The driver has a massive back. He’s wearing a white Kangol and a black leather jacket with a raised collar, plus a heavy dose of what smells like Drakkar Noir. His eyes in the rearview roam from her face down to her chest. “Where you headed, sweetheart?” he says.
The bad-cologne smell is so overwhelming, Amy’s got to roll down the window. “You know St. Mary’s?”
“Sure.”
“I’m going there. The Eighty-Fifth Street side.” She’s hesitant to say her address, to let him know where exactly she lives.
“A little late-night confession?”
She doesn’t say anything in response.
He pulls out of the lot and takes a left onto Eighty-Sixth Street. Amy watches storefronts zip by through the open window, hoping to avoid any other interaction with the driver. Tile and marble store. Tire shop. Tasty Chicken. Tasty Bagels. Paint store. The New Utrecht branch of the library. East Ocean Buffet. Threading salon. Marshall’s. New Utrecht Avenue brings the El with it where it intersects Eighty-Sixth Street, Capelli’s Funeral Home on the corner. Under the El, red lights flash. Brake lights. Doubleparked cars. A woman on a treadmill in the window of a brightly lit 24 Hour Fitness. Duke’s Deli. That Polish restaurant. Meats Supreme. Cigar Emporium. A few sushi joints Amy doesn’t remember being there before. A Popeyes with Chinese writing on the sign.
“You know a lady named Betty Clay?” the driver says.
“Don’t think so,” Amy says.
“My aunt. She goes to St. Mary’s. I used to go to Most Precious Blood growing up. Is that church even still there?”
“It’s still there.” She’d gone to Most Precious Blood on Bay Forty-Seventh with Alessandra a few times when they first moved back. Alessandra went to school there, but the school had closed years ago, and her father liked St. Mary’s better.
“You should cheer up, you know? Smile more.” The driver’s looking at her in the rearview mirror.
“You don’t know me.”
“You’re pretty. Smile.”
“Go fuck yourself.”
The driver laughs. “Whoa, there.”
They turn onto Twenty-Third Avenue, passing the bright Russian market on the corner. He drops her in front of the church on Eighty-Fifth Street and says how much the fare is. Amy pays it to the penny and doesn’t tip. She gets out of the car, and the driver is pulling away before she can even fully close the door.
She walks up the block to her apartment. As she opens the front gate, she looks up and sees Mr. Pezzolanti watching her from his window. He puts up his hand. Amy stops before descending the steps to her apartment. Mr. Pezzolanti’s door opens, and he steps outside. He’s wearing slippers and a fluffy robe with a big splotch of ice cream on it.
“I was worried,” he says. “I look at the time, I think, This is unlike her. Your old man back around, I didn’t know what to make of it.”
“I’m fine, Mr. P.”
“You sure? You look a little rattled.”
“I’m good. Just tired. I took a long walk.”
“You need anything, you just let me know.” His concern is real, but he’s also curious. She can see the questions burning in his eyes. Where was she? Who was she with?
She goes into her apartment and doesn’t turn on the lights. She sits on her bed and kicks off her sneakers. She sees herself leaning over Vincent, a streetlamp making a halo over her head. She sees Vincent’s mouth up close. Blood. Choking. His hushed plea for her to call someone. Then, the killer’s profile and his boots on the pavement. She tries to remember everything she can. She thinks about Bob Tully again, about who she was and what she saw and how that had shaped her life and especially how it had shaped everything she’d done from the minute she got to Mrs. Epifanio’s. Her inaction had been the inaction of the girl scared to death by Bob Tully. The thrill she’d felt following Vincent was the same thrill she’d felt then, too. She seemed to see herself from outside now. She’d become so boring. She’d allowed herself to get carried away.
She takes out the knife. She lets it sit in her hand like something she discovered buried in the woods. The handle is still rimmed with blood. She brings it into the bathroom and washes it with her sandalwood-spice hand soap. What’s left of Vincent’s blood runs down the drain. When she’s done, she dries the knife with a coarse black towel.
She wonders if Vincent’s body has been discovered yet. She can imagine the scene: an ambulance with its back doors thrown open; two EMS workers huddled over the body; cops milling about; neighbors out on their stoops, shaking their heads, shocked something like this could happen on their block. She wonders again if any of them saw anything—something like two men fighting and a woman crouching behind a car, then the woman rushing over to the fallen man after the killer fled. The woman not helping, not in any way they could see. The woman picking up and pocketing the knife and rushing away.
If she’s going to keep the knife, she has to hide it. She goes to the fridge, where she keeps a package of raspberry-mint ice pops in the freezer. She drops the knife into the box, then goes back to the bed and pulls on her hood. She buries herself in her aloneness. She tries to forgive herself. She asks for God’s forgiveness. She prays. She swears she hears the front gate open in the yard. She hears leaves crunching underfoot. She misses her records. She puts on her headphones, but the batteries in her old Walkman are dead. She feels forsaken. She can’t sleep. She sees Bob Tully’s smiling face. She wonders if she’ll ever sleep again.
7
Amy doesn’t remember sleeping at all. When she sits up at seven thirty the next morning, her eyes are burning and heavy. She doesn’t feel like changing her clothes. She goes into the bathroom and brushes her teeth. She avoids the mirror again and puts on her sneakers and steps outside.
The weather has changed a little, dropped about ten degrees. The day before felt like spring. Today’s not that much different, but it’s leaning back toward what February should be.
Amy’s relieved to see that Mr. Pezzolanti is not out front waiting for her.
She goes to the Russian market on Twenty-Third Avenue and buys the Daily News and a coffee. She flips through the newspaper, looking for the story, for a picture of Vincent. She half expected it to be on the cover. She guesses everyone feels that way about a crime they’ve witnessed or been a victim of, like it’s the only story in the city. She remembers feeling this about Bob Tully, too. But that crime didn’t show up in the papers; the man was never so much as missed. Vincent’s murder is nowhere that she can see, not even buried in the middle in small print. She drops the newspaper in the garbage can on the corner and sips her coffee. It’s at least stronger than the diner coffee. The blue paper cup is hot and alive in her hands.
She read once about saints and sleeplessness, how insomnia teamed with fasting could produce visions. Is she in the middle of something like that now? Not that she’s a saint. But as a regular person, hit by this trauma. No food, no sleep, her nerves a jangle of fears. Everything seems sharper and brighter and more defined to her. The train overhead is louder. Time feels thinned out, like she’s inhabiting an illusion.
Testing the dread, she walks to Eighty-Fourth Street and enters the St. Mary’s rectory. She’s supposed to do things today. She’s supposed to pick something up and walk somewhere and deliver something. She’s supposed to be a light soul. She’s supposed to be helpful.
Connie Giacchino is sitting at the main desk hoisting a red mug that reads pray bigger. Prayer cards are fanned out in front of her. Her tinted glasses don’t hide the shock in her eyes when she sees Amy.
“You okay?” Connie says, setting down her mug.
“I’m not feeling well,” Amy says, her voice sounding strange in the stuffy room. She looks at the walls, as if seeing them for the first time. Sacred Heart calendars, mysterious certificates, framed pictures of Pope Francis. “Can you please tell Monsignor Ricciardi that I’m not going to be able to do anything today?”
“Of course.” Connie rises to her feet. �
��You don’t look well. You want to sit down? Can I get you anything? Tea?”
“I’m going back home.”
“Did something happen, Amy?”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know, exactly. You just look like something happened.”
“Nothing happened.”
“It’s no problem, really. Immacula helped yesterday, and she’ll help again today. God knows, she’s got nothing going on.”
“Thank you.”
“Do you want to talk to Monsignor Ricciardi? He’ll be back in fifteen minutes.”
“Do I need to talk to him?”
“I just meant if you’d be more comfortable talking to him than me. You know, if you’ve got something going on you want to talk to him about.”
Amy steps back. “I told you, I’m fine, Connie.”
“I believe you.” Connie picks up the phone. “I’m just going to call Immacula.”
Amy turns and walks out of the rectory. She drinks some coffee and then spits it out because it’s cold. She pauses to pour the rest down a sewer drain and ditches the cup in a small garbage can by the fence.
She cuts through the parking lot to the Eighty-Fifth Street side of the church. Her father is sitting on the front steps, the glass doors behind him shivering with reflections of the morning light. If she hadn’t just seen him the day before, she would’ve figured him for a resident from the home down on Cropsey Avenue. Wild hair. Unkempt beard. Rheumy eyes. Too-big clothes from some donation drive. Filthy sneakers. Hands cupped over his knees like a scolded kid. His chest looks scarecrow-stuffed under a ratty flannel. He smiles at her.
“What’re you doing here?” Amy says.
“I’m a little early for our lunch date. I thought I’d just sit out here and enjoy the morning.”
Amy’s taken aback. Fred’s voice melts into the noise of everything else. She’d forgotten she said she’d go to lunch with him. And it’s not even close to lunchtime. “A little early? It’s, what, eight fifteen?”
“Something like that. I was just gonna kick around a little. Try to stay out of trouble. Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.”
“You don’t look okay.”
“I’ve heard.”
“You want, we can just go grab breakfast or coffee now. But I don’t mind killing time. I like to walk around. I can just explore the neighborhood a little.”
Amy looks up at the rooftop of the apartment building across the street. Pigeons perch on the edge. “That’s fine,” she says, aware of how much she’s using the word fine, as if it’s a thing to lean on, as if it’ll be true if she says it enough.
She takes him to the Starbucks on Eighty-Sixth Street, just past the corner of Twentieth Avenue. It’s right next to Lenny’s Pizza. As they enter, Fred says, “They have a computer at the place where I normally stay, and I was reading how that pizza joint right there is famous, because it was in Saturday Night Fever. You know, I never saw it. I remember it being a big deal. Travolta. I saw him in that O. J. Simpson miniseries, playing Bob Shapiro, and he was pretty good. I watch TV when I can now. I’m rambling. Sorry.”
“I saw it, sure,” Amy says. “Saturday Night Fever. Not the O.J. thing.”
“I ought to see it sometime, too.”
At the counter, she orders a grande Americano, and Fred gets a blueberry muffin and a tall coffee. Amy tries to pay, but Fred stops her and shoves a crumpled ten at the barista in the black visor and green apron with a dragon tattooed on her forearm.
They sit at a booth by the window, watching people walk by on Eighty-Sixth Street with shopping carts and baby carriages and plastic bags from markets. The Manhattan-bound D rumbles by on the El overhead. A traffic cop is out giving tickets to cars whose Muni Meter receipts have expired. Trucks are making deliveries at the curb. Amy zeroes in on a woman in blue shoes eating a Sausage McGriddle from McDonald’s over her hand. Her hair has streaks that match her shoes.
“Can’t believe this is February,” Fred says.
“Yeah,” Amy says.
Fred takes the lid off his coffee and blows on it. “Is this me doing this to you?” he says. “You look wrecked. I don’t want you to be wrecked about me showing back up in your life. That’s not the end result I was hoping for.”
“What are you hoping for?”
Fred looks out the window. “I don’t know. I just want you to know you still have a father. I haven’t been a father to you in your life, I know that much, but I want to try now.”
“Being a father is taking me out for coffee and paying?”
“I’m sorry. I’m trying.”
“You’ve gotta understand how strange this is for me,” Amy says. “I figured you for dead. I was a kid when you left, and I hardly spent any time with you then. You’re flashes in my memory, that’s it. I didn’t even remember your voice until you spoke.”
Fred tears up. Spit webs the corners of his mouth. “I wish I could take it back. I wish I could be there for you and your mother. I made a lot of bad decisions.” He picks at his muffin. “Can I be honest with you? And I’m not saying this because I want you to pity me. I’ve been on the verge of throwing myself off a bridge many times over the years. I’ve cut my wrists. Stabbed myself once. Took an overdose of pain pills I stole from a woman I was seeing. A lot of that’s from knowing how much I let you down. You were born, I had one job, and I didn’t do it. Maybe I should’ve offed myself. Maybe my gift to you should’ve been staying out of your life. You’ve done pretty well without me.”
Amy doesn’t want to feel pity for Fred right now. She refuses to accept it as one of the conditions of this encounter. She looks away. A line about four or five people deep has built up at the counter. The last man in the line, she thinks she recognizes him. Same boots. Same drooping jeans. His hands are in his pockets. He looks jumpy. She’s sure it’s Vincent’s killer.
His hair is dark. She can’t see his face. She thinks, just from the quick look, that it can’t be the guy who’d sat with Vincent on the bench outside Homestretch, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be the killer. She has no proof that they’re one and the same, and her initial read of the guy on the bench hadn’t been great. She puts her face against her arm, slumping down in the seat.
“You’re distracted,” Fred says, wiping tears from his cheeks. “What is it?”
“It’s nothing,” Amy says in a low voice.
When this man gets to the front of the line and turns to order and she sees his profile, Amy will know for sure if it’s Vincent’s killer. But if he’s following her, if he followed her here, why would he be waiting in line for coffee like a schmuck? Maybe he knows she’s not a hundred percent on his identity. Maybe he’s toying with her.
“You look like you saw a ghost,” Fred says.
“Maybe I did,” Amy says.
“I’m putting my heart on the table here.”
“It bums you out I’m not giving you my full attention, huh? Now you know what my childhood was like.”
Fred, defeated, rips off the cardboard sleeve from around his coffee. “I deserve that.” He begins to pick it to pieces, piling them on the table next to his cup.
When the man makes it to the front of the line and turns to face the barista, Amy remains silent, fidgeting. She watches him closely. She studies his profile. This man, he’s Chinese. She’s sure the killer wasn’t Chinese. He had that long Italian nose. Looked like one of those guys from the neighborhood whose last name has a lot of zs in it. She lets out a breath. She’s just being paranoid. “It’s not him,” she says aloud.
“What’s going on, Amy?” Fred asks.
“I said nothing’s going on.”
“Who’s not who?”
“Forget it.”
“You’ve been staring at the man at the counter. You know him?”
“I don’t.”
“What I said, you got any response? A big part of my recovery is letting people know how I feel and living resentment-free. I know I’ve
got no right to ask you for help or anything.”
“Resentment-free?”
“I just don’t want to walk away from this opportunity feeling like you haven’t heard me at all.”
“And you’re gonna resent me if I don’t listen to you?”
“I’m trying to be frank.”
“You’re in AA?”
“Been clean five years. One thousand, eight hundred, and sixty-three days, to be exact.”
“That’s good. I don’t drink much anymore. I never had a problem, but I gave it up after I quit working at the bar when Alessandra left. I saw what it did to people. I’d seen my whole life what it did to people. I didn’t want to drown in it, too.”
“Alessandra?”
“She was my girlfriend for a while. She’s why I moved to this part of Brooklyn.”
“I didn’t know her name. The people at your old bar mentioned that you moved to Brooklyn with someone.”
“We’re doing exactly what I didn’t want to do. Going through each other’s histories.”
“It’s nice to catch up. I want to hear about your life.”
Amy remembers her Americano. It’s cooled down enough to drink. She takes a sip. The relief she’s feeling has allowed her to let her guard down a little. She likes that Fred didn’t act surprised or shocked about Alessandra. She likes that he hasn’t asked a follow-up question. Maybe he knows. Maybe someone at Seven Bar told him she’s gay. Maybe he knows that asking dumb questions won’t get him anywhere. Maybe he’s okay with it.
“Alessandra grew up around here,” she says. “Gravesend. Bensonhurst. I stuck around after she went back to Los Angeles. I started going to church, and I just felt like I could hide out and maybe help people.”
“I get that. Noble as hell, wanting to help folks.” He sifts through the pieces of the cardboard sleeve, thumbing a bigger hunk into a folded square. “It’s so nice to be talking to you. I waited a long time for this chance. The day I got clean, I made it my number one goal. I wanted to get to a point where I could stand in front of you and not be embarrassed of who I am at that moment. I mean, I’ll always be ashamed of who I was.”
The Lonely Witness Page 6
