“Thank you for sharing that,” I said. “And for what you did.”
She smiled warmly. “What doesn't kill meâ”
“Makes me stronger,” I said, finishing.
Ironically, it was a saying of Nietzsche, the philosopher beloved by the Nazis. Though I knew it from the Schwarzenegger movie
Conan the Barbarian,
which was a favorite of Phil's. Maybe Robert was right. In the heart of that messâthe divorce, not the movieâI had felt I'd never see daylight. And I did. Not where and how I had expected, but it came. All I had to do was put one foot forward, then the other, then the next. . . .
Thomasina straightened and said she'd take care of the two-hour gig. I felt a little guilty dumping this on the team, but then, they
were
a team, a good one despite the blips that made me crazy, and . . . what the hell. I was the boss. That's what bosses get to do.
I worked in my office through most of the morning service, paying bills and periodically checking in with the staff and grabbing a few Diet Cokes, mostly for the caffeine. I was fighting the urge to eat a fried bologna sandwich, since I'd made a deal with myself that the generous slice of Johnny Cashew pie I was planning on eating would be dinner. Finally giving in to my craving, I went out and prepared to slap two slices of Hebrew National kosher bologna on the grill. As I stood there, I happened to glance out the front door and saw the woman again, the very thin one with the big hat, whom I'd seen out here . . . Christ, I couldn't even remember whether that was yesterday or the day before. Whatever. She wasn't hovering like a banshee across the street now. She was standing right outside my restaurant, like Death not taking a holiday.
I had a feeling she wasn't part of the circus that had been playing since the bread man lefteth. As Thom watched me warily, I opened the door slightly and popped my head out.
“Can I help you?” I asked.
“Gwen? You are Gwen Katz?”
“Yes.”
The woman smiled thinly. She looked like she might have been beautiful once. She still might be, if she put a little meat on her frame and did her nails. Her fingertips were rough. She worked with them somehow. My aunt, who worked in the garment district, had slightly dark, rough fingers like that.
“I saw you on the news, and I had to come down and meet you in person,” she said with a gentle Southern lilt.
“Sorry. I'm not giving autographs,” I told her. I was wrong. Sue me. She
was
part of the circus.
Or so I thought.
“That isn't why I'm here,” she said.
And then this woman whom I had never seen or spoken with or heard of said something that caused my sore feet to go numb, all the way up to my hips, and my brain to cloud from my skull to my lower jaw.
“My name is Lydia Knight,” she said softly. “I am your late father's mistress.”
Chapter 10
All I could do was stare at her, at Lydia, as she sat with obvious familiarity at my desk. She had seen it before, she said, many times. I didn't want to think what else she might have done on it. She smiled with recognition at the photographs. She even knew which part of meâmy earsâI got from my father.
She was in my chair, I was standing with my back against the closed door, and I had warned everyone to stay away. I had warned I would be listening for footsteps. If anyone stopped, I swore I would use my letter opener to stab whoever was there.
I was too stunned to react. In fact, I didn't know what I had left to react
with.
I was in emotional dry-heave territory.
Lydia was what they called a handsome woman, with strong cheekbones and white hair pulled tight like that of Peter Parker's aunt May. In fact, that was who she looked like, only more elegant. She was slender, but she didn't seem weak. Her slow, deliberate movements were a matter of genteel Southern breeding, not infirmity.
“When I first met your father, he was slouchin' forward on a bar stool in the Bluebird Cafe, his ice-cold Schlitz beer in his right hand, and he was just sittin' and starin' at their big ole television set. Well, big in those days. I was there that night to catch Kathy Mattea, before she went gold, and I spotted your father in the back, waitin' for the replay of the Kentucky Derby, the one where Swale ran away with it.”
I wanted to tell her to lose the stage setting, but I was too stupefied to talk.
“Your pa just looked so pathetic all alone, completely unaware of the crowd beginning to pour in around him, like he'd been there all day and night, like that statue of the thinkin' man, and no one was gonna move him. And I can still see his adorably ridiculous glasses and sideburns! So I sauntered on up to him and asked, âAre you from Kentucky, mister, or are you just fond of horses?' He turned. âNot a big fan of the program tonight,' he said, then smiled. âPresent company excluded.' Well, that got my attention, and we got to chattin' some. I told him that I was originally from West Virginia, right on the border of Kentucky, and that I'd often gone to see the races as a kid before moving here in my teen years.
“I don't suppose he seemed too impressed, although it took a few minutes for him to realize that he'd missed the replay on account of our conversation. But he didn't seem too upset by that, either, so I assumed I was doin' all right by him. Soon Miss Kathy started her set, and we left the café on account of the noise interruptin' our fairly decent discussion. About what I don't recall. But we spent the night walkin' the streets and talkin' about his dreams of doin' somethin' meaningful, somethin' wonderful with his brother, somethin' special. That was over twenty-five years ago.” Her gray eyes seemed to stare through the door. “And just look at the deli now.”
“It's the eighth wonder of the world,” I said.
“Your pap did that, too,” she said.
“What?”
“Got sarcastic when someone said somethin' nice about him. Don't ride yourself,” Lydia chided.
I almost said, “What? Are you my mother?” but stopped myself. That would have been creepily inappropriate.
I told myself to stay calm, think this through, not react. Because reacting right now would be overreacting, like slapping this bitch into last week. My dad had a right to a private life here. He was separated from my mother, even though they never divorced. But this was still seriously, uncomfortably strange and definitely unwelcome. Oh, and really bad timing.
“I'm sure you have a million questions, my darlin'. I know I do. It's been nearly thirteen years since I lost your father, and he left such a big hole in my heart. And an even bigger one in my life. I've worn black every day since his passin', and since we never got hitched, I've been one step short of strugglin' to stand on my own two feet. He was always quite the provider. Early on we moved in together into a two-story colonial home. He split that halfway up the middle with Murray, your late uncle.”
What?
I thought. He lived with her in what was now my house?
Something knotted deep down. I had a bad feeling this part of the story was just a preamble. God help her if she made a move to try and kick me out.
“We had such wonderful times there,” she went on gaily. “And Murray, God rest his soul, was always drummin' up somethin' new for us to all do together, on the town, at all hours of the night. Your daddy said he hadn't had as much fun since his time in the air force when he was stationed in Germany. I always loved to hear him tell those stories, didn't you?”
No.
It was always about him. That was what my mother said.
“You know he had a lady there, too?”
Okay . . . time to shut up, Lady Lydia.
“It was this local girl he'd always sit next to on the bus on his civilian rides into town. He'd always offer her a stick of gum, he said. And she'd always accept. Until one day he didn't have any regular chewin' gum, only that laxative-type gum, but he didn't want to disappoint her, so he offered her that, and she accepted. Well, their many afternoons together ended after that bit of business. Can't blame her, really.”
Thank goodness my mother has passed on, because this gal's monologue would've stopped her heart.
“I hope you don't mind that I'm tellin' you all of this. I know it's a lot to take in and I'm blabbin' at the mouth, but I've just been dyin' to get to know you for years, and I wasn't sure until I saw you on the news the other day that it was actually you runnin' this establishment.”
She finally stopped talking. So I said, “I'll admit I don't know what to say. It's a little shocking, to say the least.”
“A little like finding a live dead body, I'd imagine,” she said.
“I guess,” I replied. That was almost a Dani-ism. “You know, I didn't know he had a girlfriend. I probably should have guessed.”
“Well, it wouldn't be something for a proper lady to think about, would it?”
I didn't bother to explain that that did not apply. At all.
“I know how you must feel. Your father having a secret kinda life and all. But he was dead set on never divorcin' your mother, even though they were never going to live together again. Of course, your daddy was heartbroken when your mother passed in ninety-nine.”
Don't mention my mother, you witch. Don't.
“To tell the truth, I imagined that her death had something to do with his own passing later that same year, like they were soul mates separated by a quirk of him not wanting to work for her father.”
“It was a little more complicated than that.”
“So I've heard. Still, it was all very sad. Very sad indeed. He never really got over it. And I never really got over him.”
Okay, no more trips down memory lane, please.
It was time for her to go. My dad didn't care enough to introduce us, so why should I waste any more of my time? She'd already unpacked enough skeletons to choke a snake.
“He was a gifted man, though,” Lydia said, pressing on, “who, like his idol John Wayne, lived by a code of conduct. Take care of your family, take care of your friends, don't step on too many toes, and do what you can to help the rest of the world. In your father's case, he provided the people of Nashville with many a full belly.”
And, I wondered, what did my amazingly wonderful father leave you with? A bellyful of memories and a whole lot of sadness, apparently.
“And as for me,” she said, “I may not have gotten a house or the business or even an honorable mention in his will, but at least he gave me Stacie.”
Thinking back bitterly to Robert's rottweiler, I said, “Who's that? Your dog?”
“Your sister,” she said.
My what?
I couldn't say those words or any other words, for that matter. It was as though I'd poured paste down my throat.
“You have a sister, Gwen. Stacie. There! I said it again! Oh, it feels so good to tell you after all these years. Your father and I had a daughter. He named her Stacie, after your great-grandmother Sonia. She'll be twenty-three this May.”
“I have a what?” was all I could say.
“I know it's a lot to take in, but I felt it was time for you to know.”
“Why? Because you saw me lying on the street with Candy Sommerton? Was that one of the prophecies that needed to be fulfilled?”
“No, because your father forbade me to tell you! It wasn't up to me. He kept a lot of things private, separate.”
“In all the letters he wrote, in the yearly visits I made here, what did he do? Hide you then?”
“I stayed at a motel,” Lydia said. “He visited me when he could.”
“Oh. That's why I spent so much time flying solo with Uncle Murray. Got it. So in all that time, at his funeral. . . Were you there, too?”
“In the background, where no one could see.”
“Right. So with all that history between you . . . Wait. Did his lawyer, Dag Stoltenberg, know?”
Lydia nodded.
“Jesus. So the four of you knew, and three of you survived him, and no one once thought, Hmm, gee, maybe we should tell Gwen she's got a
little sister?
”
There were footsteps outside the door. “Get lost!” I shouted. They scuffled away.
“I wanted to tell you, sweetie, but understand that he was so proud of you, going to college and studyin' things an' all. He didn't want you to feel pressure, like you had to be here instead of there. Like you were missin' out on somethin' or had to take care of me or Stacie. And then, gradually, it just became easier to say nothin' rather than come clean. I figured it was somethin' we'd get to one day.”
“Well, lucky me! Today's that day!”
Lydia fussed with her fingers as though she was twisting an imaginary handkerchief. “Maybe he was right. Maybe comin' here was a bad idea. I should go.”
“No!
Not
telling me was the bad idea.”
“Well, there was another reason, too,” Lydia went on.
No,
I thought.
I don't think I want to hear this.
“While your father was a big part of Stacie's life, I don't think either of us were ready to be responsible for a child. Not on his catch-as-catch-can salary augmented by a deli worker's wages. He was separated, and I was twice divorced, no alimony, and workin' in a shoe store as a clerk.”
That explains the fingertips,
I thought.
Slipping feet into shoes day after day.
“As it was, Stacie spent most of her time living at Auntie Thomasina's. I don't know what we would have done without her.”
What?
That was bombshell number . . . I didn't even know. I'd lost count.
“Thomasina?” I blurted. “Thom, Thomasina?”
“Yes, God bless her.”
“She knew?”
“She was our savior.”
Well, wrap and bow tie me,
as Thom herself was known to say. That would explain why my dear friend had told me she didn't know my dad well. That was a safer play. If she didn't talk about him, she couldn't slip up. That would also explain why Thom had gone out the back door as Lydia had come in the front. Newt was the one who usually took garbage to the Dumpster. Besides, Thom hadn't been carrying anything except herself.
I couldn't believe what I was hearing. Not only did my father have an illegitimate daughter, but my closest friend raised her! And neither told me about it! Better yet, both decided
not
to tell me about it! The ripples of deceit were too great to comprehend at that moment. I just had to keep twisting the napkin in my hands and tumble to the bottom of this chilling, mind-numbing chasm.
“Hey, Lydia . . . a question.”
“Of course, darlin'.”
“Did you happen to know a man named Joe Silvio?”
“Why, why do you ask?”
“Why-why is because Nashville is apparently like one of those charts on
The L Word
about who slept with who.”
“Dear, what
are
you talkin' about?”
“Just . . . humor me. Did you know him?”
Lydia sat a little more upright, as though bracing for a fight. “I did, yes.”
“Of course you did.”
“A lot of folks down here knew him,” she said. “Churchgoin' folks.”
Was that a dig at my not being among those? Who cared? This woman's opinion didn't matter.
“Explain,” I said.