Page 73 of The Producer: Aaron

His words wash over me, making me waver. My chest empties of any emotion I have felt so far, and I have no words to say. There is so much confusion in my head that when Dakota puts her hand on my arm, I turn to look at her, completely disoriented.

It’s such huge news that I don’t even know how to process it. I lean against the wall to get some support and inhale thoroughly.

“My father is dead,” I repeat to ensure I understood right.

“I’m sorry. I offer you my condolences. If you need anything, don’t hesitate to call me. I’ll be with your mother when I give her the news,” he tries to reassure me, but the only thing I can think of is his words.

An annoying buzz fills my ears, and I realize it’s my heart pumping wildly.

“He was killed by a garbage truck.” My words come out more like a statement than a question.

The lawyer nods and studies me as if to understand my reaction. Surely it is not what he expects, given his surprised face when I start laughing. I try to hold back a laugh that rises from my chest and burns in my throat, but I explode in a desecrating grunt.

“My father was killed by a garbage truck.” I keep laughing in front of Dakota’s bewildered face and the lawyer, who seems worried. Maybe he thinks I’m crazy.

I’m so out of control that I slide down the wall until I sit on the floor, laying my hands on my face to hide my entirely misplacedreaction. But I can’t help but think of the irony of this story. The man I have always considered a disgusting scumbag was killed by a garbage truck. How many chances were there that he would leave this earth in such an indecorous manner?

“How is my father’s driver?” I ask when I can compose myself enough to formulate a decent sentence.

“He died on the spot. They couldn’t even take him to the hospital,” the man tells me, a little disoriented.

This news makes me stop laughing and brings a pain to my chest that makes me run out of breath, not my father’s death, but that of the driver who, when we were kids, took my brother and me to polo training when my parents did not even know what sport we had chosen.

This is how I realize how much death doesn’t wait for anyone. It doesn’t matter if you’re laughing and joking with your partner or in the middle of a speech, a movie, or dinner. It doesn’t matter if you’re reading a book or taking a shower. Death doesn’t wait, and when it comes, it puts a stop to your life, whether you are ready or not. Whether you planned it or not.

I stare at the black dress on top of the bed and wonder what to do. When Aaron received the news of his father’s death two days ago, he started to bark orders to lawyers to organize the funeral and ensure that his mother didn’t get carried away with pills and alcohol. After the initial hysterical crisis in which he couldn’t stop laughing, he started to get silent and open up less and less with me.

When we went to visit his mother the night of the accident, after being in the hospital to deal with the papers that the death of a parent entails, we found her in her room, stuffed to the brim with drugs and alcohol. She didn’t recognize her son. I don’t think she even knew where she was.

I had never met her before, but compared to what I’d seen on TV, the person I encountered was a shell emptied of any feeling or willpower. I don’t know what my mother was like when my father died, I was too young to remember properly and she always hid from me when she wasn’t brave enough to not cry, but I know she held me during the funeral and wanted me with her all the time. She’s always told me I was her lifeline. Perhaps, never having established a relationship with her children is what is dragging Aaron’s mother to the bottom.

I saw the coldness with which her son treated her, saw the disgust in his eyes when he found her unable to recognize him. I can’t even imagine what it could be like to live a childhood in which your parents don’t give you even the slightest sign of affection or deny you a hug, but I know what the consequencesof this choice are: indifference.

For this same reason, Aaron’s brother Evan didn’t take a flight from New York for the funeral. His father cut him off from his life years ago, so everything falls on Aaron’s shoulders and his lawyers.

Aaron has switched to the “organization mode” I have seen him in so many times for work and is directing everyone with maximum efficiency. Not a bit of emotion transpires from everything he does, so I’m not sure if he wants me next to him at his father’s funeral. It seems more like a work event than a moment for the family to grieve. A family that I don’t think ever existed.

I turn to the door when I hear him enter the room. He is already fully dressed in a black suit, always perfect in his elegance, while I am still tucked into a bathrobe.

“Are you undecided about what to wear? You don’t have to dress in black if you don’t want to,” he tells me with a smile that never reaches his eyes.

It is strange to see him like this, closed in on himself and detached from his emotions. I think the only gut reaction he’s had since he got the news is the initial laugh he couldn’t hold back. He is light years away from the attentive and caring Aaron I have known in recent months, and I don’t know how to approach him and make him understand that he can count on me.

I sit on the bed, and he sits next to me. “It’s not a problem of what to wear. Do you want me with you at the funeral? It looks like you’re organizing a movie premiere, and I can’t figure out if you want me with you or not,” I admit without beating around the bush. He has always appreciated my sincerity, and I don’t want to start to be shy now when he needs me the most.

Aaron grabs my hand and brings it to his lips to kiss my fingers. It’s the only gesture from which sincere feeling shines through and raises a little of the concern that grips my chest.

“Of course, I want you there. I haven’t been particularly attentive to you these days, but I need to focus on this. I’m the only one who has taken over the reins, and I need to focus my attention on what I’m doing.”

He can’t even pronounce the word funeral. He is so detached that, for him, this is an event like any other. My heart bleeds to see him like this. I can be close to him, but as much as he is an adult, he needs a family with whom to mourn a father who has passed away.

“How are you?” My voice comes out in a whisper as I study the tense features of his face.

For days I have been trying to understand his feelings through the small signals he cannot hide on his face, but years spent controlling his emotions don’t help me to see beyond the walls he’s built these days.

“Good. I wasn’t emotionally attached to my father. I’m fine, really.”

I have the impression that he really believes what he is saying and hasn’t realized how much deeper his bond with him goes. Maybe it’s not love that he feels but resentment, anger, even disgust, but he was never indifferent to his father. He stayed by his side all his adult life, got angry with him, and even punched him; these are not signs of indifference.

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