Step on a Crack
Page 3
“Made it?” I repeated warily.
“I’m the au pair,” Mary Catherine said. “Nona said she spoke with you.”
Au pair? Nona? I thought. Then I remembered that Nona was Maeve’s mother’s name. My wife had always been insistently vague about her past, growing up in Donegal. I had a feeling her people were a little eccentric.
“I’m sorry, um, Mary, is it?” I said. “Ah, I don’t think I know exactly what you’re talking about.”
Mary Catherine’s mouth opened as if she was about to say something. Then it closed. Her porcelain features blushed crimson as she picked up her bag.
“Sorry I wasted your time, sir,” she said quickly and a tad sadly. “There must have been some mistake on my part. I’m sorry.”
Her duffel bag slipped out of her hand as she approached the elevator. I stepped out of the doorway to give her a hand, then noticed my mail on the floor. It had been piling up a little, and my helpful neighbors, the Underhills, had dumped it beneath the alcove’s table we share in order to make way for their antique wooden nutcracker collection.
I noticed a small, odd-looking letter sticking out from the pile’s center.
“Wait,” I said. “Hold up a second, Mary Catherine. Just a sec.”
I tore open the letter. It was handwritten in a tiny, all but illegible script, but I was able to make out the Dear Michael, a couple of Mary Catherine’s, and the God Bless You In Your Time of Need, Love Nona closing.
I still didn’t know what the hell it all meant, though.
I wasn’t even 100 percent aware my mother-in-law was still alive until that moment. One thing I was sure of, though, was that it was too late and I was too tired to try to figure it all out right now.
“Oh,” I said to the girl as the elevator door rumbled open. “You’re Mary Catherine, the au pair.”
Naked hope twinkled in her bright blue eyes. But where the heck was I going to put her? Our inn was filled to capacity. Then I remembered the maid’s room on the top floor; it had come with the apartment and was currently being used for storage.
“C’mon,” I said, grabbing her bag and walking her into the elevator. “I’ll show you where you’re staying.”
It took me a good twenty minutes to get the crib, baby toys, some old car seats, and Chrissy’s Barbie and Shawna’s Three Princesses bikes out of the small room.
By the time I went down to the apartment and came back with some sheets, Mary Catherine had the mattress unrolled on the steel-frame twin bed and was putting her stuff neatly into the drawers of the dresser we’d used for a changing table.
I studied her for a moment. She was in her late twenties. Though she wasn’t very tall, there seemed to be an energetic heartiness to her. Spunky, I thought, which was good, considering the job she was applying for.
“Nona didn’t happen to mention how big my family is, did she?”
“A brood, she said. ‘Quite a brood,’ I believe was the phrase she used.”
“How many is ‘quite a brood’? Where you come from?” I asked.
Mary Catherine’s eyebrows raised.
“Five?”
I shook my head, put out my thumb, and jerked it upward.
“Seven?”
I watched a ripple of panic cross Mary Catherine’s face when I motioned for her to shoot higher.
“Not ten?” she said.
I nodded.
“They’re all toilet trained, thank God. And they’re great kids. But if you want to walk away now or tomorrow or next week, I won’t blame you.”
“Ten?” Mary Catherine said again.
“A one and a zero,” I said with a smile. “Oh, and if you’re going to work for us, you have to call me Mike. Or idiot, if you want. But please don’t call me Mr. Bennett.”
“Okay, Mike,” Mary Catherine said.
As I left, I noticed that the panic seemed to have stuck in her face.
“Ten,” I repeated under my breath.
The perfect ten.
Chapter 8
DOWNSTAIRS, I couldn’t sleep a wink after I slid in between the cold sheets of my bed. I remembered that tomorrow was Caroline Hopkins’s funeral, and that was yet another sad fact to consider tonight.
I lay in the dark, listening to the winter wind howl around the corner of my building. Somewhere, on Broadway probably, a distant car alarm started up, went all the way through its excruciating phases of electronic agony only to start up again.
For about an hour, I steadfastly refused to feel sorry for myself. I wasn’t the one whose body had mutinied. I wasn’t the one who had devoted my life to helping others for thirty-eight years-and for that trouble wouldn’t be seeing thirty-nine.
Then I started to cry. It came on slowly, achingly, like the first cracks of ice on a pond you’ve wandered too far onto. After a minute, my steely composure was shattered into a thousand pieces, and I was lost.
Originally, I had just gone along with my wife’s idea to adopt. After we found out we couldn’t have kids, I would have done whatever Maeve wanted. I loved her so much and just wanted to make her happy in any way I could.
But after we got Jane, I was a little reluctant to go on. Three kids in New York? Even owning an apartment was expensive, and it wasn’t like I was Mr. Moneybags.
Maeve showed me that we had room in our home, and in our hearts, for one more. After Fiona and Bridget, I’d roll my eyes whenever Maeve would mention another foster case or needy child she’d heard about and say, “What’s another pound on an elephant?”
But how can an elephant live without a heart? I thought as I lay there with tears streaming down my cheeks.
There was no way I was going to be able to do this. The older kids were becoming teenagers, and the younger ones… Jesus Christ, how could I be in charge of their lives and their happiness and their future all by myself?
Then I heard my door crack open.
“Peep-peep,” someone small said.
It was Chrissy. Every morning, she’d come into our room with her empty cereal bowl pretending to be a different baby animal in need of feeding. A kitten, a puppy, a baby penguin, a baby armadillo one time.
She padded up to the edge of the bed.
“Peep-peep can’t sleep,” she said.
I wiped my tears on the pillow.
“Big Peep can’t either,” I said.
She hadn’t slept in our bed since she was two, and I was about to get up to tuck her back in her own bed, but then I pulled open the covers.
“Get in the nest, Peep, quick!”
As Chrissy dove in beside me, I realized how I’d gotten it dead wrong as usual. My kids weren’t a burden. They were the only thing holding me together.
Chrissy was asleep in about two minutes. After she dug the tiny icicles of her feet snugly into my kidneys, I realized sleepily that maybe you couldn’t call this happy. But it was the first time in weeks I’d seen the ballpark.
Chapter 9
WHAT AN INTERESTING DAY this was going to be. Eventful, historic as a son of a bitch.
The silver chimes of St. Patrick’s morning bells were still hanging in the chilled air over Fifth Avenue when the Neat Man arrived outside the cathedral’s massive entrance doors. He sipped his venti drip and shook his head at the crowd of loonies who already lined the sidewalk four-deep behind the police barricades.
Caroline Hopkins’s funeral wouldn’t start for another forty minutes, and already the turnout was as thick as the mounds of donated flowers that buried the base of the block-long church. She’d be getting a bigger holiday crowd than the Rock Center tree and Radio City Music Hall ’s Christmas Spectacular combined if this morning’s 1010 WINS report was right. Caroline had been a popular First Lady to be sure, but more important to many of these imbeciles, she’d been born and raised in New York City. She was one of their own. Yeah, right. Like the mayor of New York was one of the people.
The Neat Man took another shot of caffeine and continued to check out the scene. Up on the front ste
ps of St. Paddy’s, he watched a red-faced FDNY bagpiper struggling to hold down a plaid skirt over his tighty whities in the frigid wind.
In the vestibule, just inside the open three-story bronze doors, a marine drill sergeant inspected the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine honor guard. He snapped the bottom of the marine’s dress-blue jacket and slapped the blade of his hand across the sailor’s immaculate shoulder, knocking away an imaginary speck of dirt.
Then the limousines started arriving.
Mayor Andrew Thurman got there first, which made sense, the Neat Man thought. The mayor claimed to be a close friend of the Hopkinses.
Politically active movie-star couple Marilyn and Kenneth Rubenstein arrived next. The proenvironmentalist actors had done touchy-feely commercials with Caroline to put a stop to Alaskan wilderness oil drilling, or some such horseshit. In the meantime, both of their teenage kids were having major trouble with drugs and alcohol up in Westchester.
When someone in the crowd across Fifth whistled, two-time Oscar winner Kenneth Rubenstein turned with his million-dollar smile and waved with both hands as if he were about to receive a third award. The Neat Man grinned as he watched Rubenstein’s raven-haired wife, Marilyn, elbow him hard in the ribs. Cinema verité, he thought.
On the movie stars’ heels came real estate mogul Xavier Brown and his wife, a Chanel-clad fashion diva named Celeste. The power couple was also close friends of the First Lady. Hell, who wasn’t?
The next to de-limo was New York Giants quarterback Todd Snow. His Super Bowl ring glittered as he put his arm around his attractive model wife. The athlete had done charity work with Caroline Hopkins as well.
The Neat Man gazed with satisfaction at the tinted-window freight train of limousines forming to the north up Fifth Avenue. Hail, hail, the gang’s all here. Well, almost.
Finally, he looked up at the gigantic rose window and majestic three-hundred-foot stone towers at the front of the cathedral. With the ego-per-square-inch ratio this thing was developing, he thought, stamping his shoes onto the flagstone to warm his feet, it would be surprising if there’d still be room for the casket.
Chapter 10
JOHN ROONEY MADE a face like the Grinch as his limousine finally stopped in front of the churning crowds at St. Patrick’s. As Hollywood ’s current lead box-office-grossing actor, he’d come to appreciate the loyal fans who turned out for events of any kind. Most of them were just regular folks who wanted to show their support and appreciation. And he’d certainly take them over the paparazzi leeches. Any day, anywhere.
But now as he looked out at the rapacious faces and the raised picture phones, he was a little wary. Standing room only at a funeral, even at a high-profile ceremony, was a little too close to creepy.
Fortunately for him, the church side of Fifth Avenue was VIP only. Rooney exited onto the street behind Big Dan, his security guy. There was already a line of press-legitimate newspeople for the most part-stacked along both sides of the stairs and entrance.
With effort, he managed not to turn when someone from the crowd across Fifth yelled, “WUZ UP, DORK?” the catchphrase from his latest comedy hit.
But he couldn’t quite resist the inviting looks on the faces of the press column along both sides of the cathedral entrance. Adrenaline burst into his bloodstream as a firefight of camera flash packs blistered his eyes. He looked up at the gray sky and scratched his head.
Then Rooney unleashed the day’s first high-kilowatt smile.
“I don’t know if this is such a great idea, guys,” he said casually. “Anyone hear if there’s lightning in today’s forecast?”
He quickly scanned the ranks of mostly grinning newsies, then stopped the next joke in his throat as he spotted offended alarm on the face of some pretty brunette standing near the entrance. She was right, of course. What an attention slut he was. Grandstanding at a funeral.
Rooney made his face go somber, and then he entered the church.
He could see people in the back pews turning and nudging one another as he gave his invitation to the red-coated security guard.
Yep, it’s me. I’m here, Rooney thought, irritated. That was one aspect of fame that had gotten old real fast. In a real-world setting, a restaurant or an airport, having people gawk at you was simply uncomfortable. It was as if people wanted something from him, but what? He didn’t know, and he suspected they didn’t either. People thought stars wore sunglasses to disguise themselves, but really it was to avoid eye contact.
Rooney turned back toward the church entrance as he heard cameras pop and click like an angry swarm of metal crickets.
Well, look who’s here!
Linda London, twenty-year-old reality TV socialite, had arrived at the same time as Mercedes Freer, twenty-year-old bubblegum pop diva. That the two ladies were sharing the same slab of sidewalk was news enough, Rooney knew. But what was really creating a frenzy was the fact that they were both wearing the same micromini black-widow outfit and veil.
To make things a little more interesting, seventies rock legend Charlie Conlan climbed out of his stretch and walked up the church’s stairs a few feet from the potential catfight. The tall, hopelessly cool icon had to be close to sixty now, but he still looked real good. He shook Rooney’s hand in the vestibule.
Charlie had written and performed three magical songs for a children’s movie Rooney had starred in the year before. They’d gone on a brief promotional tour together. The whole time, Conlan had never stopped smiling; tipped every waiter, doorman, and limo driver they came across; and signed autographs for any and all. Even the paparazzi seemed to like him.
“Friggin’ circus, huh?” Charlie said in his patented gravelly voice. “You one of the clowns, Johnny?”
“If I am, then you’re the ringmaster,” said Rooney, laughing as the cameras went off again.
Another loud cheer rose from the crowd. Out on the street, Eugena Humphrey was exiting her trademark pink Lincoln Town Car limousine.
“Now, now, people,” the charismatic “Queen of LA” talk show host chided the crowd. “This is a funeral, not the Emmys. Let’s have a little respect, please.”
Amazingly, the crowd quieted right down.
“Eugena rules,” someone said, and that seemed to be the God’s honest truth.
Chapter 11
NEW YORK TIMES REPORTER Cathy Calvin didn’t know where to look for the day’s next startling image. She turned as the First Lady’s hearse appeared over the northern rise of an emptied Fifth Avenue. It was led by a nine-strong V formation of NYPD parade-speed Harleys, their mufflers popping smartly in the cold hush of the world-famous street.
It was as if a contingent of the cathedral’s statues had come to life when the honor guard broke rank in the vestibule and marched slowly out onto the sidewalk.
The guard arrived at the curb the moment the hearse did.
Flashbulbs popped as they ceremoniously slid out the American flag-draped casket from the long black car.
Two Secret Service men in dark suits appeared from the crowd and completed the line of pallbearers as the former First Lady’s body was effortlessly raised to shoulder height.
The soldiers and agents stopped at the top of the stairs, just behind the former president and his daughter, as a low, violent rumbling began to the south.
A moment later, a group of five F-15s appeared low in the slot of downtown sky. As they swooped over 42nd Street, the most western aircraft suddenly broke rank and arced upward and upward as the remaining planes roared over the cathedral in the “missing man” formation.
The pallbearers waited until the last echo of the jet engines’ thunder had dissipated from Fifth Avenue ’s stone-and-steel canyon, and then began to enter the church carrying Caroline Hopkins.
The high skirl of the lone bagpiper didn’t start until the former president passed over the church’s threshold. It was as if the whole city was observing an impromptu moment of silence as the familiar strains of “Amazing Grace” began.
But that wasn’t the biggest shock to her.
No, the big surprise was when Cathy Calvin, seen-it-all reporter, put her hand up to her own cheek and realized she was crying, too.
Chapter 12
SEND-OFF LIKE THAT almost brought tears to your eyes, the Neat Man thought as he stared through binoculars from his swivel chair in the back of his black van.
Gaw-damn, he thought, and was grinning so hard it was starting to hurt his cheeks.
Tears of joy.
The van was parked near 51st and Fifth Avenue, kitty-corner to the grand cathedral, and for the last hour, through the one-way tinted window at the van’s rear, he’d been watching the nonstop parade of arriving celebs and dignitaries.
It was one thing to predict something, the Neat Man thought as the church’s entrance doors closed behind President Hopkins and his entourage of inspired toadies.
Quite another to watch your each and every prediction come incredibly true.
He lowered the binocs to rip a baby wipe from the top of the plastic canister at his feet. His red hands stung wonderfully when he started scouring them. He usually carried a supply of soothing Jergens hand lotion to counteract the chafing, but he’d forgotten it in all the excitement.
About the only thing I missed, he thought, smiling as he dropped the used wipey onto the mound at his feet and raised the binoculars again.
He scanned the perimeter of the church’s wide block, lingering at each security post with his high-resolution Steiner 15×80 field glasses.