For the next eleven years it was just the three of them. When Tina volunteered at the local elementary school, Michael would sit at his desk, and Lady would curl by his feet. When Michael went shopping, or attended the painting class he took every week, Lady would stand on the arm of the sofa with her front legs on the windowsill, staring forlornly down at the street. Tina loved to send him pictures of Lady in that pose. She looks like a WWII wife waiting for her husband to come back from the front, she’d say. Sometimes, teasingly, she’d say, “You love that dog more than you love me.” No, no, Michael would protest. He didn’t love Lady more. He loved her differently. And he loved her very, very much.
The summer after her seventy-fifth birthday, Tina found a lump in her breast. “I’m sure it’s fine,” she said, after making an appointment for an MRI. “I’ll be a-okay. Right, Lady?”
“Sure thing,” she replied in her Lady voice. “Whatever you say. But if you die, I’ll have your man all to myself. Lady.”
Michael shook his head, feeling a cold finger press against his heart. “She doesn’t think that.”
“Lady,” Tina said, “am I competition?”
“No competition,” Tina-as-Lady said. “Patchy fur. No snout. Lady.”
“Lady, Tina’s going to be fine,” Michael said. To his wife, he said, “We’ll walk you to your appointment.”
The MRI was on a Monday morning. The news wasn’t good. By that afternoon, Tina’s doctor had called with the names of two oncologists. Tina had gone in for a mastectomy six weeks later and had started radiation and chemo as soon as she was well enough, but by then the cancer had spread. After six months, when the doctor suggested another round of chemo, Tina had asked, “Is it going to cure me?”
The doctor had sighed.
“If I were your mom, what would you tell me to do?” Tina asked.
“I would tell you to go home, and be with your husband and your family, and enjoy yourself as much as you could,” said the doctor.
That was what Tina had done. Four months after that, she’d been dead, and then it was just Michael and Lady, all alone.
* * *
His son and his daughter both came; Chris for two weeks, Chloe for a month. By the time Chloe finally left, Michael was relieved. He appreciated that his daughter wanted to be a comfort and that she intended his grandchildren to be a distraction, but the truth was, spending his days with a weepy young woman daughter, a bored four-year-old who kept whining, “When can we go home?” and a preverbal toddler who had to be watched every second, lest he pull poor Lady’s tail or try to eat her kibble, was exhausting.
“We’ll be okay, won’t we, Lady?” he’d asked as he began putting his house back in order, washing the sheets from the guest bedroom, sweeping crumbs off the kitchen floor. Then there’d been a knock on the door. Lady’s ears had swiveled, and she’d gotten to her feet.
Michael opened the door to find a small, determined-looking woman standing there, a baking dish in her hands and a hopeful look on her face. “Michael? I’m Suzanne. Your down-the-hall neighbor?”
Michael nodded. He knew Suzanne, to say hello to at the mailbox or to chat about the weather in the elevator. She’d sent a card after Tina’s funeral.
“I’m sure you were flooded with food last month, but I thought that maybe you’d appreciate something now.” She handed him the dish, which smelled of meat and cheese and oregano.
“Oh! And this is for Lady.” She reached into her pocket and pulled out a rawhide bone. Lady sniffed at it delicately, but when Suzanne bent down to extend it toward her, Lady turned away.
“Sorry. She’s a little shy,” Michael said.
“Oh, don’t apologize. I completely understand.” Suzanne pressed her hands against the skirt of her dress and said, “I hope you like the lasagna. Just bring the dish back when you’re done.” She’d cocked her thumb toward the opposite end of the hall. “I’m 7-J.”
“Would you like to come in and have some with me?” asked Michael.
“Well, if you’re sure I’m not intruding,” she’d said.
“Of course not,” he said, and held the door. Between her smile and the whiff of her perfume, he almost didn’t hear Lady give a low, warning growl.
* * *
If she had reminded him of Tina at all, it would have been strange, but Suzanne Nelson couldn’t have been any more different from Michael’s wife. Where Tina had been tall and broad-shouldered, Suzanne was petite, with narrow wrists and tiny hands and feet. Tina had dark hair, with skin that tanned easily and maintained a healthy flush, even in winter. Suzanne was pale, with silvery hair, round blue eyes, and freckles. She had worked as a paralegal, had married one of the lawyers in the firm that had employed her, and had been a stay-at-home mother—“and, now, itinerant grandma”—after that. Her husband had died four years previously, and Suzanne had sold their house and bought the condo down the hall, as well as a small place in Florida. “I winter in Miami,” she told him, smiling. “I always wanted to say that, and now I can.”
Suzanne was smart, witty, well traveled, with a list of countries she wanted to visit and sights she wanted to see. She was a good cook and an even better sous-chef and dishwasher. While Tina had not been the least bit athletic, Suzanne played golf and tennis, and she and Michael joined a pickleball group that played in the mornings at Seger Park. A year after she’d brought him lasagna, Suzanne had put her condo on the market and moved her things into Michael’s place. They’d swapped some of his furniture for her antiques and made room on the bookshelf for her framed pictures and souvenirs from her travel books.
Chris had liked her immediately. Chloe had not. “I’m glad you’re not alone,” Chloe had told him. “I know it’s not what Mom would have wanted for you. But didn’t Suzanne swoop in awfully fast?”
Michael had shrugged. “I guess single gentlemen who still have their own teeth and a driver’s license are a hot commodity.”
Chloe scooped her hair into a bun, then let it fall around her cheeks. “I guess it’s just the idea that my kids won’t even remember Mom. They’ll think Suzanne is their grandmother.”
“Oh, honey.” Michael had put his arm around Chloe, drawing her close. Remembering how, when she’d been a baby, at first he’d been afraid to hold her, worried that he’d drop her, but once Tina had basically shoved her into his arms and said, “I need to use the bathroom,” he’d held her against his chest, a tiny, warm weight making delicate snuffling sounds, and he’d never wanted to let her go. “We’ll make sure they know about your mom. We’ll show them pictures, and tell them stories. We’ll do our best.”
Chloe went quiet. “Lady doesn’t like her,” she finally said.
“Lady will get used to her,” Michael said, and Chloe had shrugged. “Just be careful,” she’d said, sounding not unlike his mother.
He missed Tina. Of course he did. He missed her for who she’d been—her looks, her quick wit, her way of seeing things; he missed her because she’d been the one with whom he’d shared his own life’s history. Suzanne seemed to understand. “I’m not trying to replace her, because I know I never could. You had a life with her, the way I had a life with my Ed. But we’ve both got some good years left.” She’d given him her frank, sunny smile. “And I think we’re good together.”