When my sister heard one of the boy toy’s friends coo, “Mmmmmm, that is one big girl,” Lisa leaned over to Eddie and said, “Make sure your boy toy’s friend knows she’s actually a woman and not a tranny.” Eddie did, and the boy toy’s friend raised a well-plucked eyebrow, accusing him of joking. I smiled as the boy toy self-consciously touched his trim abs to assure himself that being around a group of people who frequently abused calorie intake had not made him fat by proximity.
There is nothing like the funeral of a fairly unlikable woman to bring out the crowds of elderly Italians. Going to a funeral that is guaranteed to not be sad was basically an exercise of paying your respects for the free buffet. The buffet, in this case, would be held after the service, at our condo. Erica had volunteered to take care of the food arrangements so we could focus on the funeral service and whatever else Uncle Freddie needed, but Lisa wouldn’t hear of it. She had laid out a spread of homemade lasagna, stuffed artichokes, and two vats of simmering meatballs, and had put together three trays of stunningly arranged antipasto that could have fed twice the people attending. Vince and I had already carefully raided the sharp provolone chunks and rearranged as needed.
The flowers were amazing, and Eddie was able to fill an entire row of guests with his overdressed friends, their ultra-conservative suits and ties contrasting with tastefully applied makeup—if you can ever consider makeup on men tasteful. I walked through a crowd of people who were marveling at how Eddie managed to make floral arrangements with birds of paradise somehow work with the somber décor of the funeral home, but Lisa and I knew that making the unexpected thing work was one of Eddie’s many gifts. Vince and I both glanced at Uncle Freddie, who was having a conversation with Dad.
Vince whispered in my ear, “I shouldn’t say it, but it’s not at all like when Uncle Tony lost Auntie Celia.”
I had just been thinking the same thing. “Don’t forget that while Uncle Freddie lived under her iron fist for all of his adult life, it’s still going to be a big adjustment for him.”
Vince agreed, “Yeah, like how some lifers don’t want to leave jail when their time comes up.”
“They get attached to the beatings,” I whispered back, as we both stifled a soft chuckle. “Could have been the great Italian food that kept him.”
“Gotta give Aunt Aggie credit there,” I agreed.
“Remember at Grandma’s funeral, when Aunt Aggie tried to throw herself in the grave?”
I sighed. “Good times.”
Vince said, “Well, if it happens again, there’ll be no waiting.”
We were unable to get Uncle Freddie’s favorite priest, so the eulogy was so benign it sounded like the priest was working off Mad Libs: The Eulogy Edition. It was shaping up to be a very uneventful wake and funeral, a rare thing in our family. I had been so busy with the camp that the droning of the priest got to me and I nodded off to sleep a few times, waking up when Vince elbowed me as Uncle Freddie stepped in front of the gathering to say a few words.
Mom was still wincing with her I-killed-someone-with-my-evil-powers face, and I watched it twist it up a notch as Uncle Freddie began to speak. “Thank you all for coming,” he said with his Italian accent and sweet smile. “My wife and I were together for over fifty-seven years, and there was not a single day where we didn’t look into each other’s eyes . . . and have an argument.” The crowd let out a relieved chuckle, hoping they’d dodged a tear-jerking speech.
Uncle Freddie continued, “I had no idea all I had to say was ‘drop dead’ and I could have lived my whole life in peace!” Everyone chuckled again, as Mom shook her head and covered her face in embarrassment.
“But seriously, my wife and I argued, but we had a lot of laughs, too. Nobody could energize a room like my Aggie, you could never deny her that. I used to tell her she was a tough lady to love . . . but she was my tough lady.”
The room took on a tense silence, noted by shifting bodies and creaking chairs and a few uncomfortable coughs. “When we were first dating, Aggie used to tell me I was the only man strong enough to love her. But I don’t feel very strong today . . . Maybe this is what I will be—a little less strong without her.”
I caught the eyes of my sister and brother, who both looked like I must have looked: We were all hit by the realization that, despite all the yelling she did and complaining he did, Uncle Freddie had lost his best friend.
“We didn’t expect her to leave us this suddenly, and she sure would have wanted to stretch it out a bit. Aggie loved to be the center of attention, so she had talked about what she wanted for her funeral. I was surprised when she asked me to do only two things. The first was to ask a favor of all of you, and I promise you, she really asked this. She asked that you all forgive her for the way she was sometimes. She loved you all, but she couldn’t help it. She said it was too much fun to be a bitch.”
There were a few small laughs, but now people were tearing up, and the row of stout female cousins and Eddie and his friends began sniffing into Kleenex’s. One of our cousins, the one that Lisa called “Buff,” was putting on the best show of grief I had seen since Grandma’s funeral when Aunt Aggie eclipsed the competition, even though Aunt Aggie had not spoken to Grandma in years. Like Aunt Aggie, Buff was quite the character, equal parts sweet and bitchy, and she was equally wide as she was tall, which this was the reason Lisa called her Buff. (Her real name was Faye—as in, Buff-Faye.)
Uncle Freddie continued, “The second thing she asked me to do is a little harder . . . but I have to do what she wanted since it is her last request.” His voice cracked and I could feel my eyes burning with the threat of tears. “So now, I am going to ask that my Lisa, Marie, and Vince and my brother-in-law Sal come with me into a private room.” There was a hush to the crowd again, but Uncle Freddie lightened his voice and said, “Please join us back at the house to enjoy the lovely buffet Lisa has prepared, and thank you so much for coming. See you back out here in a few moments.”
We followed Uncle Freddie into a back room of the funeral home, where a man had been standing at the doorway. The man nodded at him as we passed and opened the door for him and before he closed it behind us, I could see Mom’s face scrunched with concern for what was happening without her, the assassin of Uncle Freddie’s wife.
When the door was closed, Uncle Freddie walked silently around to the other side of a long table in the middle of the odd-looking room lined with plastic on the floor (for the hard-core criers?). He leaned on the table with both of his hands. The table was covered with a bland tablecloth that reached to the floor and had a floral arrangement on it that was attractive but not offensively pretty for the occasion of death. He paused and didn’t say a word for a long time while we stared at him, not knowing what to do.
Dad finally asked, “Freddie, are you alright?”
Uncle Freddie took a deep and serious breath. “Aggie asked me to do is this, because she said keeping the kids’ traditions are important, and, you know, she knew you kids always did this at funerals . . . and she couldn’t leave this earth without getting in one last shot . . .”
Just then, Uncle Freddie dipped under the table and whipped out two large, bright fluorescent plastic objects, and pointed them at us: “She said none of you would dare shoot back at the bereaved!”
Even as it was happening I knew later the scene would be remembered and retold in slow motion in classic war-movie style like a scene from Full Metal Jacket and Saving Private Ryan, only we would be laughing our asses off.
Vince, Lisa, and I all mouthed in slow motion the word “Noooooooooo!” as Uncle Freddie blasted us with two giant water pistols, outfitted with automatic trigger-action, light, and blaster sound effects. Uncle Freddie had skimped on the coffin, but had gotten the deluxe Super Soakers. Good choice, I thought, as I dove for the floor, despite my tight black skirt.
My siblings and I all hit the deck at once, and I knew my brother and sister would be thinking what I was, that for years we’d thought our discreet
shooting of each other with water pistols at family death-related events had gone unnoticed by the older folks. I realized now as I shamefully crouched down behind the table Uncle Freddie was shooting us from, that I would have used a row of elderly relatives as human shields.
Sprawled out on the floor, I looked to Vince in desperation and hope. “Do you?” I asked. He nodded, then I turned to Lisa, “Do you?” and she nodded back with a sinister grin.
While Dad was getting nailed by the water pistols for not reacting quickly enough, I called out, “On three! One . . . two . . . THREE!”
The three of us jumped up, pulling out our own water pistols (sadly, not the type to do battle, just the tiny, easy to hide, snub-nosed variety, the twin bed of the water pistol industry—perfect for drive-bys, but not for a battle like this) and we laughed our asses off as we fired back our pathetic weapons at Uncle Freddie in our perfect policeman stances, legs far apart, eyes on the barrel of our yellow, pink, and purple guns with bright orange safety plugs at the end of the barrels. The thought struck me, What does this sound like from the other side of the doorway, but there was a battle going on, and a guard at the door, and I couldn’t concern myself with that.
Then, in a stunning act of betrayal, Dad finally got his act together and pulled out his water pistol and chose to jump to the side with the heavy artillery. He sidled up to Uncle Freddie and helped him soak us as he and Dad laughed like hyenas. Collectively, we turned our guns on Dad, but even the three of us were no match for the Super Soakers, especially since Dad yelled to Uncle Freddie to play dirty and aim for the eyes and ears.
Uncle Freddie was heading closer, in slow motion (his usual speed), and my one thought was if my shirt got much wetter it would be completely see-through, so I backed out of the room, laughing and shooting, like the last action hero left on an alien-infested starship. When Lisa and Vince realized I was leaving, they turned their guns on me, Lisa’s last stream—tiny, but a direct hit to the eye—made my vision blurry when I emerged from the room soggy and stupid, unfocused on my Uncle Tony and his new wife Katherine who had entered the funeral home.
My heart stopped beating as what I feared would happen, did: a beautiful red-headed woman entered the room right behind them. Lorn Elaine, closeted actress, ex-love of my life, the woman who had dumped me three times (or was it four?), was now standing just a water pistol stream away. The door to the war room was still open, so my siblings naturally took advantage of my shock and nailed me repeatedly in the face, and everything went back into slow motion, the water pelting me in the head doing nothing to revive me from my state of shock.
“Oh shit,” Lisa said, as she halted her shooting.
“Oh shit,” Vince echoed.
“Oh perfect,” Erica said, somewhere behind me.
As Lorn moved toward me, I wiped a wet chunk of hair stuck to my face, feeling the sting of running mascara burning my eyes. A shallow thought pushed to the very front of my brain: Why is it when you look your worst, you see the person you wanted to see when you look your best? My body was frozen, but my heart was thudding loudly in my ears . . . or maybe it was the contents of Vince’s emptied water pistol sloshing around in my sinuses.
Katherine and Uncle Tony stepped back to let Lorn approach me first, her eyes boring into mine. Of course she looked amazing. I dropped my full pistol on my foot and stared down at it, as confused by the pain as if my foot had been hit with a steaming meatball. Meatballs would come later, along with some fresh grief from seeing Lorn again.
“It’s good to see you,” she said, and my body betrayed me by reacting naughtily to her voice. When I didn’t answer, she moved closer and said, “I’m so sorry about your Aunt Aggie.”
I could smell her, and instantly my senses came alive like someone had switched me on. A neon sign that had been turned off and cool to the touch, now raged hot and blinking: OPEN TO SERVE YOU. When I at last found my voice, I was thankful it remained ice cold. “You didn’t have to come all this way. You hardly knew her.”
Lorn’s eyes searched for some sign of the woman she knew before. I hoped she saw none.
She said softly so only I could hear, “I came for you.”
I could feel my brother and sister drifting away from the door behind me, leaving a sinking ship, and the ship was me. “You didn’t have to,” I said, “Aunt Aggie didn’t like a lot of people, including me, I think.”
Lorn took another step closer and I could see the tiny flecks of gold in her green eyes, the detail I could see only when we were close enough to touch. I could also see she was fighting back tears. Actress, I thought.
“Marie. I said I came for you,” she said again.
I felt a drop of water release from my chin. “You said a lot of things. I’m saying you wasted a trip.”
Twenty
Punch To The Gut, And I’m To Blame
Lisa was yelling a barrage of questions at me in the car, but I heard only a few: Why didn’t you tell her off?; Why didn’t you smack her across her pretty face?; Why didn’t you let me smack her pretty face?; etc., etc.
“Lisa—” Vince tried to shush her, but she was not having it.
“I don’t know,” I said as something hot tumbled down my cheek. A tear splashed on my pants and I looked at it, puzzled, as if it were a leak in the car roof. I turned my head to look out the window, hoping they didn’t notice. Lisa’s questions kept coming as I watched the cemetery trees whip by. Another tear rolled down my other cheek, which really pissed me off because I had made the decision not to cry.
As Vince tried to shush Lisa, I felt a hand gently press the middle of my back. It was Erica. Her touch made the floodgates burst open further. Lorn was not supposed to be here, I was not supposed to still hurt this much, and Erica was not supposed to behave sweetly to me. Erica felt the shudder in my back and thought her hand upset me, and took her hand away. It didn’t matter, of course, because I could still feel her there. She had left a scorching mark on me—and I worried if everyone else would see it, too.
We arrived at the cemetery, for which I was grateful, since it’s the only place besides the movies where you can cry in public without anyone asking what’s wrong. Specifically, I was grateful I could cry out of a maddening confusion about Erica, which my siblings would assume was about Lorn.
Lorn was there, but she kept her distance, or, more likely, Vince and Lisa kept me distant from her, since I had been led from the car by both my elbows as if I could lose the use of both my legs at any moment. I glanced over to Uncle Freddie, who looked sad but also quite strong for a man who had just lost his mate, and I stared at him, using him to will myself to get my frigging act together. I could not appear to be the most shattered person at a funeral for my famously cantankerous Aunt Aggie . . . it was fucking ridiculous.
I took a deep breath and scanned the crowd. Lorn was directly across the grave, her gaze fixed on me. I felt a punch to my gut. The distance gave me courage to risk staring back at her and ignore my inner voice telling me that the more sane option would be to poke my own eyes out and flick them into Aunt Aggie’s new digs. I was scanning the ground for pointy sticks to help me do just that, as I felt Vince’s arm slide around my shoulder.
It was Vince who understood best what Lorn had done to me, and what she still could do to me, if I let her, but it occurred to me that Erica also knew. I looked at Erica and saw that her eyes were also on me, but she shot her gaze away as if I had caught her pitying me. Instead, she turned her attention to Lorn and glared at her across the grave. I saw some hate there, and if Lorn knew Erica as I did, she would best be served by yelping like a wounded dog and running her pretty actress ass back to California.
Erica looked back at me and sadly, almost imperceptibly, shook her head no at me, a Charades-style warning to watch my step around that woman who had hurt me before. I stupidly looked back at Lorn and felt the punch to my gut for the third time. That is not how you should feel when you look at someone, right? I looked back to Erica to acknowl
edge that her silent warning was likely good, solid advice, but Erica had already left and was walking toward the car. The feeling in my gut was an unexpectedly stronger kick to the stomach.
I was grateful that Lorn didn’t come back to our condo after the funeral. My Uncle Tony and Lorn’s mother Katherine did, however, and although I really liked Katherine, I tried to avoid her until she cornered me in the kitchen and completely disarmed me with a warm hug.
“I’ve missed seeing you,” she said. “You know my daughter still loves you.” Katherine’s directness was the last thing I needed to hear as my heart pounded with the confirmation that Lorn was still mine, in some small way.
“I can’t do it again,” I said.
“Good,” she said, surprising me. “As much as she needs you, it really wouldn’t be best.”
I was disgusted by the regret that roiled up inside me. Maybe I was secretly hoping her daughter had changed and she could somehow guarantee she would not run from me again. But I knew this wasn’t true.
Katherine gently held my chin until I looked her in the eyes. It didn’t help that her eyes were an exact match of Lorn’s. “You need to do what’s best for you. I told Lorn she shouldn’t come, but you know how my daughter doesn’t listen to her mother.”
“What daughter does?” I said.
Katherine looked at me with concern. “Protect yourself.”
“She could never be with me, not in the way I wanted.”
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