C Reiss - Sing

I reacted. It was half laugh, half groan, but I was so focused on staying together I thought nothing showed on my face. But everything must have been there. Disdain. Disbelief. Disgust.

“You don’t believe me.”

“Oh, I believe you.”

“In my life, I know I’ve done everything I could to keep this family together. Nothing is as important to me. And when I see it breaking, it...troubles me.”

Even Dad had a safe place, apparently. I knew I smiled at the thought, but I felt out of myself.

“And me here reminds you of how you fucked it all up?” I asked.

“Not exactly.”

Lettie bustled in, checked my tubes. “You have visitors,” she said. “Do you want to see them?”

“Five minutes.”

She took her time, tapping into a computer, taking notes. When a man came in, doctor or nurse, I couldn’t tell, they spoke briefly in medicalese, the one language I didn’t know, and left soon after.

“You’re close to the end, you know,” Dad said.

“See you in hell.” I was being obstructive, because it was easy.

“You’re making this hard for me.”

“Just tell me what you want.”

I heard him shift in his seat, flashed movement from the corner of my eye. “I want your mother. She’s entrenched in her position. She can’t forget the past. I need what’s left of this family to work before...well, before.”

“Your philandering isn’t her fault.”

“I need you to talk to her. She won’t ignore your request.”

I wanted something from him, something big, but I had nothing to threaten him with, nothing to ensure he’d keep his promises. What was I supposed to do? Plead? I was already flat on my back.

“Stay away from my wife.”

“I don’t know what you mean?”

“Sell that house. Hello and good-bye. That’s it.” I couldn’t go into longer explanations of all the things I didn’t want him to do. Touch her. Tell her jokes. Communicate with her unsupervised. Entangle her business. Go to her second wedding. Breathe her air. Exist on her planet.

“Promise it,” I said, feeling the futility of my demand. What was I going to do? Hold my pinkie out for a good twist or make him swear on a stack of Bibles? What was the devil’s promise worth without a blood guarantee?

“You’ll speak to your mother?”

“Yes.”

“If you convince her, you have a deal.”

“If not?”

“Then, not. I’m sorry. My promise is contingent on the actions of a third party.”

“I despise you.”

“What if I told you I loved you?”

“You don’t have the capacity.”

I may have said that, or something else, but the space around me fell into a dream with disembodied voices and floating lights, with a touch of pain, just to keep me from sleep.

MONICA

I waited in the cafeteria, alone. I wrote a little, some verses about murder that could probably be used against me in a court of law, with the judge unmoved toward leniency by the fact that they were atrocious, puerile, on-the-nose.

Whatever was going on, it was taking too long. I went up to Jonathan’s floor and found Deirdre staring at a magazine that couldn’t have been of interest to her, and Sheila pacing like she wanted to carve a ditch in the floor. His mother stood, as usual, next to the chair closest to the hall leading to his room, which was by the elevator. So, she caught me first, and I thought of something I hadn’t before. She was my mother in-law. I wasn’t calling her Mom. No way.

“Hi, Eileen.”

She smiled a smile so fake I could have bought it at Nordstrom’s on the sale rack. “Monica. I hear congratulations are in order.” She indicated my left hand with its borrowed engagement ring and jury-rigged wedding band.

“Thanks. How is he?”

Her face darkened. “They’re constantly in there...” Her eyes got wet. The coldness of her expression when I entered had hidden the fact that she was breaking apart. She cleared her throat and straightened her neck. “A heart will come. I know it. I can feel it.”

“I can too.”

Her hand slipped into mine and I squeezed it. All our bullshit fell away for a second. This was her son. We loved the same person. She wouldn’t be easy to deal with, but we were bound by him, whether we liked it or not. Then she smiled a couture smile, and even kind of warmish, as if something happened between us that had meaning to her. I promised myself to never again forget that her goal was to protect him. That was worth something.

I gave her hand a squeeze and sat next to Deirdre.

“Hi.”

“Hi,” she replied. “You got married last night.”

“Yeah.”

She nodded.

“I would have married him anyway, you know.”

“I do.” She flipped through her magazine.

“I think you’re mother’s pissed about it.”

“There wasn’t a pre-nup. Jonathan doesn’t believe in them. Neither do I.”

“Ah, I hadn’t thought about that.”

She shrugged, still mindlessly going through the magazine. “Neither does God.”

I’d never engaged Deirdre for such a non-antagonistic string of sentences, but that was all I was getting from her. She settled on an article and for all intents and purposes, read it. I cupped my tea and gave the television my attention. It was set too low to hear, but the talking head with the perfect hair had a floating box next to him, and in it, Paulie Patalano, mob boss, philanthropist, murderer, drinking wine with his wife in a picture captured in happier days. The ticker described him as brain dead, as if I needed the reminder, and placed him in an unknown location. The picture flipped to three mug shots. I didn’t recognize but one face. The brown eyed man who had come in with Theresa. Even in the mug shot he was handsome, angry, with a knowing grin that frightened me.

My newly-minted mother in-law didn’t see the television, as her gaze stayed in the middle distance. Sheila was on the phone threatening someone, and Deirdre was into her magazine. Declan was either seeing Jonathan, or making arrangements for me to kill someone. I’d need to be ready. It was time for me to see Paulie Patalano in his undisclosed location.

I excused myself and took the elevator to the second floor. I scoped out the stairwell, wondering if I should take it next time, then more complications presented themselves. First being, how would I find him? How would I do it once I got there? How could I be sure Declan’s job was done?

Who did I think I was?

In pacing, and beating the hell out of myself, I rounded a few corners, trying to look for something I’d never defined, only finding ignorance and a lack of expertise in the simple skill of murder. I had a scattered entry plan and a slight hope I’d only get caught when it was too late to do anything but harvest Patalano’s organs. After that, just confess and let Jonathan’s family talk him into annulling my marriage. But he’d be alive. I could deal with the rest if he lived.

The squawk of a police radio made me look up before I crashed into the uniformed cop. He was in his thirties, and seemed to take up more space than humanly possible. A female counterpart stood nearby.

“Staff only,” he said, blocking my way to the narrow hall.

“Uh, okay?” I peered past him. The hall looked like every other one, except for the lack of flitting staff and the presence of three old Italian women in black. This was the hall.

I made note of the location and walked away.

I knew Brad had said he’d be in his Doheny office, but I checked anyway. He was just my neighbor, and he meant nothing to me, but I’d stepped on him in a way guaranteed to offend him. I didn’t want to leave things like that.

He was there, on his way out the door, clipboard in hand. He slowed when he saw me, which I took as a good sign.

“I know you’re busy.” I said. “I just wanted to apologize.”

He kept walking. “I want to explain how serious what you did is, but I have a meeting.”

“I know. I have reasons, but not excuses.”

He pulled me to the side, out of the hall traffic. “I only have a second. I don’t want to make you feel better, because I’m still pissed off. But first of all, the list doesn’t work the way you think. Geography is important. The state of the patient. The gender. It’s not like a line for coffee. But second, you’re not getting away with it. When this is over, you’re sitting with me and I’m explaining to you the ten ways you fucked up.” He was taller than me, and used to being in charge. He had the arrogance of a cardiologist, and the authority of a man not called by his first name. But when he looked at me, I knew he wasn’t half as pissed as his words let on.

“All right.”

“Over dinner.” He must have seen me turn to ice. “Platonic. If you knew me better, this wouldn’t have happened. That’s all I want.”

“I guess I owe you.”

“You do.” He walked away. Had he just asked me out? Yes and no. Jonathan wouldn’t be thrilled, but Brad didn’t expect Jonathan to be around, did he?

MONICA

I had to see him once again before I did this thing and they dragged me away. Just put my fingers on his lips before I faced what I had to face. I wasn’t going to tell him what I was doing, because he’d be an accessory if he didn’t stop me, and suicidal if he did. I was going to stand with him clean, as his mate, if even for an hour.

I got out of the elevator on Jonathan’s floor, and made a right instead of a left, to check the placement of the stairwell closest to Patalano’s room. I stopped at the turn as if a brick wall was in my way.

Margie and Will Santon stood in a corner, too close for friendship, too far for intimacy, hands up, Margie pointing and accusing, Will’s in supplication. Their words were inaudible, but their faces shouted rage, hurt, and frustration. I’d have to check the placement of the stairs on the little map by the elevator, because I wasn’t just strolling past them. I turned and walked away.

I got two steps before I felt a hand on my arm. Margie slowed me down. She looked drawn and upset, and though I didn’t know her that well, I was sure she didn’t want me to ask her what was going on with Will.

“I was just—“ I started to explain exactly nothing, and was grateful for her interruption.

“Forget it.”

“Where have you been?”

“This family’s a full-time fucking job. Congratulations, by the way. Well done. One less pre-nup to argue over.”

“It didn’t even occur to me.”

“Him either, I’m sure. But I want to tell you, if he doesn’t make it through tonight, I have your back. I’ll do what my brother wanted.”

“He’s not dead yet.”

She grabbed me by the shoulders and put her eyes square with mine, as if she wanted to tell me something; something critical and painful, but instead she threw her arms around me and held me so tightly I thought my ribs would break.

“I envy you,” she said. “You know that?”

“If something goes bad,” I said into her ear, “like if I do something wrong, would you represent me? No matter what?”

She pushed me away, holding me by the shoulders. “What are you talking about?”

“Stuff. Life. Say yes.”

“Fine.” I caught Will out of the corner of my eye, and her gaze flicked to him, then back to me. “Go see him. I’ll be there in a minute.”

MONICA

There were doctors and nurses everywhere. Clean white sheets and sage scrubs. Trays of uneaten food and plastic detritus in soothing, meaningless colors. The lights pinpoint and dull as if this would help him sleep with the human traffic in the room.

The doctor wasn’t much older than I was, but I knew her from the way she asked questions instead of answered them.

“Hi,” I said.

“You’re the wife?”

The title still hit me like a bag of flour.

“Yeah. I’d like, I don’t know. Time. A little.”

“You got it.”

She hustled everyone out, and it was just me and him. He looked like someone had painted him white. If I thought it was hard to see him after his disastrous operation, well, this was worse. This was where it came down to me accepting that this was what it was, or me living in a fucking illusion.

“Good evening, sir,” I said.

“Get over here.” His voice was no better than a whisper breaking through a stone wall. There was effort in it, as if he carried me uphill. I put my elbows on either side of his head and touched my nose to his.