The funeral was today.

I didn't go. How could I?

A year and a half, and I'd never been a part of that life. I'd gotten the leftovers, nothing more, the breaks, a few days here or there when we'd live like the law was on our heels. And it was, wasn't it? I hadn't really minded, if I was being honest. 

The service was at noon, EST, so at 10:55 in Chicago, I closed my computer and stared into the clock above the TV. 

I must have thought about something--his face or the last time he'd been here or how heroin had become the currency of the twenty-first century or what the weather was like in Newark--but lying in bed that night, I couldn't remember a thing except watching a spider rebuild her web behind the III and the V, anchoring it somewhere inside the clock’s filigree border. It had been one of those silly, romantic purchases, as we wandered through Target on a Wednesday afternoon--he liked the strength and practicality of Roman numerals; I liked the delicate silver vines crawling around them. It was our first compromise. 

Lying there in the dark, I tried to not imagine what it had been like. A casket? An urn? His picture on an easel, propped there like that smile would live forever in the hearts of everyone there?

I should have been there, sitting in the front row, dabbing at my cheeks. Wondering if I was playing the part the way I needed to. Wondering if I was wearing the wrong emotion on my face. Swooning just in time to be carried out and saved from the ugly moments that were to follow. 

It was okay, I kept telling myself. It was all over now. 

Freddie had called just as the spider scurried back into the clock mechanism

“Beth? It's over. Everything’s fine.”

I understood what he meant. I knew that was my cue to exhale. But I couldn't. I hadn’t exhaled in nineteen months, two weeks, and five days.

Not until I heard Benji’s key in the lock at 1:30 did it finally come, with trembling hands and a racing heart and sudden tears on my pillow. Kyla barked two fast, happy barks and was quiet. The living room light flashed on and then off. A board in the hall creaked. His belt on the dresser. Then his gun. His pants on the floor. 

“You asleep?”

My heart pounded into the darkness. Glee and longing and relief poured into the space between us and I sat up halfway. “Of course not.” I stared into the dark, slowly focusing on his black shadow. “It's over?”

He was taking off his shirt. “Freddie called you. You know.”

“I want to hear it from you.”

I could tell he was grinning. Because he was proud of himself? Because I wouldn't believe it until he said it? What did it matter? I grinned too. 

“It's over,” he confirmed. 

“You got ‘em?”

“Eleven.”

I wasn’t likely to get more details out of him, and I didn’t push. 

It had been a big op for him, for the agency, and the staged funeral hadn’t been part of the plan. I probably wasn’t supposed to know that much, but his handler had a soft spot for me, for Benji and me, and he’d called three days ago to tell me that today was going to be big--and to send up prayer if that was my thing.

My best guess was that they’d suddenly faked his death to pull him out and then done a major takedown at the funeral.

I didn’t really care, to be honest. He had made it through whatever dramatics happened at the service, and the months of dramatics that had led up to that. It was over. A year and a half of constant worry--that familiar ball of anxiety trailing me everywhere I went, no matter what I did--of never knowing where he was or what he was doing, of seeing him for two or three days every couple of months, it had finally come to a close.

He lay down next to me and took my hand in his. 

I wasn’t the mistress anymore. I wasn’t second to the job, to whatever op he was living. At least for a while.