The rain falls thick and sweet, like milk.

It films the teashop windows and obscures the shadows that stroll in the streets. Steam peels off the surface of my steeping tea. Like smoke in a chimney flue it travels up my nostrils, and the pleasant, cleansing sting of lemon-scented steam makes me crinkle my nose. With the nonchalance of an indulged youngest son, Jack pours a measure of Tennessee whisky into his coffee. Glug, glug, glug. I don't pretend not to notice; instead I pin him with a pointed look as I fill my own cup with heaps of sugar and heavy cream—a gentler indulgence. The flask, which I know to be bound in embossed chocolate leather although it is wrapped in a brown paper bag, is slightly too bulky to slip back into his pocket. He sets it on the table between us, and in the same obstinate silence, I pick it up and put it in my purse.

A smile, molasses-slow, spread his lips. He laughs; the sound is perpetually amber-tinted, coloured warm and golden by the drink he likes so much. It's the colour of his skin, of his whisky eyes.

"Hey, it fit into my pocket a minute ago, di'n't it?" he remarks between chuckles. He rubs the bump on the freckled bridge of his nose. Eventually, he is laughing so hard that pretty tears spark in his eyes like the first hint of fire.

What I do say, in a voice carefully restrained, is, "I don't see what's so funny about that."

What I don't say is that I think it's funny too; that his eyelashes look like they're dripping gold when they're wet; that I can't thank him enough for never really letting me see him cry.

"Lord, Whisky, you look damn pretty when you're angry." His grin is bright, magnolia white and hangs loose and lazy like a crescent moon over the river. "Still not going to marry me?"

I peer down into my tea, taking brief refuge as my head cartwheels at that oh-so-familiar proposal. "Don't think so," I reply with more self-assurance than I feel. My porcelain teacup rattles like rain on the roof as I place it back on its saucer.

"Now, don't be shy about breakin' my heart again," he drawls. Slow, like gators in the mud, his hands slide across the table and close around mine. In three years, I have seen those lazy, lethal reptiles surprise a victim or two with their death rolls. Though Jack's grip is gentle, in my chest I get that upside-down, underwater, about-to-die sensation anyway. Because his blood is as thin as a veil, it runs from his heart to his fingertips in no time at all. They burn as he traces them over the back of my hands taking care to worry the silver band on my left hand with his hot coal fingers.

He muses, "That should be my diamond, y'know."

I can't bring myself to pull my hands back. "Well, it's not." My actions undermine the conviction of my words, and I'm furious with myself, but I press on. "I love him, Jack. I'm in love with him. I think you forget that sometimes." It still doesn't feel like I've said enough, so I add, "He's a good man."

"A good old man," he corrects, finally releasing me and hiding his hands in pockets; the tools of his rejected advances. Slow like the pendulum of a porch swing, he shakes his head, "Oh, Whisky, Whisky, Whisky." He intones my name like he's savouring it. To him, it's something delectable.

"Y'know, I reckon it's very tellin' that everything I love is called 'whisky'. I'd say that's more than coincidence. Why, I'd say that's fate."

We always hit this point when we see one another; the point where we lose our balance and stumble into the dangerous territory of drinking and weddings and things beings what they are. Sometimes we manage to skirt the edges of it for hours, talking like old friends about nothing at all. Other days end like today, when he dives into the shallow end of the pool head first, paralyzing the conversation. I stand up, grabbing my purse, before the tears that prickle the backs of my eyes break through.

"I think it's very telling that you changed my name to 'Whisky' instead of calling the whisky 'Olivia'." My hands tremble like thunder-shaken windows panes as I count out three dollars and eighty-seven cents onto the maple table top. "I should go."

"Olivia," he concedes, grasping my bird-boned wrist as I pass him, "don't go home to 'im. Please. Y'can't just leave me and go right on home to 'im."

"He's my husband," I reply quietly, "and he needs me."

The slow-brewing storm behind his hold eyes falls on his whole face, darkening it as though the bank of rain-clouds rolling overhead had decided to waltz right into the tea shop. It's pouring outside and pouring inside and I am stuck some place in the middle, drowning. "You're young, Olivia. You're twen'y-one. That's far too young to be anybody's wife but mine. And far too young to be a widow."

I draw a deep, easy breath. "It's too young to be a lot of things."

"How long has 'e got? A month? Two?" For the most inconsequential sliver of a minute, his eyes go cool and lucid and I really do hate him. "I can wait."

***

Two blocks away, under the wisteria choked eaves of a lit-up shoe boutique, I wait for Josiah to bring the car around. The honey-hued whisky is dark as oil as I pour it onto the sidewalk, murmuring Hail Maries and begging divine pardon for not telling him what I'd promised the Good Lord I would. The cloying smell, sticky, sweet and tripled in strength by the wet heat of summer in the South—makes me sick to my stomach. I'm sick at the waste of the precious liquor, sick with longing for it, and just plain sick.

In April, the doctor told me my husband would be in the ground inside of two months.

It's July.

***

Despite the suffocating humidity brought on by the low-slung sky, the house is cool as a crypt.

"Carter!" I cry, trying not to alarm him as I rush in from the hallway with my mud-caked boots still on my feet, "Why are the windows open? You'll freeze to death!"

His laugh is bayou-mud slow as well, cool and deep and languid, like he still had all the time in the world left for laughter. I remember it seemed so exotic to me, with its confederate twang, when I first met him. Now there is laughter just like it everywhere; the whole South is full of its charm. I stick out like a potted plant in the swamp as the only person for miles who doesn't drag my vowels out with warm breath. Here I, the potted plant, am exotic.

"Sweetheart, I'm already dyin'. Leave the windows open. I want to listen to the rain."

With a tilt of his head, he gestures to the big, cream-velvet armchair at his bedside. Meekly, I abandon the painted ebony shutters and take my seat next to him, pulling off my rubber boots. The chair is plush, and I am snug and safe with my feet tucked under me. My hands lie like fallen doves in my lap, and I study them as though I intend to recreate the image from memory one day. On my neck, pale as spring, and on my damp cheeks I can feel his eyes touching me, wishing he still had the strength to touch me for real. I wish for the same, but I don't pray for it. One reason to be angry with God is plenty.

Carter's breath grows more ragged everyday—his lungs catching on his ribs and ripping—but somehow it still comforts me.

"You weren't gone long, darlin'. Not in the mood for shoppin' today?"

"I don't suppose I was." The lie has the consistency of tar in my mouth. Silently, I remind myself that Confession is tomorrow evening. All I have to do is survive the night and maybe I can unburden my soul.

"No matter. I prefer your company to Nurse Jennings' anyway. She doesn't let me keep the windows open."

I look up at him. The strong, clean structure of his bones shows through his skin, and I am keenly aware that he hasn't eaten a single thing we've prepared for him since yesterday morning. I tell him so.

"And you haven't even touched your soup. Don't you like cream of celery anymore?"

"I'm not all that hungry, honey." He's a ray of March sunshine, dull but trying hard to brighten up the bleak world.

"Yeah? Neither am I."

He's not supposed to catch me playing with my ring, the silver and diamond stunner his great-grandfather gave to his great-grandmother way back when New Orleans was built of wood and the swamps were full of voodoo spirits. He's not supposed to, but he does. Slow enough to break my heart, he slides over under the woven white quilt, making room for me. I peel off my wet sundress—the pores of my skin suck at the wet, rose-print cotton—and climb in next to him. He's got a fever, a bad one, and he's burning—I can feel it from where my toes press against the slackening muscles of his calves all the way to where my cheek rests against his sharp collarbone. The ember touch of Jack's fingers tries to ignite itself in my mind but smother it. I refuse to think of him while I'm lying next to my husband.

Warm kisses fall on my hair like sunshine; I tilt my head back to meet his familiar lips. He shivers.

"Am I making you cold?" I ask, anxious that I am killing him faster just by lying beside him. But he folds me in his arms and holds me closer.

"No," he breathes, "no. Just let me enjoy this. D'you know how lovely your skin feels? It's like silk and butter and rain, all at once." I slip under his shirt and place my palms on his bare stomach. Oh, but he is so thin… and how can I not think that very soon I won't be able to sense the organic mechanism of his breath and blood? "It's the flesh of youth, isn't it, Olivia? You're so lucky to be so young. There's so much time left."

"Time without you, though. Too much time."

He laughs again. "I hope you aren't plannin' on spendin' the next sixty or seventy odd years cryin' over me, sweetheart. Twen'y-one is far too young to resign yourself to celibacy and widowhood." Though I hate to hear him use that bald, artless word, I love the way he shapes it with his voice: widduhood.

"Well, forty-seven is far too young to be dying and leaving your wife to fend for herself."

"You don't have to fend for yourself. There's a whole city full of younger men lined up to marry you, little one. What about William O'Flaherty?"

"The banker?" I exclaim, sharing his laughter, "but he's so boring! Don't you remember? We sat beside him at dinner last Christmas. You went upstairs to lie down because you weren't feeling well and I had to listen to him talk about his indigestion until I was too drunk to keep my eyes open and he went home."

A bird, plump and bejeweled with raindrops, lands on the window sill and shakes herself dry. Just last week, Carter remarked that she had been back and forth from the windowsill for quite some time, carrying bits of string, twigs and ribbon. She still did so occasionally, but it seemed her nest was for the most part built and ready for her babies. I envied her the certainty of her situation.

"There's always Jack Carrière," he suggests, beautifully unaware, "Remember him? He fixed the back porch two summers past. Good Lord Olivia, he followed you 'round like a puppy. Nice boy, though: good and polite. Not to mention, he's a hard worker. Used to have a drinkin' problem, if I'm not mistaken, but Father McCullough tells me he's right as rain again."

"Oh, Carter," I say, knowing that my voice will betray me if I don't say something honest, "he's too young for me."

This has him laughing so hard I'm afraid I will be the death of him after all.

"He's twen'y-eight! Honey, I think a young man is what you need. They're a little more reliable." When he sees that protest is nearly at a boil on my lips, he clarifies, "What I mean to say is they don't go around dropping dead like men my age do. I don't want you to be lonely on account of me, Olivia."

The bird leaps into the vines that clamber up the lattice work. A smattering of tender, musical notes greet her, escaping from the frail throats of newborn mockingbirds.

"I won't be alone."

In the next room, I hear the phone ringing, cold and artificial next to the meek staccato of the hatchlings. I kiss Carter and creep out into the hallway, shivering and naked except for my underwear.

"I wonder who it could be," he calls from his room.

It's my mother. She's just arrived at Louis Armstrong International. Delicately, she asks how Carter's doing and with my father's frankness, I reply that he's dying more than he was yesterday. I tell her I'll send the car as she tells me she would have come sooner, were it not for the hurricane that had coming banging its fist on the doors of every home near the Gulf. We chat for a bit, then we give each other our love, and she sends hers to Carter.

At first, I can't understand the stillness in the room when I return. The air is like marble, thick and chilly, and weighs down on me. It deliberately refuses to enter my lungs. Out of respect, the baby birds are silent in their clematis-strung nursery. My stomach twists and flips like a fish in a barrel, which I take to be the manifestation of grief or shock. It is still too early for me to feel the baby move.

I approach the bed like a sleepwalker, nearly tripping over my toes as I drag my feet. My breath catches, releases, and then I murmur in a broken dam rush, "Carter?"

Dreamily he opens his eyes. The expression in them bruises as he takes in my face.

"Honey, you're white as a sheet. Did I frighten you? I'm sorry," he says, beckoning me with the undulation of his fingers, "I was only sleepin'."

I shake my head, climbing back into the nest of snowy blankets and rawboned limbs, "No," I promise, "no, sweetheart. You didn't frighten me." We rest our heads together on the pillow. Outside, the tenebrous sky is paling. "But listen. Do you hear that?"

The birds are singing again.