The Pursuit of Alice Thrift (23 page)

The ghost of Mary Ciccarelli visited. Why hadn't I asked forensic questions? What was the nature and location of her accident? Had there been an autopsy? Had tissue samples been preserved?

No one, not one living soul except the reservations manager, knew where I was. It would take a private detective to find me, if ever. The pond outside was murky, black, opaque, possibly bottomless. Who would even miss me? Until my parents put two and two together and obtained my dental records,
if
my bloated body floated to the surface, I'd be an unidentified victim, the notorious Cape Cod Jane Doe.

Someone should know my whereabouts. Who could I call? I slipped out of bed. Ray stirred, snuffled, but didn't wake. I took his cell phone into the bathroom and called my home number. “This is Alice Thrift. Just for the record, in case anyone is looking for me, I am at the Upstream Inn, Falmouth, Massachusetts. I married Raymond J. Russo of Brighton, Mass., today, March 15, at Boston City Hall. I'm supposed to return on Saturday, March 16. Most likely you won't need this information.”

“Alice?” Ray called. “Whaz wrong?”

I said, “I never told anyone where I was going. I just wanted to leave the information on my answering machine in case of an emergency.”

“That's nice,” he murmured.

“Go back to sleep,” I said.

“You, too, hon,” he said. “Come to bed.”

I did. I nudged him a few inches toward his own side, and wedged a pillow under his head. He smiled as if these were the ministrations of a doting helpmeet.

“Love you,” he murmured.

It was a hard fact to ignore: My husband not only didn't mind me but he adored me. He was so easily gratified, so eager to find tenderness in any custodial act. Wasn't that a compelling enough reason to marry? Wasn't it better to give than to receive?

I felt ashamed that my thoughts had stalled in the sulci of my brain that housed criminal suspicions. Here was a man in pain, a lonely widower, hardworking, undistinguished in almost every way, outwardly unattractive. Yet he was convinced that I brought him joy and relief and, even as a physician on probation, some distinction or pedigree. In Ray Russo's book I was a success—a healer, a curer, an ideal wife.

It could work. It shouldn't matter what outsiders thought, or what inquests I imagined in the dark. I'd call my parents in the morning and elicit their blessing. Eventually they'd send out engraved announcements, and host a subdued celebration.

My colleagues, especially the social-minded nurses and the popular Dr. Stephanie Crawford, would notice the gold band on my left hand. “Alice Thrift?” they'd squeal.
“Married?”

“Eloped last Friday,” I'd say offhandedly, but with a veiled smile. I'd practice in the mirror beforehand.

24.
Hiatus

IT WAS A GOOD THING THAT IMMIGRATION AND NATURALIZATION
had no reason to examine our union, because, after dropping me off at 11G, Ray announced that he'd be going back to his place.

“To get your things?”

“That. And because of Pete.”

“Who's Pete?”

“The dog!”

I said, “You never mentioned a dog.”

“Pete's the reason I never could stay over: He acts out when he's left alone for too long, and the neighbors signed a petition. Besides,” he said, “if I'm smart about one thing, it's marriage.”

Smart about marriage?
I asked. How did that correlate with pets?

Ray put an arm around my shoulder and tilted his temple against mine. “In this day and age, any arrangement is normal. Separate apartments, separate cities, separate time zones. This place is such a steal, and my place is not only rent-controlled but doubles as an office. So why go crazy if it means having a whole new set of business cards printed up?”

He walked to my night table and picked up my alarm clock. “Note what time it's set for: five
A.M.
Once I'm awoken I can't fall back to sleep. Also, I'm used to a little more space. My speakers alone would take up a high percentage of your square feet.”

“How many bedrooms does your apartment have?”

“Two. But it's crummy. I haven't kept it up. And Mary was no white tornado, either.” I followed him into the kitchen, where he wrote
Grape-Nuts
and
hot sauce
on my magnetized shopping list. He turned around, smiled, and announced, “The next thing on our agenda is telling your parents.”

“No hurry,” I said.

“Here's what I'm thinking: You say, ‘Ray proposed to me and I accepted.' In other words, we're engaged.”

“Not ‘Ray and I got married'?”

“Unh-uh. Too cut-and-dried. That was just a civil ceremony to make it official, but now we're talking about a real wedding.”

I said, “I don't want a real wedding. That's too much fuss; too much pomp and silly outfits.”

“Okay. I'm hearing you. What about a party? Because a party says, ‘This is our son-in-law. Alice finally tied the knot. Come meet the guy who swept her off her feet.' ”

I said, “Maybe, at most, I could go along with a quiet dinner for their closest friends.”

Ray opened the cupboard above my sink. “I'm counting four dinner plates. Four salad plates. Three mismatched bowls that look like they came from a yard sale. Two chipped mugs, and one wooden egg cup painted to look like an Indian maiden.”

“It's from my childhood,” I said. “There used to be a mate.”

“My point is, what kind of inventory is this?”

“I have enough as long as I wash them after each use.”

“But what about company? What about when we entertain? Are we going to set the table with Chinet and plastic forks?”

I asked if this was the sole motivation for restaging a wedding: the acquisition of housewares.

“Is that so bad? I've seen kitchens get outfitted in one fell swoop, especially if someone throws a shower. Have you heard about registering at a department store? Because when Mary and I got married, we picked things out that we never thought anyone could afford—like a Mixmaster with a dough hook, and a toaster with four slots. And would you believe that her coworkers at Kinko's chipped in and got both pieces for us?”

“What happened to those presents?”

“I gave them away. It was too hard to have them around as reminders.”

“Even the appliances?”

“I let Mary's sisters take what they wanted. The rest I gave to Goodwill.”

I asked if he stayed in touch with these original in-laws.

“Here's how that came down,” he said. “When a daughter dies, even if it's an accident, parents resent the fact that it was their daughter who lost her life, and not their son-in-law. I know that's crazy, but it's human nature. It's not that they want me dead per se; it's just that deep in their subconscience, they're angry Mary was picking up the Chinese food, and not me.”

“Is that how it happened? She was picking up takeout?”

“I never told you that?”

I said no. How awful. How senseless.

“People die every day running errands,” he said. “She was the one who had the egg-roll craving. I was willing to eat leftovers that night. But I understand why her family severed all ties.” He pointed to the telephone: speaking of parents.

I said I'd wait. Sunday was my traditional phone-home day.

Ray smiled. “You know what I think? I think you're dragging your feet. You want to call when I'm not around, because they might go ballistic, and you want to spare my feelings.”

I said, “Actually, I do want to talk to them alone.”

“You can't say ‘I love the guy' in front of me?”

I said, “I could. The more personal the better in Joyce's book.”

Ray grinned. “Now I get it. You're going to try to explain the chemistry thing, and you think I'll get embarrassed.”

“Something like that,” I said.

“Wow. If I told my old lady anything personal, let alone doing it, let alone
enjoying
it, she'd slap me across the face. Wife, fiancée, girlfriend, it wouldn't matter.”

I asked when his mother had passed away.

“Where are we? March? A year ago.”

“So you lost your mother and your wife at the same time?”

“The winter from hell. First Mary's accident, then my mother's.”

“Your mother died in an accident, too?”

“She fell taking out her garbage, broke her hip, and next thing I knew the hospital's calling me and telling me she has cancer.”

“What kind?”

“Whaddyacallit: bone.”

“What was the primary?”

“Huh?”

I said, “That's usually a metastatic focus and not a primary. Do you know if it was a pathologic fracture?”

“
Bone cancer
sounded right to me. I didn't know I was supposed to ask about where it started. And don't forget, I was still in shock over Mary.”

“Probably breast or lung.”

“Too bad I didn't know you then,” said Ray. “You could've fed me the questions.”

I said it probably wouldn't have changed the outcome. Was she a smoker?

Ray said, “Can we talk about more pleasant topics? Like our upcoming wedding?” He pretended to transform reality into something gauzy with a wave of his hand. “Me relatively handsome in a tux and you in a dynamite white dress, your big happy grin behind a veil which is flowing down from a shiny tiara.”

A wedding dress. I felt a pinch in my heart where Sylvie had been. For weeks I'd been trying to forget the death of that friendship, studiously substituting her minuses for her pluses. But now I couldn't conjure what I'd say, on my own, to a bridal saleswoman, or what I'd make of my reflection in a three-way mirror.

“Did I say something wrong?” asked Ray.

I told him the truth: that the phrase
wedding dress
had made me wistful—

“I know, I know. But you're going to get a chance to do it up right.”

I said, “Not that. I meant I was thinking of Sylvie; that
wedding
dress
was reminding me of past girlfriend diversions. We shopped together once. It was only to Filene's Basement for bras, but it was really fun.”

He pointed to the door. “Go. She's right across the hall. Knock on her door and ask her if she wants to have a soul-searching conversation about who hurt whose feelings and how to prevent future misunderstandings. I know how much you enjoy discussing and dissecting your feelings. So here's your chance. What's the worst that'll happen? She'll slam the door in your face?”

“Maybe I could just say, ‘I thought you'd like to know that Ray and I were married yesterday.' ”

“First,” said Ray, “she couldn't care less. And second, we have to get our stories straight: Did we get married yesterday or engaged? We can't have two separate versions floating around.”

He picked up the receiver and handed it to me. “It's not gonna get any easier,” he said. “Your parents and your friends will still want to know, ‘Why in hell would you pick that guy?' My advice is to say, ‘Ray wants to marry me,' and see if they say, ‘Over my dead body,' or, ‘I have to get off and rent the hall.' ”

I put the phone back in its charger. “Remind me why we chose a civil ceremony in Government Center if you're so determined to have a church wedding and a big party.”

“It's simple,” said Ray. “I couldn't wait. I wanted you to be Mrs. Ray Russo ASAP. But when I thought about it, I realized I'd cheated you. I had a big first wedding, but this was all you got—‘I do' in a concrete office with a pencil sharpener for a bridesmaid.”

I said, “I don't like to lie.”

“Is it a lie if we were just sealing the deal, getting ourselves on the books? I don't think so. But you do what you think is right. I gotta get going. The kennel closes at six.”

I asked if I could come with him.

“No way! Not until I clean up my apartment. You'd divorce me if you saw the way I lived.” He snapped his fingers. “But that gives me a great idea. Why don't I take something of yours back with me so Pete can get used to your scent?”

I said maybe next time. Which would be when?

“I'll come by tomorrow,” he said. “And I'll wear my Paco Rabanne.”

“I'm working tomorrow, remember? They gave me Friday off in exchange for Sunday.”

“Lunch, then?”

I said, “Lunch? You know I can't stop for lunch. I don't even have time to get a wrinkled dollar rejected by a vending machine.”

Ray walked to the door, where he'd left his garment bag in a slump. With his hand on the doorknob he said solemnly, “I think you understand why it's a good plan to keep our separate places.”

I said no, actually. The rationale was not clear to me at all.

“I want you to miss me. Let's say you can sneak away through the tunnel for a catnap during the day. I don't want to be here, needing a shave, doing paperwork or calling customers. In other words—and I speak from experience—I want to keep love alive.”

I said, “You're being awfully modern and liberated.”

He grinned. “That's me: Ray Russo, a.k.a. Mr. Thrift.” He slipped his wallet out of his back pocket and checked its contents. “You wouldn't have a couple of twenties until I get to the bank on Monday?”

I said there was an ATM in the hospital lobby, through the tunnel, just inside the pneumatic doors.

He checked his watch. “I gotta get Pete,” he said.

We were husband and wife now. I found my knapsack, and gave him two twenties, a ten, and the spare key I'd never had use for.

He kissed me in haste. “Call your parents. Then leave a message on my cell.”

IT WAS FIVE-THIRTY
P.M.
and I'd been married for twenty-four and a half hours. As I studied the Mykonos take-out menu, I actually wondered whether Ray was a spy or a G-man. I'd read of dissembling within a marriage, of husbands drawing paychecks from the U.S. Postal Service when the true employer was the CIA. First-Prize Fudge could be a front for some top-secret job that required occasional travel by car around the six New England states.

No, I'd eaten that fudge, and I'd heard fudge anecdotes that only an insider could know. I had no reason to doubt Ray's credibility—except that I'd only known his address, his date of birth, and his middle name since applying for our marriage license.

I selected Greek salad and dolma, but hung up before the restaurant answered. I'd need cash. Was it the ATM that sent me down the elevator, across the tunnel, into the hospital on a Saturday night? Or was it loneliness?

“What's new?” I might ask a fellow house officer across the sneeze shield of the salad bar. “I haven't been around. I had two days off: As a matter of fact, I got married yesterday and have been honeymooning on the Cape.”

But when I entered the square beige cafeteria, its lights dimmed as if Saturday night required atmosphere, there were no convivial teams of house officers occupying tables I might join. I saw a few lost souls, and several adults who looked like the depressed grown children of parents on life support. My salad was dressed with chalky ranch, its carrot curls desiccated, my onion soup watery. On my return trip—for coffee and the last piece of coconut cream pie—I came tray-to-tray with Meredith, dressed for midwifery in blue scrubs.

Her greeting—“Alice! Hello!”—was friendly, even warm. “Where are you sitting?” she asked.

I led her to my table, where she lined up her two cartons of skim milk, a banana, and a dish of paprikaed cottage cheese.

“How's work?” I asked. “And how's the fetus?”

“Work is great,” she said. “I know I'm supposed to be tired, but I'm all energy. Shaw says it's plain old excitement.”

“How is Dr. Shaw?”

“Fine. He asks about you. I think he thinks . . .” She stopped. “I think he thinks that I see you more often than I do.”

“And Leo? Is he excited, too?”

“Leo and I . . . are on what we're calling a hiatus,” she said.

I waited for her to define that term, and after two deliberate spoonfuls of cottage cheese, she did. “We're being perfectly cordial, but we're not spending time together. It was my decision. First, he hasn't told his family yet. Secondly, I felt as if I couldn't talk about the baby with pure, unalloyed enthusiasm. I shouldn't have to walk on eggshells.”

“Don't people often wait to announce the pregnancy?”

“Because they're superstitious. Which is such fallacious reasoning. I mean, what if the worst happened and you miscarried? Would the pregnancy be forever a secret? People don't think like that anymore. If you lost a child, would you hide that fact? Wouldn't you want people to know; your
community
to know?”