[Iris and Lily 01.0 - 03.0] The Complete Series

by Angela Scipioni

  Auntie Rosa reached her hand toward Uncle Alfred. “Lemme see, Al... lemme see.” Uncle Alfred walked forward mechanically and placed the bag into her hand. “Oh, bebi, bebi... my little Carlo,” said Auntie Rosa, opening the bag and reaching her hand inside. “Alfred!” she cried, her eyes widening. “Where are the other medications? There’s only one here.”

  “They took them, Ro,” said Uncle Alfred with a sob. “The paramedics took his medications and brought them to the hospital and the doctors kept them all except that one. They wanted to do an autopsy.” Uncle Alfred’s bottom lip trembled. “An autopsy, Ro.” He gasped. “I told them we did not want that. ‘No autopsy,’ I said. Then they asked Dr. Bob all sorts of questions and asked him to sign some sort of paper before they would let me go.”

  “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,” said Auntie Rosa, crossing herself. “Thank God Dr. Bob was there, is all I have to say.” She sat quietly for a moment with her eyes closed and then let out a deep sigh. “Sit down, Alfred, have some toast. You’ve got to keep up your strength, after all.” She surveyed the mound of eggs and bacon on the table and said, “My goodness, Lily, I can’t b’lieve you did all this. You remind me of Iris.”

  “Oh, yeah,” said Lily, filling a row of cups with hot coffee. “We’re just two peas in a pod, me and Iris.”

  By seven o’clock, Violet emerged from the stairway, holding an elastic band between her front teeth, her fingers entangled in her thick chestnut-brown hair, weaving it into a braid.

  “Has anyone called Marguerite or Iris?” she asked softly.

  “Iris!” Auntie Rosa wailed. “I couldn’t do it, Violet... I can’t do it... And today is Sunday; I’m quite sure they are all at Isabella’s enjoying a nice family dinner... what a terrible shock it will be... Iris will be devastated.”

  “Don’t worry about it, Auntie Rosa,” said Violet, “I’ll take care of it. I’ll try her at home and if she’s not there, I’ll try Isabella’s. I’ll get a hold of her.”

  Violet grabbed her purse and went into the sunroom. Jasmine pulled the doors closed behind her, taking a place next to Auntie Rosa on the couch. After about ten minutes, muffled weeps began to periodically escape through the cracks of the door. Violet emerged, blowing her nose.

  “I talked to Marguerite and Gregorio - he insisted on breaking the news to Iris; he wanted to make sure she was properly prepared. Marguerite was out of town; she’ll be here this evening. Gregorio said he’d make arrangements for Iris. Since it’s Sunday, it’s complicated, but his friend owns a travel agency and he’s going to get Iris on the first available flight. A flight tomorrow morning.”

  “Oh, thank the Lord,” said Auntie Rosa. “Did you hear that, Lily? Iris is practically on her way.”

  “Yes, I heard. So is Marguerite.”

  “Poor Iris... over there all alone.”

  “She has Gregorio.” Jasmine patted Auntie Rosa’s hand. “He will take care of her until she gets home. Don’t worry.”

  Funny, thought Lily. I thought Iris was home.

  Violet swung her long braid over her shoulder, then bent and picked up her purse, retrieving a small note pad and a pen from inside. “We’ll have to make the arrangements. And write an obituary.”

  “I’ve got that handled,” said Henry. “I’m gonna run upstairs and take a shower, so I can be at the funeral home when they open at nine o’clock.”

  Violet opened her mouth and drew in a breath, but Henry disappeared up the stairs before she could speak. She leaned over and whispered to Jasmine, who just shook her head “no.”

  Violet sat on the couch and let out a sigh. “Within twenty-four hours this place is going to be lousy with Capotostis. We’d better make sure there’s food and everything. William, could you snoop around and see if you can find any cash we can use to feed people? Then each of us will have to keep track of whatever we spend out of pocket, and we’ll make sure everyone gets reimbursed, OK?”

  “I’m quite sure Iris is going to pay an arm and a leg to fly here on the spur of the moment like this,” said Auntie Rosa.

  “Well, Auntie Rosa,” said Jasmine, “I’m not sure we can do anything about that, but I don’t think we need to worry about Iris. She can manage just fine.”

  After Iris had moved to Italy, Auntie Rosa’s favoritism of her had blossomed into a fixation, as though she could compensate for the distance between them by thinking and talking about Iris at every opportunity, perhaps creating the illusion of her presence. She saw the world through her own personal Iris lens. When she’d stopped over unexpectedly one Saturday while Lily and Joe were having their new furniture delivered (thanks to a hearty discount and installment payments from La Casa Bella), Auntie Rosa exclaimed, “Wait until Iris sees this!” When Auntie Rosa saw the letter to the editor that Lily had published in the local paper presenting her argument for a traffic light in front of SaveMart as a way to cut down on traffic congestion, she called Lily and said, “Did you send a copy to Iris?” And when Lily had announced that she was pregnant, Auntie Rosa cried out, “Oh, poor Iris!” Lily sometimes wondered if her aunt had been relieved about the miscarriage, just to save poor Iris from feeling bad.

  Perhaps Auntie Rosa recognized Iris was living the life that she herself may have lived, had it not been for any one of a number of events that had transpired along the way. They were events over which she had no control, but that had irrevocably shaped her destiny: her parents’ decision to emigrate to America, Teresa’s drowning, the Depression, Irene Capotosti’s crippling arthritis which did not afflict Auntie Rosa physically but which - by emotional association and because it left her mother dependent upon her for everything - rendered both of them invalid.

  If things had worked out differently, perhaps Auntie Rosa would be the one living on the Ligurian seaside, married to a successful doctor, shouting, “Ciao!” and “Buongiorno!” from her terrace as townspeople passed on their way to work or to the market. If things had worked out differently, maybe Iris would be sitting here, offering her a baby to hold, and Lily would be the one Auntie Rosa would have to miss and wonder about. That would undoubtedly have been easier, but wouldn’t have provided nearly the same degree of suffering, which was the one thing Auntie Rosa loved nearly as much as she loved Iris.

  It was probably a good thing that Auntie Rosa had no children of her own, no one to whom she could pass along the legacy of guilt and punishment that had become marks of the Capotosti crest. Still, it didn’t stop her from trying to make a daughter out of Iris. All those years of whisking Iris away on the weekends, of sneaking special presents to her, of holding her close in bed and stocking the cupboards with Iris’ favorite treats, and still, Iris up and moved away. She left her, just as everyone she’d loved left her. As it turned out, it wasn’t a bad deal for Iris, though. She enjoyed all the benefits of having a mother all to herself, and now - being far away - none of the responsibilities that came along with being an adult child in this family, whose string of needs never seemed to end.

  So much depended on who stayed and who went away.

  Still hoping to provoke her own grief, Lily returned to Chestnut Crest the next morning to see what tasks needed to be done. Perhaps going through her father’s desk to look for necessary papers, or through his dresser to find something to bury him in would make her sad, would finally produce tears. At the very least, being around people who looked like her and shared her history could inspire her and serve as a model for how she should grieve.

  “Marguerite! I was hoping I would you see you this morning. What time did you get in?”

  “Hey, Lily of the Valley,” said Marguerite. She ran red fingernails through her thick dark hair. It was one of the few times in recent years that Lily had seen Marguerite when she wasn’t meticulously put together, with her nails matching her lips, matching her bag, matching her commanding presence.

  “I got in late. I know I look a fright.”

  “You don’t,” said Lily. “You actually look pretty great.”

/>   “Thanks to Jane Fonda,” said Marguerite, gliding her hands over her slender hips. “She is my new idol these days. Do you work out, Lily?”

  “Work out? Like go running?”

  “Yes - exercise, fitness... it’s great for the skin and hair, too. Not that you can tell from looking at me right now.”

  “I’d hate to think what anyone could tell from looking at me,” said Lily.

  “Well,” said Marguerite, taking stock of Lily’s clothes and hair. “You get a free pass for now, but when all of this is over, you should check out Jane’s videos, and give yourself a little health and fitness makeover. In fact, I’m going to leave you my copy - believe me, you’ll thank me for it.”

  Lily immediately felt even more self-conscious and exposed. As an active member of the artist community and as someone who always wore the latest styles, Marguerite knew about such things, and if she thought Lily needed a makeover, then she must look even worse than she thought, even worse than she felt. She reached into her purse and fished out a tube of pink lipstick, squeezing it into the pocket of her jeans.

  It was strange for Lily to be sitting in the room where she had spent so many hours of her youth surrounded by her sisters, none of whom she felt she really knew. Over the years, the gap had widened, their ages being the smallest of the wedges between them. By nature of Lily’s position as baby girl of the family, she was the last one left at Chestnut Crest - left to fend for herself and eventually for their father, too. She knew they didn’t agree with her decision to side with their mother during the separation. They didn’t understand; they’d only heard their father’s side of the story and they never bothered to ask any of the kids who were actually there. They never bothered to ask Lily to tell them her side. If just one of them had offered her some guidance, looked out for her, she wouldn’t have had to choose a parent. She shouldn’t have had to.

  “I have a unique look,” said Violet. “It’s called toddlerhood. I can’t get Olivia to take a nap to save my life. She always wants to be up and looking around, like something fantastic might happen that she’ll miss. It’s exhausting. She wants to be part of anything and everything that goes on.”

  “Sounds like someone I know,” said Jasmine, playfully poking Violet in the side with her elbow.

  “Are you kidding me?” said Violet. “I would love to take a nice nap in the afternoon, grab a cup of tea, drift off while watching General Hospital. Of course that would mean that someone else would have to take some responsibility for the practice for a change.”

  “Why don’t you hire an assistant? Just because it’s your practice, doesn’t mean you have to do everything,” said Jasmine.

  “Assistants cost money,” said Violet. “I’m a midwife, not a doctor. I can’t afford that kind of expense.”

  “You’d better do something,” said Jasmine. “You know that those babies are not going to stop being born.”

  Lily’s eyes stung. She was glad her sisters didn’t know about the second miscarriage. They never asked her questions about why she hadn’t gotten pregnant again and she didn’t offer any explanations. She had so little in common with them as it was; she couldn’t afford to feel much more different.

  “What you’re doing is so important,” Jasmine continued. “And not the delusional kind of importance that I have about my work.” Jasmine twisted a lock of her long, wavy honey-brown hair with the fingers of her right hand.

  Lily reached her own hand up and ran it through her wild mop of curls - the texture of which was too coarse to be worn in the bob cut that she had recently attempted. After years of growing it out, Lily’s hair had finally grown back to the length she preferred, but Lucy had convinced her to try for a more modern look. “You should look like you are a mommy, not like you need a mommy,” Lucy had told her. “Short hair is so much more chic.” Lucy dug into her ear with her pinky finger. “I’ve always worn my hair short. All of the most sophisticated celebrities wore short hair - Marilyn Monroe, Lucille Ball... all of them.”

  It had taken a mere hour to cut off, but it would take years before Lily would again acquire the mane that had been a lifelong trademark of the Capotosti sisters. She wondered if she had the patience to wait. She wondered why, when she loved long hair so much, she had allowed herself to be talked into cutting hers. Again.

  “Aren’t things at the shelter going well?” Marguerite asked. “I thought since that bastard of a partner moved away, your adoption rate was improving.”

  “So much of what I do isn’t even about the animals anymore,” said Jasmine. “It’s the business side of things - funding and regulations and community affairs. I really just want to help find homes for some of those little angels, but I spend way too much time on paperwork.”

  Lily was struck with the familiarity that her sisters had for the details of each other’s lives: they were obviously in touch with each other, chatting on the phone, maybe even taking weekend trips to visit one another.

  Lily was embarrassed that she didn’t even know enough about Jasmine’s life to offer a comforting word of reassurance. Then again, her sisters knew nothing about her life, either - not about their new home, certainly not about her life as a Diotallevi. She hoped they would not ask. As long as the details remained private, Lily could pretend that she and her sisters had more in common besides grief and death; she could pretend she was one of them.

  “Iris is getting in at eleven, right?” said Jasmine.

  “Didn’t you hear?” said Violet. “Gregorio called earlier. There was no way for her to get out today. She has to wait until tomorrow.”

  “But I thought the wake was tomorrow,” said Lily. “Are they changing it?” She and Joe had already gotten approved vacation time for Tuesday. Changing the wake was really going to mess things up.

  “No can do,” said Marguerite.

  “You’re kidding!?” said Jasmine. “Why don’t they just push everything out a day?”

  “It’s all been booked,” said Violet. “Obituary ran in this morning’s paper.”

  “Shit,” said Jasmine. “What does that mean?”

  “Sounds like it means that by the time Iris gets here, the wake will be over,” said Marguerite. “ Damn... I feel so bad for her.”

  Lily did too. Even though their father would be dead, they would all get to see him one more time. And if Iris were there right now, she sure would not be having any trouble finding her tears. Their father deserved to be surrounded by weeping daughters. And Iris deserved to be here.

  “Does Auntie Rosa know?” Lily asked.

  “Please,” said Marguerite. “We had to give her one of Dad’s Valiums. Ricci drove her home.”

  “I still can’t believe she couldn’t get a flight out today,” said Jasmine. “She probably went to that travel agent that tried to help us change our ticket home when we went there,” said Marguerite.

  “That was nuts,” said Jasmine. “I half expected to get off the plane in Rochester, Minnesota.”

  The exchange might have gone unnoticed by Lily, except that Violet glared at Marguerite, who looked quizzically at Jasmine, who looked at Lily and then cast her gaze down at the bedspread. When had they all gone to visit Iris? Why hadn’t she been invited to go? The four women sat in awkward silence until Lily excused herself to go to the bathroom.

  As she closed the bedroom door behind her, Lily heard Violet say, “Nice going, Marguerite.”

  “What?” said Marguerite. “How was I supposed to know we weren’t telling Lily?”

  The next two days were a whirl of people and errands and emotion and empty beer bottles. By the time Lily arrived at the wake, she still had not shed a tear. She sat at the back of the room, ducking out every hour or so to have a cigarette. Sometimes she would stand alone, gazing out over the gray leafless cemetery across the street, and sometimes she would find Louis, or Violet’s husband Todd there, also having escaped to catch a breath of fresh air.

  “So,” Todd would say. “This sucks.”

&nb
sp; “Yes, it does,” Lily would reply, as they stood shivering in the February wind.

  The line of people moved into the funeral parlor, and shuffled up to the casket to cross themselves and offer up a prayer for Carlo Capotosti’s soul. Lily watched as family and friends of family cried and hugged and chatted. She struggled to remember the names of those whom Auntie Rosa, Marguerite, Violet, and Jasmine knew so well and seemed so happy to see. To anyone who bothered to notice, Lily may have looked disinterested, sitting against the wall next to her mother, when in truth she just didn’t know what to do with herself. Sharing the company of a fellow outcast was better than sitting alone and unnoticed at your own father’s wake.

  Lily checked her Timex wristwatch. Joe would be getting out of work soon. She was glad that Jasmine and Violet and all the others would see him at her side, comforting her. She wanted them to realize that even if she didn’t belong with them, at least she belonged with someone.

  “Hey, you -” said Marguerite, holding her hand out to Lily. “Wanna come up with me and say good-bye?”

  Even if you didn’t know that Marguerite lived in Manhattan, you could tell by the way she looked that she wasn’t from Gates. Her maroon brocade suit fit snugly to her curvaceous form, and her wavy hair pertly bounced with the cadence of her confident stride. Lily accepted her warm smile and her hand.

  “I don’t know if I’ve ever seen Dad just lying down that way,” said Marguerite.

  “Me neither, now that you mention it.”

  “I guess this is one way to get him to stay put and stop screaming so much.”

  “I guess.” Lily’s father looked somewhat as he had on her wedding day - which was one of the few times she’d seen him in a nice suit. His salt-and-pepper hair was combed and sprayed firmly into place. A white rosary was carefully braided through his folded hands.