“I know.” I hoped my smile was sarcastic enough for her to see through her thick glasses.
“She hasn’t visited me once since she moved here. Even though she lives in Brooklyn. She called Arnie.”
I nodded as though Aunt Cilla had made a modicum of sense. Merry had dinner with Cousin Arnie once a month. It was difficult to picture him now a stockbroker.
“Come in,” Aunt Cilla said. “Uncle Hal wanted to be here, but he’s at work.”
Probably still ashamed of dropping us off as though we were so much trash.
“I can’t get him to retire,” she said. “Tell me, who goes to a shaky-handed old dentist?” She wiped her hands on her faded, green-checked apron.
“Shaky old women with false teeth?” I offered.
Aunt Cilla clicked her tongue. “Still with the fresh mouth, even after all these years.”
She held out her arms for a hug. I held my breath, leaned in, and gave her my Oprah hug. God, Lu, I can always tell when you don’t want someone touching you, Merry said. You give the same hug Oprah does when the guests are too starstruck and she needs to keep her distance.
“So, can you have lunch? Or are you just going to grab everything and go?” Aunt Cilla steered me inside. “Hal brought the boxes from the attic.”
We walked into her kitchen. The high-gloss appliances and expensive-looking walnut cabinets were an uncomfortable contrast to Aunt Cilla’s aged face. Her old kitchen, the one I remembered from childhood, had been the blond wood that was then the height of fashion. I remembered my mother snarling at my father the entire weekend after she’d seen Uncle Hal’s remodeling job.
The table was set with Mimi Rubee’s china. That I also remembered. Mimi Rubee had given the service to Aunt Cilla soon after my grandfather died. Mimi Rubee didn’t want the old-fashioned Haviland, festooned with pictures of dancing maidens, garlanded with green and gold. My mother had hated the dishes, as attached to modern as Mimi Rubee, both of them buying white melamine stamped with turquoise starbursts.
“Arnie keeps hocking me for these.” Aunt Cilla shook her head. “A grown man who collects plates. I should give the whole service to you. If you don’t like it, you can put it away for your daughters.”
I started to protest, worried Arnie would feel sidelined. Merry had told me he hid being gay from Aunt Cilla. Instead, I looked at my aunt and said, “I’d love them.”
She seemed taken aback. Clearly, it had been a hollow offer. “In fact, I can come back tomorrow and wrap them.”
“I better wait, I need to ask Arnie.” Her words trailed off as she took a platter from the refrigerator.
I could have rescued her, but I didn’t. “I’ll tell the girls. They’ll be so excited. Why don’t you box the dishes up and ship them to us? On the other hand, perhaps I should have Merry come and pick them up. How would that be?” Would it be pushing it if I offered my father’s services in carrying the dishes out?
“Your mother’s boxes are in the living room.” Aunt Cilla slammed a plate of chopped liver and egg salad on the table. “You can look through them after we eat. See what you want. Make your decisions.”
“I don’t have to decide. I’m taking everything.”
Aunt Cilla placed her hands on her hips and pulled herself up to her full shrunken height. Like so many women of her generation—didn’t I treat them, didn’t I know?—she showed the signs of osteoporosis and someday would be pocket-size. “If you take it all, what will I have to remember my sister?”
“You’ve had years to memorize everything, Aunt Cilla. Anyway, how do I know what you put in the cartons and what you kept?”
“Are you accusing me of stealing? Of lying?” She held a hand to her chest. Diamond rings cut into her plump fingers. “How dare you? See, this is what comes of trying to be nice. I wanted to start fresh, like Arnie said I should. Why would I steal from you?”
I took a giant scoop of chopped liver and smeared it on a piece of rye bread, licking the excess from my fork. “Mmm. Good.” I covered the chopped liver with a piece of lettuce and folded the bread into half a sandwich. “Why would you do that to me? I don’t know, Aunt Cilla. Why would you abandon me to an orphanage?”
I packed up the car as soon as I’d choked down the thick half sandwich, Aunt Cilla watching with pursed lips as I chewed. We had stayed silent as I carried six cartons to the car. I waited for some milk of human kindness to overtake me after carrying the last box out. Uncle Hal had labeled it “personal items,” inking the words over the prestamped DAWSON DENTAL SUPPLIES.
I stood by my rented car, looking back at Aunt Cilla. She pulled her sweater tighter with one hand as she held open the front door, waiting. I walked to the driver’s side, opened the car door, and inserted the key, feeling Aunt Cilla watching and waiting, maybe expecting me to come back and hug her. Kiss her.
Two sad little girls had once waited and waited for someone to take care of them.
The engine caught, roared, and I drove away.
Driving to Park Slope from Mill Basin took about thirty minutes. Block by block things changed. My aunt’s suburban-looking street turned to the busier Avenue N. When I hit Flatbush Avenue, I saw the Brooklyn of my childhood. The area grew shabbier and darker. Storefronts were crowded with piles of cheap offerings, discount giant bottles of strangely named shampoos, rayon shirts in wild colors, dresses stiff with sizing, made to last until the first washing.
My children would like this—seeing my childhood—but it was too close to my father. I needed more miles between him and here to feel safe. The girls asked to see their grandfather once in a while. Now, I no longer told lies. I simply said no. Someday perhaps they’d visit him anyway, but while they were under our watch, Drew’s and mine, we’d keep them away from him.
That was my plan. On occasion, Drew broached the subject, and, when he did, I tried to explain myself to him. I listened as he spoke. I forced out words for him as my heart banged away. I loved my husband. I couldn’t afford to love my father. I’d never give up what little peace I’d gained.
As I approached Prospect Park, life spread out, the architecture allowing breathing space around people. The Park Slope streets looked green with trees and new money.
Merry’s street had no driveways. I crammed into a parking spot between a Matrix and a Prius. I reached into my bag and took out my cell, pressing her speed dial number, the first in my phone.
Merry came out and ran across the street.
We hugged and kissed. She seemed as though she’d known for weeks that I’d arrive, rather than the fifteen-minute warning I’d given. She wore lipstick and velvet.
It took us three trips to get the cartons up to her second-floor apartment, both of us sweaty afterward despite the December chill. A pot of chili simmered on the stove, lending warmth and spice to the air. Perfectly glazed challah sat on a brick red earthenware plate.
“Look at the miracle,” I said. “You finally learned to cook.”
“No. Dad did.”
I studied my sister’s face. Was she waiting for a reaction? However, she simply looked Merry. Piquant. Rock-star pretty. She seemed sweet, like she had when she was little. She’d lost her clenched edge.
“Good that he’s finally useful,” I said. I’d never told Merry I’d given him the fifteen thousand. She’d told me about the tuition he paid and the furniture he made, but none of it made me want to see him, not even a little. The only difference was, I finally didn’t care that Merry did. “Let’s see what we have in here.”
I sat on the floor next to the pile of boxes, looking for the one I’d asked Uncle Hal to label especially for me. “Here. This one’s for you. Happy birthday.”
I watched as Merry slit open the tape Uncle Hal had aligned so carefully. After removing a layer of crumpled newspaper, she uncovered a black onyx box inlaid with mother-of-pearl. She looked up, the box clutched in her hands, tears filling her eyes.
“Don’t start crying yet,” I said. “You have more to unwrap.�
��
“Help me.”
I scooted over and reached into the box, pulling out another newspaper-wrapped object, surprised at the weight I’d forgotten. Under the paper, I stroked the stone, as smooth and cold as it had always been. “I have the one you gave me on my dresser,” I said. “I thought we’d divide the rest of these.”
“Remember how we played with them?” Merry opened another and held the box to her cheek. This one had a vein of intricate silver running in a circle.
“Mama called it playing. Actually, we were cleaning them for her.”
“Still, it was nice.” Merry looked dreamy, remembering things I didn’t think possible. “Especially in the summer, when they felt so good. Remember how we rubbed them up and down our arms and said they were our cooling stones?”
“Afterward we’d be filthy. All that dust.” Little gritty dirt balls had covered our bodies, even between our toes.
“Mama always made us take a bath right after.” Merry stretched her legs, keeping a hand on a box.
“Then she’d wipe our arms and chests with the alcohol.”
“No, she did that before we went to bed,” Merry said.
“No, she did it after our bath, when we’d be all hot from the water.”
“After the bath she’d put on powder.”
I shook my head. “You’re so wrong.”
Merry got up on her knees and dusted off her hands. “Actually, I might be right.”
“Maybe,” I said. “But I doubt it.”
Merry laughed and reached for another cardboard box. “Do you know what’s in here?”
“The rest is all a surprise,” I said. “I told Aunt Cilla we wanted everything of Mama’s; that I was taking her things home. For you and for me. I think we’re ready and I think it’s time.”
Acknowledgments
Before offering thanks to those who helped with this book, let me say this: I wish this story were science fiction instead of realism. For ten years I worked with men who, like Merry and Lulu’s father, destroyed their families—men who weren’t monsters, but who did monstrous deeds. This book is for their children, the ones who suffer unnoticed, and for all amazing men and women who dedicate their lives to helping these children. You may never know whose life you’ve saved. Thank you Federation of Jewish Philanthropies, Doris Bedell, and Camp Mikan for the gift of childhood.
Thank you Stéphanie Abou, golden agent extraordinaire, who provided everything I needed, including joy, wisdom, and friendship, and thank you Foundry Literary + Media for making me feel cared for and special. Thank you everyone at St. Martin’s Press for being supportive and kind, and for gifting me Hilary Rubin Teeman, the extra-insightful, smart-as-a-whole-college editor, whose judgment I treasure. For the design and production team, and especially for copy editor Susan M. S. Brown, all I can say is wow! To Steve Snider and the art department, thank you for drawing my imagination. And thank you Sphere Publishing, in the United Kingdom, for welcoming me so thoroughly, especially my brilliant and warm editor, Jo Dickinson.
Merci, Editions Calmann-Levy in France, danke Diana Verlag in Germany, bedankt, Uitgeverij Artemis in Holland, and , Kinneret in Israel; thank you all for taking Merry and Lulu worldwide.
One million hugs to Jenna Blum, my lucky star, wonderful friend and teacher, and to all the beloved council, now and before: Amin Ahmad, Christiane Alsop, Nicole Bernier, Edmond Caldwell, Cecile Corona, Kathy Crowley, Elizabeth de Veer, Stephanie Ebbert Devlin, Elizabeth Gallagher, Chuck Garavak, Leslie Greffenius, Iris Gomez, Javed Jahngir, Ann Killough, Henriette Lazaridis Power, Elizabeth Moore, Necee Regis, Dell Smith, and Becky Tuch. It would be impossible to find a better group of writers and critiquers. May we always keep forming and reforming.
One million kisses to the group: Ginny DeLuca (who read and critiqued every version of this book,) Susan Knight, and Diane Butkus, BFF, you are as much family as friends, and to Nina Lev for listening to me talk about my imaginary friends as we walked the pond year after year.
To the superb writers of The Splinters: RJ Bardsley, Chuck Leddy, Leslie Talbot, Len Sparks, Kate Wilkinson, Jill Rubenstein, and Paul Parcellin, who gave me courage and shared their wisdom.
Thank you Grub Street! What would any of us do without you—fearless leaders and brilliant writers Chris Castellani, Whitney Scharer, Sonya Larson, and Whitney Ochoas. You make a home for us!
And to my family: Becca Wolfson, Sara, Jason, and Nora Hoots, Jill Meyers, Nicole Todini, Jeff, Morris, Jeanne, Bruce and Jean Rand: I hold you all in my heart. And, in memory of my mother, Joyce Cherlin, this book is yours as well as mine.
The Murderer’s Daughters Page 31