The Ninth Wife (45 page)

Feh.

I hated her most of all for jumping off that bridge she lived under. Right onto a highway in rush hour. Stupid girl.

I hated her more than ever because I wasn’t allowed to hate her anymore, do you understand? She returned my husband to me empty. He wouldn’t laugh at the funnies, even though I put them right in his lap. He never had time to fix anything in the house because he was sleeping, why? Because he stayed out late, all the time with that music, that
shvartze
music he had no business listening to.

Maybe your grandfather told your mother about Rose, I don’t know. He wouldn’t tell me if he did. I hope he didn’t. What did she need that pain for?

Maybe I should have left him. One time, I almost did. He started coming home with those mannequins, and boy I’ll tell you. Such
chai kock
in my own basement. Who collects such things? I packed a suitcase and drove to my mother’s apartment, but she ordered me to go back.
You make your marriage work
, she yelled at me.
That’s what you do
. So I did. That’s what we did in those days.

I always wondered whether my mother ever thought of leaving my father. I wondered what their marriage was like. Who knows. You never know. People lie anyway.

Why didn’t your grandfather leave me? God knows I wasn’t easy to live with. You’ll have to ask him. I imagine it’s for the same reason. Stay and survive. Find joy.

Find joy
. There’s a bit of wisdom from your grammy,
nu
? Get married, don’t get married, it’s all the same.

There was a time when I thought we could adopt another baby. Your mother brought us so much pleasure, I thought it could, I don’t know, fix things. But I couldn’t take the whole process. All that nosing around our personal lives, talking to neighbors, the surprise home inspections, the interviews,
oy gut
. They played God, those adoption people. I was told, the number one thing they wanted to know? If we had a happy marriage. How could they know that? What, a couple doesn’t argue? He puts the toilet seat down? She cooks his dinner? What kind of
mishegoss
is that? Only you know if you’re happy.

Sometimes I think it’s how we remember things.

Lately, I don’t know. I can’t remember good things. It seems so hard, I don’t know why. Your grandfather, he doesn’t remember anything so there you go.

Where did the last forty years go, eh?

Do you remember your grandfather on the day of your mother’s funeral? He sat on the edge of the bed, in his suit, limp like a wilted tulip. I said let’s go, I’m here, we’re
together
. You should have seen him, like I said a miracle. I’ll never forget how he looked at me, the way he looked at me when we said our vows so long ago. He held me, kissed me, my husband with the sparkling eyes and dancing feet. We cried and cried, oh my God. For a few moments I let my mind drift to my wedding day, before your mother even came into the picture. I started humming our song. Do you know “Cheek to Cheek,” that song? All these women wanted to dance with the groom and he only wanted to dance with me. Imagine that. Just with me.

He’s a good man, your grandfather, a good man deep down.

I don’t know what’s with him and that mannequin. Maybe it looks like Rose, I wouldn’t know. I never saw her after your mother was born. Maybe it looks like a woman he was futzing around with at those clubs. Maybe she’s nobody. It doesn’t matter anymore. It was too crowded. It’s always been too crowded.

But I’m here now and I’m going to take care of him. Just me. Me and him, together.

End of story.

Chapter Thirty-five

B
ess folds her grandfather’s discharge papers into her bag as they wait for the nurse to usher his obligatory wheelchair out the door. “Now no more skiing, Mr. Steinbloom,” says the attendant as he moves about the bed, stripping the sheets and spanking the pillows. “And no more of that hockey. I know how much you like hittin’ them hockey pucks.” He is shaking a finger at his patient, amusing himself.

Irv waves him away. “As long as I can still eat a hot dog. I can still do that, right?” He looks at Millie. Millie had cried at first seeing him. She had cupped his jowls with both hands and kissed him hard on the lips and whispered something in his ear that made him squeeze her shoulder. Now she sits politely in a chair with her ankles crossed, holding his sweater and sun hat. She meets his gaze and offers a knowing smile.

“Now
that
will surely kill you what with all that chemically nasty stuff,” says the attendant, “but you do what you gotta do.” He winks at Bess.

“She’s coming,” says Cricket, reentering their room. Cricket looks different, camouflaged and masculine. He’s wearing jeans and a new, blue twill shirt with saddle stitching. Even his skin, ballooned at the chin, looks more tanned and tough.

“Is that a Velcro watch, Cricket?”

He flashes Bess a playful frown. “What’s it to you?”

“Nothing. I didn’t say anything Mr. Shoot-Me-Now-If-I-Ever-Wear-Velcro.”

The stripes of sunlight beaming across the tile floor are bright and hot. Bess brought the van to a gas station this morning to fill up, check the oil, and get a general sense that there should be no problems on the road to Santa Fe and on into Tucson. It’s time to bring her grandparents home.

“Let’s give your grandparents some time alone, shall we?” Cricket whispers to Bess.

Bess has been watching her grandparents in these moments of their reconciliation. Irv relays a joke he heard one of the nurses tell and Millie flashes a coquettish grin. He reaches for a plastic cup and Millie jumps to his assistance. She insists he drink his water until the cup is empty, but she says so lovingly, encouragingly. When she reaches out to fix his collar, he reaches up to hold her hand.

Bess doesn’t fully understand why forgiveness has come so easily to her grandfather, nor does she believe this is the end of their nasty outbursts and hurtful behaviors. But their endearments are bursting with hope for a new way of being together. She can feel their yearning to summon the best of their past and learn how to heal and move forward. She can do that, too.
Find joy
. Bess closes her eyes and makes a wish for Millie’s advice to play out for them, may it be so for the rest of their lives.

“Bess, honey?”

Bess opens her eyes and nods to Cricket. “We’re going to take a walk,” she says to her grandparents. “We’ll meet you in front.”

The grounds around the hospital are peaceful and scenic. A dirt pathway winds around the building in partial shade past landscaped patches of shrubs and flowers, all labeled for visitors. Bess likes the simplicity of the Aspen daisies. Their flat white petals with yellow centers like sunbursts look like the kind of flowers kids first draw with crayons.

“Nice necklace,” says Cricket, pointing to his birthday gift to her.

Bess smiles and rubs the silver pendant between her fingers. “Thanks.”

“So how do you feel?”

“Tired. And strange.”

“Well, that makes sense after what you’ve been through, darling. Have you thought any more about what Millie told you?”

“Of course. You know me, I can’t stop thinking about it.”

“Like what? What are you thinking?”

“I don’t know.” Bess removes a plastic candy wrapper from the dirt. “About everything. Like, Gerald’s my mom’s half brother. Does that make him my half uncle?” Cricket shrugs.

“I keep replaying all these memories I have of Gerald with this new spin on them,” she continues. “And if that isn’t freaky enough, I just found out I have black roots. Gabrielle will probably sign me up with the NAACP.”

“Well, you knew your mother was adopted, and she had darkish skin you told me.”

“I know, but I never thought I’d find out who her parents actually were. I mean, her father was my grandfather’s best friend. I wish they were both still alive. I’d look for them.”

“You would?”

“Maybe I wouldn’t.” Bess listens to the sound of their footsteps in the dirt, like the rubbing together of fine sandpaper. She feels far away from the urban click of heels on floorboards and closer to the earth. “What I still don’t get is why my grandmother’s so angry now when all of that was long ago.”

“Look, give it time to sink in,” says Cricket, pulling a leaf from Bess’s hair. “And go easy on your grandmother. She did a very brave thing talking to you.”

“True, but she’s also hurting my grandfather.”

“She’ll get help. From what I saw in that room this morning, she wants to heal.”

“No, you’re right.” She swats away an insect.

“Will you look at these,” he says. He points to blooming prairie clover. “They look like little penises with purple pubies.”

“Nice,” says Bess. “Glad to hear you haven’t changed that much.”

“I haven’t changed at all, what are you talking about?”

Bess pinches the sleeve of his shirt. “New duds, is all I’ll say.”

“You like this? I got it last night at Rockmount Ranch Wear,
yeehaw
.”

“Didn’t you have a shirt like that once? A black one?”

“That was ages ago, I’m surprised you remember.”

A thought pops into Bess’s head and she decides, looking at Cricket, to share. “You look like your old self, you know. The way you used to look when Darren was alive.”

Cricket looks out toward the mountains. “Darren’s with me.”

Bess is struck by this sweet sentiment, rather unlike Cricket. She is moved by the depth of its meaning, for how true it is, the way we carry people with us. “He
is
with you,” she says. “He’ll always be with you, right here,” she says, patting above her heart, “and I—”

“Stop! My Lord, I see you haven’t changed, either. Bess, he’s in my motel room. You know the white bag I took on the trip? The one I kept by my feet that I wouldn’t let you near? It contains an urn.”

“An urn.”

“With his ashes. Which are now on the windowsill with a note to the cleaning staff saying please don’t touch.”

Bess is processing several new thoughts at once. “I don’t understand.”

“He had no family, remember, except for an elderly aunt, who gave me his ashes.”

“Why did you . . .”

“Bring him along? Suffice it to say you weren’t the only one who romanticized this road trip, my dear. I thought it was time to seek closure and I, well, I’ve seen one too many schmaltzy movies is what it comes down to. I thought I could drive out West and spread his ashes across the Rockies from the top of a cliff, something like that. Cue the orchestra, Max Steiner, and pass the box of tissues. Oh, but then I came to my senses. Darren was mildly agoraphobic, you know. He hated the dry air for puckering his skin, and spiders gave him nightmares. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“Wow.” Bess has stopped walking and is staring at him. “What are you going to do? Bring him back to D.C.?” Is it appropriate to say
him?

“I don’t know what to do. I was so worried he’d spill all over the car mats every time we drove over a bump. I don’t know if I can go through that again.”

“Wouldn’t you have a harder time taking his ashes on the plane?”

Cricket continues walking so Bess has no choice but to stay by his side. “I’m not flying back,” he says. “I’m driving. With Claus.”

She stops again. Did she hear him right? Claus, Isabella’s brother? The irresponsible louse who let Cricket’s dog escape? The albino maniac whom Cricket ran from at Eastern Market?

A sinister smile spreads across Cricket’s face. “He’s kind of cute, don’t you think?”

Bess croaks a laugh. “No wonder he was so nice to you at the funeral.”

“We spent all day Saturday together, and Saturday night.”

Bess smiles broadly, but stops herself from teasing him. Last night was the night of Claus’s sister’s funeral. Something in Cricket’s countenance confirms that this tryst of theirs was a comfort of many kinds. “Did you know he was gay?”

“Not when we were growing up, no. His father was a minister, if you recall; Claus was convinced that what he felt in adolescence was a terrible sin, beating me up for his guilt because he suspected I felt the same. He didn’t come to his sister’s wedding; he left home after he graduated high school to travel Asia and didn’t return until a few years ago. It so happens he moved to Washington and wanted my friendship, but Darren had just died so I wasn’t too obliging. Plus, I couldn’t forgive him for bullying me so viciously as children. I guess I’m suddenly in a forgiving mood.”

Bess pinches a pebble out of her shoe. “Will the surprises never end,” she says under her breath, and then sighs deeply.

“What? What’s the matter?”

“Nothing. I’m happy for you.”

“But?”

“No buts.” She pauses. “Okay, one
but
. I wish I could reach Rory.”

“Have you two spoken recently?”

“We had a hard conversation on Friday but haven’t really connected since.”

“I’m sure he’ll call as soon as he’s able.”

“Maybe.” She looks at her watch and points in the direction of the hospital’s front door. “We should get back.”

“I’ll follow you.”

“Cricket,” she says, touching his arm. “I’m glad I have you to come home to.”

He pats her hand. “And I you, my dear. And I you.”

Bess and her grandparents drop Cricket off at the hotel and they hug him and pat a panting Stella good-bye. Millie and Irv extend an invitation to visit them in Tucson, and Cricket graciously accepts. “It has been a pleasure, Mr. and Mrs. Steinbloom. I promise to look after your granddaughter to the best of my ability.”

“She’ll be fine,” says Millie. “Won’t she, Irving?”

Irv advertises his feelings in his forehead. Bess can tell by his clenched or raised brow when he’s relaxed, when he’s frustrated, and especially when he’s concerned, as he is now. His look is both deeply intimate and helplessly far away.

“Yes, I’ll be fine,” says Bess, wrapping her arm around her grandfather’s shoulders.

“Au revoir,” sings Cricket, blowing a kiss as the van pulls away.

T
he traffic on Interstate 25 is dense leaving Denver and thick again around Colorado Springs, but soon the four-lane highway opens up to skirt the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains with few cars and fewer rest stops. Irv sits in front with Bess, thinking. Millie knits in the back, evidently thinking, too.