BETTY’S DEAD
It hadn’t been a merry Christmas. First of all, Richard had to work; but even if he hadn’t had to, the thought of Betty Resnick sitting in that seedy apartment, dying, had haunted him.
And so he hadn’t called her again. He’d gone on with his regular routine until the holidays were behind him. But despite his best efforts to forget the hollow-eyed woman, she remained in the back of this thoughts, which ate at him like the cancer that was consuming her.
It had been ten days since he’d met his mother and younger half-brother.
She’d told him about the cancer; told him the names of her doctors, but he’d waited until after Christmas to face the bad news. And, coward that he was, he’d avoided calling her, too.
And so, it wasn’t until January second that he dialed the phone number he’d looked up weeks before and asked the question for the answer he didn’t want to hear.
“She’s got two—maybe three months,” the oncologist told him.
His mother—whom he’d only recently met—was living under a death sentence.
Richard swallowed hard. “Does she know?”
“She’s been told, but she seems to be in denial.”
Well, who wouldn’t be?
She was going to die, and what would happen to his half-brother, Jeff, when she was gone?
Richard didn’t want to think about it.
So, after making his call, he went on his way. Day after day; week after week, trying to blot out the memory of the haggard woman—her head swathed in a multi-colored scarf to hide her bald scalp—that was etched upon his memory, and did nothing about it.
Until….
“Dr. Alpert, your mother called,” reported the duty nurse on the general ward at Sisters Hospital.
All around him chaos reigned.
Monitors beeped, techs raced purposely down the hall, and dinner carts trundled past. “What?” Richard asked, a chill running through him.
“Your mother.
She left a message. She said it was urgent.” The nurse handed him a slip of paper. He stared at the phone number, suddenly feeling numb. “Thank you,” he managed, stuffing the paper into the pocket of the white lab coat that covered his blue scrubs. It was seven in the evening and he was scheduled to work until at least six the next morning. What was he supposed to do?
Troubled, he darted into the nearest conference room and called the number, but it was only one of the nurse’s station
s at Roswell Park Memorial Institute.
“I’m Elizabeth Resnick’s son. She called me. Does she have a phone in her room?” he asked
“I’m sorry, no. But if you’d like to leave a message, I’d be happy to relay it to her.”
Richard let out an exasperated breath. “Please tell her I’ll be there to visit her in the morning.”
A long silence fell. “Sir, Mrs. Resnick is….”
“She hasn’t got much time, has she?”
“It isn’t my place to say,” the woman said, but her tone conveyed more than mere words could.
“Please tell her to hang on, and that I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
“I’ll do that, sir. And thank you.”
Richard settled the receiver onto its cradle and frowned. It had been a mistake—a big mistake three months before—to have called his biological mother. If he’d known she was dying of cancer, maybe he wouldn’t have called.
Then he could have been oblivious to her pain, to her suffering. But now, at the end, she’d reached out to him. He’d already reneged on the promise to visit her again, and now he had to make it right.
He exited the conference room and headed for the charge nurse’s station to see if he could get someone to cover for him for a few hours.
#
I’ll never forget that cold Wednesday in March. Tommy Kravitz had been busting my balls all afternoon, swearing that The Big Orange—Syracuse—was going to nail a Sweet Sixteen birth in March Madness. No way! Villanova had much better stats, and their center was looking at a career in the NBA about thirty seconds after he graduated.
The discussion had kept me thinking about other—lots more important—things … until I saw Richard standing on the walk outside my school’s main entrance. I’d only met him once before, but I remembered his face. Remembered that grown-up moustache.
“I’ve got some bad news,” he said by way of greeting.
I went cold over all. “She’s dead. Isn’t she?”
He nodded, avoiding my gaze. “I’m sorry, kid.”
A group of giggling teenaged girls passed us, giving Richard the eye. He motioned for me to follow him to the parking lot. The sky was bright blue on that raw March day. How could someone die on such a beautiful winter’s day? I slid into the passenger side of Richard’s red Porsche two-seater. I’d never sat in an import before. The dashboard looked strange—as foreign as the controls on a space ship.
Richard took papers from the breast pocket of his topcoat and showed them to me. “As of today, I’m officially your legal guardian. You’re going to come live with me.”
Anger flashed through me. “What if I don’t want to?”
“I’m afraid you’ve got no choice.”
I swallowed my pique and tried to be grown up. “What about school?”
“You can finish the year here if you want. You’ll be going to Amherst Central next fall.”
No choices. Just commandments. My mother was dead and a stranger was calling the shots.
“What about my stuff?”
“We’ll go pack a bag now. We can get the rest later.”
I ground my molars so hard, I was sure they’d crack. “What about Mom? Can I see her?”
“Tomorrow, at the funeral parlor. The service will probably be Friday.”
I nodded, and stared ahead at nothing.
The silence lengthened.
“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked finally.
I looked into his clear blue eyes and saw fear—as if he was wondering what the hell he had gotten himself into.
I shook my head. What else was there to say?
A group of stragglers exited the building. What was the point of finishing the school year there? I had no close friends. Why delay the inevitable?
Richard turned the key in the ignition and we drove away.
#
I unlocked the apartment door and stepped inside, with Richard right behind me. It wasn’t at all welcoming. I’d been staying there alone after my mother had been taken to the hospital by ambulance, but I’d kept up with my chores. The dishes still stood in the drying rack; the table had been wiped, and I’d done the laundry and folded and put it away. I’d kept busy because it was better than thinking about the future.
I’d only visited my mother once in the hospital. It had taken two bus transfers to get there. Then, she’d been so doped up she didn’t even seem to know I was there. I had planned on visiting that afternoon, but it was too late. I never got to say good-bye, and it had been a long time since I’d told her I loved her. I didn’t want to think about it because it might make me cry—and I wasn’t about to do that in front of my new guardian.
I stood in the middle of the living room for what seemed like a long time, not really taking in in my surroundings.
Richard finally broke the silence.
“Where do you keep your suitcases?”
I turned and looked up at him. “Suitcases?”
“Yeah, you must have a couple for when you travel.”
Travel? I’d never gone anywhere in my entire life.
“Do you have any boxes?” he tried.
I shook my head.
“Trash bags?”
We had a whole mess of plastic bags from the grocery store. Richard gave me my privacy as I filled seven of them with everything I owned. The apartment came furnished. Except for an old black-and-white TV—we didn’t own a damn thing.
I moved the bags into the living room.
“What’s going to happen to mom’s stuff?”
“You should go through it, but it doesn’t have to be today.
I assume the rent is paid through the end of the month.”
I nodded.
“I think you’ve been through enough for one day,” he said kindly. “It can wait.”
Again, I nodded. But before we left, I entered my mother’s bedroom and snagged her purse.
Putting it in yet another plastic bag. Then we picked up the bags and headed for the door. I took a long hard look around the shabby apartment, the only home I’d ever known, then locked the door.
Richard turned on the radio during the ride across town, which was good since we didn’t seem to have anything to say to each other.
I was kind of numb—not really paying attention to where we were going until he pulled off Main Street and drove slowly down a road filled with really big, really fancy houses. A lump formed in my throat as he pulled into the driveway of a three-story house that kind of reminded me of stately Wayne Manor that I’d seen on reruns of the old Batman show. I glanced at the person who was my half-brother.
“Are you rich?”
“Well, yeah,” he answered rather reluctantly. “But this isn’t my house. It belongs to my grandparents.”
My heart skipped a beat.
My mother had told me about old Mrs. Alpert. Mom wasn’t a woman to swear, but she’d called her former mother-in-law a bitch. She hated the woman and described her as evil incarnate, whatever that meant.
“How old are you?” I asked as the car came to a halt.
“Twenty-six.”
“And you still live with your grandparents?” I’d planned to hightail it out of our apartment and get my own place
when I made eighteen.
Richard let out what sounded like a defeated breath. “It’s just easier,” he said, put the car in park, and switched off the engine, yanking the keys from the ignition. He looked toward the house and I could see he was nervous. My mom had hated his grandmother.
Had his grandmother hated my mom, too?
“We need to get a few things straight before we go inside,” Richard said, his words filling me with dread. “My grandmother can be rather intimidating. But you’re my brother.
You need to tell me if she gives you a hard time.”
“You’re a grown up.
Why don’t you have your own place?” I asked again.
“It’s very complicated.”
I studied his face. He didn’t seem pleased about the situation.
“Okay.”
We got out of the car. I bent down to grab a few of the bags, but Richard waved a hand to stop me. “Curtis will bring them up later.”
“Curtis?” I asked.
“Their chauffeur.”
“Chauffeur?” I didn’t even know people in Buffalo could have chauffeurs.
We walked across the driveway and entered the home’s side door. Inside was a pretty big room with lots of shelves and cabinets filled with dishes and glasses, and places to hang coats and stow boots. A door to the left led to a brightly lit kitchen. At a table in front of the window overlooking the driveway sat a gray-haired black guy, while a white woman stood at the stove. The black guy stood as we entered.
“Jeff, I’d like you to meet Curtis,”
“Master Jeffrey. I’m very happy to meet you,” the old guy said and offered his hand. I shook it. The old guy smiled and for the first time since I’d learned my mother had died I felt a smidgeon of hope.
“Hi.”
“And this is Helen,” Richard said, indicating the middle-aged cook at the stove.
The woman swiveled her head to take me in and I knew in an instant that she and I would never be friends.
“How do you do?” she said.
I nodded, unsure how to answer.
“Mr. and Mrs. Alpert are in the living room,” Helen said.
“Thank you. Curtis, there are some bags in my car. Would you please bring them up to Jeff’s room?”
“I’d be glad to, sir.”
“Thank you.”
“Jeff, this way,’ Richard said, and strode toward a darkened hallway. I followed, wondering why he’d warned me about his grandmother.
I found out when we entered the large living room. An old man and lady sat reading in chairs that faced one another.
The old guy looked okay, but the old lady seemed to radiate something awful. Was it her expression, or the way she sat huddled in her chair. She reminded me of a slug—something I’d only seen pictures of. Slimy and nasty. Why had Richard brought me to live with such an awful person? I looked to him for an explanation, but he strode into the room, leaving me to catch up.
“Grandfather—Grandmother, I’d like you to meet Jeff.”
The old people swung their heads to look at me. Then the old man stood and offered his hand. “Glad to meet you, Jeffrey.”
I shook his bony hand.
“Thank you.” I thought better and added, “Sir.”
The old man took a step back and nodded toward his wife.
“Hello, Mrs. Alpert,” I said.
The old woman glared a
t me and said nothing.
“We’re very sorry to hear of your mother’s death,” the old man said.
Was I supposed to say thank you?
I wasn’t sure, so I said nothing.