Sharon’s mind drifted to different times and places. She thought about other missed opportunities in her life and the anger that seemed to control her. Sharon remembered how it was when she enrolled at Lehigh University right after high school. “I’m not ready for college,” she had told her mother. However, her mother firmly insisted Sharon go to school and there were no if, ands, or buts about it. No discussions. That’s the way it always was with Mom.
Maybe if Mom hadn’t been so controlling, Sharon would not have entered into a contract with John Stone, Mr. Potatohead, as Robin called him, the disinherited son of a retired State Congressman. “That was a big mistake,” she whispered to herself. She got up and eased over to the casket and knelt down. “I got pregnant with John’s child,” she whispered to her mother. “Then I married him because I was convinced you’d set up a trust fund for us. Isn’t that what Grandfather did when Dad knocked you up with Miss Wonderful sitting behind me?”
She leaned on her folded hands and stared at her mother and thought about the great plan with John Stone. She got pregnant on purpose, married and left Lehigh University in that order. She and John Stone would divorce, of course, and he would be paid handsomely for his efforts. Sharon even made John sign a pre-nuptial agreement in case he had hidden agenda of his own.
But Mom suspected something, and when she found out what was really going, Mom called it ‘a cunning strategy’, and from that day forward there were no legacies, no inheritable trust funds forthcoming. In fact, Mary Wolff gave quite a dissertation that Thanksgiving Day when Sharon announced at the dinner table she had eloped with John. Somewhere between the main course and dessert, Mom made her own announcement which disavowed any responsibility to share or give any money from her estate to any of her children simply because they were old enough to copulate and marry. Conditions would be different, Mom told Sharon, if she decided to go back to school and earn her degree.
“I was caught in a dilemma, wasn’t I?” she whispered. “I really didn’t want a child, and I didn’t want to wait five years, and you knew it. You didn’t like John that much, but he was a congressman’s son, for goodness sakes.” Sharon chuckled to herself, recalling the fights she had with her mother. “You knew it was all a ruse and I had no intention of living with him forever. But you wanted me to have that baby, didn’t you? Was it because you wanted me to carry the Stone name? Have some political influence?”
She stared at her mother’s stern face and chuckled, remembering her mother’s reaction when she told her she was pregnant. It seemed ironic to Sharon that even in death her mother still scowls. “You couldn’t forgive me because I got an abortion without telling you. That’s what it was all about. The secrecy. But down deep you were embarrassed by me, weren’t you, Mom? Oh, don’t deny it. Why else were you so hell bent on telling people I had a miscarriage? You never liked me working at the collection agency, either. Did it surprise you that I’ve been there all these years? They appreciate me there, you know. They appreciate my … powers of persuasion, which I inherited from you, Mom. You should be proud of me for that.”
Sharon looked around, checking if anyone was within hearing range. The coast was clear. “You always had to have things your way. It made me so mad, sometimes. You know, when I was a kid, I wished you dead. But then I grew up I thought, hey, she just wants the best for her daughters. And when you announced you had cancer, I thought everything would fall into place between you and me. I thought you were going to change your will. But you didn’t. What was that all about, Mom? Just to get me to visit you during your last days? How cruel is that?” Sharon paused for a second, adjusted the flower on her mother’s lapel.”
Sharon scouted the room again and saw her father in the back talking and shaking hands with a couple of people. Mrs. Aldrich was stilling yapping behind her.
“Can you hear what’s going on behind me? Mrs. Aldrich is complaining about Dad’s relationship with Dixie? That’s the man you left all your money to, Mom. And he’s over there talking to people like it’s a convention, or something.” Sharon paused for a second. “Agh, you never listened to me when you were alive. What should make me think you’ll listen to me now?” She leaned in and looked directly in her mother’s face. “Big deal. So I got an abortion without talking to you first. We’ll, here’s something you didn’t know. It was a boy you never got to raise.” Sharon reached into the casket again, and with a quick jerk she broke the flower off the stem.
Sharon got up and sat back down and listened to the conversation between Mrs. Aldrich and Robin. She noticed how Robin took extra care to pronounce each syllable of every word. Perfect diction. Symbolic, Sharon thought, of how her sister lives her life, everything in its perfect place, proper order, a model citizen who sets commitments and exceeds expectations in whatever she does, disgustingly successful. Mom’s favorite.
Robin rolled her eyes to Sharon, as if to suggest Mrs. Aldrich won’t stop talking. Sharon made a puppet mouth with her hand and flapped it. Blah! Blah! Blah!
Sharon noticed her father slowly approaching from the far end of the room. He waved to people as if he were a politician schmoozing his constituents. Distracted by a sudden feeling of tightness in her chest, Sharon took several quick breaths and whispered to herself, “It’s only anxiety. Relax.”
Mrs. Aldrich finally ran out of steam and stood up and waved her good-byes. Sharon watched her as she started down the center aisle, but Mrs. Aldrich saw Henry and turned and quickly exited the other way.
“She’s a real odd-ball,” Sharon said to herself. She looked around and noticed the parlor was filling with people, most of whom she had known all her life. She noticed Mom’s bridge club sitting in the back away from everyone. There were also some women from the correctional institution where Mom did volunteer work as chairperson for a co-dependency group-meeting every week.
Sharon looked at her watch and then leaned over to Robin. “Dad’s here. He’s an hour late. Now, how responsible is that?”
Two female strangers approached before Robin could respond. “We’re so sorry for your loss,” one of the strangers said.
“We’re from out of town,” the other woman immediately piped in. “And we read in the paper … Well, we knew your mother when she was in high school. And we wanted to pay our respects.” Robin and Sharon both nodded and they shook hands before the strangers left.
Robin leaned in to Sharon and said, “You’re pissed at me because Judge Brady elected me as his temporary financial guardian so the bills can be paid …”
“I’m not pissed,” Sharon interrupted. Both women feigned silence. “And don’t forget the twenty dollars a day you’re ‘allowed’ to give him,” Sharon finally chimed in. She looked over and saw Henry was preoccupied talking to someone, so she leaned in to Robin and whispered, “I don’t think Dad is financially responsible, and what is profoundly evident to me is that YOU don’t think he’s financially responsible either. Yet, you’re letting me do the dirty work. Are you telling me you think he can live responsibly by himself? Are you actually telling me that?”
“Mostly. Yes.”
“Damn it, Robin. The estate is ours. It always has been ours. Mom felt pity for Dad, that’s all. And Dad is giving it away like water to people like Dixie. I just don’t understand why Mom …”
“Mom loved Dad, and she always did. That’s the reason she never changed her will. I don’t understand you. I take that back. I do understand you. You have a job where you squeeze money out of people who can’t afford their mortgage, and you love it. You love it. You love what money does. You love the power of it. The smell of it. And no matter what you have to do, even if it means destroying what’s left of our family, you want control of it.”
“Such drama,” Sharon said. “Dad won’t be able to survive on twenty dollars a day. He won’t be able to survive on a thousand dollars a day because he treats money like a child treats money. Like there’s an unending supply. Hell, he’s lived life like a child for the past three
decades. Mom had to supervise him. Without her, how long do you think it will be before the estate is gone? A year? Two years? I’m not a demon, Robin. Believe it or not, I love Dad very much. But I’m also a realist. And I think it’s irresponsible of you not to care what Dad does with Mom’s estate.”
Robin starts to rebut her sister, but she sees Henry approaching. “Shh. Dad’s coming. And besides, this is neither the time nor place to discuss this.”
* * *
ROBIN FELT ESTRANGED from her sister and bound to her only by genetics and their father’s love. Still, she wondered if Sharon might be right. What was it about Dixie that Dad found so enticing? She wanted to cry as her sense of family was being shattered. Something she might want to talk to Doctor Tucker about.
All of sudden Henry stood before Sharon and Robin with open arms. The three clutched each other and Robin couldn’t help feeling that, by all appearances, they seemed to be properly grieving - a tightly knit family with an oddly dressed patriarch.
“Dad,” Robin said as she eyed him up and down. “You’re wearing a jogger’s outfit, do you know that?” Robin motioned to the other people sitting behind them. Mrs. Steinberg was wearing a black dress. Mr. Cunningham, a suit with an Oxford button down shirt and tie.
“Ooh. I see what you mean,” Henry said.
Out of nowhere, a woman came up to Henry and hugged him. Then she turned to Sharon and grabbed her hand. “I’m so sorry,” she said. Sharon nodded.
The woman then grabbed Robin’s hand and repeated the same words.
She turned to Henry and hugged him again. “I’m so sorry, Henry.” Several seconds of silence went by. Then Henry finally broke the tension. “Yeah, life’s a bitch, then you die.”
The woman took a sudden inhale, as if she had taken a blow in the solar plexus.
Henry pointed to the casket. “Go. Go pay your respects. And don’t forget the church ceremony tomorrow.”
The woman seemed horrified. Stunned. She hurried to the casket and knelt.
“Tomorrow is the funeral service, Dad,” Sharon said. “It’s not called a ceremony.”
“Ah, yes. And this is a wake,” Henry added. “Should be called a snooze. Everyone here is so somber.”
Robin received Sharon’s raised brow as having an underlying message that their dad was loony.
They all sat down. Henry took a position between his daughters and Robin leaned towards her father and whispered, “I thought I knew everyone in this town. Who is that?”
“Oh, that’s Mrs. … Hmmmm. I don’t know who she is.” A few seconds went by. “Oh, yeah. She’s Jamie’s mother.”
“Jamie who?” Robin asked.
“I don’t know. If I knew that, I would know the lady’s name now, wouldn’t I, Sweetie?”
* * *
HENRY GLANCED around the room at people’s faces and saw very serious, somber looks – the furrowed eyebrows, the bent heads, and the folded hands on their laps. Henry mimicked what he saw trying to blend into the ambiance.
He folded his hands on his lap and looked ahead. Jamie’s mother got up from the casket, started to walk over to the Wolff family but stopped. Henry was giving her the Groucho highbrow, which seemingly persuaded her to turn and head in the opposite direction.
“Mrs. Clinton!” Henry shouted and pointed to Jamie’s mother, who jumped a foot in the air as she was walking away, as if someone just poked her with a stick. “Mrs. Clinton,” Henry repeated. “Jamie’s mother.”
“Yes, I am,” Jamie’s mother said. Everyone in the parlor looked at her. She turned and hurried to the back of the parlor where she slid down into one of the chairs in the last row.
* * *
SHARON HAD her hands on her lap, clutched, twirling her thumbs and feeling estranged from her father and sister. Henry just humiliated a woman in front of fifty people, and her sister hated her for filing a petition against their father and, while she was indulging in her negative projection, she might as well throw in the fact that her mother never liked her either.
Another person quickly gave her condolences and left. For the next few moments, Sharon watched people walking up to the casket offering their respects and then turning and finding their way to the Wolff family. Sharon accepted these greetings somberly and quietly. She noticed Henry greeting the well-wishers with a robust handshake, as if the mourners had just entered a Tony Robins’ motivational seminar. Sharon looked over to Robin for her response to her father’s odd behavior, but she was avoiding eye contact.
Mrs. Cohen stepped up and said to the entire Wolff family, “I’m so sorry for your loss.” She turned to Henry. “How are you doing, Henry?”
“I’m fine,” Henry said. “How are you, Mrs. Cohen? I haven’t seen you since Mr. Spector died.”
Robin nudged her father, then turned to Mrs. Cohen and said, “Thank you, Mrs. Cohen.”
Henry leaned to his daughters and said, not all that quietly, “I think the only time she comes out of the house is when someone dies. A strange coot, wouldn’t you say?”
“Strange?” Sharon interjected in a much softer voice. “You think Mrs. Cohen is strange?” Sharon picked up her things. “I gotta go to work.” She got up to leave.
“You’re not staying?” Henry asked.
“I’ll be back tonight. Robin and I worked it out where one of us is here at all times.”
Henry frowned and Sharon came back. She touched her father on the arm. “Are you okay, Dad?”
“I’m fine, Sweetie,” he said. “I miss you. I don’t get to see you much.”
“I’ll see you tonight.” Sharon kissed her father on the forehead and left.
* * *
HENRY SAT next to his oldest daughter without speaking for a few seconds. He started to hum, as if he was doing a mantra. Then, with a sudden focus, Henry got up, walked over to the casket and knelt down. He looked to the ceiling, closed his eyes and whispered, “Dear God, I love you. I love you because you are much smarter than anyone I ever met. You made the animals, and a million species of bugs and us. No one else could’ve done that.” He paused, looked down at Mary. “Mary, when you see God, ask him … when you see Johnny, ask him, too ... if they have forgiven me. That’s it, honey. Just ask them if they have forgiven me and … and I’ll be up there with both of you before you know it.”
He laid his hands on the casket and appeared to be listening. “I love you, too. I always have and I always will.”
He got up and turned to those who were gathered in the room and bellowed, “My wife appreciates you coming. She wishes you all happy holidays, and wants you to know that someday soon you, too, will die. She says don’t be afraid, even though death might be painful to some of you, it’s only a temporary pain, like a prick of a needle before the morphine kicks in.”
* * *
ROBIN RUSHED to Henry’s side. She took him by the arm and, while escorting him outside, noticed the whispering, the nudging and the subtle shakes of the head. She remembered all too well while growing up those looks of amusement, the disapproval shown by the raised eyebrow or the half-closed eyelid accompanied with the condescending shake of the head. She spotted Mrs. Aldrich who sat quietly with her rosary beads mumbling prayers, unfazed by his bizarre comments. She was probably the only one in the room used to Henry’s bizarre behavior.
Robin led Henry outside. They stood on the top stoop, alone. “Did I say anything wrong, Sweetie?”
“No, Dad. But I don’t think people like hearing they are going to die any time soon. Life is hard enough to live on its own terms. They don’t want to be thinking about their own … death!”
“How can you NOT think about dying when you’re in a funeral home?”
“Yes, well, here comes Mrs. Cunningham. Let’s be civil, okay?”
Mrs. Cunningham walked up the steps. She hugged Robin and Henry. “I am so sorry,” Mrs. Cunningham said. “Mary was such a good person.”
“She still is, Mrs. Cunningham,” Henry said.
“Yes. Ye
s. Well, I must go in.”
“Thank you for coming, Mrs. Cunningham,” Robin said. “Your husband is inside.”
They both waited in silence for Mrs. Cunningham to walk inside.
“She looks so unhappy,” Henry said.
“Dad, I think she’s feeling sad because Mom died.”
“Oh! Okay. That makes sense.”
Sharon drove by and honked the horn. The two sisters gave each other a cold wave.
“Bye, Sweetheart,” Henry yelled to Sharon.
Robin noticed Henry staring at Sharon’s disappearing taillights. “What’s the matter, Dad?”
“I think your sister works too hard,” Henry said.
“Yeah. Right. Listen … Dad. I have to come over and discuss something with you. Did you get a chance to read the letter from county court?”
“Yes.”
“Did you understand it?” Robin interpreted her father’s silence as a ‘no’. She sighed because she really didn’t want to deal with this today. But she felt she must, so she continued. “It says that I’m to govern your finances temporarily because Sharon has requested a hearing concerning your competency to handle your own finances.”
“Oh. That’s what that letter meant?”
“Yes and I’m suppose to temporarily manage your bills and allowance.”
“Okay.”
“And we have to see Judge Brady on Wednesday.”
“Judge Brady? Why?”
“Because he wants to … he wants to see if you understand what’s going on.”
“Oh. I see. Okay.”
“Maybe Sharon will change her mind,” Robin pondered out loud.
Henry laughed hard. “Sharon is stubborn, you know. Stubborn as a raging river after a thunderstorm. Can’t stop a raging river, you know. No matter how much you try.”
South of Main Street Page 6