The track finally ended and the music ran out. . . .

 

2

Lena Gamble poured herself a fresh cup of coffee and walked it around the counter to the table in the living room. As she sat down, she took a first sip through the steam and gazed out the window at the city. It was two o’clock in the afternoon. The piping hot brew tasted rich and strong, with just enough kick to revive her. She had taken the day off and had done nothing but read the newspaper and listen to music. It was the first day she had worked at doing nothing in a long time and she was reveling in the vibe.

The repairs to her house were finally complete, and she was celebrating. The roof that had blown away in the Santa Ana winds eight months ago had been replaced—the work guaranteed for fifteen years. The ground cover around the house had been pushed back twenty yards in case of another wildfire. And her brother’s furniture—and all of the evidence that went with it—had been removed and replaced. Yesterday the painters finally cleared out. All that remained was the smell of fresh paint and polyurethane. Nothing was left but silence. Emptiness. That feeling that she wished David was still with her. Still here to live and play his music in the small home they once shared on top of a hill overlooking Hollywood and the city of Los Angeles.

She turned and looked into the bedroom. Through the far window she could see the two-story garage on the other side of the drive. Just after moving in her brother had converted the space into a state-of-the-art recording studio, attributing the success of his band’s third CD to the acoustics. But that was all over now. The studio had been dark for nearly six years. As her eyes fell away from the building, she wondered about the word closure—who invented it and why. It was one of the few words that had no meaning for her. No definition or purpose.

Lena realized that the reason she was probably thinking about all this was because last night had been the first night she hadn’t slept in the upstairs guestroom since she closed the Romeo murder case and solved her brother’s homicide. It had taken an entire bottle of wine to block out the memories and knock her down. But she’d slept through the night in her new bed without dreams, or nightmares, or any of the ingredients that taunted her and seemed to go with the word closure.

She had been dealt the low card. She knew that. Her brother’s murder had been senseless. Something she would walk with for the rest of her days.