Authors: Jilliane Hoffman
90
She sat on the same ripped vinyl bench, staring at the same
People
magazine on the chipped end table that she had almost three months before. How different life was now. She looked around the waiting room, empty once again on a Saturday morning.
The guards in the bulletproof booth wouldn’t even look at her, once they figured out why she was here. ‘That’s Cirto’s sister,’ had quickly spread among the MH Police, like the panic of an infectious disease. And she was the leper.
The door next to the booth opened and Dr Mynks suddenly appeared. Julia gathered her purse and rose to follow him back to his office, but he stepped into the reception area, letting the door close behind him this time. In his hand he held a large brown paper bag, like one that you might get at a supermarket. It was clear that their meeting was going to take place here.
‘Ms Valenciano,’ he began in that same soft, yet cold and impersonal voice he had used on the phone. ‘On behalf of the staff here at Kirby, allow me to say that we are sorry for your loss. This is a tragedy and we will, of course, be looking into all the circumstances surrounding your brother’s death.’ He handed her the bag. ‘The nurses on Andrew’s ward thought you would like to have this. These were his belongings. Most of it is just clothing, but there are some drawings he was keeping on his wall, as well as a journal he was writing, his wallet and a high-school graduation ring. All the things he came in here with.’
Dr Mynks’s words were spoken so quickly and so matter-of-factly that Julia knew he didn’t mean them. He didn’t mean any of them. For him, Andrew Cirto’s death wasn’t a tragedy; it was simply a statistic. An unfortunate statistic that had unfortunately happened on
his
watch, and would now be a blemish on
his
record. To him, Andy was a patient number, an inmate, a murderer, and his death was otherwise insignificant. She was waiting for Mynks to look down at his watch in annoyance. Maybe tap his foot impatiently just to give her the hint to get lost.
She took the bag, which felt too light to contain all of someone’s worldly belongings, and stood there for a few moments, not sure what to do. Not ready to leave. Not ready for any of this to be real. ‘What happened?’ she finally managed in a squeaky voice that sounded nothing like her own, as she looked around the waiting room. She felt the guards watching them. She looked and saw one of them was laughing.
Dr Mynks didn’t even blink. ‘Suicide. Like I told you on the phone, Ms Valenciano.’
She didn’t look away. She didn’t nod. She didn’t shake her head. She just stood there with that profoundly blank look on her face until he finished.
‘He hung himself. In the shower,’ he finally added.
Now
he looked at his watch. ‘Look, once again, I am sorry for your loss, but depression is a byproduct – for lack of a better word – of schizophrenia. Your brother had come to terms with his illness and, eventually, the crimes that he’d committed. That was one of the reasons he was being transferred to Rockland. Sometimes, unfortunately, those realizations are just too overwhelming for a person to emotionally handle. Once the medication has worked its magic many patients cannot deal emotionally with the crimes they committed when they were ill. And then with all the recent changes in Andrew’s life …’ His voice trailed off. He held up his hand in front of him. ‘I am not saying that’s the reason Andrew took his own life. There was no note and he told no one what he was going to do, so this is all, of course, conjecture.’
There was nothing else to say. Dr Mynks had said it all without saying a thing. Julia had been the recent change in Andrew’s life. The reminder from his past that he could not cope with.
‘Now, if you’ll excuse me,’ he started to say, but Julia didn’t hear the rest. She’d already turned, and with all of Andrew’s belongings clutched tightly in her hand, she headed back out the security doors and into the cold New York City sunshine.
91
The Barnes and Sorrentino Funeral Home on the corner of McKinley Street and Hempstead Avenue was still painted that same unremarkable yellow that she remembered. Set slightly back from the road by a small patch of lawn, blooming flower beds lined a cement walkway that led to a dark wood front door. Julia had biked past it maybe a million times while she was growing up, on her way to the library or the bagel store, and she’d always thought it was a doctor or dentist’s office. It wasn’t until her parents were waked there that she realized it was a funeral home.
A light drizzle had begun to fall and she stood for a moment outside in the empty parking lot next to her rental car as memories rushed her. The gas station on the corner she and Andy would fill their bikes up with air at had closed, but the Venus Cafe was still across the street. Every Sunday after church her dad would take the family there for brunch and the best pancakes Julia had ever tasted. In fact, she’d had them the last time she was here in West Hempstead, when Nora and Jimmy had taken everyone in the family for a bite to eat in between the afternoon and evening wake services for her parents. She hadn’t had pancakes since.
Come on, Julia, honey. We can’t be late now. People will be waiting.
An older lady with a stack of teased snow-white hair and ruby lips greeted her as soon as she opened the door, appearing seemingly out of nowhere. ‘Oh my,’ she said, looking past Julia at the parking lot behind her as the door closed. ‘Looks like it’s starting to rain again. Maybe that means spring is coming soon.’ She smiled. ‘Can I help you?’
Julia looked around the dark lobby. ‘I called yesterday. I’m … My name is Julia Cirto. I called about my brother, Andrew Cirto.’
‘Yes. I’m terribly sorry for your loss. I’m Evelyn. Why don’t you come into my office?’
Julia followed Evelyn past a gas-burning fireplace and down the worn red-carpeted hall. What an odd color for a funeral home, she thought. A red carpet. Maybe it was meant to be symbolic. A grand exit from life.
You, too, were a somebody!
Inside a modest office, Julia took a seat in one of the two paisley wing chairs that were posed perfectly in front of an antique desk. Eveyln took the other.
‘We received the body today from the Medical Examiner’s Office in New York County. We just needed to meet with you to …’ Evelyn hesitated for a second, searching for, Julia assumed, the most delicate word possible, ‘… go over a few things. We have a catalogue that you can look through, or we have—’
Julia shook her head. ‘I, I can’t afford much, Evelyn. There was no insurance, and my brother didn’t, well, he didn’t have any money. But I want him to have something nice. I can spend about five thousand dollars. Can you pick something nice for me?’ She didn’t want to see all the prettier caskets she could have picked, or all the extras she could have had. Just take her money and get this done. She wanted to believe Andy had the best.
Evelyn nodded. She reached over and lightly touched Julia’s knee. ‘Of course. We’ll handle everything.’ She paused for a moment. ‘I’m curious. You’re from Florida, and your brother died in Manhattan. Why did you choose Barnes and Sorrentino? Are there other relatives here in West Hempstead or on the Island? Is there any bulletin you would like us to notify?’
Julia looked around the tiny office. One small window faced the parking lot. She could see that the rain was coming down harder now, forming deep puddles on the uneven asphalt. She remembered trick-or-treating up the block, and walking to Echo Park Pool. ‘I used to live in West Hempstead. My brother and I both did. We grew up here, a couple of blocks away, on Maple. It was the only funeral home I knew,’ she said absently. She looked down at her lap. ‘My parents both had their services here.’
‘Oh my,’ said Eveyln. ‘When was that?’
Julia shook her head. ‘A long time ago,’ was all she offered.
‘Oh,’ Evelyn said again. ‘Well, we’ll make sure that everything is taken care of. Now, about the wake. When would you like to have the services, over one day or two?’
‘No, I don’t need a wake. There’s just me,’ she replied quickly, her voice a whisper. ‘There won’t be anyone else. No one here knows my brother anymore.’
‘Oh,’ said Evelyn again. She looked out the door down the hall. ‘I’m not so sure about that. We did get a flower delivery today. We put them in Chapel A.’
‘That must have been mine.’ She bit her lip. ‘Everyone deserves flowers, Evelyn.’
‘Okay,’ replied Evelyn, slowly. She rose from her seat. ‘Let me show you the room, then, for the service, if you decide to have it here.’
‘We’re Catholic. I think I’m going to have it at St Thomas.’
They walked down the hall in silence. Outside the room designated as Chapel A, a black magnetic board encased in glass read ‘Andrew J. Cirto’ in small, white letters. In two days or so, Julia knew the letters would be switched around to read someone else’s name. Evelyn opened one of the double doors and Julia closed her eyes.
You don’t have to look if you don’t want to, Munch. The caskets will be closed.
Please, don’t honey. Don’t look, little one. That’s something you don’t need to see. You don’t want to remember her that way.
‘As you can see, it was a rather large delivery. We had to put them all in here,’ Evelyn said.
Julia opened her eyes. The room was filled with hundreds and hundreds of white peonies.
92
The massive church was eerily quiet on Monday morning. Just the patter of rain slapping against the stained-glass windows could be heard echoing across the marble and through the towering stone-columned halls. Julia sat by herself in the front pew. Directly in front of her, draped in a white cloth and the funeral spray she’d ordered, was Andrew’s casket, propped on a metal transport gurney. The white peonies from the funeral home filled the altar. She hoped Evelyn had selected a nice casket. She hoped it was lined with satin and maybe a soft pillow. She hoped he looked peaceful inside.
You don’t have to look if you don’t want to. The casket will be closed.
And so she hadn’t.
The parish of St Thomas the Apostle ran two churches in West Hempstead – the main church and the much smaller chapel on the other side of town by the Southern State Parkway. Her dad had always liked the chapel, so that was where her family usually went on Sunday mornings when she was a kid. But if given the choice, Julia herself always liked the main church. Especially for midnight Mass on Christmas Eve. Besides her parents’ funerals, that was one of the only times she could remember the huge church being filled to capacity, with every row filled and spilling out into the vestibule and onto the front steps. The choir would sing in the loft above, accompanied by the old organ and the folk guitars. Most of the choir members were the older brothers and sisters of her classmates at St Thomas’s elementary school next door – juniors and seniors at Sacred Heart Academy or Chaminade High School in Mineola. Julia could remember there was a time when she’d wanted to join the choir, too.
The door to the sacristy opened and a young priest walked out, his heels softly clicking on the polished marble floor. He fashioned a long stole around his neck and kissed it, genuflecting in front of the altar. He looked down the center aisle of the empty church. The two pallbearers from Barnes and Sorrentino stood in the far back by the doors, off to a side hall. ‘Do you want me to wait a little bit longer?’ Father Tom asked, softly. He looked like a young, balding George Clooney.
Julia shook her head. She didn’t look behind her. She didn’t need to. ‘No, Father.’
Aunt Nora had hung the phone up on her last night, the second she mentioned Andy’s name. She hadn’t even gotten to tell her he’d died. The line had stayed busy after that, all night long. Besides her and Uncle Jimmy, there was no one else to call. There would be no one else who even cared.
In her hand she held the folded-up drawing that Andrew had almost finished sketching. She’d found it in the paper bag of belongings that Dr Mynks had given her. It was a picture of her. Sitting at the table in the visiting room, smiling, framed by stars and moons.
‘Okay, then,’ Father Tom said. ‘I suppose this will be very intimate.’ He smiled a gentle smile and, instead of moving behind the pulpit, he stepped down off the altar and walked over to where she sat, sliding into the pew right beside her. To her surprise, he found her hand and held it softly in his. ‘We are here today to say goodbye to Andrew Cirto, a loving son and brother,’ he began in a mild voice that matched his smile and his touch. ‘A lost soul who will be missed by all who knew him, by his family and, most of all, by his sister.’
Julia did not correct him. She bowed her head and listened while Father Tom held her hand and went on for ten minutes about all the things Julia had told him last night when they met over coffee at the rectory. About ice-skating with Andy in Hall’s Pond Park, and movie nights at the Elmont Theater with their mom. About how it was Andrew who always held her head over the toilet whenever she threw up, and who shared his sandwich at school when she had forgotten hers – even though that meant being made fun of by the older kids. About how he’d shoved the first boy who had said something nasty to her. About how he would wait for her when she missed the bus at school so they could walk home together. About what a great listener he was and what a great friend he had been. All about the gentle, misunderstood man with the sheepish grin of a boy that she had just come to know again after too long of an absence. And while she listened, she was relieved to hear that Father Tom never once mentioned that Andrew was a murderer. Or a crazy. Or sick.
‘Let us now pray,’ Father Tom said and Julia got down on her knees and prayed hard to a God she thought was cruel sometimes. A God she had long stopped believing in. A God who now beckoned her back with his soft whispers. She closed her eyes and saw Andrew’s face as she wanted to always remember it, before the sickness sucked the life out of him. Swinging a baseball bat with a smile at sixteen. The tears slipped out of her eyes as Father Tom led an empty church in prayer.
‘Hail Mary, full of Grace,’ he began softly. ‘The Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.’
‘Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners,’ Julia said, joining him. ‘Now, and at the hour of our death.’ She cast her eyes up to the Sanctuary, to the crucifix suspended above the altar. She saw Jesus smile down at her. He was whispering the words along with her.
‘Amen,’ she whispered back.