If I Knew You Were Going to Be This Beautiful, I Never Would Have Let You Go (27 page)

“Closure,” Luke said, snorting a laugh. “We should have sent her his wooden leg.”

“What about Mitch’s leg, man?” I asked suddenly. It bothered me, now that I thought of it, what would happen to his leg. “Did they—did they take it with him?”

“I don’t know,” Luke said, sounding as surprised as I felt. “Shit. Len, did you—”

“I didn’t notice at the time,” Len said. “And what does it matter now? It would be a kind of creepy souvenir.”

“I guess,” I said, after a minute. I had the insane thought that Mitch might miss his leg, and then I thought about the wood burning and I shook my head because the sun was high in the sky and such thoughts seemed out of place.

“Though I was wondering,” Len said hesitantly. He reached underneath the bar for something and came back up with Mitch’s cane. I stared at the silver dragon’s head and my eyes flooded with tears. I took a deep breath and blinked them back. It wasn’t the time, I told myself. This wasn’t the time.

“You think he would have minded—” Len looked at both of us. “I don’t know who to ask,” he said apologetically. “Maybe the wife, I don’t know. But I was thinking, maybe I could give this to my brother-in-law? The one that’s a vet as well? He’s had some trouble walking, and I was thinking—” He broke off, staring down at the cane. He ran his hand over the wood. “Maybe I should ask the wife, you think?”

“No way, man,” Luke said firmly. “I mean, who was closer to him at this point, right?” He turned to me. “What do you think?”

I loved that Luke had asked me. I no longer felt like crying. “You take it, Len,” I said, just as firmly. “He would have liked to know it was going to another soldier, don’t you think?”

“You think his wife is really coming in all the way from Frisco?” Luke asked skeptically.

“Fresno,” Len said, putting the cane back beneath the bar. “And I got to tell you, the way it sounded, she just might show up. Asked me what time things would start happening, how far we are from Kennedy Airport.”

“You talking about that one-legged nut job? One was in here mouthing off a couple weeks ago?” We all swung our eyes to the voice. It was familiar to me. I saw it belonged to the fat construction worker who had been in the lounge that day with me and Mitch.

“Shove it, Jimmy,” Len said quietly. I watched his shoulders flex. “Guy passed away last week, so lay off.”

“Yeah? What from?” another voice asked. They were clustered at the far end of the bar, by the door that led to the piazza.

“Choked on his own bullshit,” Fat Jimmy said, chortling fatly, meanly. Nobody else laughed.

“You know them?” Luke asked me in a low voice.

“I’ll tell you later,” I whispered.

“I said, lay off, Jimmy,” Len said sharply.

“Hey, hey, rest in peace, all right?” Fat Jimmy said. “But you got to admit, the guy was a—”

“He was an American,” I said loudly. “An American who fought for his country. And now he’s dead and we’re planning his funeral, so please, man, show some respect, okay?”

It was quiet again. Jay and the Americans were singing “This Magic Moment.”

Luke put his empty bottle of Bud down on the bar. He paid for his beer and my ginger ale. “Let’s cop the breeze,” he said. On our way out, the younger construction worker who had sung along to “Fly Me to the Moon” that day when Mitch was still alive stepped out in front of us.

“You gonna wake him or what?” he asked quietly.

I explained about the ashes, the party afterward. “He had a lot of
friends,” I said, making sure Fat Jimmy could hear. “A lot of people who loved him.” Luke and I walked out to the patio, where we paused to light cigarettes before heading to the beach. He cupped the match so that when we bent over together for the light, our foreheads touched. We heard someone call, “Hey!” The match went out. The young construction worker walked toward us, quickly, and when he reached us, he handed Luke a small wad of rolled-up bills. “For the, you know, whatever,” he said. Close up, he looked older. In the sunlight you could see the wrinkles around his eyes.

“Thanks, man,” Luke said. “But I do believe we’re covered.” He didn’t want to take the money. He tried handing it back, but the construction worker pushed it hard into Luke’s hands. He looked from me to Luke and back to me again. His eyes were sorry. “Must be something,” he said. “Buy a round, after. Maybe some bagpipes, right? Something.”

•   •   •

T
he day of the ceremony, a soft, light rain was falling. There was a strip of gold light lining the horizon, which meant the rain might stop, and it did. The afternoon fog rolled out to sea and the air was dry and smelled like clean clothes and seaweed. All our people were there and some others. Len had closed the bar for the occasion and Desi and Angie came down from Eddy’s. There were some regulars from the lounge at The Starlight Hotel who Mitch would drink with during the day, men and women with bad teeth and putty-like complexions who may have been meant for better things but never moved far enough off their barstools to find them. And Mitch’s wife had shown up after all, had taken a cab from Kennedy Airport and was staying in Mitch’s old room until Sunday. She stood now at the edge of the half circle that had formed close to the shore, near the jetties, a faded-looking girl who used to be beautiful and whose eyes told you that she knew it and missed her beauty. She wore a long granny dress and a fringed shawl with delicate flowered
patterns across the back. She was barefoot and so were most of the rest of us, though the sand was damp and cold. Our flip-flops lined the seawall at the Comanche Beach entrance, a delicate barrier proclaiming the privacy of the occasion.

“So. You and Luke, man,” Liz whispered, as we shared a cigarette before.

“There is no me and Luke,” I said, though there had been other remarks over the past few days, raised eyebrows, knowing glances.

“Oh, please,” Liz said, rolling her eyes. “You think we’re all blind? You think we never noticed the way you act whenever his name comes up? I’m just happy you finally got up off your ass and did something about it.”

“It’s not like we’re going out or anything,” I said. “It’s just—I don’t know, man. I don’t know what it is. The whole Mitch thing, you know?”

Liz nodded. Her face had lost weight since the abortion. She looked thinner, older, and was working a lot of hours at the dealership, “saving up enough so I can finally split, man, get out of that fucking house.”

“Go for it, man,” she said now, her gaze cool and knowing. “But don’t be stupid. Go on the Pill, it’s practically foolproof. You want me to go with you? There’s the clinic over in East Cliff, we can go before school starts, have lunch at Cookie’s—”

“Liz, man, slow it down,” I said, looking around to make sure no one had heard. I wanted to tell her. I wanted to tell her, but I couldn’t because she did have a big mouth, which was why Nanny and I held back from her, why she still thought Nanny was a virgin, why she never knew that when Nanny was stoned enough on ludes she still did it with Voodoo on his stained sheets beneath the Jimi Hendrix poster, and that she felt doubly dirty, balling someone she didn’t love, with the
Electric Ladyland
album playing in the background and Jimi and his flaming penis hanging over the bed. But neither Liz or Nanny knew that I planned to make love to Luke that very night, in one of the empty rooms at The Starlight Hotel, and that I was prepared through the rhythms of my body
and the box of rubbers I’d bought two days ago, since I didn’t have time for clinics and pills. I hadn’t told either of them that I wanted Luke’s honey-colored baby inside me someday, that sometimes, when I thought about it while lying awake at night, I put my hands on my stomach, imagining its shape.

But not now. I didn’t want it now, when things with Luke were first beginning. I didn’t want to end up like my mother, having to make that kind of choice before I was ready. I wondered had she been careful or careless; did the rubber break, or had she been so carried away by passion she just didn’t care? I wondered if she ever thought about me on my birthday, or wanted to forget the day I was born because it made her sad, or angry, or if she never gave it a second thought. I knew who I was, though. I knew if I carried Luke’s baby around for nine months and had to give it up, I’d give it a second thought. I’d think about it until it drove me crazy.

Liz was gazing at me, smirking. “You and fucking Luke McCallister. Wouldn’t that be something, man. Wouldn’t that be a trip and a half.” There was love in her eyes, and something else, but I turned away from it and began walking closer to the shoreline.

Billy faced everybody and coughed a few times. Luke stood farther apart, holding the small silver urn. He’d asked if I’d wanted to ride back over to Farrell’s to pick up the ashes; I’d wanted to get out of my shift at work but I had already gotten this weekend off, both Friday and Saturday, and didn’t want to push my luck. “It’s cool,” Luke said. “I think the cat’s afraid of me, but hey, fuck him if he can’t take a joke.” I wanted to kiss him right there, in front of the A&P, where he’d come looking for me. I smiled, but I felt a small clutch of something when I looked into his eyes. I saw the shadow of the strain there, as if he was trying really hard and unsure that his efforts were succeeding. And then he smiled and the shadow was gone.

“Okay, man,” Billy said loudly. “We want to do this while it’s still
light out, so we can see what we’re doing. So let’s—let’s get going.” Billy was usually the best speaker, a natural master of ceremonies, but he was standing awkwardly in the sand, looking like he’d lost something. His voice sounded too high. I looked around at everyone, waiting. We wanted it to be beautiful, but it was strange, not having the priest, the organ. The limousine out front, waiting for the coffin.

Then Billy turned to me. “Katie, man, how about you say a few words, start the ball rolling?” And I saw Liz’s eyes slide over, saw that something in them that made me turn away. I stepped forward. I was wearing my cream-colored peasant shirt and most faded jeans. I had washed my hair with Herbal Essence and the juice of half a lemon. I wore mascara and Bonne Bell Musk Oil on my wrists, my throat. Between my legs. I looked out at everyone. Some people were mildly high; out of deference to the occasion, it had been informally decided that hard drugs would wait until after the ceremony. Even Bennie Esposito’s eyes weren’t yet at half-mast. I looked out at my friends and wanted to feel sad, but I felt something else instead.

“We all know why we’re here tonight,” I said. “I can hear Mitch now, telling me, ‘Keep it short and sweet, sugar, I got a drink to catch over at the lounge.’” There was laughter in the crowd. In back of me the shadows were lengthening in the sand. “If anyone has a memory to share or something you’d like to say . . . just say it, man. We can go down the line.” I cleared my throat. I spoke too quickly, talking about that day in the bar with the construction workers. I didn’t tell about why I’d wanted to speak to Mitch, or what Len had said about the screaming. I just told how he’d handled the construction workers, how they’d done a turnaround at the end. “It wasn’t just because of his leg,” I said. “It was because of Mitch. You know how he was, no bullshit. One of those guys even chipped in for tonight. Told us to get some bagpipes.” More laughter. There were bagpipes at practically all the funerals at St. Timothy’s, somebody’s uncle from Knights of Columbus dressed in a kilt, playing “Danny Boy.” I was
starting to feel choked up. “Good-bye, Mitch. I loved you, and I’ll miss you.” I stepped back and turned to look at the ocean. It was all right to cry. A friend was dead, and other friends were close by.

Almost everyone took a turn. A lot of shared memories: the last joint smoked; the last shot bought. A day at the track. Mitch singing along to the jukebox in a surprisingly clear tenor, belting out “I Left My Heart in San Francisco.” The books that lined the windowsill of his room, Hemingway and Steinbeck and Richard Brautigan and Kurt Vonnegut. “Mitch, baby,” Bennie murmured, swaying lightly on his feet from force of habit; he hadn’t stood up straight in a long time. “He always came in the store, he’d tell me, ‘Hello, beautiful,’ like it was my name,” Angie said, her voice quavering. “No disrespect, I dug him like everyone else did,” Voodoo said, when it was his turn. “But I’m gonna give a quote from Jimi that sounds exactly like what Mitch would have said if he was here: ‘It’s funny how most people love the dead. Once you’re dead, you’re made for life.’”

Billy went last. He took a crumpled piece of paper from the pocket of his jeans, saying, “I remembered this from when we did Shakespeare in school, man. Can’t remember which play, but I felt it was right on for this—for Mitch.” He read, “‘Now cracks a noble heart. Good night, sweet prince; and flights of angels sing thee to thy rest.’” I stared at Billy, but he was still looking down at the piece of paper, putting it back in his pocket. I was thinking how life went on and on and for weeks and months on end nothing ever seemed to change, and then suddenly people would amaze you.

Everyone fell silent, and we thought we were done, but then Mitch’s wife stepped into the line, hesitantly, and said, “Is it—if it’s not too late.” She cleared her throat nervously. “I have something, but if it is too late, that’s fine, I don’t want—” She threw her arms out, as if she could draw meaning from the air without having to speak. “I don’t want to intrude,” she finally said, looking around the circle, trying to find our eyes.

No one spoke at first. Everyone had heard the story of her first
reaction to Mitch’s death. But she’d been a part of his life that none of us had known. She was already retreating, her ankles sinking backward in the sand, and I stepped forward and said, “No, it’s—it’s cool, it’s fine, please . . . please. Go ahead.”

She stepped forward again, standing between Conor and Raven, hugging her shawl tighter around her shoulders. “It’s a poem he liked,” she said. “He liked it very much, and it seemed to fit the occasion. It’s called ‘The Valedictory,’ by José Rizal, but it’s also known as ‘
Mi último adiós.
’ Mitch used to call it ‘Crown ’n’ Deep.’” She cleared her throat and began:

Land I adore, farewell. . . .