Once Upon a Lie (5 page)

As the coffee dripped into the pot, she picked up the papers that were delivered every morning and that sat on the small patio in front of the store. Various headlines bemoaned the loss of titan of industry Sean Donovan, his death still a mystery, a cause for concern among the people who lived in the neighborhood where he had been killed. One of the headlines was tawdry and unnecessary, putting a voice to the fact that he was not where he should have been, another focusing only on the devastated family, the sordid nature of the story buried in the last paragraph. She closed the papers and folded them flat, then stuck them beneath a large stack so that no one would know they had been read.

The morning rush went smoothly, Maeve having prepared just enough scones and muffins so that only a few were left by the time midmorning rolled around. Jo had handled the front of the store with an ease and flexibility Maeve hadn’t really seen to date, and she wondered if this was a Jo she could rely on completely if she wanted to take a vacation day in the near future. By lunchtime, though, Jo’s energy was flagging and they fell into their usual roles of stressed-out baker and hapless assistant.

Instead of working, Jo was reading aloud from the village’s local rag, the
Day Timer,
and her favorite feature, the police blotter, which was particularly entertaining that day.

She was draped over the counter, her long legs stretched out behind her, her short hair sticking up in a number of different directions. Her overalls were covered with flour, making it appear that she had worked far harder at baking and with more efficiency that morning than she actually had. “Get this one,” she said. “‘A woman called the Farringville Police to report that she didn’t like the e-mail alert on her new cell phone. An officer responded and changed the ringtone to one the woman found more pleasing to the ear.’”

Maeve was restocking the front glass case with cupcakes, red velvet this time, her biggest seller. “You’re making that up.”

“Hand to God,” Jo said, putting a hand over her heart. “Our tax dollars at work. Listen to the next one. ‘Picnickers at Farringville Park called to report an auspicious diver in the Hudson River.’” She waited a beat. “You heard me right. Auspicious. As in ‘providential’ or ‘fortunate.’”

“Must have been a good day for diving.” Maeve pulled the empty platter out of the case. “What did the police do with this charming fellow?”

“Nothing. Blotter says he was just looking for fish.”

“As only an auspicious diver can,” Maeve said. She pulled off her apron. “Sorry I have to leave you to close,” she said. “I would say that I’d be back by four, but I know how long these Conlon-Donovan things take.”

“I still think my people have the right idea,” Jo said, folding the paper into perfect rectangles. “Die one day, bury the next.”

“Yeah, but then you have that whole sitting-on-a-box thing for seven days, right?” Maeve grabbed her peacoat from the back of the kitchen door and put it on.

“With the best bagels and lox known to mankind on the buffet,” Jo said. “The Jews can take any event and make it a deli day.” She grabbed a bottle of glass cleaner and a roll of paper towels from under the counter. “Go,” she said, shooing Maeve out the door. “Who wouldn’t want to go to an ash scattering in the middle of a gorgeous October day?”

Maeve hesitated. When she put it like that? Not her.

“You bringing Jack?” Jo asked.

“He wouldn’t miss it,” Maeve said, offering a little laugh. For the comic relief alone, she had to bring Jack. His asides would be the only thing keeping her sane during Sean’s dispersal from the banks of the Hudson River, a journey south that would take her to her old Bronx neighborhood.

So why was she going? Maybe to make sure he really was dead.

Jo bowed at the waist and offered a benediction in Hebrew.

Maeve asked for a translation. She had gotten used to most of Jo’s Yiddish and Hebrew expressions, but this was a new one.

“Stay strong,” Jo said, focusing her attention on the glass case and the myriad fingerprints that had appeared there.

Maeve went out to the parking lot and noticed the stiff breeze that had kicked up between the time she’d left the house and arrived at the store. Not really the perfect weather for scattering ashes. She drove the short distance to the assisted-living facility, fetched Jack, and headed south on the parkway.

“Hated the snot,” Jack said. “Hate that Dolores even more. She’s a wailer.”

That was putting it kindly. Maeve would remind him of this the next time they were invited to a Donovan family party, even if they had lobster and Johnnie Walker Blue. Jack often talked about how much he hated Sean but seemed to have forgotten when he got that invitation to the Fourth of July party in the mail. Turned out Jack Conlon’s love could be bought for a two-pound lobster and a shot of good whiskey, not to mention an opportunity to prove to everyone that he was still the same old Jack.

Maeve had heard through the family grapevine—namely an e-mail from Margie, who seemed to want to reconnect with Maeve suddenly—that the widow Donovan had tried to follow her deceased husband’s casket into the back of the hearse that would take him to the crematorium before one of the stronger relatives stopped her. All for show or truly an exhibition of a lost love? It was hard to tell, hard to know. Although Maeve had done her fair share of family parties, and with the exception of the July Fourth extravaganza, she hadn’t spent a whole lot of time around Sean and his family after she had left for college, and that was the way she liked it. Sean made her skin crawl, while Dolores had been a neighborhood girl and a not very nice one at that, so Maeve had no interest in keeping that relationship going. Familial loyalty and devotion went only so far, and Sean didn’t deserve any of hers. Margie seemed nice enough, but Maeve wasn’t all that keen at rekindling what had been a casual friendship at best.

Jack blathered the whole way down, and although he protested vehemently about being “ripped from the warm confines of the community room” to attend the ash scattering of the “little puke,” he was more than delighted to be traveling alongside his daughter on a jaunt that was sure to be interesting, given the players. Maeve had also promised him a late lunch at his favorite clam joint on City Island, and the prospect of that had him on his best behavior. He was dressed today in a natty tweed blazer, pressed khaki trousers, a bow tie, and loafers. The only sign that he had maybe lost the mental thread while he was dressing were the two different socks—one black, one green—that Maeve could see peeking out from beneath his cuffed pants.

“You look handsome, Dad,” Maeve said.

“Mimi Delaveaux helped me pick out this outfit,” he said, pulling at his collar. “I think she wants to get in my pants.”

Maeve cringed.

“You think the bow tie is a bit much, don’t you?”

“I didn’t even know you had a bow tie,” Maeve said.

“There’s a lot you don’t know about me, daughter of mine,” he said, but there was no humor in his voice, and that worried her.

They were silent for most of the ride, Jack coming to life a little bit when they passed their old street. He craned his neck toward the window. “I can see it,” he said. “The old house.”

“Do you want to drive by?” she asked, praying that the answer would be no.

Her prayers were answered. “No,” he said. “Too hard.” He turned back around. “I loved it here, though. Didn’t you?”

The number of lies she told herself, as well as her father, grew with each passing day. “Loved it,” she said flatly.

They came to a stoplight on the avenue. Jack whispered as if they weren’t alone in the car, “I know why you asked, you know.”

She wasn’t sure if this was one of his tangents or if he had something on his mind. She waited.

“About that Saturday?” he said. “That’s when Sean died.” His voice got a little louder. “And I know that he didn’t die of those things you told me. I have eyes. I read the paper.”

She made a left turn onto the avenue, keeping quiet. It was better that way.

“You think I forget everything, but I don’t. I remember stuff.”

“So where were you, Dad?” she asked quietly, not wanting to arouse the ire that he displayed infrequently but enough to keep her on her toes. From what she had read, the anger was part of the dementia that was slowly stealing his mind and his essence, the thing that made him Jack.

He turned into a petulant child, his arms folded across his chest. “I don’t have to tell you everything, you know.”

“No, you don’t.” She wasn’t sure she wanted to know everything anyway. She waited. “So where were you?”

His voice was as tangled as if a clump of cotton were stuck in his throat, and when he spoke it came out thick and hoarse. “That I can’t remember. That’s one of the things.”

She knew he was upset. It was these times, when he had the realization that his grasp on what was now and what was then was tenuous, that made him scared. It scared her, too. She changed the subject. “Tell me about
Water for Elephants
.”

“Now why would you want to know about that?”

She pulled up at another light. She leaned over and gave him a quick peck on the cheek. “Because unlike you, I happen to love elephants.”

Maeve had printed out directions, but she didn’t need them. She drove the narrow, windy streets of her old neighborhood and wended her way down to the river, just past the train tracks and into the parking lot of the Metro-North station, where she parked the car illegally. She figured she could keep a watch from where they stood so that if the police came, MTA or city, she would be able to move quickly.

Twenty or so people had gathered riverside, the blowsy Dolores clad in an expensive black pantsuit, the jacket of which was stretched across her broad back. She was wailing openly, just as Jack had predicted. He got out of the car and surveyed the scene. “Why are we doing this again?” he asked.

That was a very good question. She didn’t tell him that Dolores had specifically requested his attendance, saying that Sean had loved Jack like a dad—Maeve was pretty sure that that was an out-and-out lie—nor did she mention the fact that their nonattendance at the funeral had been duly noted by the entire family. She guessed that their attendance at the wake didn’t count. Apparently, it was the funeral that mattered. Maeve wasn’t sure why she cared, but she did, more for Jack than for herself. She counted the number of people whose wakes or funerals she would be required to attend and came up with exactly four. Once those people were gone, she could quietly fade into the sunset, never to be seen again by any members of this wholly dysfunctional family.

She and Jack found themselves in the large throng. Dolores made a show of giving Jack a big hug and an even bigger kiss, one that he wiped away when she wasn’t looking. She proclaimed loudly that now that the “latecomers had arrived,” they could commence with the service.

No Irish family is complete without one priest to call their own, be it a relative with a vocation or a parish priest who had seen his fair share of goings-on and had heard the confession of every member of the extended family. Today, the go-to guy was the ubiquitous Father Madden, the same guy who had married Maeve to Cal all those years ago and who now looked at her with a mixture of sadness and disappointment because he knew she was divorced. Despite preaching to the crowd about the resurrection, he seemed to seek her out specifically, making eye contact with her the whole time, maybe trying to make her understand that the rising of the Lord on the third day applied to dead marriages as well. On that account, she was a nonbeliever. She held his gaze, having found over the years that the person first committing to the stare was usually the first one out when it became a two-person contest. She listened with faux rapt attention to his droning about Jesus and how He died for our sins.

If that were truly the case, He would have died a second time knowing that He had created the ultimate sinner, Sean Donovan. Or at least turned over in His tomb.

A priest was supposed to preside over the burial of ashes, not the scattering of them, but Maeve knew from the e-mail that had circulated that Dolores had every intention of throwing Sean into the Hudson. She didn’t know if Father Madden knew this or was turning a blind eye, the Donovans being solely responsible for the new gym floor at St. Augustine’s. That Madden had sold his soul for a stretch of hardwood didn’t surprise Maeve.

Margie stood on the outskirts of the family, a tall, attractive woman by her side. The wife, Maeve presumed. Margie eyed Maeve warily, either embarrassed by how much she had drunk at the barbecue a few months earlier, the last time she had seen her, or regretting their conversation, the one that had left Maeve a little upset and feeling less than warm toward the long-lost Margie, e-mails replete with family gossip notwithstanding. Clumsy, she had called her. Maeve thought the word sounded sinister in her brain, given how inaccurate it was. I guess that’s one word for it, she thought. She did the right thing and shot Margie a warm smile, one that hopefully evoked the sadness that she was supposed to feel at the situation and the forgiveness she felt was necessary for biting the woman’s head off at the family party.

The grand finale—the sprinkling of the ashes—came a lot sooner than Maeve could have hoped for. Next to her, Jack had begun to shiver in his tweed blazer, his hands jammed down deep in the pockets of his khakis. Dolores held the urn aloft and turned toward the river, her wailing becoming one long, steady sob that transcended even the noise of the commuter train rumbling behind them. She beckoned the group closer so that everyone could see the remains of her beloved husband scattered into the river he loved so well, if his fifty-foot sailboat was any indication.

Dolores pulled the top off the urn and turned dramatically, flinging ashes into what turned into a very stiff north wind. Jack had the good sense to zig as the ashes zagged, leaving Maeve open to the vagaries of the windswept remains of a cousin she had been glad to see go. A few flecks of Sean Donovan landed on her shoulders and on her sleeves. Her stomach did a flip as she took in the amount of ash in which she was now covered, noticing that everyone else seemed to have been downwind of the ashes’ trajectory and clean of any soot.