Lucien didn’t mind taking his time getting to the house. He could sense that Dieuseul needed the air and space to let his mind and body roam as much as he did. He looked Dieuseul over as he turned the steering wheel into the many right-hand turns required to get from Ozone Park to SOP. He tried to see what Marie-Ange had seen in the man and concluded that it could only have been the resemblance to her father. He looked at Dieuseul gratefully for the times when he’d dutifully cared for Marie-Ange during the night shift. He wouldn’t have cared if the two had had an affair. By that time, Lucien had had little use for her body except when her ailing hands had cooked what he’d liked when he’d liked. He’d accepted and reciprocated hand jobs just to appease her but had been uninterested in her sex. Dieuseul had done him a favor by flirting with and collegially caressing the ailing but still beautiful Marie-Ange. Lucien didn’t even care that she’d confided in Dieuseul his affair with Asante. He’d always known that the painter would never breathe a word. He’d eavesdropped to find out how much Marie-Ange had divulged. The furthest she’d gone had been his promise to get rid of his basement bitch and hire a nurse to care for her. He’d done so much worse over the years that his quick fucks and few affairs should have been the least of her worries. Lucien had waited to hear her tell another soul what he’d done and explain why she’d stayed with him after all. After all.
Lucien had both witnessed and been the beneficiary of women’s tolerance. Marie-Ange hadn’t been the first and wouldn’t be the last to stay with an unemployed man. She’d nursed Lucien through his on-the-job injury for more than the workers’ comp windfall that had gone straight to repaying their debts. These had been her loans, taken out behind his back with his steady job as collateral. The steaming steel pipe that had fallen on Lucien’s leg had completed the khaki tan he’d acquired while working at the factory for nearly a decade. He’d stayed home for three years figuring out if he wanted to return to work at all, anywhere, for anybody. With leftover money from his workers’ compensation claim that he’d hidden from Marie-Ange, he’d bought a taxi medallion and a yellow cab to slap it on. He had had no shortage of candidates coming through KAM willing to take any offered shift for six to seven days per week. Dieuseul had won out for the day shift and Lucien had gladly taken the night. While Lucien’s injuries had completely healed, Marie-Ange’s had just started to form, fester, harden, and corrode her insides with what would be decades of difficult-to-diagnose multiple organ failure.
Sitting next to her first caregiver, Lucien could not recall the feeling of watching his wife deteriorate. Dieuseul would have told him, if he’d asked. But Lucien would never ask. He liked being the all-knowing one with answers to every question. His best conversations had always been with himself. Talking to Marie-Ange during her illness had always ended in arguments. Her illness had come with the erosion of her verbal filters as well. She hadn’t been able to censor herself to save anyone’s feelings. Years of repressed emotional venom had attacked her body, plunging her in a chemo chair while still in her early thirties.
Lucien started to grow weary of Dieuseul’s slow driving through the neighborhood. It wasn’t like they needed a tour of SOP. Nothing had changed there, except for his house. He wanted to grab the wheel to make Dieuseul pull over, so he could take the wheel and get to the house faster. He didn’t want to think anymore, to remember why he was where he was at this stage in life. He didn’t want to drift into memories of his daughters. He’d been dreaming about them less than an hour ago and, as beautiful as they’d been, he did not need to see them now. Thinking of them while fully awake would force him to feel. Not guilt or shame, which would have been appropriate. But something he couldn’t name because his insides were both hollow and corroded. I am nothing.
His daughters had been different. By the time Marie-Ange had been deep into her first round of sickness, his daughters had started evading and then watching his every move. Marie-Ange had turned a blind eye to her daughters’ self-protective maneuvers until knowledge had slapped her in the face. She’d known that Lucien had loved his daughters, especially Veille, more than life itself. She had been their first, the one who’d most resembled him and his kin.
Veille’s birth had been unexpected and inconvenient. But she had also been a comfort to them; one more reason to stay together. Lucien had felt prepared to be a father and had fallen in love with his firstborn. A first daughter herself, Marie-Ange had understood that love. She’d also needed additional comfort, someone to love while continuing to mourn her father and Lucien, who’d been set to leave for the United States. But everything changed when she learned that she was pregnant again with a baby still at the breast.
Lucien had always known what Marie-Ange had never been able to admit—that neither of them should have ever been a parent. They hadn’t known what true parenting was because their own had loved and abandoned them irresponsibly. But, unlike Marie-Ange, he’d been fine with his view and treatment of his daughters. They’d both seen their children as props, possessions, and extensions of their own egos. Lucien had worshipped Veille and her sisters like the imported figurines in his aunt’s glass curio, with which he’d been obsessed as a child. His pursuit of women at KAM and innumerable affairs had been attempts to distract himself from his unnatural attraction to his girls.
Lucien knocked back the thoughts like a child fighting off a forceful and determined bully. Just as they crossed Liberty Avenue, he reclined his seat. He allowed sleep to fight on his behalf and closed his eyes while Dieuseul continued their redundant tour of the neighborhood. Losing his battle against the onslaught of memories, Lucien crawled backward into his dreams like a soldier retreating into a foxhole. Once the shelter collapsed, he had no choice but to dig through the dirt to excavate visions of his exquisite daughters. This time, they were younger, not even in their teens, Marie-Ange’s little dolls done up like pedigree show dogs. They were the primped, pretty overachievers; the prizewinners into which their mother had turned them. How could his adoring stares not progress into leering? How could he not touch?
Why was Veille so sad? Why was Marie-Ange so angry? Why was she shaking the girl? Did she need the details? Something to compare with her own father’s behaviors? Of course, she would rationalize that her father’s affection had been nothing like what he’d done to Veille. Of course, her general had never made her do what he’d made Veille do. Of course, he’d known better.
Wake up! Wake up! Lucien shouted inaudibly to himself while attempting to tunnel himself out of the dirt threatening to bury him alive.
Was that any reason for them to watch me the way they did? Was it enough to make her sick, to make her body begin its shutdown? Was it enough to make her threaten me the way she had? With severing? Abandonment? Did she have to say those words? Had she been choking on them for years? And her questions—how could I possibly respond? How could I tell her while she lay in her sickbed? The way she looked at me, she had clearly been thinking these things before asking, before cutting. I need to wake up! I have to wake up! I don’t want to know. I don’t want to hear her again! I don’t want to go there again! That’s where she hurt me with questions I could never answer. Not truthfully to a mother in her sickbed.
Wake up! Wake up!
No sound except for her questions:
Did I make them too pretty for you? I gave birth to them that way. That’s how they came out. Me mixed with you, but with more traces of me. That’s what made them so pretty. Especially Veille. Did I keep her skin too smooth until she learned how to properly lotion her own body? Did I make the parts in her scalp too straight? Did I comb, brush, and style her tresses too temptingly? Did the hair on her head turn out so thick, so black, that it made you think that she had something more for you? At six years old? Did it remind you of what’s between mine? Were the edges of her flannel nightgown too lacy? The cotton too soft? Her panties too roomy?
Did I dress my girls too nicely? Lik
e presents for Papa Noel. Did they look too joyous? Like Christmas? Did I make too many of them? Did you think it was okay to break just one? Did you have plans for all three? To strip them after church? Take off their matching suits? My favorite, fine herringbone fabric trimmed with white? A dress suit with a hem that hit and hid past shin and calve. Covered. Knee socks that vanished under the hemline. Covered. My favorite outfit, high neckline, mock turtleneck with white trim that hit the lower part of the throat. Covered. I found one for each of the three in the right size. Sleeves that fell just below the wrist. Covered. Shoes polished with Griffin black. My special trick, a thin coat of Vaseline. Covered.
Were my girls too shiny for you? Smoothed eyebrows, glossed lips. Covered.
Did I teach them to stand too still? Did they look like mannequins? Flawlessly dressed, prettier than any black dolls Mattel had ever made. Putting white dolls to shame. Perfect. Did I make them too perfect? Manners, mannerisms, poise onstage? Did you think they operated on batteries? Did you see them through glass panes? Covered.
Were they too much me and not enough you? Did you forget that they were yours?! All three? Did you plan to stop at her? Were the twins next? Take two at once. Did I make too many? Enough for you to count? Did I make them too fucking lovable?! Pretty, polite, performing at church on those special occasions when you came. To stare. Glass figurines behind God’s curio pane. Covered! Were you curious? Did you just want to see? What would happen if you touched? Just one? Did you know that she was real? Did you know that she would break? Did you know that she could speak?
Lucien startled himself awake. He did not want Dieuseul to see him trembling. He would never explain his dreams to anyone, not because they seemed real, but because they were the truth. How would he ever explain the tears? His haunting himself with soft sounds wafting like smoke, I am nothing. As they drove up Rockaway Boulevard, he counted the streets until they reached his house. He climbed out of the taxi and into his van as quickly as he could. He signaled for Dieuseul to follow him. Lucien drove and then parked the van in front of an abandoned house on the corner of 135th Street, just off the Conduit. He panted as he struggled to get himself out of the van and back into the taxi. He gave Dieuseul a look that said, “Don’t ask. Just drive.” Lucien closed his eyes and slowed his breathing. He knew when they reached 126th Street, three blocks from his house. He opened his eyes to signal for Dieuseul to slow down and turn right. He placed his hand on the steering wheel and guided the taxi into a parking space. He didn’t have to explain why they weren’t parking closer to the house. They both already knew that they needed to keep their presence hidden to achieve their separate ends. Lucien sat in the warm car until Dieuseul finally knocked on the passenger-side window. He waited for Dieuseul to open the door and help him out. Not that he needed assistance. He wanted to prepare Dieuseul for the work ahead.
They walked the three blocks to their street as quickly as Lucien’s limp allowed.
Dieuseul nervously interrupted the silence to keep his lips from freezing shut. “Did you ever hear from that hairdresser again, the dealer’s girlfriend? I can’t believe she was Haitian.”
“Not a word. That ingrate.” Lucien was not interested in saying more. He dropped his chin into his coat, covering his mouth.
“Asante! Ingrate…” Dieuseul said, then let silence prevail.
The men turned into the driveway to get to the back of the house. They crept around looking for the easiest way in. Lucien let Dieuseul yank the board off the back door. He didn’t need to be there to help or to watch. He needed to get water, five gallons, and bread, gone stale over months, from the freezing garage. When he returned with two gallons of water in his claw, Dieuseul seemed ready to talk again.
“You plan on staying?” Dieuseul nodded toward Lucien’s struggling grip.
“For Ezili. Marie-Ange said so.” Lucien wouldn’t let Dieuseul help with his charge. “My penance. I moved the angel to make room for my things.”
Dieuseul understood vodou rituals and accepted Lucien’s explanation.
Lucien sunk into his thoughts, plotting his next maneuver. If he could soundproof and insulate his garage to keep the cold out and the heat in. But, mostly, contain Cocoa’s singing. Damn, that girl could sing! She had a voice that the world should have heard, but he’d kept it to himself. He could turn the garage into a recording studio. He had all the equipment. No one would question the kooky old man who’d somehow convinced himself that he could make records out of his garage like it was the 1950s. He would have to move them one by one…He would leave Asante, Zero, whom he’d used up. He would take the loudest one first. One, if Sol was well enough. Then Two, Chiqui, to keep Sol in line. Then his favorite, Three, Cocoa with her singing. He’d allow only breathy whispered songs—“This Woman’s Work,” “Killing Me Softly,” “Time After Time”—or use chloroform to keep her quiet for a while. He would allow one more song because he didn’t want My to miss “American Boy.” The neighbors might recognize her voice since she’d sung at every school, church, picnic, and talent show ever held in SOP; but so many years had passed since then. His mind wouldn’t allow him to move them out of order. Please, remain on the line and move your girls in the order in which they were received. Zero, One, Two, Three, My. He could keep the boy out, bring him to Leona’s. He was his “grandson,” after all. She’d have to take him in.
“I forgot.” Lucien put down the water and limped back to the garage to where he kept his finer, more salable things. He started to calculate what he would need to make it suitable for his girls. He grabbed two more gallons of water.
They would have to settle for water, leftover sardines, and confiture with bread. At least they’d have water from a spring, not the tap. He thought of how kind he was to his family in the safe room.
LA KAY
La Kay could feel someone walking Its perimeter outside. It was both too late and too early for the demolition crew to be creeping. It was so cold that not even vandals would be outside. Only someone with a hard fixation would brave the single-digit temperatures. It was desperate for a peek. Unable to open Its eyes, It tried to catch the person’s smell in the arctic clean air. It inhaled, held Its breath, and deciphered two familiar scents. Its former inhabitants were seeking entry. It tried to play dead. It sucked in air, trying to seal every opening more tightly. It knew that the sawdust boards could be easily removed. It wanted to do something to keep Lucien and Dieuseul out. It knew that the latter could only want his precious paintings and memorabilia from his long-defunct marriage. Lucien, It knew, had to be there for more.
Since It didn’t know exactly where the voices had been coming from, It couldn’t barricade whatever trapdoor they were crouched behind. It had to let Lucien in, so he could lead It to the right place. But that would be too risky. What if he had come to kill them all? What if he could get to his gun? The one on display in Marie-Ange’s china cabinet. What if he’d come with kerosene and matches? It had to find them before he did. It thought of making some loud noise to send the neighbors running out of their homes into the predawn freeze. But It knew that nothing short of another fire would get anyone outside in the cutting cold and disheartening darkness. And certainly not to see what was going on at a place made uglier than it had already been.
La Kay had heard from Its associates how their owners resented the addition of insults to injuries—the turning of a hoarder’s house into pure urban blight, boarded up, inviting graffiti. They would never come. Not even a nosy neighbor awakened by a full bladder would bother to press a nose against a frosty windowpane to see what was going on in that place. It didn’t have the strength to make noise. It was barely conscious. Its aluminum siding had become a glacier. Its insides were still burning in certain pockets where sparks refused to die. Its only consolation that night was the simultaneously scary and thrilling entertainment of Lucien limping around It in the January cold. It wanted to wake up the houses to
see the crazy old man and his cab pal trying to break in. Although It hadn’t told them much about Lucien over the years, It had told them just enough to make them look down on him. And he had done just enough to secure their owners’ pity and disdain.
* * *
—
LUCIEN HAD also made improvements to his basement before moving Asante into the neat subterranean apartment. He’d sealed off the slim bathroom, the only entrance to the safe room, to house her and his secrets. La Kay had missed that part. It had been too busy minding Marie-Ange, missing the daughters, and hoping for music to focus fully on Lucien’s redesign. It had been trying to cheer Itself up to keep from jumping off some invisible cliff. It had forgotten that, given Lucien’s cravings, there would always be women needing protection.
La Kay forced one back window open to watch as Dieuseul pried a board off the back door. Its one eye followed Lucien as he hobbled to the garage and back. It watched as the gallons of water swung from his good hand and his claw. It held Its breath as Dieuseul ran inside first with Lucien hopping in behind him. It felt Its back door close. Two sets of Its stairs creaked and collapsed. It searched and discovered that the agile man going upstairs had succeeded. It trembled nervously, attempting a chuckle that made It choke as Lucien slid down the stairs to the basement and got stuck like a fishbone in Its throat.
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