The Leap Year Boy

by Marc Simon

  Abe draped his coat over a kitchen chair. “You don’t know what you’re talking about, Ida. They love Alex at The Wheel. You should have seen what he did today. I can’t believe it but I seen it with my own eyes.”

  She shook a finger in his face. “I don’t want to know so don’t bother me with your malarkey.” She grabbed her coat and went to the door. “By the way, that greenhorn doctor of yours is upstairs checking on your wife, in case you give a damn. And shut the flame off under the soup.” She slammed the door behind her.

  Let her go, Abe thought. She wouldn’t appreciate what Alex did, anyway. He spooned some soup into a bowl. That Alex. Entrepreneurship possibilities spun in his head.

  *

  Arthur propped Alex up on the top bunk. “You want some candy?” He showed him a bag of jellybeans.

  “Momma went to sleep again.”

  “She’s just tired, Alex.”

  “Look.” Alex took the diamond stickpin from his pants.

  Benjamin said, “Holy moley.”

  Arthur tried to grab it, but Alex pulled it away. “Where’d you get that?”

  “When I went with Daddy.”

  Benjamin said, “You mean at that buh…bar? But how did you get it?”

  “Five fingers.”

  Arthur said, “Wow.”

  “I threw darts.”

  Benjamin said, “Alex, can I see it?”

  “I played darts for Davy and won the game.”

  Arthur said, “Sure, sure.”

  “I did.”

  Arthur tried to pat Alex on the shoulder. “OK, OK, Alex, I believe you. Just let me see that thing for a minute.”

  Benjamin said, “It looks like a duh…diamond.” When Arthur scowled at him, he offered, “I saw pictures of duh…diamonds in school.”

  “It’s for Momma.”

  Benjamin shook his head. “But wait. You can’t give it to her.”

  “Why?”

  Benjamin said, “Because you…because.”

  Arthur pushed him away. “He means, because she’s sleeping right now. You said she was. Plus, it’s not her birthday. If you wait for her birthday, it’s a more special present, see? You wrap it in pretty paper and put a ribbon on it. Remember how your birthday presents were all wrapped up in shiny paper, with ribbons and bows? Same thing for Ma. Right, Benjamin?”

  Benjamin stammered until Arthur freed his tongue with a punch to the back. “Right.”

  Alex clutched the pin. “When is her birthday?”

  “Pretty soon. April 23rd. Only a few weeks away. Then you can give it to her. And you know what else, Alex? We’ll help you wrap it up pretty for Ma. We’ll get special paper, even. But we need to hide it somewhere in our room so she won’t see it before her birthday, so it will be a big surprise. OK, Alex? You want it to be a surprise, don’t you?” Arthur looked around the room, as if he were scanning it for secret hiding places. “Just give me the pin and I’ll put in where only you and me and Benjamin will know where it is. Wait, I know.” He slid the wooden box where they kept their toy soldiers from under the bed. “We’ll put it in here. Ma and Dad would never look in here. Just hand me the pin. No, wait. Alex, you put it in there, you bury it good, OK?”

  Alex looked at Benjamin, who nodded. He placed three infantrymen and two cannons on top of the pin and closed the lid.

  *

  Abe held the five dollars and change he’d won on his bets at the tournament. The money felt warm in his hand—easy money that had come to him, not without a little bit of tension, that was true, but it sure beat working. My God, he thought, how in the world did Alex throw those darts like that? Those arms! God knew what He was doing when He gave them to the boy. It was a goddamn miracle, hell, like Abraham parting the Red Sea, he thought, his mind reeling back to the little he could remember from those Old Testament stories his uncle had told him. Maybe that miracle stuff was true after all.

  Even if it wasn’t a miracle, it sure was a huge opportunity. In his head he clicked off the bars and taverns in the immediate vicinity: Dee’s Café, The Elbow Room, The Brass Rail, Kelly’s—no, that joint was way too rowdy for a little boy—The End of the Road, Johnny & Joe’s, Taylor’s Bar, Kulka’s. All were within a five-mile radius, and if the word hadn’t spread about Alex’s wondrous feat, Abe could walk into any or all of those joints and lay down a challenge to their best dart player. Hell, even if they had heard about Alex, so what? Chances were good they wouldn’t believe a story like that, a tiny boy tossing darts with the pinpoint accuracy of Cy Young. He could hardly believe it himself. All he had to do was walk into a joint, lay some cash on the bar and announce, my money here says my little boy can beat any so-called champion dart thrower in the house. If he could shake lose, say, a ten or so from Delia, and God knows she’s tight with a buck, why then he could turn his bets into some real money, a nice bit of jack for the two of them. The road ahead offered no shortage of bars and taverns where Alex could whip all comers. The boy was his meal ticket, and good meals at that, steak and potatoes and top-shelf whiskey. Hell, the rich bastards in this country made tons of money without doing a real lick of work. Why couldn’t he? All he needed was someone to stake him.

  But then, could he really go through with it? Would it be right to use his son like this? The boy seemed to be having a good time, but what if this day was a one-time miracle? How did he know Alex could do it again? And what about Irene? Oh yes, Irene. When she caught wind of it, she’d put the kibosh on it in two seconds. God damn it, he thought, why did things always have to get so complicated? He felt the curtain closing on his dream. But still. This was going to take some thought to make it happen.

  “Excuse me, Mr. Miller.”

  “Malkin. I was just about to come upstairs. How is she?”

  “I have given it to her something for the symptoms, yes, but she is quite ill, as you are knowing it. However, with some rest perhaps we shall see it an improvement.” He sniffed the air. “Oh, excuse me, but before I had went upstairs to give it to your wife the physical examination, Mrs. Ida, a sweet and gentle woman as there ever is, she had offered it to me some soup. I am wondering now, as I see it is still on the table, as I would not want it should be wasted, if I may have it.”

  “Yeah, go ahead, help yourself, I don’t care. Wait.” Abe fingered a bill in his pocket. “What do I owe you?”

  Forgetting his charitable offer just minutes before, Malkin said, “For you, just one dollar today. Please.”

  *

  After Alex hid the stickpin, the boys added up the money from Principal Darwimple’s wallet and the woman’s change purse. Arthur put everything in the purse and told them he’d hide it somewhere in the basement, near the furnace, and that they would spend it a little at a time so nobody would know how much they had, which was a lie, since he had his eye on bigger things, namely a 25-inch pop gun that could shoot cork, peas or gravel.

  The brothers shared more candy and sang a few rounds of Row Row Row Your Boat so loudly they didn’t hear the gurgling sounds coming from their mother’s bedroom.

  Chapter 12

  Irene died the following Monday. Abe swore up and down that her death was due to an overdose of Malkin’s tonic, and while it certainly may have been a contributing factor, the Allegheny County Coroner’s Office officially listed her death as it had listed the demise of more than 10,000 other Pittsburghers that year: heart and lung failure due to diphtheria.

  A surprising number of Mellon Street neighbors turned out for the funeral and burial, surprising because of the nasty late March weather and because Irene had never been very “social.” If a neighborhood woman needed to borrow a cup of sugar or spread a rumor about someone else’s husband, Irene Miller would have been far down the list of confidants.

  Two inches of fast-melting spring snow had muddied the grounds around the gravesite, and the mourners stepped gingerly between the wet spots, trying to stay on the gray carpet that led to the newly dug grave. They clustered together tightly, perhaps wi
th communal grief, but more likely to trying to find warmth in numbers.

  Arthur and Benjamin stood stiff-legged in the slush in their new, poorly fitted black suits and dress shoes that Abe had purchased with his winnings from the wagers he’d made at the darts tournament. Benjamin held Abe’s hand and sobbed quietly. Arthur held a handkerchief to his face, pretending to wipe his nose but in reality trying to hide tears.

  Abe wore a broad-brimmed hat and his only suit, a navy blue pinstripe, with lapels that were decidedly too sporty for such a solemn occasion. He held Alex in his left arm and stood a bit unsteadily, partly out of grief, partly out of remorse, and partly because he’d been drinking since nine that morning.

  Father Kiernan presided over the funeral. Ida had insisted that her daughter be given a Catholic burial and Abe consented, figuring she was brought up that way, let her go out that way. Kiernan instructed the assemblage to close ranks around the coffin, which was covered partially by a tarpaulin canopy. He seemed pleased with the turnout, which was larger than some of his weekday masses.

  Despite the tarp, a drippy glaze covered the casket, a mid-priced metal model with a simple silver cross. Father Kiernan cleared his throat and began to speak with his flat, singsong intonation. “O God, by Your mercy, rest is given to the souls of the faithful, please to bless this grave. Appoint Your holy angels to guard it and set free from all the chains of sin and the soul of her whose body is buried here, so that with all Thy saints she may rejoice in Thee forever. Through Christ our Lord, amen.”

  The crowed said, “Amen.”

  Mildred Donnelley, standing near the back, whispered, “I hope he’s don’t go on and on with it.”

  The wind picked up, and people began to fidget and shiver. Father Kiernan seemed uncomfortable, too, perhaps because he hadn’t spoken to Irene in years and the memory of her wild teenage ways and her marriage out of the faith had always disconcerted him. But he pressed on. “Because God has chosen to call our sister from this life to Himself, we commit her body to the earth, for we are dust and into dust we shall return.”

  As he tried to finish up, Ida kept repeating loudly that it was a terrible thing to outlive your child, that it wasn’t natural, and her voice, full of angst and frustration, was so strident, Father Kiernan felt compelled to say, “Ida, please.” He gestured to the mourners. “The Lord’s prayer.”

  Standing thirty yards away under a large maple tree were four husky men in dark overalls and boots, smoking cigarettes and leaning on their shovels, seemingly unaffected by the weather or the ceremony. It was just another day, just another hole to dig, just another casket to pry open after the crowd had left, to see what jewelry they could salvage from the fingers and necks of the deceased. After all, who could make better use of the jewelry, the dead or the living?

  After the last “amen,” the crowd moved as quickly as decorum would allow to the relative warmth of the waiting cars and wagons. On Abe’s instructions, Arthur and Benjamin took Ida’s arms to help steady her over the bumpy ground. Abe and Alex followed.

  The gravediggers moved around the coffin. They knocked the mud from their boots with their shovels. Fanning out around the casket, they maneuvered the burlap straps and began to lower away.

  Alex, however, wasn’t ready to leave. He twisted out of his father’s arms and scrambled back toward the grave as fast as his arms and legs could carry him. Ida cried, “Someone grab him! He’s going to throw himself in,” but instead, Alex hurled the pick-pocketed diamond stickpin into the grave. Before Abe could retrieve him, as if he knew their intentions, Alex pointed at the gravediggers and shouted, “Leave her alone.”

  *

  Back at Mellon Street an hour later, the mourners arrived in threes and fours, wet, chilly and hungry. Abe had stationed Arthur and Benjamin near the door to take their coats and stack them in the small living room. Hushed, respectful tones soon gave way to louder, more cordial, even slightly jovial exchanges as the well-wishers consumed free liquor and sandwiches, potato salad, deviled eggs and coffee cakes. Abe stood next to the dining room table and accepted heartfelt and not so heartfelt condolences from friends and neighbors, feeling melancholy and slightly numbed from his fourth drink of the day.

  A shout came from the living room. “Mom’s calling me!” It was Benjamin, pointing frantically to the second floor. “She’s calling me now.”

  Abe jumped up. “Benjamin, calm down, son.”

  “She’s calling me! She wants me right now.” He ran up the stairs.

  “Arthur, get him,” Abe yelled, but Arthur, spooked, stood rooted to the floor.

  Upstairs, Abe found Benjamin sitting outside their room. “Mom called me, she said she needed me.”

  “It’s all right, son, it’s all right. Come on back downstairs.”

  “But she wants me here.”

  Abe put his arm around Benjamin’s shoulders. “You’re just imagining it, that’s all.”

  Benjamin began to cry. “But she…I want to go to buh…bed.”

  “All right, Benjamin. You go lie down.” Abe sighed. Wouldn’t you know it, now it was the quiet son that needed all the attention. He put him to bed and helped him off with his shoes.

  Despite Benjamin’s hysterics, it was Alex who drew the most sympathy. Women kissed him on the forehead and explained that Momma had gone to a far better place, that she was now up in Heaven with Jesus, looking down on him right this moment, that Heaven is where all the good people go when they pass from this Earth, and even though you don’t understand what has happened to your mother, someday you will, and on and on, espousing all the predictable clichés one might say to a lost little boy, a very little boy at that. More than one of the women commented that they wished they could take the motherless Alex home with them, just look how precious he is.

  The only missing member of the extended family was Ida, who had refused to come to Abe’s house, preferring to go home by herself, saying that she wanted to go through some of Irene’s childhood things. The truth was, she was unwilling to expose herself to the sympathy of strangers. She preferred the company of a bottle.

  By one o’clock, the coal and iceman, Mr. Traficante, was halfway in the bag and looking to go all the way. He began to sing Italian folk songs, which thinned the crowd a little. Someone yelled at him to put a lid on it, but he kept on singing, albeit toned down a touch.

  During the third chorus of O Solo Mio, a crew of a dozen men arrived from The Squeaky Wheel, led by John and Davy O’Brien. They carried platters of food, and John’s barman wheeled in a keg of beer. The remaining neighbors decided they could put up with Traficante’s singing now that reinforcements had arrived.

  More than twenty people stood stuffed around the dining room table, where the food was set up. Cigars were out in full force, generating a low-hanging cloud of smoke. Alex sat in Davy’s lap. Soon the conversation moved away from the sadness of Irene’s passing into a retelling of Alex’s dart-throwing exploits. According to Emil Kozich, who’d lost a dollar on Edward Peck, it was the strangest damn thing he’d ever seen—no wait, it was like a dream, wasn’t that right, fellas? Yet and still, he asserted, the whole deal was bogus, John should have made Davy throw himself or forfeit the match. John told him to shut up, it was over and done with, but then even John couldn’t help himself, he retold the story and turned to Alex. “Listen, kid, show everyone again how you threw them darts.”

  Alex looked at Davy, who was sipping Malkin’s tonic from a silver flask. His complexion was greenish gray. He said, “Leave the child be, will you. His mother just passed.”

  “Never mind, I’ll show you, “ said Edward Peck. He did his best to imitate Alex’s herky-jerky catapult motion, but Kozich told him, no, you got it all wrong. He palmed an orange from a fruit basket sent by Plotkin’s Grocery and went into Alex’s delivery. When he reached the apex the orange flew out of his hand and hit Mrs. Traficante squarely between the eyes, which caused Mr. Traficante to hit Kozich in return, and full-scale mayhem may have broke
n out between The Wheel crew and the locals had Davy not bellowed out a powerful chorus of “Amazing Grace.” The pushing and shoving gradually subsided, and as Davy crooned, Alex hummed along in a sweet, high-pitched voice.

  As Davy sang, all eyes were on him except for Abe’s. His gaze was firmly planted on a tall, pretty woman with dark bangs and a feathered hat standing just inside the door.

  Delia motioned to Abe. With a furtive glance back at the crowd, which was imploring Davy to sing another, he slipped away to join her.

  They stood outside, a couple of steps from the front door. “So,” Delia said. “I’m sorry about your wife.” She touched his arm. “Really I am. Maybe it ain’t the same thing, but I was pretty shook up when I lost my mother, so I guess I know how you feel.”

  “Thanks.”

  Mr. and Mrs. Traficante edged by them. Halfway down the walkway, Mrs. Traficante peeked back over her shoulder.

  “Anyway, Abe, I hope she didn’t suffer too much.”

  “I don’t know. I mean, she was pretty bad off, you know, the fever had her all confused.”

  “Malkin didn’t show his face today, did he?”

  “No, and if he does I’ll break it for him.”

  “The son of a bitch.”

  Abe glanced down at his shoes, still splattered with mud from the cemetery. Irene would have made him take them off on the porch. “She was a good woman, you know.”

  “Sure.”

  “She didn’t deserve this.”

  “This? You mean The Dip? Or do you mean, you-and-me this.”

  “Either. Both.” He sniffed and wiped his face with a handkerchief. “Before the boys was born we had some good times, Irene and me. You wouldn’t know it, but she was some dancer. Made me look like a cripple next to her.”

  Delia sighed. “No kidding.” She turned her collar up against her neck. “Feels like it could snow some more.”

  “But then the boys came along and it seemed like our life together was over, at least the part of it where we were young.”