Page 85 of You'll Be the Death of Me

Mrs. Lewis sighed a deeply pained and resigned sound. She slightly shook her head as if to ease the feeling. “No, we can’t. But we can look toward the future. You said you are interested in Cole’s work?” She nodded at Dell, and it took Dell a moment to remember she was supposed to be a twentysomething English lit grad student.

“I am!” she said with perhaps too much gusto and a hint of nerves. She hadn’t thoughtshe’dbe the one in hot water, having to lie about her knowledge of English literature. That was supposed to be Jason. The last English class she’d taken was as an undergrad before she went to culinary school. She discreetly cast Cole a nervous look, hoping dearly he remembered what his work was on and could coach her through the rest of this conversation.

“My work was on interpretation of the metaphysical symbolism found in the nineteenth-century novel,” Cole said like it was imprinted on his brain.

“The what now?” Dell whispered.

He elbowed her in the side in reminder that to everyone else, she was talking to the empty space between Robbie and Jason.

She cleared her throat. “Yes, I am very interested in, um... his work,” she said to his mother. She couldn’t even pretend to repeat what he’d said.

Mrs. Lewis lovingly batted her hands. “We never understood his work anyway. We just knew he loved it and always had his nose in a book or a research paper. We were so proud of him.”

Dell sighed in relief that she’d dodged a bullet and they weren’t going to grill her.

“Actually,” Mrs. Lewis said, and started to climb out of her chair. “We’ve got his old notebooks in storage, if you’d like to see them.”

“Really?” Dell asked in hopeful surprise.

Cole perked up beside her.

“Yes. We gave a lot of things back to the university, but his personal notebooks are in the spare room. I’m sure he’d be happy to have someone use them instead of them turning yellow in a dusty box.”

“We would love to see them,” Dell said, and stood.

Cole sprang up beside her, which of course made Chaucer stand up too.

“He seems to really like you,” Mrs. Lewis said with a smile down at the dog.

“Dogs are the best,” Dell said, and patted his head, not letting on it wasn’t her winning the furball’s affection at all.

They followed Mrs. Lewis down the hall to a bedroom that washalf guest room, half memorial to Cole. A queen-size bed with a neat blue comforter took up the room’s center. Adjacent to it was a bulky wooden desk stacked with books, bound manuscripts, a few framed photos, awards like Educator of the Year and Faculty Mentor of the Year. Cole’s PhD hung in a frame above the desk, alongside a photo of him in a cap and gown that looked more suited for a wizard.

“When we closed the lease on his condo, we moved his important things here,” Mrs. Lewis said, and slid back one of the closet doors to reveal a row of file boxes piled five high. “We might move it to storage someday, but we are not ready to part with any of it yet.” She lovingly ran her hand over a crimson-and-black gown with white velvet stripes on the puffy sleeve. It was the same one Cole was wearing in the photo above his desk.

“I hated that thing,” Cole said. “It’s so heavy and hot, and the hood almost choked me.”

Dell was biting Robbie’s lip at the thought of him wearing it. Or maybe just the hood and nothing else. Until that moment, she didn’t know academic regalia did something for her.

Mrs. Lewis let out a sniffle. “I’m sorry. I’ll leave you to look around. Please excuse me.” When she turned to leave, Cole reached out for her.

“Mom, wait—” he said.

When she suddenly shivered, he dropped his hand from where he had touched her shoulder. She left the room still sniffling.

The pained look on Cole’s face made Dell reach for him. She wrapped her hands around each of his biceps and rested her chin on his shoulder. “I’m sorry.”

Cole shook his head. “I thought this might be hard, but I didn’texpect to remember them. It’s like being on the other side of a glass wall where I can’t touch them.”

Dell’s heart ached. “I’ll tell them anything you want me to.”

He turned so her hands slid from his arms. “Thank you, but how is that going to work if they think we’ve never met?”

“I—” Dell went to answer, to come up with some solution to help this man she was falling for more by the second, because that was what she did—she helped people—when Jason interrupted.

“I thought he taught at Cal.” He had removed one of the box’s lids and was flipping through a folder.

Dell circled around to his side, Cole on her heels, and looked over his shoulder. The page on top showed letterhead from the University of Sydney and a message addressed to Dr. Cole Lewis.