Nick shook his head in disbelief.
“Just your word,” Teddy said.
Nick leaned across the table. Teddy could see tears forming in his eyes. The old Nick never cried. The old Nick didn’t even own tear ducts. So maybe Graciella was right, and his grandsons had wrought a change in the devil. He hadn’t wanted to tell Graciella that he thought it was impossible, but he was willing to be proven wrong.
“I swear on my mother’s grave,” Nick said, voice hoarse with emotion. “I would never hurt Graciella. She’s like my own daughter. But if she—” His voice broke. “If she doesn’t want me to see the boys, if she thinks that’s really the best for them? Then I’ll do it. I’ll do it for them. Because I love those boys.”
Irene squeezed Teddy’s arm, hard.
“I’m so happy to hear that,” Teddy said. “I’ll let her know the good news.”
Nick didn’t shake their hands as they left. He was staring at the desk. At six pencils, two envelopes, and a collection of souvenirs.
—
Irene helped him into the passenger seat. Neither of them spoke.
He’d set up the feeble act back at Mitzi’s a couple of weeks ago, just so he’d have an excuse to have Irene in the room with him when he met with Nick. He needed her there, listening to the man talk. Every squeeze on his arm from her had meant a lie from that bastard.
They were two miles from the tavern when Teddy finally said, “Well?”
“He’s lying, top to bottom,” she said.
Teddy sighed. Of course he was. What a shame to be proven right.
“Let’s go,” Teddy said. “We need to warn Graciella.”
19
Irene
In the end, there was only one place to take them. Irene opened the front door to the house, peeked inside to make sure Buddy wasn’t naked or something, and said to Graciella, “As it turns out, we have a lot of spare beds.”
Graciella hadn’t wanted to leave her house. Dad, however, managed to persuade her without inducing panic. He’d presented the idea of a sleepover at his house as a lark, a bit of fun for the kids, while somehow getting across the idea that her sociopathic father-in-law might indeed want to break into Graciella’s home, kidnap his grandchildren, and shoot her in the head. Graciella took this implied news better than Irene expected. The woman’s primary emotion, however, seemed to be not fear, but anger. She was mad at Teddy, or else mad at herself for going along with him. Irene knew exactly how she felt.
Plus, who would want to leave that palace? Irene had known that Graciella had money, but she hadn’t realized just how much until she saw that home.
And now, unfortunately, Graciella was seeing theirs. Irene ushered her inside. Buddy was nowhere in sight, but he’d left a sawhorse in the middle of the living room. Sawdust coated everything.
“Uh, we’re doing a little renovation work.”
“I know,” Graciella said. “I was here earlier.”
“Right? Then come on in.”
Her sons looked around at the room, saying nothing. It hadn’t been easy to get them out of their house, either. The two younger boys, Adrian and Luke, didn’t have the first clue how to pack a bag, and the teenager, Julian, seemed to think that if he hid in his bedroom then they’d somehow forget about him and let him stay home. Fortunately, both Graciella and Irene knew how to herd young males.
And summon them. “Matty!” Irene called. “We have company!”
There was no answer from the basement. Was he sleeping again? How much downtime did a teenager need?
Dad came in through the back door. “The wagon’s all tucked away,” he said. He’d wanted to take the precaution of parking Graciella’s Mercedes in the garage and out of sight. “I know, it’s a silly thing, probably not necessary at all, but why not? No sense advertising your presence.”
Adrian, the youngest, held out a dollar bill to Teddy. “Now can you do a magic trick?”
Dad took the dollar from him. “You think you’ve been patient, eh?”
The boy nodded.
“All right, then. Ever hear of the shoe bank?” Dad sat down on the ottoman and pulled off a shiny black oxford. “The first step, so to speak, is to make a deposit.” He folded the bill with his stiff fingers and placed it inside the shoe. Even crude tools could do crude work. Enough to fool a child, perhaps. “Then we wait for interest to develop. Don’t worry kid, these are all jokes you’re going to get someday and just laugh.” He slipped the shoe back on and stood up. “Now the tricky part. How to make a shoe-to-shoe transfer?” He slid the money-laden shoe forward. “Let’s go toe to toe, shall we? No, the other foot—right foot to right. Press the tip against mine. This, you see, allows us to combine our digits. No? Nothing? Okay, now we order the money. This is called a money order.”
Graciella groaned.
“As I mentioned, someday, hilarious. Are you ready?” Adrian looked at his brothers, then nodded. Dad said, “Repeat after me: Money! Order!”
“Money order,” Adrian said.
“Transfer!” Dad said, and kicked his toe against Adrian’s. The boy hopped back as if he’d been shocked. Dad said, “Now let’s see if the wire went through. Take off your shoe, my boy.”
Adrian dropped onto his butt and pulled off his shoe. “Under the insole,” Dad said. “That’s right, pull it right out.”
The boy pulled out the foam insole. Underneath was a folded bill. “It made it!” Adrian shouted. He unfolded the bill. “And it’s a five!”
“Holy shit,” Graciella said.
“Mom!” Adrian said.
Graciella laughed. “How did you do that?” she asked Dad.
“He’ll never tell,” Irene said. She’d never seen that one before. It was a pretty good gag. He hadn’t touched the kid’s shoe, except to tap it with his foot.
“Now the best part,” Dad said. “You boys like video games? Because we’ve got a whole setup down there.”
“What kind of video games?” Adrian asked.
“A brand-new whosit whatsit.”
“An SNES?”
“Undoubtedly,” Dad said. “Right that way.”
Irene said, “If there’s a boy down there, wake him up.”
Adrian, one shoe off and one shoe on, jumped down the stairs. The older ones followed.
Dad was excited by all this drama, despite the danger. Or maybe because of it. Irene had always known that her father was once a gambler, what Frankie euphemistically called a “risk taker.” She’d thought that was all behind him. After Mom died, he was at first depressed and unengaged, then frustrated and unengaged, and finally just unengaged. All this time, she’d thought he didn’t like children, but maybe it was just that he didn’t like his children. Only an audience of strangers would find him entertaining.
“What are we doing for supper?” he asked Irene.
“Don’t look at me,” she said. “Where’s Buddy? And Frankie?”
“Buddy’s out back, cleaning the grill. Frankie, no idea.” He clapped his hands. “I guess we’re ordering out. What do the boys like?” His eyes lit up. “What about fried chicken? Boys love any food that comes in a bucket. I’ll get it. You girls get comfortable. Make her a drink, Irene. Graciella likes Hendrick’s.” And then he was gone.
“Wow,” Irene said.
“I think he’s enjoying this,” Graciella said.
“And a little afraid to be in the room with you.”
“You think so?”
“He doesn’t want to disappoint you,” Irene said. “Don’t worry. He will, sooner or later.”
Graciella gave her an appraising look. “How about that drink?”
They sat at the dining room table, among the file folders and boxes from NG Group Realty. Graciella picked up one of the listings that Irene had marked up with red pen. “How bad is it?”
“Could be worse,” Irene said. She walked her through what she’d found in the last two years of files. Going by the number of properties being handled, most of the busin
ess was legitimate. But the cash flow was seriously weighted toward the suspicious house trades—and almost all of those were done by one agent.
“If you’re going to run this clean,” Irene said, “you’ve got to fire this Brett guy. And if you’re going to make a profit, the other agents have to sell a lot more houses.”
“I appreciate that you’re not sugarcoating it.”
“Who has time?”
“I’ll drink to that.”
They both did. “To fucking Nick.”
“Junior and Senior,” Irene said.
“And how about your guy?” Graciella asked. “How’s that going?”
“Down in flames,” Irene said.
“I thought you seemed down after your trip. You broke up with him?”
Broke up. With Lev, her almost husband, and with other boyfriends, the phrase felt right; she broke them off from her, let them fall away like the spent stage of an Apollo rocket. She was stronger without them and never looked back. With Joshua, though, it was as if she’d left a piece of herself behind. She was the one who was damaged, incomplete, adrift. Destined to grow cold and die alone.
She needed a story to tell Graciella, however, so she invoked a different destiny. “It was never going to work,” she said. “He can’t leave Phoenix. He’s got a daughter, and they have split custody. He wanted me to move out there, get a job with his company, but I couldn’t even get through the interview.”
“What happened?”
“I found out they’d instituted a uterus tax.”
Graciella laughed. “Oh, one of those places.”
“Let’s just say that I’ll never work for those fuckers. I just hope I didn’t get Joshua fired.”
“Is he mad at you?”
“No! He feels guilty. Says he should have known more about what he was putting me into. He thinks I’m great and everybody else isn’t worthy.”
“Sounds like you’re up on the pedestal, right where you belong. What’s the problem?”
“The problem is that he’s delusional.”
Graciella put two fingers to her pursed lips and bent forward—the signal used by sane people to indicate that they would have spit their drink in laughter, if only they were a teenager or Lou Costello. Irene appreciated the gesture. Graciella swallowed and said with a smile, “Explain.”
“We’ve only known each other for a couple months,” Irene said. “We’ve barely spent time with each other. He hasn’t even met the family!” And I haven’t met his, she didn’t say. “He keeps talking like everything’s going to be so easy, so wonderful, nothing but unicorns in the garden. He has no idea what it would be like to live with me on a daily basis.”
“The psychic thing?”
“Ah. Teddy told you about that?”
“He’s not a bit ashamed of it.”
“Well, I just know I wouldn’t be able to handle it when he started lying to me.”
“You’d be surprised what you can handle,” Graciella said. “I knew what Nick was when I met him. It was part of the attraction. And for almost twenty years, it was fine. I didn’t have to think about what he did with his father. I knew he was still doing things, not-so-nice things, but our family was good. If he hadn’t been arrested, I’d still be the happy homemaker.”
“Must be nice,” Irene said.
“To be happy?”
“To live like that. To not notice the lies.”
“Oh, I noticed them.”
“Really?”
“You haven’t been married, have you?”
“I got threatened with it once.”
“Here’s the secret. You both have to lie sometimes to make it work. He says, ‘You look great in that outfit.’ You tell him he’s right about Clinton. And when he comes home at three a.m. with a bag of fucking teeth, you make sure not to ask him who they belong to.”
“Jesus,” Irene said.
Graciella stared at her glass. “You’re right. That’s awful. How did I live like that?” Her eyes shone. Irene had never seen Graciella get emotional.
“I knew when Nick wasn’t where he said he was,” she said. “Or when he made up some story when he was working for his father. And I just…let it go.”
“You had the boys to think about,” Irene said.
“I was thinking of myself. All the things I had.”
“It is a pretty good house,” Irene said.
Graciella shrugged, admitting it. “Is Joshua well-off?”
“Better off than I am.”
“And you’ve known him for all of two months.”
“Almost three. We met online.”
“Online. I don’t get that. How much have you been with him in person?”
Irene tried to count the days. “Maybe a week’s worth? Ten days?”
“That’s crazy, Irene! Ten days and he wants you to move to Arizona?”
“I know. It’s not like me.”
But what was like her? Stay home and take care of the boys, for sure. To be the Designated Adult in the room. To put herself second. She said, “I’m just not sure what person I want to be anymore.”
“Stay here, then,” Graciella said. “Work for me. Take care of the money.”
“You want me to be your bookkeeper?”
“We’ll hire a fucking bookkeeper. I need you to be the chief financial officer. Someone who knows where all the bodies are buried.”
Irene made a face.
“Monetarily speaking,” Graciella said.
“You’re serious?”
“Dead serious.” Then: “I really need to find a different way of expressing myself.”
“I’ll think about it,” Irene said.
“I see. This is you being an adult. Non-impulsive. Let’s drink more.”
A few minutes later, Dad’s Buick slid past the picture window, heading for the driveway. Irene said, “Let’s get the boys.”
But Matty wasn’t in any of the bunk beds. Irene went up to the attic and knocked on his bedroom door. “Supper, kid!” After no answer, she knocked again. “Matty?”
She tried the knob. It didn’t turn—which meant that Matty had locked it from the inside—but the door wasn’t sitting flush in the frame. She pushed it open.
Matty lay in bed, unmoving, hands under the covers. Jesus Christ, not again, she thought. She started to back out of the room, then realized his eyes were wide open.
“Matty?”
She waved her hand in front of his eyes.
“Matty. You hear me?” He didn’t move. She put her hand to his neck and verified that he was still breathing.
“God damn it,” she said. Her son was an astral fucking traveler.
It was in the limo ride to the cemetery that she thought, Maybe now we’ll be normal. At the end of the service she realized: Nope. Never gonna happen.
On the way there, Dad seemed to be in a trance. He sat in the backseat, his hat beside him, watching the telephone poles slip by. It was Irene who had to keep Frankie and Buddy in line. Buddy had refused to sit on the seat, and was lying on the floor mat, drawing in crayon on his big pad of paper. Frankie kept putting his feet on top of him and saying things like “Wow, is this footrest comfortable!” Buddy would slap his feet away, and Irene would yell at both of them, and as soon as she looked away the whole process would start all over.
Dad ignored them. This only made her more angry with him. She was furious that he’d never come back from the hospital to bring them to see Mom. Mrs. Klauser had gotten them all bathed and into fancy clothes, like they were getting ready to go onstage. Then they’d been forced to hang around the house, not allowed to go play outside because they’d get dirty. After three hours of waiting the phone rang. Mrs. Klauser told them they weren’t going to the hospital. Only Irene knew what that meant.
Dad should have taken them that morning. Mom wouldn’t have cared what they looked like. But because he was so worried about appearances Irene wasn’t allowed to say goodbye to her mother. None of them were.
Well, at least now the act was over. There was no Amazing Telemachus Family without Mom. Now they could be just like everybody else.
The graveside service wasn’t nearly as crowded as the viewing the night before, or the church service that morning, but there were still over a hundred people gathered around the coffin. Dad got out of the limousine without looking back, leaving the boys to Irene. “Put the coloring book in the car,” she told Buddy. “Tuck in your shirt,” she said to Frankie.
“You’re not the boss of me,” he said.
“Stop it,” Irene hissed at him. “This is Mom’s funeral.”
“Is it? I hadn’t noticed.” Frankie had been a jerk from the moment they’d made him put on a tie.
The funeral home worker led them into a tent over the grave site, then to the front of the crowd, right next to the hole. They sat on white folding chairs while most everybody else stood.
Someone put a hand on Irene’s shoulder. She glanced up and saw that it was a red-haired woman she’d never seen before. “I’m so sorry, honey,” the woman said. “If you need anything, you can call on us.”
“Anything at all,” said the man beside the red-haired woman. It was Destin Smalls, huge as ever.
Later, Irene wished she’d said, “All I want is for you to leave our family alone.” But at the time she only said, “Thank you,” and turned back around.
The priest said yet more words, but Irene was beyond listening. What was left to say? Mom was gone, and Irene was trapped here, the next available adult in charge.
Finally it was time for the coffin to be lowered into the ground. Irene took Buddy’s hand, for herself as much as him. A couple of funeral home workers in black suits squatted beside the metal frame that surrounded the coffin and flipped some latches. The priest kept talking as the men worked the thick straps that held up the nickel-colored coffin. The box lowered a few inches, then stopped.
The funeral workers looked at each other. They lowered the straps some more, but the coffin wasn’t going down. It hovered, unsupported. A murmur ran through the crowd. Dad didn’t seem to notice anything was wrong. He was looking off in the distance, chewing at his lip.
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