Widowish: A Memoir(31)

“I just do. I think our bodies are temporary. And his body was so sick. Now that he’s not in his body, he must feel better, right? I just have to believe that.”

“I think he’s here with us,” she said.

“You do?”

She nodded yes.

“That makes me so happy,” I said. “Even when you and I are apart, Daddy will still be with you, and with me. He’ll always be watching over you and protecting you, like an angel.”

I told her this every night for months. I don’t know that Sophie took it in the way I meant it. I sometimes think she just said what she thought I wanted to hear just so she could go to sleep.

I visited a psychic the spring after Joel had died. The appointment was made months earlier. Maybe it’s a phenomenon only in Los Angeles, but similar to getting a reservation at a great restaurant, the best psychics in LA book up months in advance.

I was not new to the world of psychics. In fact, one of the best readings I had was when I was in my early twenties and living in New York City. I had only just had the thought that I may want to try my hand at screenwriting, when the psychic my friend told me that I must see had an opening. I was looking for some direction—Should I stay in New York and work in advertising, or should I consider going back to Los Angeles and attempt screenwriting? Would I find love again in the city or back in my hometown? I believed that Katherine might have the answers.

The doorman in Katherine’s opulent eastside building showed me to the elevator, which took me up to the penthouse. Her assistant led me to one of the bedrooms, where a card table was set up next to a king-size bed that was covered in satin pillows of all shapes and sizes. At the card table sat Katherine—blonde, big, friendly. Think Texas. But this was New York City, and Katherine was all business.

I was there for five minutes when Katherine, without knowing anything about me, said, “I see you in these big warehouses. There are big cameras and lights, too.”

“Really?” I said.

“And something about foxes. Or a fox. Fox and . . .” She was searching, concentrating; her eyes closed. “Fox, fox. They keep showing me a fox. But also, lights, big lights, movie lights.”

I was trying to figure out what she meant. Foxes? My mind came up blank. The closest thing I could think of were the deer we’d sometimes see on weekends in the Hamptons. But I stayed quiet. Then Katherine’s eyes opened, and she smiled and looked at me.

“Fox,” she said. “And Disney. You’ll be working for them. Writing. I see pages, lots of pages everywhere, so much writing! That’s what they’re telling me. You are a writer!”

I didn’t quite understand who “they” were. But I took what she was saying as the confirmation I needed at the time. I am a writer!

Or at least, I would be a writer at some point in the future.

Sure enough, when I moved back to Los Angeles later that year, my first employer was Disney. Followed by Fox. Later, Disney again. I don’t remember much else from that reading with Katherine, but clearly it didn’t dissuade me from believing that some people have a gift, a gift that allows them to tune into a frequency that relays messages from somewhere beyond. This is what I was hoping for when I drove to Beverly Hills to meet Candy, the psychic I waited almost five months to see.

“Come in,” Candy said. “We’ve been waiting.”

Candy’s office was in a big building in Beverly Hills. The other occupants seemed to be doctors. Candy sat at a desk full of family photos and trinkets. She had more framed photos on the walls; some were of her posing with celebrities.

She gestured for me to sit across from her, and she smiled warmly. She had a full figure and an enthusiastic energy.

“Yes, oh my God, he’s been waiting for you!” She started to laugh and looked up like she was talking to the air. “She’s here, she’s here. Oh my God, he’s so happy!” She looked at me and asked, “What did you bring me?” She had a vague accent, somewhere from the Middle East, I thought. Israel or maybe Iran.

I reached into my bag. Psychics sometimes suggest bringing an object or a photo of the person you hope to connect with. It helps them channel or receive information. I handed her Joel’s watch—a gift from his father years earlier that Joel had worn every day. I also brought some photos. She looked at one of them.

“This is him?” she asked.

So far, all I had said was hello.

“He was sick. So sick. I thought he was older . . . Now I’m confused.”

“Yes,” I said. “That’s my husband.”

“So young!” she said. She got very serious staring at his picture. “He went very quickly. He was waiting to go.”

I started to cry.

“It’s funny because my client before you, she’s been waiting for a man to come into her life, and your husband was here waiting for you. She was so disappointed, but I knew he wasn’t here for her. She was hoping because this man, your husband . . . His love is . . .” She searched for the word.

“Strong. His love is very strong for you. I thought he was older because of the sickness.”

She continued to concentrate. She stroked the photo with her index finger.

“He couldn’t move?” she asked. “Not the coma, I mean, in life.”

I hadn’t said anything about a coma.