…she had loved me like my mother should have loved me.

One thing concerned me, though, especially when compared with the detail in Margaret’s will—the store. She had been mum on which of us—Desmond or me—was to receive the store. Looking back now, I don’t think I was instantly greedy and wanted it for myself, though I did want the memories and the work that I had come to adore. I was more afraid that Des would close the store, or sell it, and somehow displace me.

The will was read twice, one upon Margaret’s death, and again when Desmond arrived—par Margaret’s wish. (I think she must have known the blockhead would be late arriving.)

The first time I met Des, I was fighting a bout of tears and losing the fight. I was sitting in the store, behind the desk. It was closed, the front door locked, but he had a key. I looked up as the bell rang, confused and pissed to be dragged from my reprieve. He stepped in, his eyes fixed on me.

“I’m sorry,” he said haltingly, raising his hand slightly. “I didn’t realize anyone was in here.”

I knew who he was, even though I’d never met him, or even seen a picture of him before. I stood up and tossed the big teddy bear that I’d been clasping onto the counter, moved around it, and came toward him. He watched me, and I saw the curiosity in his eyes. I think he honestly thought I’d go into his arms and weep.

That made me even angrier, and when I reached him, I didn’t collapse like a damsel in distress. I slapped him. Good and hard with an open palm, right in the center of his cheek. His head turned with the violent whack, and we were both utterly still for a moment, only my heavy breathing punctuating each second. Then he raised a hand to his reddening cheek and I was caught by how beautiful his hands were—long fingers, knuckles and joints sticking out. They were nothing like mine; they didn’t look soft smooth. Just rough and well-used.

Then he pulled in an audible breath and turned dark eyes back to face me. “I suppose you’re Elsie Riley, aren’t you?” His mouth barely moved, but his eyes swept down my face, making each part of me tingle when he lingered in certain places; my lips, my neck, then my breasts and my hips, and on down. Heat curled in me, pooling near the center of my body.

“And you’re Desmond Middleton,” I said back at him in a voice that was rough from crying.

The left corner of his lips twitched, not a smile or a frown, just a twitch that puckered that side. “I guess I deserved that…for not being here sooner for her,” he said softly.

“Don’t hold your breath,” I said, feeling choked on tears again. “Margaret didn’t except to see you again. I slapped you because you took the same viewpoint.”

His eyes searched me for a moment, and then he nodded, like he’d just understood something. “She died alone.” It wasn’t a question.

I nodded, looking away suddenly because I didn’t want him to see that I was crying again. “She went to visit a friend when she…She died in the hospital, before her friend could get there…I didn’t know until—until—”

He put his arms around me and pulled me to him, holding on tightly. I was too tired to fight him, and besides, having a shoulder to cry on was a relief. Crying alone can almost be worse than grief. It makes you feel so alone and abandoned, worse off than you perhaps really are. It shreds your soul, just as surely as the death of a loved one does.

But in Des’s arms I felt safe, still hurting and anguished and brokenhearted, but not quite so alone. I didn’t know why, but didn’t really care either.

Somehow he managed to take me through the back of the store, and up the stairs that led to apartment on the second floor, the one that I occupied. He sat me down in the living room, left briefly and returned with a glass of water. I didn’t want to drink it, but he put it to my lips and coaxed me to, and when the first bit splashed in my mouth, I realized how parched I was, and downed the whole glass.

He smiled slightly as I wiped at my tears and red eyes.

“My mother wasn’t truthful with me.”

I turned started eyes on him and croaked, “What?”

“She said you were a pretty young thing; she didn’t say you were beautiful.”

I stared at him, wondering how in the world he could say such a thing when I was crying for his mother. Then he leaned forward and pressed his lips to mine, gently at first and then more hungrily. It was my first kiss, and even though I felt it was kinda awkward, he liked it. He scooted closer on the couch and pulled me against him again, this time pressing my chest to his.

I was swimming in sensations, physical ones and mental ones. I hadn’t ever felt so alive and sensitive, not ever, but after the last few days of feeling so incredibly dead and alone, his kiss and his arms around me, the way we seemed to mold together where we touched was stunning.

He tried to back out of the kiss, slacken his arms, but I didn’t let him. I didn’t even think about having to consciously stop him, I just did. I needed him to hold me, then do more. I needed it, or (and this struck me suddenly) I feared that I would die just as suddenly as Margaret had.

When I refused to let him go, he changed. His arms around me became more demanding, not rough and not gentle, just demanding. The kiss deepened, became more. I guess I fell, because he says he didn’t push, but the next thing I knew I was on my back on the couch, and he was above me, his body nestled between my legs. We were both fully clothed still, but it was incredible to me. I’d never felt so close to anyone before.

Then I looked up, into his eyes, and drowned. The need and comfort there blotted out my pain, and all remorse for losing Margaret.

His hand went into my shirt, his palm flat against my stomach, then my ribs, then my bra. His breathing was ragged as his hands went back down to the hem of the shirt and started pulling it upward, slowly, giving me the time to protest. But I didn’t. I couldn’t have, wouldn’t have.

The rest of our clothes melted away after he let my shirt fall from his hands to the floor, in that unconscious way that lovers always block out the rest of the world. I’d never been loved before; it was exhilarating. He was so gentle that I ended up crying again, all over, with new and different tears. It was slow and relaxed and tense at the same time, heightened senses, soft touches, rough demanding, all of it.

You know why people make love right after someone dies. It’s not that they don’t care, or that they’re being disrespectful. It’s that they’re so torn that they have to be reminded that they’re alive, and nothing else does it. It’s a celebration of life, inevitable and vital. And for Des and me, the first time was perfect.

When I woke up, it was late afternoon, and he was already awake, watching me. We’d somehow ended up in my bed, wrapped up in each other and the cover. His fingers went through my hair as he said,

“Hey.”

I smiled slightly, really not knowing what to say. I was also fairly distracted by my body pressing against his. He was just lying on his back. I was turned on my side and moving quite a lot.

“Do you forgive me?” he asked.

I frowned at him. “For what?”

“For not being here when she died.”

“Your mother forgave you before it happened,” I told him.

He smiled, sad and accepting. “I know. But do you?”

I was watching him closely, then pursed my lips and nodded slowly. “Yeah, I guess I do forgive you.”

“Good. I would hate for you to be mad at me for the rest of our life.”

“Our life?”

“You don’t expect me to let you go after last night, do you?”

“We don’t even know each other.”

He shook his head. “Doesn’t matter.”

“It doesn’t?”

“Nope. We’re fated—didn’t you wonder why my mother’s will was so vague, except for a few items? She meant for us to share everything.”

“But how could she have known?” I asked, thinking. To this day, I disagree with Des; Margaret’s will was very detailed, except for a few select points.

“I told you—fated.” He smiled. “Besides, life always comes out of death. That’s just the way things are.”

Des was right. Life always comes out of death, in one form or another, even if those affected by the death don’t realize it, or vise versa. Life, Love and Death—really you can’t ask for more.

Copyrighted © 2008 Arden Ashart