The Grievers (10 page)

“Which is?” Neil said.

“Preserving a way of life,” Ennis said as if this much were self-evident. “Upholding the time-honored values of the Noblac order. Molding the boys of today into the leaders of tomorrow.”

“So we’re talking about money,” I said.

“We’re talking about the greater good,” Ennis said.

Somewhere between
greater
and
good
, my cell phone went off and a gospel choir started to serenade us with the theme from
The Jeffersons.
Though I tried to pretend that it wasn’t
my
phone informing us that we were moving on up to the East Side, it was pretty clear by the time the choir got to the deluxe apartment in the sky that the tune was coming from the left pocket of my cargo shorts. Privately cursing Anthony Gambacorta for screwing with my ringtone and (after I checked to see who was calling) Sean Sullivan for trying, more than likely, to sell me a Volkswagen at such an inopportune moment, I switched off the phone and looked up just in time to see the devil himself standing in the doorway.

“Here’s our man,” Ennis said, rising from his desk. “You boys remember Frank Dearborn, don’t you?”

The air went out of me as Ennis put an arm around Frank’s shoulders and ushered him into the room. He had the same Abercrombie & Fitch good looks I remembered from high school. The same swagger, too. His only flaw, if you could even call it that, was still his crooked nose. Sure, he looked a little older, but not the way Neil and I looked older—with our already receding hairlines and the paunch of a few too many beers creeping slowly over our guts. For Frank, growing older meant nothing more than the finest of wrinkles in the corners of his eyes when he smiled and shook our hands. For Frank, growing older meant a deeper tan and a sharper suit. For Frank, growing older meant that he was still, in every way, our social better.

“Jesus, guys,” Frank said, apparently in reference to Billy. “I still can’t believe it. What do you think happened?”

What do I think happened?
I wanted to scream.
You can’t be serious! People like you happened, Frank. Day in, day out, the butt of all your jokes. The poor guy couldn’t take it anymore. The only miracle is that it didn’t happen sooner.

“I keep thinking about how much fun we used to have,” Frank said. “All those songs?
Billy Chin is not my lover
. God, I can’t even begin.”

“I know what you mean,” Neil said as I held my tongue.

“And the time he found the kittens in bio lab?”

“That’s right,” Ennis said. “You boys were in my class together.”

“I already told you that,” I said. “Remember? On the phone?”

“We used to laugh so much,” Frank said as if I weren’t in the room. “I still can’t believe he’s gone.”

“
I’m
the one who found the kittens,” I said, inexplicably intent on setting the record straight. “That was
me
.”

“But it was Billy’s cat,” Frank said. “Right?”

“It was
our
cat,” I said. “Billy was my lab partner.”

“Time does have a tendency to make a blur of things,” Ennis said. “For better or for worse.”

“Are you kidding?” I asked, looking to Neil for even a modicum of support. “I remember like it was yesterday. You asked me what I was doing, and I said I was cutting open the cat’s scrotal sack. Then you told the class to come and watch, and when I cut it open, the kittens popped out.”

“That’s right!” Frank shouted. “They popped out and Ennis asked if your scrotum was full of kittens.”

“Something like that,” I said, suddenly wishing I’d left well enough alone. “Billy tried to warn me.”

“Fun times,” Frank said wistfully. “But like they say, you can’t live in the past, right?”

Screw you, Frank
, I thought as Ennis went to the minibar and asked the bastard if he wanted his regular drink.
I can live anywhere I want—including the past.

Frank’s job, Ennis explained, was to help me and Neil with the letter. And, of course, with planning Billy’s memorial service. There were, after all, a lot of details to consider—what to serve, how big a crowd to invite, whether or not to involve the press. In short, Frank was there to make sure we got the most bang for the Academy’s buck.

“I think we can handle it on our own,” I said.

“No worries, gentlemen,” Ennis insisted. “Think of Frank as part of the team. He was doing some consulting for us a while back when I figured out that it was cheaper to hire him full time. Publicity and marketing, mainly. The man’s a wizard when it comes to finding the right words.”

“What can I say?” Frank said, taking the drink from Ennis. “Working for the Academy is my
mitzvah
. Know what I mean, Schwartz?”

“This letter,” Neil said before I could answer. “It’s what? An invitation to the memorial service?”

“More or less,” Ennis explained. “You can leave the details to Frank. All we really need is for you and Schwartz to sign off on it.”

“It really isn’t a big deal,” Frank said. “We’ll mention Billy’s passing and how much the Academy meant to him. We’ll talk about the new cafeteria, the new gym, the new swimming pool. Drop a few hints about how much money it all cost. With any luck, we’ll get some checks in the mail and a few bodies in the door on the day of the service. The real trick is to keep things light and not dwell too much on the negative aspects of the situation.”

Frank stirred his drink with his finger.

“Keep things light?” I said. “Billy killed himself.”

“That’s one story,” Ennis said. “But it’s not the only one.”

“You’re saying he didn’t?”

“I’m saying there’s a difference between the forest and the trees.”

“Ideally, we try to avoid specifics in cases like this,” Frank added. “Only because they detract from the larger message. But like Phil said, leave the letter to me. All we need from you guys are a couple of signatures and your blessing.”

“Our blessing?” I said.

“A letter from me is one thing,” Frank said. “But a letter from you guys?”

“But it won’t be from us,” I said. “It’ll be from you.”

“In spirit, the letter will be from all of us,” Ennis said. “But with your imprimatur—”

“Our imprimatur?” I asked.

“It means endorsement,” Frank said. “Your seal of approval.”

“I know what the word means,” I shouted, struggling to rise from my deep, soft chair with an air of authority. “I just don’t know why—”

“We’ll do what we can,” Neil said quietly. “Whatever you need, just let us know.”

I turned and glared at him.

“We understand that it’s a tragic situation,” Ennis said, stepping forward and turning out his hand to indicate that our audience had reached its end. “But it’s times like these that bring out the best in all of us.”

“Exactly,” Frank said, raising his glass in our direction as Ennis made a less than subtle gesture toward the door. “Grace under pressure.”

I choked back my rage as Neil thanked Ennis for his time and told Frank that it was great to see him again. Gradually herding us out of his office, Ennis said that Frank would be in touch as soon as he had a draft of the letter. We could feel free to tweak it a little to make it sound more personal, Frank added, calling after us from inside the office, but in the meantime Neil and I could give some thought to the kinds of refreshments we wanted for the memorial service—and if either of us was up for it, to come up with a few nice words about Billy.

“So,” Neil said as Ennis closed his door behind us and our footsteps echoed down the cold, stone stairwell that led to the ground floor. “Frank Dearborn.”

“Yeah,” I said, shaking my head in disbelief. “Frank Dearborn.”

Beyond that, there was nothing more to say.

  CHAPTER EIGHT  

A
soft rain had begun to fall as Neil turned out of the Academy parking lot and onto the broken street. His windshield wipers slapped a steady beat as we passed the row homes, pawnshops, taverns, bus stops, liquor stores, churches, supermarkets, and gas stations that slumped shoulder to shoulder in various states of disrepair along the narrow wrecked roads of North Philadelphia. Some of the houses were undergoing reconstruction, but most were crumbling to the ground. Halfway down a block, we’d see a gap in the row, like a missing tooth in an ugly, brown smile. The vacant space would be overrun with weeds and stray cats, and the imprint of the fallen home would still be visible on the flanks of its neighbors—where the floorboards had been, the walls and the staircase. People used to live in these spaces, I thought to myself. They used to sit down to dinner and talk about their days or lie awake at night and wonder how to make ends meet. They had holidays here. First dates and clandestine meetings. They talked and loved and fought and lived, and now they were gone. Ghosts. Memories. Dust.

“I told you we shouldn’t have come through Australia,” Neil said, doing Groucho once again as his Pontiac bumped along Girard Avenue. “You know it’s all ripped up. We should have gone straight up Lincoln Boulevard.”

“I don’t know,” I said, assuming it was yet another cue to spit out the wrong title of a Marx Brothers movie.

“Take a guess,” Neil said.

“Do I have to?”

“Here’s a hint: Last night I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got in my pajamas, I’ll never know.”

“I really don’t feel like it.”

“Not even close,” Neil said. “But thanks for playing just the same.”

“Can you at least try to be serious for once?”

“Me?” Neil said. “I’m not the one with
The Jeffersons
ringtone. How’d that get on your phone anyway?”

“Anthony did it,” I said. “It was a birthday present.”

“And you haven’t thought about changing it?”

“Of course I’ve thought about changing it,” I said. “But there’s a principle involved.”

“Right,” Neil said. “A principle.”

We crossed the Schuylkill at 34th Street and passed the zoo where street vendors were still out, hawking soft pretzels and inflatable superheroes despite the rain.

“You could have at least said something back there,” I said. “All that bullshit about Noblac ideals and bringing more alums back into the fold?”

“What was I supposed to say?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “How about that Frank’s an asshole? How about that Ennis could go to hell? How about that we weren’t going to sign their stupid letter? That would have been a nice start.”

“What good would it have done, Charley?”

“We’re talking about Billy,” I said. “We’re talking about his memory. What do you mean what good would it have done?”

“They’re doing this with or without us,” Neil said. “And in the end, who knows? Maybe they’re right. At least this way, something good comes of it.”

“Of Billy’s suicide?” I said.

“Yes,” Neil said. “Of Billy’s suicide.”

“So we just, what? Roll over and take it?”

“We make the best of it,” Neil said as I realized that we missed the on-ramp for I-76. “I haven’t mentioned this to anyone, but my father isn’t doing so well.”

“Is it his heart again?” I asked.

“No,” Neil said. “Alzheimer’s.”

I didn’t know what to say.

I never know what to say.

Neil’s dad printed forms for a living, documentation and paperwork for banks and small businesses.
Name, Date, Social Security Number,
I thought to myself.
Fill in the blank. Check all that apply. Press firmly with ballpoint pen: __I’m sorry your father is sick. __I’m sorry he’ll forget your name. __I’m sorry you’ll watch him fade over time. __I’m sorry he’ll look at your children one day and smile blandly like my grandmother used to as he wonders who they are and why they’re hugging him, and I’m sorry they’ll never know how funny he was, how witty, how smart, how full of life.

__I’ll never forget the summer after college when the world was still big and full of possibility, how you’d call me at work and say let’s go to the shore, and I’d grab a fresh shirt, and we’d meet up for pizza and beer and talk about everything life had in store for us.

__And I’ll always remember the night a girl cut her toe on a broken bottle and her boyfriend threw a punch at the guy who dropped it, and a table turned over and the whole place exploded, and the cops burst in wearing gas masks and riot gear as we slipped out a side door with a couple of Asian women who spoke twelve words of English between them and asked for a ride back to Wildwood where they were living with their cousins; one had to be fifty, and the other was her mother, and they were both wearing skintight sequin dresses, and when we pulled up to a motel after a thousand wrong turns, ten guys with mustaches and butterfly knives swarmed around the car as the women stepped out, and they eyed us up and down, flicking their knives and lighting unfiltered cigarettes as they tried to decide how to dispose of our bodies until one of the girls said something in a language we didn’t know and the men started laughing and slapping the hood of your car, the roof, and the windshield, and the younger woman leaned in as if to kiss you goodnight and said, “Don’t worry, big boy, I tell them you candyass homo couple bigtime,” and we both nodded and said goodnight as you threw the car into gear and peeled out of the parking lot in a cloud of exhaust fumes and burning rubber, a small army of Asian men laughing their asses off in your rearview mirror as we vowed to never breathe a word of the incident to anyone.