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A bellyful of chicken noodle soup, a supposed mendicant, the panacea to heal all ills. . . it does nothing to relieve the knowledge that he's gone.

It seems so unreal. A TV drama. The proverbial bad joke. The night terror from which I can't wake. (I despise these clichés.) Except I am awake. I'm even breathing.

And the clock says that I have to brush my teeth and go to work.

And the dog needs his pill.

And the color orange still is.

Doesn't it know?

Sudden trite imperatives reel through my mind like tickertape: . . . the laundry in my hamper three weeks clean needs folding the bathroom as always wants cleaning i must get my car washed organize papers record passwords tell my mother I love her just in case . . .

We're left with artifacts:
a number in a phone
a piece of art
the email correspondences, too few
the [now precious, starkly archival] photographs
the conversations that live in our memories, ephemeral

The conversations. I want to record them in stone, to give them form and texture, before I forget the bright scraps I remember. (I just didn't know to take better notes.) But how do you capture the tone of a hello? The way he stretched in thought. The shape of his mouth. The inaudible kindnesses. The expansive generosity. A chisel can't describe the careful pauses in his speech. Marble insults his warmth.

In the hierarchy of relationships, I am the least of those who mourn. But there was always tomorrow. (More the fool, I.) I mourn the lack of tomorrows. I mourn for my betters who now hold their yesterdays so close, who gasp for breath in their grief.

For his mother.

Oh, God. His mother.

I can't help but think that when she got the call, she must have wanted to hear it from him, improbably. And in that instant understood -- the finality of it, unwavering, Jupiter's gravity more forgiving.

No more ands.

I hate this.