The Unspoken Arrangement

The church smelled like lilies and furniture polish, the kind of scent that tried too hard to mask grief. I stood at the back, hands shoved in the pockets of the suit I’d bought yesterday because I didn’t own one, watching strangers file past Dad’s closed casket. They kept telling me how good he’d looked at the end, how peaceful, but I couldn’t shake the memory of the hospital room—fluorescent lights, the mechanical hiss of oxygen, his fingers twitching like he was still trying to sign one last brief.

A woman broke away from the receiving line and walked straight toward me. Mid-forties, maybe. Chestnut hair twisted into a low knot, charcoal dress that fit her like she’d been born into it. I’d never seen her before, but she moved like she belonged here more than I did.

“You’re Simon,” she said, voice low enough that only I could hear it over the organ’s wheeze. “I’m Elena. Your father and I shared a wall at Whitman & Associates for twelve years.” She offered her hand—cool, steady, no tremor. “He talked about you every day. The photo of you in your college graduation robes? Still taped to his monitor.”

The words hit harder than the eulogy. Dad had been a master of compartmentalization; I hadn’t realized I’d existed in his daylight hours, only in the margins—Sunday calls, birthday texts, the obligatory dinner when I passed through Chicago on business. I swallowed against the sudden thickness in my throat.

“He was proud of you,” Elena went on, eyes—gray, not blue, storm-cloud gray—holding mine. “Prouder than he knew how to say.”

I wanted to ask why he’d never said it to me, but the organ cranked into “Amazing Grace” and the funeral director was herding us toward pews. Elena’s fingers brushed my elbow.

“Sit with me,” she murmured. “You shouldn’t be alone in the front row.”

I almost laughed. The only family left was an aunt in Phoenix who couldn’t fly due to a hip replacement. Alone was my default setting. Still, I let Elena guide me to the second pew, her presence a strange anchor in a room tilting off its axis.

The service blurred—hymns, a cousin’s trembling recollection of Dad teaching him to drive, the pastor’s generic reassurances. Elena’s shoulder rested against mine the whole time, light enough that I could have pulled away. I didn’t. When the congregation stood for the final blessing, her hand slipped into mine, palm to palm, no hesitation. Her skin smelled like rain and something citrusy—bergamot, maybe—the scent of someone who’d come straight from work, from real life, to this sterile chapel.

At the cemetery, the wind whipped off Lake Michigan, snatching the priest’s words before they reached us. I stared at the coffin suspended above the open earth and felt nothing, a hollow so complete I wondered if I’d ever fill it. After the mourners tossed their obligatory roses, Elena lingered, coat collar turned up against the cold.

“Your father hated these things,” she said. “Last year he told me he wanted a party—Irish whiskey, Van Morrison on the stereo, people telling embarrassing stories. He hated the idea of everyone standing around crying over a box.”

A laugh escaped me—raw, surprised. “That sounds like him.”

She smiled then, the first real one, small lines fanning from her eyes. “There’s a bar two blocks from here. It’s warm. They have Jameson. Come toast him properly.”

I should have gone to the wake, shaken more hands, accepted more casseroles I’d never eat. Instead I followed Elena across the icy grass to her silver Audi. She drove like she argued cases—smooth, decisive, no wasted motion. The bar was a dive pretending to be an Irish pub, all dark wood and Guinness mirrors. She ordered two doubles, no ice, and raised her glass.

“To William,” she said, “who billed 2,400 hours last year and still found time to sneak out for Cubs games.”

We drank. The whiskey burned a path to the hollow place, lit it up like a lantern. Elena told stories—Dad pranking the paralegals with fake voice-mails, the time he cited a Star Trek episode in a patent brief, his secret stash of chocolate-covered espresso beans. I listened, laughing until my ribs ached, realizing I was learning my father from a woman who’d sat ten feet away from him for a decade.

The stories grew quieter, more personal. She told me about the Monday mornings they’d dissect the game highlights, the way he’d slide a packet of those espresso beans across the partition when she was facing a brutal deadline. “He had this theory,” she said, tracing the rim of her glass. “That grief was just love with nowhere to go. He said it after my divorce was finalized. I thought it was a line from a movie, but I’ve never been able to find it.”

“It sounds like him,” I said. “He collected obscure quotes like some people collect stamps.”

“He did.” She smiled, but it was tinged with sadness. “He worried about you being alone out in Denver. Said engineers forget to look up from their blueprints.”

“He wasn’t wrong.” I swirled the amber liquid, watching it cling to the glass. “How long were you married?”

“Eight years. It ended… civilly. No kids. He kept the dog.” She said it plainly, a fact entered into evidence. “William was a better friend through that than my own family. He’d leave a ridiculous meme on my screen every afternoon at three. A distraction tactic, he called it.”

“Did it work?”

“The memes were terrible. But the intention?” She met my eyes. “It worked.”

When the bartender called last round, snow had started to fall, fat flakes melting on the window. Elena checked her watch—eight-thirty, a Tuesday. “I should let you go,” she said, but her hand stayed curled around her glass.

“I don’t want to go back to the house,” I admitted. The realtor had staged it with throw pillows that smelled like someone else’s life. “I keep expecting him to walk in and ask who redecorated.”

She studied me for a long moment. “I live ten minutes from here. Guest room’s made up. No pressure, Simon. Just—don’t sit in an empty house tonight.”

I thought of the drive to the suburbs, the silence waiting for me. “Okay.”

Her condo was on the twentieth floor, lake view, walls of books. She gave me sweatpants and a Northwestern Law T-shirt that had belonged to her ex-husband, she said casually, tossing them on the bed. The guest bath smelled like eucalyptus and something darker—sandalwood, maybe hers. When I came out, hair still damp, she’d changed into a gray tank top and black pajama pants, bare feet with scarlet-painted toes. She handed me a mug of tea laced with something stronger.

We sat on the couch, knees almost touching, watching snow erase the city. The silence was comfortable, the kind I hadn’t felt since before the hospital. When I finished the tea, she took the mug, set it on the coffee table.

“Come here,” she said, opening her arms like it was the most natural thing in the world.

I went. She tucked me against her side, my head on her shoulder, fingers threading through my hair the way my mom had when I was small. The storm-cloud scent of her filled my lungs. I hadn’t been touched in months—casual hookups felt pointless, relationships too heavy. Now every nerve ending leaned into her warmth like a plant toward sun.

“This part’s the worst,” she whispered against my temple. “After everyone leaves and you’re supposed to remember how to breathe.”

I turned my face into her neck, breathing her in. Her pulse fluttered under my lips—fast, not calm at all. Her fingers in my hair shifted, almost imperceptibly. What had been a soothing, maternal rhythm changed. The pads of her fingers pressed more firmly against my scalp, then her nails scraped slowly, deliberately, from my crown to the base of my skull. A different kind of shiver raced down my spine, electric and unmistakable.

Something shifted, a current arcing between us, grief and gratitude and something darker, hotter. My own breath hitched. This wasn’t comfort anymore. It was a question. When I lifted my head, she was already looking at me, eyes wide, pupils blown with a blackness that swallowed the gray.

“Elena—” My voice was rough.

Her gaze dropped to my mouth. “Simon.” Just my name, but it sounded like a verdict.

The space between us crackled. I could pull back, retreat to the guest room, preserve whatever this was supposed to be. But the hollow inside me yawned, and the heat of her was the only thing that seemed real. “Is this…”

“I know what I’m doing,” she said softly, her lawyer’s precision cutting through the haze. “Do you?”

It was the clearest consent, wrapped in a challenge. I answered by closing the distance, my lips meeting hers—soft at first, a tentative question. She tasted of whiskey and the faint mint of her toothpaste. A sigh escaped her, warm against my mouth, and then her hands were framing my face, pulling me closer. The kiss deepened, turning hungry, desperate in a way that had nothing to do with solace and everything to do with a shared, frantic need to feel alive.

She pulled back first, forehead resting against mine, breathing ragged. “We shouldn’t,” she breathed, but her hands were already under the hem of my borrowed T-shirt, palms skating up my spine, cool against my feverish skin.

“I know,” I said, and it was the truth. This was a terrible, beautiful idea. “And I don’t care.” I kissed her again, deeper, backing her into the couch cushions. She arched against me, and I realized she wasn’t wearing a bra, the soft weight of her breasts pressing against my chest through the thin cotton. My thumbs brushed over her nipples, and she gasped, the sound sharp and sweet, her nails digging into my shoulders through the fabric.

“Simon—” My name broke on a moan when I mouthed down her throat, tasting salt and skin. “You’re grieving, this is—”

“Don’t.” I lifted my head, met her stormy eyes. “Don’t tell me what this is. I know exactly what I want. Do you?”

She stared at me, her chest rising and falling rapidly. Then, with a decisive tug, she pulled the tank top over her head and tossed it aside. “Yes.”

Her body was a revelation. My engineer’s mind, always seeking patterns and structures, went quiet, overwhelmed by pure sensation. Her breasts were fuller than I’d expected, pale like marble in the dim light, with nipples the deep rose of a winter sunset. But it was the topography of her that held me—the slight, powerful curve of her shoulders from years carrying briefcases and the weight of arguments, the defined line of her collarbone, the soft swell of her stomach. This was a body that had lived, not just existed.

I bent and took one peak into my mouth, swirling my tongue, learning her. She liked slow, firm circles, then the gentle scrape of teeth. She threaded her fingers in my hair, holding me to her, a low hum vibrating in her chest. Her hips rolled up against mine, and I could feel the damp heat of her even through the layers of our pants, a humid promise that made my head swim.

I stood, pulling her up with me, and then lifted her into my arms. She wrapped her legs around my waist, her mouth finding mine again in a kiss that was all tongue and teeth. I carried her the short distance to the bedroom, her weight perfect in my arms. She tugged at my T-shirt, breaking the kiss only long enough to pull it off. When her bare chest met mine, skin to skin, we both shuddered, a full-body tremor at the shocking intimacy of it.

She pushed me onto the bed and straddled me, grinding down slowly, torturously, her eyes locked on mine. I gripped her hips, the bones sharp under my palms, and thrust up against her, the friction of denim on cotton almost too much. Her head fell back, exposing the long line of her throat.

“Condom?” I managed, my voice shredded.

“Top drawer,” she said, not moving from her position, watching me as I fumbled in the nightstand. I rolled it on with hands that trembled, not from inexperience but from the sheer magnitude of wanting her.

I flipped us so she was beneath me, her hair fanned out on the pillow. Her pupils were huge, lips swollen from kissing, a flush spreading from her chest up her neck. I kissed my way down—the hollow of her throat, the slope of a breast, the ridged landscape of her ribcage—pausing to dip my tongue into the shallow well of her navel. When I hooked my fingers in the waistband of her pajama pants, she lifted her hips, helping me slide them off.

She was bare underneath, slick and ready. I groaned, pressing my face to her inner thigh, breathing in her scent—musk and salt and something uniquely her, like ozone after a storm. When I licked into her, she cried out, her thighs tensing around my head. I took my time, mapping her with my tongue, finding the rhythm that made her gasp, the specific pressure that had her fisting the sheets. Her body was a complex, beautiful system, and I was determined to learn its language. When she came, it was with a choked-off cry, my name a sigh on her lips as her back arched like a bowstring drawn taut.

Afterward, she pulled me up, kissing me deep, tasting herself on my tongue. She looked at me, her gaze clear and fierce. “I want you inside me,” she whispered. “Don’t be gentle. He wouldn’t have been.”

The words landed like a physical blow, layering the act with a stark, defiant truth. This wasn’t just sex; it was a rebellion against the void, a living, breathing repudiation of the quiet box we’d buried today.

I positioned myself at her entrance and slid home in one slow, inexorable thrust. We both froze, a shared gasp caught between us. The sensation was more than heat and tightness. It felt like an answer to the hollow space his death had carved—a fierce, living proof against the void, a connection so profound it bordered on violence. She wrapped her legs around my waist, her heels digging into the muscles of my ass, urging me deeper.

I set a deliberate pace, watching her face—eyes closed, lower lip caught between her teeth in concentration. But she met me thrust for thrust, rising to meet me, her body demanding more, taking everything I gave. When I shifted my angle slightly, she gasped, her eyes flying open.

“There. God, Simon, right there.” Her nails scored down my back, a bright, possessive pain.

I lost all semblance of control then, driving into her with a force that shook the bedframe, each impact a punctuation mark against the silence of the snow-filled night. She came again, a raw, sobbing cry as she clenched around me, and I followed, burying myself deep, her name a broken prayer against the sweat-damp skin of her neck.

We collapsed together, a tangled mess of limbs and rapid heartbeats. The room was silent except for our ragged breathing. I expected regret, the cold slide of shame, but it didn’t come. Instead, a profound, weary peace settled over me. Her fingers traced the paths her nails had carved on my back.

After a long while, she shifted, kissing my temple, and pulled the heavy comforter over us both. “Stay,” she murmured, her voice thick with impending sleep.

“Okay.” It was all I could say.

We woke twice more in the deep, dark heart of the night. The first time, I stirred to the feel of her mouth on me, slow and wicked, her hair trailing over my stomach. She took me to the very edge, then straddled me, sinking down with a sigh that sounded like home. She rode me slowly at first, then faster, her head thrown back, while I thumbed circles over her clit, feeling the tension coil and release as we shattered together in a silent, intense climax.

The second time, the digital clock glowed 4:17 AM. I woke with her back pressed to my chest, my arm around her waist. I was hard against the curve of her ass. She pressed back into me, a silent invitation. I entered her from behind, one hand splayed over her sternum, feeling the frantic gallop of her heart under my palm as I moved. She reached back, her hand gripping my thigh, urging me on until she came with a muffled cry into the pillow, and I followed, my face buried in the scent of her hair.

Morning brought a diffuse, gray light and the smell of coffee. I found her in the kitchen, wearing my discarded T-shirt, humming off-key to a jazz station. She was surveying the contents of her refrigerator with a critical eye. When she saw me, she smiled—soft, real, no shadow of shame or doubt.

“Eggs?” she asked, as if we’d performed this morning-after ritual a hundred times.

I crossed the room and backed her against the counter, kissing her until the coffee pot sputtered its last drop. We ended up on the cool kitchen floor, her legs over my shoulders, her cries echoing off the stainless-steel appliances, a bright, sharp counterpoint to the silent snow outside.

Later, under the hot spray of the shower, she washed my hair with a brisk, efficient tenderness that reminded me of the way she’d guided me in the church. “I fly to Boston tomorrow,” she said, her voice raised over the water. “Deposition. Back Friday evening.”

I nodded, water streaming between our faces. “I’ll be here.” The words felt both inevitable and terrifying.

She tilted my chin up, searching my face with those lawyer’s eyes, looking for loopholes or false testimony. “This changes things, Simon. This isn’t… a one-night condolence call.”

“I know.” I kissed her, slow and certain, trying to pour all my newfound certainty into it. “It does. And I’m not sorry.”

A small, relieved smile touched her lips. “Neither am I.”

She left for the airport before dawn the next day, a sleek carry-on wheeled behind her. I locked her condo, the click of the deadbolt sounding final, and drove to the house I hadn’t wanted to enter alone. It still smelled like strangers and lavender air freshener, but the crushing hollowness was gone—filled now with the memory of her scent, her laugh, the way she’d whispered my name like a secret in the dark.

I went to Dad’s home office. The desk was clean, ready for staging. I opened the top drawer, and there it was, tucked under a stack of blank legal pads: the photo she’d mentioned. Me in cap and gown, grinning with a future’s-worth of ignorant hope. On the back, in his cramped, precise handwriting: My son, the engineer. Smarter than his old man. Proud of you. Always. The ‘Always’ was underlined twice. I stared at it until the words blurred, then carefully tucked it into my wallet.

The days passed in a strange limbo. I met with the realtor, signed papers, boxed up the few personal items I wanted to keep—his favorite coffee mug, a battered copy of To Kill a Mockingbird, his collection of vintage Cubs caps. I slept in his empty house, and the silence was different now. It was waiting, not accusing.

Friday night, I stood in Elena’s kitchen, attempting the pasta recipe Dad had emailed me last year, a dish he’d claimed was foolproof. The kitchen was a battlefield of diced onions, splattered tomato sauce, and a suspiciously blackened edge on the garlic bread. I was staring at the pot of boiling water, willing it to cooperate, when I heard the key in the lock.

She arrived with snow in her hair, her cheeks flushed from the cold, her professional demeanor softened by the long day. She dropped her bag by the door, her eyes taking in the set table, the lit candles, the evidence of my culinary struggle.

For a moment, she just looked at me. Then she crossed the room in three strides, her heels clicking on the hardwood. She didn’t kiss me. She put her hands on either side of my face, her thumbs brushing my cheekbones. Her gaze was intense, searching.

“You’re sure?” she asked, the question hanging between us, weighted with everything that had happened and everything that could be.

I looked past her, at the slightly burnt bread, at the chaotic kitchen, at the life I was standing in the middle of, which felt more real than any blueprint I’d ever drawn. “I’m sure,” I said. “But I think I burned the pasta.”

A laugh burst from her, bright and unexpected. The tension shattered. “William burned everything,” she said, her eyes crinkling. “It’s a family trait, apparently.”

She kissed me then, soft and sweet, a promise and a beginning. Outside, the snow kept falling, erasing footprints, covering graves, turning the city into a clean, blank slate. Inside, surrounded by the mess we’d made and the meal I’d nearly ruined, we built something fragile and real—something born from grief, forged in comfort, and complicated by desire. It wasn’t a fairy tale. It was better. It was ours, and neither of us regretted a single, unspoken step.