Disposition of Remains

by Laura T. Emery

  “Okay, so then what?”

  “I left work for the day. I checked Nova into a hotel room, then explained to her why I hadn’t gone back. She was furious and crying. I didn’t know what to do. I was in love with her, but it just couldn’t be. Things were so different then. No hospital would have hired me; no one would go see a doctor who would leave his pregnant wife for another woman. I told Nova that she should go back to Havasupai, but she said she couldn’t go back, that she had dishonored herself and couldn’t face her people. Then she told me to get out.”

  “Did you?”

  “I tried to tell her that I would drive her back. I would take the blame. I would do whatever it took to make the situation right. But she just became angrier. She began to hit me and throw things at me. She told me that she never wanted to see me again. So I left. Your mother, she was very…tempestuous.”

  “Yes, I’m well aware. Let me guess: The hotel you took her to, was it the Imperial Palace?”

  “How did you know?”

  “Because she always told me it was her favorite place. I don’t really understand it from that story though.”

  This became the second time in one day that I watched a grown man cry. He continued his story through his tears. I was tempted to put my arm around him. I actually felt sorry for this man who had ignored me my whole life.

  “About a year later, I went to the Imperial Palace for a medical conference, after which I decided to try my hand at poker. Then I saw her; she was a cocktail waitress there. I should have just turned and walked away. I thought in my mind that she had surely come to her senses and gone back to her people. But, she had stuck to her word; she really was too ashamed to go back.

  “She suggested that we get a hotel room. I knew it was a bad idea but I couldn’t resist her, I loved her so much. We made love. She thought I had come back for her.”

  “But you hadn’t.”

  “No. Shortly after my daughter was born, my wife was diagnosed with early onset Parkinson’s disease. It was very aggressive. My situation had become even more…unleaveable.

  She said that she loved me and that she would take me any way she could get me, so we began to meet at the hotel whenever I could get away.”

  “So why did you never come to see me? Did you know that she told me you were dead?”

  A look of shock came over his face.

  “No, I didn’t. I also didn’t know about you at all.”

  “How could she hide something like that?”

  “I saw by the birth date you put on your application that you are thirty-eight, yes?”

  “That’s right.”

  He nodded his head.

  “I thought as much. She must have been pregnant already when she came to Las Vegas. She had you during the period of time she had pushed me out of her life. She probably knew that if she told me about you, I would have insisted on seeing you. But, knowing her like I did, she was ashamed of our relationship. She didn’t want you to know that I was a married man. But it’s important to me that you understand: I’m not proud of how I behaved.”

  “Where were you when she was sick? And when she died?”

  “One night, in our usual hotel room, Nova told me she had met someone and she couldn’t see me anymore. I was heartbroken, but what could I say? I had a wife and I thought that Nova deserved to be happy, so I let her go. It wasn’t until years later that I tried to track her down again at the Imperial Palace. I just had to see her. I was told by someone there that she had died. It was the most devastating day of my life.”

  “There was never anyone else…at least that I know of,” I said, trying to comfort him.

  But I quickly realized that there also wasn’t anyone my mother hadn’t lied to.

  “The last time I saw her, she told me that she wanted me to remember her the way she was when I first met her: with youth and beauty. I didn’t understand why she said that until later. She obviously —hadn’t wanted me to see her sick.”

  “She lied to both of us,” I said, sickened by the whole thing.

  But it all made sense. She’d created this fairytale life for me. In her mind, she was the dutiful nurse married to the handsome doctor. She wanted her daughter to be a nurse, marry a doctor or a lawyer, and have the life she’d only dreamed of.

  “Don’t be angry with her; she was trying to protect you.”

  “When I was teenager I thought she went to the Imperial Palace all the time because she had a gambling problem. It’s turns out she had a you problem.”

  And with that, I started to laugh. Alexander laughed along with me.

  “I don’t think your mother ever gambled,” he managed.

  I shook my head. I knew almost nothing about the woman who had raised me.

  “Your other daughter, what’s her name?” I asked.

  “Before I reveal that to you, I want to tell you a story.”

  “Okay,” I answered, wondering how many more stories there possibly could be.

  “When I met your mother on the reservation, we would sit for hours by the waterfall and she would tell me the legends of her people. One time, she asked me to tell her a legend of my people. I told her the only one I knew:

  “In the early 1900s, Nicholas II, the last Czar of Russia, was celebrating more than three hundred years of the Romanov Dynasty. He had a wife and five children. His youngest, the only boy, suffered from hemophilia, and his parents were told that he would soon die.

  “Alexandra, the Empress, sought out the help of a peasant faith healer named Rasputin. Alexandra soon began to cherish his advice and company. She believed Rasputin had done wonders for her son’s health. But Rasputin had gained privileges in the Czar’s household that many considered improper, even becoming a political advisor to the Czar. He was thought by most to be a charlatan. He was an alcoholic, and many accused him of crimes of a sexual nature.

  “As war began to break out in Russia, the Czar feared for his reputation and had Rasputin exiled from Saint Petersburg. Rasputin sent a letter to the Czar, saying that he felt he would be murdered, and he’d had a vision that if he were murdered by a Romanov, the Czar’s entire family would be executed within two years. His curse. Many sought to end Rasputin’s life, but he proved extremely difficult to kill. He had been previously stabbed and had survived. On the night he was murdered, he was poisoned, shot four times, and beaten before he was finally tied up and drowned in an icy river…by a man who was married to the Czar’s niece, and, therefore, a Romanov.

  “The Czar abdicated his throne, and the family was held under house arrest in Siberia. On July 17, 1918, a little more than a year and a half after Rasputin was murdered, the Czar’s entire family was executed by the Bolshevik secret police, just as Rasputin had cursed. All had been murdered but one. Legend has it that one of the daughters, the Grand Duchess Anastasia, a lively and vivacious girl, escaped. She somehow snuck out, evading the onslaught. Her body wasn’t found with the others.

  “In the years that followed, many women came forward claiming to be the lost duchess, but they all turned out to be imposters. No one knew for sure what had become of her. But she had been raised to cook and clean and sew. The legend is that she lived happily amongst the people as a commoner, never revealing that she was royalty.”

  He told the story just as my mother had.

  “I’m familiar with the story; I’ve heard it a million times. But they found Anastasia in a ditch in Siberia a few years back.”

  “It’s a legend,” he retorted in frustration.

  “What does any of it have to do with your daughter?”

  “Your mother loved that story. So when my daughter—your sister—was born, I named her Anastasia, as a tribute to Nova.”

  “That’s so creepy!” I cried, bypassing my mental filter. “Did my mother know?”

  “I don’t see how she could have. I was very careful never to discuss my home life with Nova; it upset her greatly. My other daughter, she is also thirty-eight. We call her Ana.�
�

  “Well, that’s a relief. People call me ‘Stacia.’”

  “I would have come to see you sooner, but I wanted to tell Ana first. She was quite upset. Her mother died just a few years ago. I felt like it was punishment for my wrongdoing, to have both of the women I loved die so young. I did love my wife, just not the way I loved your mother. But now I have you in my life, maybe my curse is broken.

  I didn’t have the heart to tell him, “Oh by the way, I’m dying too.”

  “It was very difficult for me to hurt Ana like that, by telling her the truth, but she is no more my daughter than you are. I feel that the lies must come to an end. She said she would like to meet you…eventually.”

  My head felt as though it were about to explode. I couldn’t hear anymore. I needed some time to process everything. I think it would have been easier if Alexander were some kind of monster. But I understood him. I could see why my mother loved him. He had a soft, kind face, and a soothing voice. He had cheated on his spouse, but who was I to judge? I had stayed married for all the wrong reasons. And who knows—had I met Wilbur while I was still living with Evan, would I still have fallen in love with him? The answer was probably yes.

  “I hope that you and I can have a relationship. You are the part of Nova that didn’t die, and I would like to get to know you, Stacia.”

  “I’d like that,” I replied, biting my tongue.

  I went to shake his hand, but he hugged me instead.

  When he released me, he began to walk away, turning back just long enough to call out, “Oh, you got the job.”

  When I went inside to face Misty and Wilbur, I didn’t know where to begin. I’d only awakened a few hours before—after a week in bed—and my mind was spinning. I kindly requested that they let me explain in the morning.

  “As long as I know you’re all right,” Wilbur said, gently.

  “Yes, I’m fine. I’m good,” I replied.

  I couldn’t help but smile.

  We said goodnight to Misty, then Wilbur and I went to bed. I could tell that Wilbur was dying to know what had transpired between my father and me. My father. I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I had always wanted a father; I’d wished for one every year on Christmas. But after the age of twelve, I’d given up on actually getting one—let alone the one I’d thought was dead. He wasn’t a replacement father; he was a bona fide biological one. The real deal.

  I tore Wilbur’s clothes from his body as I had fantasized about doing at dinner. I was alive and I was going to act like it: animalistic and raw. I was so happy to be back in his arms. I had an incredible, sexy man who loved me; I had an aunt, a father, a best friend, and a job—just like that. Life would have been perfect, except for that pesky terminal-illness issue.

  When I woke up in the morning, I found Misty and Wilbur sitting like puppies waiting for breakfast, eager to consume my detailed description of my exchange with Dr. Alexander Misalov. So I proceeded to tell them everything.

  As I was relaying to them all that my mother had done to deceive the both of us, I realized that I no longer harbored any real resentment toward her. Instead, I felt sorry for her. She was a lost soul.

  I spent the next few days with Wilbur, walking The Strip, eating out, chatting, and laughing endlessly. I remember those days fondly—the days before our lives changed forever.

  Part 6

  Deliverance

  CHAPTER 41

  I decided to buy a car in which to make the trek back to Los Angeles. I financed it by putting my new job down as a reference. The sixty-month term of the loan may have been a bit unrealistic—and somewhat fraudulent, but it kind of felt good to deceive the car dealership, instead of the other way around. How often does that happen?

  I signed the papers, not caring whether Evan found me anymore, although I was fairly certain he had stopped looking. I bought a lime-green Volkswagen Bug—a newer, more reliable version of Misty’s beatnik-mobile.

  As Wilbur and Misty prepared to meet Paul in Sedona, I headed down the long desert road to Los Angeles once again. I had called Jerry’s office a few days prior to make an appointment, although I knew he would be furious. I figured that if I saw him first in the safe environment of his office, he might take it easy on me. Even though Jerry and I hadn’t been as close as I would have liked during the Evan years, he was still my lifelong friend, and I owed him a serious apology for taking off without so much as calling him.

  I couldn’t help but smile when Jerry opened the door to his exam room. As livid as I knew he would be, I was so glad to see him.

  “Stacia? What in the hell are you doing?” Jerry demanded. “Where in God’s name have you been?”

  His cheeks flushed a shade somewhere between red and purple—violet, maybe.

  “I know, I know. But, Jerry, I swear this time, I’ll do whatever you say.”

  “I want you to do exactly the same thing I wanted you to do the last time you were here! Go to the lab and get your blood work, get your ultrasound, and I’ll see if Dr. Jenkins isn’t too pissed off to make time for you.”

  “Done.”

  Then Jerry lunged at me and squeezed me tight.

  “I don’t know why you did this, Stacia. I called and called you. Your cell phone is disconnected, and your bastard husband wouldn’t tell me anything.”

  “I left him.”

  “Wow, that’s great!”

  Jerry smiled briefly, and then resumed an expression of concern.

  “The longer you wait, the harder this is going to be to treat.”

  “I know.”

  I gave Jerry a quick summary of my recent events before he excused himself to attend to his next patient. We agreed to meet later for dinner. Fortunately, Jerry could never stay mad for long.

  I took my blood slip—marked “stat”—to the lab and let the vampires go to work. I knew it would be just the beginning of the poking and a whole variety of other tortures, but I was ready now to take a chance that it all might afford me some more time on this planet.

  Afterward, I walked down to the radiology department to have my ultrasound. I was instructed to have a full bladder, so I downed a half a gallon of water on the spot. It soon became incredibly unpleasant, to say the least, considering that they kept me in the waiting room far past my scheduled appointment time.

  The ultrasound technician was a twenty-something-year-old named Amber, who, I imagined, would much rather have been texting or shopping than staging my tumor. It felt so bizarre inviting other people into my sad truth. Would Amber care about what was going to happen to me? Would her eyes bulge and her jaw drop at the size of my mass? I cringed as she dug around in my full bladder with the ultrasound wand.

  “Mrs. Altman…”

  “Call me Stacia,” I said through clenched teeth.

  “Do you want to know the sex?”

  I stopped cringing and sat straight up. I didn’t know cancer had a gender.

  “What did you just ask me?”

  “I just want to know before we go any further if you want to know the sex of the baby, or if you’d rather it be a surprise?”

  I already assumed that Amber must be disinterested in her job, but this was really outrageous—malpractice, even. How insensitive could someone be to assume I was there because I was expecting rather than dying?

  “I think you’ve misunderstood.” What a twit. “I’m here to stage my cancer.”

  With a baffled look on her face, Amber grabbed my referral.

  The poor girl, she probably just graduated from high school yesterday. I felt her pain, but I still wanted to throttle her. I imagined her going home that night completely mortified by her mistake.

  Shaking her head, Amber set down the referral. She then turned the monitor in my direction.

  “Mrs. Altman…”

  “It’s Stacia, for God’s sake!”

  My full bladder combined with her stupidity were making me quite irritable.

  “Stacia, look; I want to show you something.�
�

  She moved the wand again over my mass. This time, I saw…and heard. It had a heartbeat.

  “What the fuck?!” I yelled, not caring how it sounded.

  “Mrs. Altman—I’m sorry—Stacia, that’s not a mass. It’s a baby. I’m guessing you are about eighteen weeks along.”

  “But, wait. That’s not possible. I tried for so long…Oh my God!...Oh my God!...You mean I’m not gonna die?”

  “Well, I didn’t say that…I mean, I don’t know. All I know is that mass is a baby. It’s a baby boy,” Amber reiterated, pointing to the screen.

  Just as Amber’s words were starting to register with me, Jerry suddenly burst into the exam room with a cluster of papers in hand.

  “Stacia! Your labs are all perfect; the CA125 is—”

  Jerry caught a glimpse of the screen and stopped in his tracks.

  “Holy crap!!! Is that a fetus?”

  “Yes!!!” I squealed.

  I jumped off the table and grabbed Jerry, causing my unbuttoned pants to fall to the floor.

  “The medicine man was right! I did have gas!”

  “Say what?”

  You’re the worst doctor ever!” I told Jerry, half laughing, half crying.

  Jerry, Amber, and I all jumped up and down together in some sort of crazy football-type huddle.

  “I saw the coyote. He wasn’t fooling me. I was fooling myself!” I howled.

  “What on Earth are you talking about, you crazy woman who’s invaded Stacia’s body?”

  Before I could answer, I came to a horrible realization.

  “My God, Jerry. Eighteen weeks. This baby is Evan’s!”

  Somehow, that evil monster had managed to impregnate me. Oddly enough, dying would have solved a lot of problems for me. No pressure to make long-term decisions. No need for a divorce. No need to talk to Evan ever again. I had spent all that time planning my death. Not only was I going to live, but I was going to have to face my life; I was going to have to face Evan…again. And suddenly, I had a baby to think about. My baby.