I laughed for the first time in several hours. “I have to admit that I’ve never had a restaurant gig. All my temp jobs have been in offices.”
Speaking of which…
I told Joey Moriarty I’d see him this evening and ended the call, then phoned Uncle Earwax at home to officially give him the news that I’d be segueing out of his office and into an Off-Broadway role. I asked him if he had a clue as to whether Gram had left a will. It wasn’t that I was interested in an inheritance, but I knew that estate matters would need to be resolved and if there was no will, much of whatever she had in her bank accounts would become the property of the state. Uncle Earwax suggested that I call my parents down in south Florida and find out if Gram had an attorney. You’d think I would have known such things, but she never spoke of anyone in all the years we lived together.
“One thing I can tell you, Alice, is I’m sure as hell not her lawyer. The woman hated my guts. You know what she used to call me?”
“What?” I questioned disingenuously.
“Rat bastard.”
“You knew that?”
“Yeah, I knew it. But I figured I was in a select pantheon where she was concerned. The only other person I ever heard your grandmother refer to as a ‘rat bastard’ was Richard Nixon.”
I called my father, who gave me the name of his mother’s lawyer; someone I’d never heard of, a guy named Bernard Pikarsky. I phoned him, introduced myself, and arranged to stop by and see him on Monday. Understanding the importance of dealing with Gram’s estate as soon as possible, Uncle Earwax had given me the day off to attend to business.
Mr. Pikarsky’s office took up the entire parlor floor of a Chelsea walk-up. The attorney was a short, squat, slightly ruddy white-haired man who told me he had known Gram since he was a boy. He offered me a chair and poured me a mug of freshly brewed coffee. “My parents were good friends of hers. They were garment workers—union organizers and socialists—and your grandmother was very sympathetic to them politically.” Mr. Pikarsky leaned back in his well-worn leather chair and laughed. “Your grandfather…well, that was another matter. He despised socialism, communism, but couldn’t stand the machine politics of Tammany Hall, even though so many of the movers and shakers were Irish. When he voted at all, he was a staunch Republican.”
This was a side of my grandparents—both of them—that I hadn’t known. Gram never told me that she and Grandpa Danny ever disagreed on anything.
Mr. Pikarsky pulled open a file drawer and removed a slender manila folder. Inside it was an official-looking sealed envelope. “This is your grandmother’s last will and testament,” he said.
“And you had asked me to dig up whatever recent bank statements I could find,” I said, and reached into my purse for the papers, which I handed across the desk.
Mr. Pikarsky opened the envelope containing Gram’s will. The document itself was only a couple of pages long. “She wrote this about five years ago,” he said. He briefly perused its contents, then offered it to me. “You’ll see that she leaves everything to you, but apart from her personal effects in the apartment that you share, there isn’t really any property, financially speaking. There appears to be enough in her accounts to cover her funeral expenses—”
“There isn’t going to be a funeral,” I blurted. I caught his look. “She wished to be cremated, so I’m having that taken care of, and…the memorial service,” I added, choosing my words carefully, “will be private.”
“Nevertheless, there’s enough money on hand so that you don’t end up out of pocket for whatever modest arrangements you plan to make, and there’s so little here that I can’t in all good conscience charge you a legal fee.” My eyes widened. In my vast experience with attorneys, this was practically unheard of. Mr. Pikarsky noticed my amazed expression and shrugged. “Alice, your grandmother knew me since I was a little pisher. She was good to my parents. How can a ‘red diaper baby’ like me nickel-and-dime you over this? Come in again next week and I should have some papers from the banks and brokerage houses for you to sign, so I can transfer to you what little funds are there. I’m sorry to say this, but if you entertained any fantasies of becoming a rich woman upon your grandmother’s demise, I’m afraid I’ll have to disappoint you.” He laced his fingers together and rested his elbows on the desktop. “She didn’t leave you much of a legacy.”
“That’s what you think,” I said quietly. I rose from my chair, shook Mr. Pikarsky’s hand, and thanked him for his time.
“I can’t believe you’re even here,” Louise remarked when I returned to Balzer and Price the following day. She gave me a quick, awkward hug. “I’m so sorry about your grandmother. Oh, Mr. Price brought these in for you. He thought they might cheer you up.” She handed me a box of Godiva chocolates and a little bag of Swedish fish.
“See? He’s not such a bad guy,” Rosa said. “I’m getting use to him; his bark is a lot worse than his bite.”
I opened the box of chocolates and offered some to my two co-workers. Rosa popped one in her mouth, chewed it thoughtfully, and stood for a moment, studying my face. “I’m very sorry about your loss,” she said.
I regarded the expression in her large, dark eyes. “You knew. Didn’t you?”
Rosa gave a little nod. “But what was I supposed to do? Tell you about it? Whether or not you chose to believe me, would it have made any difference? Would you really have wanted to know?”
“No. I wouldn’t have,” I said softly.
“I know you loved your grandmother very much. And I know you miss her right now.”
“Will I ever stop missing her?” I asked. “No, wait,” I added, trying to laugh about it. “That’s also something I don’t want to know. I don’t think the missing ever stops, no matter how much time passes.” I went over to my desk. “What’s this?” I asked them, pointing to the white bakery bag.
“Your uncle brought you breakfast,” Louise said. “He left it for you before he went to court. I think it’s a coffee and a croissant or something. He thought you deserved a little break from all the danish. Oh, we should congratulate you on getting a part,” she exclaimed. “I know it’s been a rough week, but you shouldn’t forget to celebrate the good things that come along.”
“Did you know that was going to happen, too?” I asked Rosa. She shrugged and smiled enigmatically. “Okay, then, will I make a big splash in this role? No—don’t answer that—because if it’s not a yes, I don’t want to hear it!”
Rosa laughed. “I wouldn’t tell you anyway. Trust me, working for Mr. Price is a lot less stressful than being a professional psychic.”
“I can’t believe that!” Louise exclaimed.
“I know,” said Rosa.
Dorian would have loved to perform in Grandma Finnegan’s Wake. For one thing, the actors got fed at every performance as part of the proceedings. All the corned beef and cabbage and Irish soda bread you could shovel in. They even sold shots of whiskey to the audience. As I shadowed the actress playing Fionulla Finnegan, I wondered if some of the performers ever took a nip now and then during the show. A couple of them were cast as raging drunks anyway; the creators of Grandma Finnegan’s Wake couldn’t have given a damn about political correctness and reveled in every opportunity to play to stereotype.
Joey Moriarty had given me a somewhat skeletal script, with not much to memorize for the role of FiFi, beyond the eulogy, which had some leeway for me to play with the text anyway, and getting the words right to “Danny Boy.” The lyric was sacred, but it wasn’t a problem. I’d been singing the song for years and it was something of an anthem around my branch of the Finnegan family tree. The rest of FiFi’s part was predominantly improvisational and by the third time I trailed the show, I was pretty confident that I had the scenes down. In one, she was supposed to break up a bar fight between her twin cousins Kenny and Denny, two of her backup band members, each of whom she learns has a crush on her. That looked like a fun one to play. In an equally irreverent scene, she got to whip
out her blusher compact and attempt to apply some rouge to the cheeks of the dearly departed because she thought the corpse looked “too pale.”
I’m quite sure there are a number of people out there who staunchly believe that death is no laughing matter—or shouldn’t be—but this week, the brazen zaniness of Grandma Finnegan’s Wake was just what I needed. And I think Gram would have gotten a real high kick out of it.
Chapter 19
Each evening when I came back to the apartment, I tried to sort through Gram’s things, knowing that part of life was the “moving on” part; but I couldn’t bring myself to do it, because it meant coming to terms with the fact that she wasn’t just on an extended vacation and would eventually be coming home. I wasn’t ready to handle it. Not alone, anyway.
“I was wondering what happened to you,” Dan Carpenter said when I phoned him.
I explained why I hadn’t called any sooner to have him come back to work on the antique settee. There was a heavy silence on the line.
“I’m so sorry, Alice. And I apologize if this may sound hollow, since you don’t know me, but it isn’t: I can empathize with your loss. My grandmother was the reason I became a craftsman and not a lawyer.”
I cradled the receiver to my ear through another lengthy silence.
“Is there anything I can do?”
“I could use a house call, if you’re not too busy. It’s very hard to look at her favorite piece of furniture all pulled apart.”
Dan arrived a few hours later with his worn black Gladstone.
“Can I watch?” I asked him, as he checked the status of the wooden frame.
“She’s holding together pretty well,” he said, appraising the new jointure. He nodded in response to my question. “Sure, grab a seat.” He patted the floor beside him. “We’ll work on the new underpinnings tonight. The importance of a solid foundation should never be underestimated.”
Ain’t it the truth?
I looked at the components of Gram’s settee, scattered and spread out around the room. “Teach me, Danny Boy,” I said softly. “I want to know how to pick up all the pieces and put them back together…stronger than they were before.”
I’d spoken to both Izzy and Dorian several times since Gram’s death. They’d stopped by for a brief visit on the following day, but I was an utter basket case, still incapable of accepting the finality of the situation. The day of my debut in Grandma Finnegan’s Wake I felt ready to begin to clear out Gram’s things, but I needed my best friends by my side.
“Well, you make quite a fashion statement,” Izzy said as I let her in the door. “Isn’t that a little small for you?”
I was wearing Gram’s old and worn white acrylic cardigan with the tea stain just above the second button. “It’s hers,” I said simply. I held out my arm and Izzy took a deep whiff of the sleeve.
“That rose perfume she always wore,” she said. “Whew, it’s really strong!”
I sniffed the same area. “No, you can hardly smell it at all. That’s what scares me…that it’ll fade away forever…and one day when I do this,” I said, inhaling again, “I won’t be able to smell her anymore.”
Izzy pulled my head onto her shoulder. “Maybe you’re right. Ever since I found out I was pregnant, I’ve got this incredibly heightened sense of smell. Last night, Dominick sprinkled a little parmesan on his baked ziti and I went nuts. He thought I was going clinically insane or something. Speaking of food,” she said, as I lifted my head, “do you have any pickles? It must be another truism—what they say about pregnant women craving pickles.”
I went to the refrigerator and pulled out two jars. “Here. They’re all yours,” I said, handing them to her. “Gram bought these. She was a real pickle fiend. I hate pickles.”
“So do I,” Izzy said, accepting the two jars. “Thanks. I hate pickles so much that when I go to McDonald’s and they give me shit about making a special order for me and I don’t have all day to wait around or to argue with them, I peel open the bun and pull out the pickle slices with my fingernails. Dominick thinks it’s repulsive.”
The doorbell rang again. It was Dorian. “Isn’t your uncle upset that you’re not at work today?” he asked me.
I shook my head. “No, I told him I needed the day off before my opening night. You guys are coming tonight, aren’t you?”
“Aw, gee, and I was going to spend the evening shampooing my cat,” Izzy teased, giving me a poke in the ribs. “Of course we’re going to be there, you nimwit. Even Dominick is coming.”
“What about your parents?” Dorian asked. “You would think they’d come up to the New York for the memorial service, if not for your opening night. You know, kill two birds with one stone, and all that. Sorry.”
“My parents are insane,” I said. “First of all, there isn’t going to be a memorial—well, not in the traditional sense, anyway. Secondly, my mother always hated Gram. Okay, that’s not really true. She didn’t hate her—she just couldn’t stand her. My father has been afraid to fly, says it’s too far to drive, gets antsy on trains and nauseous on buses. Besides, he’s never been really religious, and since we’re not holding a formal funeral, he says he’ll mourn his mother in his own way, and even if he came up to New York, she wouldn’t know he’d been to all the trouble to do it, anyway.”
“Well, in a slightly selfish, sick, and twisted way, that makes sense,” Izzy said.
“But what about your opening night?” Dorian asked.
I opened my arms in a theatrical, Jackie Masonesque shrug. “Can I explain them? It’s a ‘soft’ opening. No fanfare, no critics, I’m going into a long-running show as a replacement. Sure, it’s my opening night, just as it is for half a dozen Grandma Finnegan cast members, but…” I collapsed into a dining chair, defeated. “I don’t have the energy, emotional, physical, or otherwise, to make excuses or rationalizations. They’re staying in Florida, plain and simple.” I looked up at my two best friends and tried not to cry. “Family is a funny thing, isn’t it? I mean, you guys have always been there for me when my flesh and blood hasn’t. What could be more ‘family’ than that?”
Dorian kissed the top of my head. “It’s true. You make them where you find them. Here I am, a single, boyfriendless, relativeless guy in the big city. I think that’s another reason I could never give up acting. Every cast becomes a family in a way, too. You share everything…joys, sorrows…”
“Toothbrushes,” Izzy said.
I whipped my head around to look at her. “What?”
“Yeah, there was an actress on a Neil Simon show I did in summer stock who was always stealing my toothbrush. Who knows what that’s about?”
“I need you here to help me go through some of Gram’s things, if it’s okay with you,” I told them, changing the subject. “I tried to sort through them on my own, but it’s too lonely. I can’t do it.”
Izzy and I did a preliminary inventory of Gram’s clothing. I told her she was welcome to anything that caught her eye or might fit her. We had a brief but friendly argument over an original Pucci blouse, after which Izzy agreed that she’d probably end up spilling ketchup on it, and besides it had belonged to my grandmother. As we continued our treasure hunt, she reached into the back of the closet and found a faded pink feather boa. After sneezing a number of times as she yanked it through the densely packed hanging garments, she draped it dramatically around her neck and struck a pose.
“It’s you!” I giggled. “And it’s yours.”
“I love it,” she said, looking down at her shoulder admiringly, running the soft marabou feathers through her fingers. She sneezed again. “Although I think I may be allergic to it.” She gave me an expectant look.
“I told you it was yours,” I said. “Wear it in good health. Or on Halloween.”
Dorian was poring over a number of old photographs. “Do you think I could keep this?” he said, holding up a sepia-toned studio portrait of “The Footloose Finnegans” doing the Castle Walk. I came over and looked at the
photo. “It’s an extra,” he said. “I found another copy in one of the other folders you handed me.”
“A large version of this hung at the top of the stairs of their dance studio,” I said. Gram said it was the first thing people saw when they walked in. This one,” I said, indicating the one Dorian lovingly cradled in his hands, “must have been one of the copies they displayed in the glass case on the street level.”
We found a number of posed professional photos. “She was quite beautiful,” Dorian remarked, looking at several of them.
“Inside and out,” I agreed. “Although she could be remarkably vain, given half the chance.” I arranged the loose photographs in a row. “What do you notice about each of them?”
Dorian looked at the line of pictures. “They’re all taken at the same angle.”
I nodded. “Three-quarter view, from the left side of her face only. Just like Claudette Colbert had in her film contracts.”
“She looks like she’s flirting with the camera,” Dorian said, amused.
“Don’t you think she wasn’t!” I regarded the row of photos. “Yes, she was a real looker in her day,” I agreed. “And I’m going to miss her like crazy…but I wonder if she went at a good time after all.”
Dorian gave me a quizzical look. “Is there ever a right time?”
“She’d started showing signs of dementia,” I told him. I glanced at the partially repaired settee she’d referred to as a “sitting-on thingy,” in her struggle to define a word her eyes remembered, but her brain forgot. “And aphasia, too. Strange episodes and not remembering things. I’ve been thinking about what might have happened had she degenerated further. It would have been inevitable…and who wants to live through that—aware that you’re in and out of awareness?”
“Imagine if you were a writer. Like Iris Murdoch,” Dorian mused. “Someone who lives in the mind. And then…when you lose your mind, it’s like becoming homeless.”
Temporary Insanity Page 27
