by Mary Campisi
Gloria smiled. He’d be here by seven as usual. And of course, Christine would come, and that ridiculous fool Charles called a brother. Harry Blacksworth was nothing but a drunk living off of his family’s good name. But Charles insisted Harry be invited and damn that man, Harry always came. He had gall coming to their home, laughing, talking to Charles as though he deserved to be there, as though nothing had happened. Sometimes she wanted to just open her mouth and let the words fall out in one screaming jumble, let Charles know the truth about his little brother, Harry. But she wouldn’t, she’d never tell. And Harry Blacksworth knew that.
***
Gloria again
Januarys in Chicago were bleak, the mornings marred by the previous night’s swell of ice or snow. Years ago, she’d welcomed the wet darkness with its cold harsh winds, thought it would be the perfect test for what was to come when she moved to London… Now the mornings brought pain to her back, the arthritis tightest during damp weather like a fist gnarled around her vertebra, squeezing. Still, she preferred dark winter months to summer’s brilliance. There was too much symbolism in the white light, too many lost possibilities.
She’d suffered her first miscarriage three months before her first anniversary, during a scorching July fourth weekend. Fireworks split the sky as splotches of bright red stained her white shorts, doubling her over in cramped spasms. The doctor said she’d barely been pregnant. Eight months later she lost another child, this one five months along, much more than barely pregnant. It was August eighth,, she’d just stepped out of the shower and reached for a towel when the pain ripped through her uterus, buckling her knees, slumping her to the floor. She gripped her belly with one hand and clamped the other low, trying desperately to stop the blood that oozed between her legs. So much blood, too much for the baby, a boy she named Charles Edwin. They buried him in St. Thomas’s Cemetery two days after Gloria was discharged from the hospital with a new pint of blood flowing through her veins and a prescription for Valium.
There was another barely pregnant loss the next year which kept her in bed three months afterward, too listless to comb her hair or shower, or even eat. What was the point? But eventually Charles coaxed her into seeing a doctor who prescribed more Valium and life was once again back on a steady, slightly tilted track.
And then, just after her fourth anniversary, a horrible time when she wondered if there would be a fifth, she found herself pregnant with Christine.
Living could be such a difficult proposition. Thank God for pills to smooth out the rough spots, blend the hours like an artist dipping his brush in water and smearing it on a canvas dotted with paint. Everything ran together—the beginning, the end, the edges, the middle—it was all the same, all even, all tolerable.
Gloria stared at the white tablet in her hand. Life really was an ugly undertaking, stripped naked with bruises and scars that could make even the most adventurous individual reconsider the trek unless he chose an easier route, a way to get through it, or maybe around it, whether it be with another person, a pill, a bottle, even a charge card could suffice at times. She popped the pills in her mouth, took a sip of Crown Royal.
She was doing quite well considering the circumstances, had made it through the calling hours, the service, the small gathering after the funeral, the hundreds of bodies hugging her, shaking her hand, kissing her cheek, mouthing the same words, So sorry, Charles was such a wonderful man. We’ll all miss him, over and over. She’d pasted the half-smile on her face, forced herself to reply, Yes, we’ll all miss him, and Harry, standing in the background, watching her. She fished another Vicodin from the bottle, swallowed it, noticed there was only a third of a bottle left. She’d have to call Roger, talk to him about upping the dose, the damn stuff just didn’t work like it used to. Of course, he’d tell her that wasn’t a good idea, that’s what he’d said when she’d been on Percodan. He’d said she should consider alternative therapy in conjunction with the pills—acupuncture, bio-feedback, massage. But in the end he’d pulled out his prescription pad and written her name on it. He’d do the same now, tonight actually, when she saw him and Astrid for dinner.
And tomorrow she was meeting with Beverly and Rita to start planning the Women’s Auxiliary Spring Fashion Show. They’d thought she wouldn’t be interested in chairing the program this year, that she might need time alone; to recover, reorganize, regroup. Oh, God, if they only knew.
Charles was dead. How was she to move forward? Thirty-one years together wiped out with a single phone call. What did women do when the other half of their existence was brutally erased?
What would she do?
Christine was all she had now and she was leaving for the Catskills in two days. Gloria supposed it was her daughter’s way of dealing with her grief; going to the last place her father had been, perhaps even locating the spot where his car had flipped and he’d taken his last breaths. Why would a person torture herself like that? The knowing should be enough without the details. Details killed people’s souls, drove them mad. It was better not to know, not to ask question after question, prying apart truth from lie. It was better just to accept.
And ignore the details.
***
For those who have read A Family Affair, I am including an alternate ending. If you’ve not read it, please stop here!! A Family Affair was initially intended for a broader general fiction audience and there was not as much concentration on the romance between Christine and Nick. What happened to Lily in this version was a wake-up call to embrace life, forgive, and live forward. But in the end, I just couldn’t do it, so turned Lily into a living symbol of hope and unconditional love.
Alternate ending to A Family Affair
“Okay, Lily.” Mr. Lipton handed her the reins. “Now you go twice around by yourself and I’ll watch. Just remember what we went over. Okay?”
“Okay.”
“Good luck. You can do it.”
She eased the horse into the ring, talking to her as they walked. “Isn’t this so much fun, Jenny? What do you think? Huh? I think it’s fun.” They moved along the path, the sun beating down on them. “Do you like the sun, Jenny? Do you get too hot?” She giggled. “Do you ever get a bath?” They made the first round and started on the second. “Does that thing hurt your mouth? I won’t pull too hard, okay? Is that better?” She leaned forward a little, whispered, “You know, my sister had a horse that looked like you. Her name was Lady Annabelle and she won ribbons. Lots of them. Did you ever win a ribbon, Jenny? Huh?” She patted a patch of fur. “We could win ribbons, I bet, me and you. What do you think?” Pat, pat, pat. She glanced at the white fence in front of her. “Maybe if Mr. Lipton saw you jump he’d let you be my horse and we could win ribbons together. Blue’s first place.” They were almost halfway around; the stretch of field past the white fence was green and soft-looking. “We could win lots of ribbons. Do you want to win a ribbon, Jenny? Do you want to be my horse?”
They could win lots of ribbons like Christine and Lady Annabelle. Mr. Lipton just had to see that Jenny could jump.
“Let’s jump, Jenny. Let’s jump!” Lily kicked the animal’s sides hard like she’d seen cowboys do in the movies when they wanted to get their horses to run. Jenny’s Promise let out a yelp and took off straight for the fence, fast, faster. “Go, girl!” Lily leaned in low, clutched her arms around the horse’s neck like Christine had told her to do.
She didn’t hear the screams behind her; there was nothing but the sound of hooves beating against the ground, the feel of the wind on her face, the rhythmic speed of Jenny’s Promise’s body, moving and rising, high, higher, lifting them over the fence in one perfect jump.
We did it! We did it!
Lily’s eyes were squeezed shut, a smile on her face when the horse landed, stumbled, threw her to the ground in one quick jerk. Jenny’s Promise recovered, tore across the field, stopping several hundred feet away where she lowered her head and began grazing. Mr. Lipton was the first to reach Lily, the first to no
tice the unnatural bend to her neck as she lay face down in the moss-green pasture, the riding hat several feet in front of her. He swore under his breath and made the sign of the cross, then knelt and gently eased her onto her back. A trickle of blood escaped her full lips but Lily Eleanor Desantro, age fourteen, was still smiling, even in death.
***
Harry flipped through a client file, made a few notes. He’d done a little preventative maintenance, made some suggestions, that was it. It was Christine’s client and she wasn’t in any shape to deal with it, so he had.
He still couldn’t believe the girl was dead. Fourteen years old, first time on a horse and the damn animal takes off, jumps the fence. It was a shame, a damn shame. Harry had gone to the funeral, saddest hour he’d spent in a long time, even worse than Charlie’s funeral. And that picture of the girl would be embedded in his brain forever; a 10x13 glossy propped in the center of the coffin’s satin folds. She’d been wearing a riding outfit, sitting on a white horse, smiling like there was no tomorrow. Christ. The kid hadn’t even lived.
Lily Desantro sure had a lot of people who cared about her. The church had been packed and the house, hell, you had to squeeze one cheek at a time to get through the doorway. If he died, he could only count on Chrissie to be there, maybe Greta. Everybody told him about Charlie, how they missed him, what a great person he was . . . how Harry resembled him.
The second he looked into Miriam Desantro’s hazel eyes, heard her soft voice, he knew why Charlie had fallen for her. She was a genuine piece of humanity, sincere, gracious, kind of like Greta in a way and not bad to look at either. The son wasn’t the son of a bitch Harry thought he might be. Maybe the girl’s death changed him or maybe being with Chrissie had. Or hell, maybe he’d been more bluster than anything else. If Harry’s mother had been sleeping with a married man for fourteen years and had a kid with her, he doubted he’d be rolling out the red carpet when the guy died. Either way, Harry liked the guy. He wasn’t a Connor Pendleton, thank God. Actually, he was civilized and quiet which was better than running at the mouth all night. Chrissie said he’d had a full beard but shaved it the morning after the girl died because she’d never liked it, said it was too scratchy.
Why was it that people waited until somebody died to honor his wishes? As if the dead person cares then? It happened all the time, somebody dies, somebody runs out and does what the dead person’s been begging him to do for months, years, maybe even decades. It’s all wasted effort at that point, the only good it serves is to soothe somebody’s conscience.
Even so, this Nate Desantro was a decent guy and if not cutting his mountain-man beard was the worst thing he ever did to his sister then he was okay. Chrissie seemed to think so, she hardly left his side and he was glued pretty tight to her, too. Harry hadn’t missed the part where she offered to stay at Nate’s to ‘give you a place at Miriam’s.’ Did she think old Uncle Harry was stupid? He laughed. Good for her, sometimes the only thing you could count on in this miserable world was a little body warmth. The knock on the door yanked him from his thoughts. “Come in.”
It was Chrissie, arms loaded with a stack of files. She looked pale, thinner. In the two weeks since they’d been back he’d hardly seen her. She’d been holed up at home doing paperwork or God knew what, or buried in her office. “Hi, Uncle Harry, can I come in?”
“Hey, Chrissie girl. You and the cleaning lady are the only ones brave enough to step foot in here. Come on in.” She closed the door behind her, set the files on one of the chairs next to his desk and sat in the other. “What’s this?” He pointed to the files.
“Client files.” She fidgeted in her chair. “Some things I need to go over with you.”
“Oh?”
“I… it isn’t working, Uncle Harry. I can’t do this anymore.”
He didn’t have to ask what, he knew. She couldn’t live the life anymore, not since she’d found another one, a real one. “I know.”
“You do?”
“Give me a little credit for having at least a tiny bit of gray matter up here,” he said, pointing to his head. “And I’m not talking about the hair either.”
“I do give you credit, Uncle Harry. You don’t give yourself enough.”
“You’re probably right but you didn’t come here to talk about me, did you?”
“No.”
“You’re coming to dump these files on me hoping that because I’ve been sneaking around helping you out that maybe now I’ll start taking an interest in the company, handle some of your clients?”
“Well, kind of.”
He held up a hand. “I’m not finished yet. You’re doing all of this so you can clear your conscience and head back to that damn boyfriend of yours.”
“I thought you liked Nate.”
“I do but that doesn’t mean I want him stealing you away.”
“He isn’t—”
“He already has, that whole damn town has. His mother, him, even that old geezer, Jack what’s his name, they’re all in love with you.”
She smiled. “Finnegan, Jack Finnegan.”
“Whatever.”
“I have to give something back, help people who really need it. When”— she paused, took a deep breath—“when Lily died it made me realize I had to do something that wasn’t about me. I could teach the people of Magdalena how to protect their money, make it grow through investment strategies, savings, debt reduction, maybe I’d even show them how to apply for a small business loan, analyze mortgage rates—”
“Okay, okay, I get it.”
“Those people need me and I need them.”
“Yeah, I guess.” She was slipping away, he could feel it.
“Nate said he might even consider starting a custom furniture making business. I could help him with that; get all the financing in order, maybe even make a small investment, if he’d let me. And Miriam needs me now. I want to be there for her.”
“Enough. I get the picture.”
“I’ll be back to see you and you’ll come see me. It’s not that far.”
“Sure.” He twirled his pen between his fingers. “You tell your mother yet?”
“No.”
“Are you planning to or are you going to just let her find out when you don’t show up for Christmas dinner?”
“I don’t know. It’s not something you slip into casual conversation.”
“Are you ever going to forgive her?” Are you ever going to forgive me?
“Someday. I can’t deal with that whole issue right now. Uncle Harry?”
“Hmm?”
“I never got to tell Lily I loved her.” Her voice shook, the words falling apart with each breath. “Right before she went for her ride she told us all she loved us and I was going to tell her too, just as soon as she got off the horse.” She pressed her fingers against the bridge of her nose, “I never got to tell her.”
“I’m sure she knew, Chrissie.”
“Do you think so?” Her eyes were wet, her face pained. “I really did love her.” She fingered the small heart necklace she was wearing.
“I know.”
“I love you, too.”
“I love you too, kiddo.”
“And”—she swiped a hand over her face—“whether or not you’re my biological father you did more for me these last months than most fathers would do for their daughters.”
“I don’t know about that.”
“Thank you for being a father to me when I really needed one.”
He opened his mouth to speak but dammit he couldn’t get the words out. He coughed, cleared his throat, once, twice. “Charlie—”
“Was a good father, too.” She reached across the desk, squeezed his hand. “I don’t want to know which one of you was my biological father. I’ve been lucky enough to have two fathers in my life and that’s how I want to leave it.”
He nodded. “If I’d known you’d be looking at me like a father, hell I would’ve watched my mouth around you.”
S
he laughed. “If you did, Uncle Harry, you wouldn’t be you.”
“You’ve got a point there.”
“I’ve got something for you.” She reached into her pocket, pulled out a shiny gold object—his father’s pocket watch.
“What the hell, where’d you get that?”
“Miriam gave it to me.” She laid it on the desk, eased it toward him. “And I’m giving it to you.”
“No.” He gripped the armrests of his chair, pushed himself away. He’d spent half his life hating that watch, secretly wishing his father would consider giving it to him, knowing he wouldn’t. “I don’t want it.”
“Listen to me, please. I know the significance of this watch, at least back when you and Dad were younger. It was nothing but a prize to be won by the Blacksworth who worked the hardest, the longest, and stripped away pieces of himself for the good of the company. Dad knew this, knew it would destroy everyone who wore it unless he could reinvent its meaning. So”—she touched the edge of the watch—“he gave it to Lily. All she knew was that the watch was beautiful and shiny like the sun. And that it was a gift from a man she loved very much.”
“I…” He eyed the watch, still keeping a respectable distance from it.
“Take it, Uncle Harry. Don’t let your father have that hold over you. Take it and think of Lily, the little girl who changed all of our lives.” He reached out, touched the watch’s face. “It’s yours now.”
He covered his hand over the watch, felt its smooth surface mold into his palm. “Thank you, Chrissie.” It was all he could manage.
She stood and walked to his side of the desk. “You’re welcome.”
He let out a long sigh. “Guess you’re getting ready to head out?”
