Honey, page 5
“Darling. I have always had the fact sheet, and let me tell you, it doesn’t help one bit. Facts are not what you have to master. Illusion is the only hope.”
The girl blinked. Obviously she didn’t get it.
“Ignore me,” Honey said. “I believe I’m drunk.”
“Me too. Wow.”
They were both quiet then. A slumping Jocelyn stared at the floor, giving Honey an opportunity to study the girl more closely. Unpainted nails bitten to shreds; hairy forearms crusted with a few withered Band-Aids; abysmal posture.
She was no beauty, certainly—though she did have something. But it was something most men would never see, especially nowadays. Once upon a time, a man might have prized this girl for her tubbiness, that pale dimpled skin. Her face had something of a Flemish painting about it. Even the cheeks flaring with rosacea seemed a kind of bravery against a very cold world.
Suddenly the girl reminded Honey of herself. Not that she’d ever been fat; in fact, she’d always been a twig. And, unlike this girl, she’d always known how to dress. Still—why not be honest?—Honey had never really been a beauty. Not a natural one, anyway.
Yes, she’d fooled many men in her life, men who thought she was the most beautiful thing since spun gold. And while Honey never squandered the glow of their adoration, she was not so deranged as to disallow another version of herself—all the bony bits, the sharp angles, the less than perfect nose, even after the surgery. Still, there were plenty of tricks at a girl’s disposal. The way the hair lay against one’s face, the way one shaded one’s cheeks—it was all so important.
Such things, of course, were the least of her charms; Honey’s greatest vanity, perhaps, was her mind. She knew she was smart, and she’d always been able to talk circles around a man. Which worked for a while, but then often backfired. A clever woman was suspect, dangerous.
As Honey sipped the dregs of her wine, she was unsure how to evict the slovenly girl in the lounge chair. The silence between them lingered, though strangely it was not uncomfortable. Actually, it was a relief to just sit with someone and not talk, to dwell companionably in the damn puzzle of it all. Honey had spent nights like this with Dominic. He’d never been afraid of silence—which, in a man, seemed to imply that he wasn’t afraid of love.
“Are you all right?” the girl said. “Oh my God, are you crying?”
“It seems that I am.” Honey wiped her eyes with a chocolate-smeared napkin. “Merely a minor attack, I assure you.”
“Is it about the tree? You know, I really am sorry about that.”
“Yes. Well, I suppose I was rather attached to it.”
“I promise I’ll replace it.”
“You will do nothing of the sort. Now come on, get up.” It was time for this evening to be over. Honey clapped her hands, not only to rouse the girl but to shoo away her own insipid emotion.
“Up, up!” Honey stood, to illustrate how it was done. Apparently the only way to get the girl out of the house was to treat her like a child. “Now I want you to go home and go straight to bed—and no nonsense on the computer.”
The girl rose dutifully, then pointed to the plate of brownies. “Would you mind if I took a couple of those home with me?”
How vulgar, thought Honey. One should never reclaim a gift. But at the same time, the girl’s honesty was refreshing.
“Just leave me one, darling. For breakfast.”
“You won’t be able to eat just one. I’ll leave you two.”
“Very generous of you. No, no—no hugs necessary. Off you go.”
* * *
Honey peered out the window to make sure the girl wasn’t still lurking. The lamppost was lit, illuminating the cherry blossoms on the lawn. In the glare they looked more red than pink—a botanical crime scene. By tomorrow the blossoms would be brown and shriveled.
The funeral was tomorrow.
Honey wasn’t sure she’d be up to it. Besides, she’d already said goodbye. And if there was anything more she wished to say to Nicky, she would say it from the privacy of her own heart, and not in the presence of vicious old women.
And, really, why subject herself to a depressing ceremony when she could stay at home, giddy with Valium, and have a more intimate chat with her dead boyfriend?
“You wouldn’t believe the night I just had,” she said to him now, as if he were standing beside her. Worm poo, she thought, and laughed.
It was all right to laugh, wasn’t it?
Nicky, of all people, would not want her to languish.
5
Too Cool to Live
Honey woke to a jack-in-the-box sun and the scent of pre-programmed coffee. A movie set of a morning, for those who could appreciate it. Honey, unfortunately, couldn’t. She had a splitting headache. The adjective was not used lightly—her head felt half in this world and half in another.
In the living room she saw the empty wine bottle, the leftover brownies, and threw both in the trash. Ever since she’d learned that Corrado had gone into recycling, she saw no reason to separate out glass and plastic and paper. No doubt her nephew’s company simply dumped these things in the ocean or shoved them into a stinking hole.
Entering the kitchen, she shielded her eyes. The sun had overtaken this room as well, doing a Donna Reed on the yellow wallpaper. Honey wasn’t buying it. Everything seemed fraudulent and cheap. And the drip coffee was far too weak; it would do nothing for her headache. After closing the curtains, she brewed a more potent mud with her stovetop Bialetti, and then slowly sipped two cups while pretending to eat a banana. She still had no appetite.
In the shower she made the water extra-hot, scalding herself like a penitent nun. Afterward, she powdered, painted, and poofed, and then slipped on the black Versace dress with its mournful blouson sleeves. Over her chestnut wig she laid a mantilla of black lace, finely wrought and crowded with spidery flowers.
It seemed she was going to a funeral, after all.
* * *
Honey’s leg was free of cramps, so she opted to take her own car, a pearlescent Lexus she had on lease. Nicky was to be buried at Hillside Cemetery, where his wife and parents were. Honey’s people were there too, along with Joey Ramone and William Carlos Williams. Hillside was quite the eclectic dinner party—not a place, it seemed, where one could get much sleep.
Honey, on the other hand, had overslept disastrously. Too late for the mass at St. Margaret’s, she drove straight to the cemetery. Hillside was huge, though, and she wasn’t sure of the location of Nicky’s interment. There was a funeral party not far from the main entrance, but when Honey approached she didn’t recognize a soul, and the casket was disturbingly small.
On higher ground, another crowd was gathered. As she drove up the hill, familiar faces and silhouettes came into view—Angela Carini easily pegged by her diminutive frame and the bright blue oxygen stroller.
Honey couldn’t bear getting any closer. She parked the Lexus halfway up the hill and stood on a patch of lawn, watching the ceremony from a good ten meters away. She kept her distance not because of her unapologetic widow’s weeds or fear of Angela’s hiss. Honey’s reserve had more to do with not wanting to see a body being lowered into the ground—that implacable, irreversible gesture.
While she understood that a dead body was merely a shell whose essence had fled, this knowledge provided little solace. What use were spiritual truths when pitted against primary fears born in childhood? The man buried in the garden, behind her parents’ house, remained the dark note, the double bass, in Honey’s metaphysical symphony.
She leaned against a tree—a massive oak whose high branches made a sound like the ocean, a constant swishing that drowned out the drone of the priest. For a moment the holy man seemed to be looking directly at her, and Honey slipped around to the back of the tree. She felt like one of those photographers who used to come to her family’s funerals—reporters or Feds, lurking in the distance, gawking and snapping. She scanned the crowd, to make sure her nephew wasn’t there. When a text pinged on her phone, it startled her.
Just wanted to say hey. What are you up to???
Dominic was the only person who texted her—so who the hell was this?
The phone pinged again.
This is Joss by the way. Your neighbor!
Honey was horrified. No doubt she’d made a fool of herself last night, crying on the couch, wearing no wig. And how on earth had the girl gotten this number? Honey swiped and deleted the message.
When she looked back at the mourners, they were already dispersing. As Honey stepped toward the car, a woman lifted her arm in greeting. And then this woman, who Honey didn’t recognize, began to make her way down the hill. Oh, for Christ’s sake—what venom now?
Honey stood up straight. Verticality, she’d always felt, was one of the central pillars of elegance. Plus, a straight spine protected you; it was a kind of armor.
The closer the stranger came, the more the face grew familiar; still, Honey couldn’t place it. A slim gal around forty, smartly dressed, prematurely gray. Her step was lively, though, almost sprightly.
“Are you a friend of my uncle’s?” the woman asked.
“Yes.”
“You’re not Honey, by any chance, are you?”
“As a matter of fact, I am. And you are?”
“Oh, I’m sorry”—she extended her hand. “I’m Linda, Dominic’s niece. His sister’s granddaughter.”
Yes, of course. Honey understood why the face looked familiar. It had those wide Sparra cheeks, the acorn-shaped eyes.
The woman smiled. There was no venom.
Honey chided herself for her defensiveness. “It’s very nice to meet you,” she said, shaking the woman’s hand. “I remember your grandmother Peg.”
Honey hadn’t known Nicky’s sister well, but recalled that she’d lost a finger in that dreadful commercial laundry where a lot of the poorer girls had worked.
“I was hoping to see you at the wake,” the woman said. “Were you there?”
“I left early. Why did you want to see me?”
“Oh, I don’t know—my uncle mentioned you a few times.”
Honey rather doubted that. “Did he?”
“Yeah, we talked pretty often. On the phone mostly. I live in Boston now.”
The woman paused, though obviously there was something she wanted to say. Honey waited, expecting the worst.
Linda shook her head, troubled by something. “My uncle was never really a happy man. I shouldn’t say this, but I don’t think he and Aunt Mary were a great match. He was pretty depressed for a long time—I don’t know if you knew that.”
Honey didn’t. She nodded vaguely and let the woman continue.
“And then, I don’t know, he just seemed very different after he started seeing you—and so, yeah, I just wanted to say that. I think you made him happy.”
Honey felt her breath stop. “Did he tell you that?”
“Not in so many words, but . . . it was pretty obvious.”
There was really no way to absorb such information. It was simply too much. Not to mention useless. When grace arrived too late, it only brought tears. Honey felt it best to change the subject.
“So you were close to your uncle?”
“Yeah. He was always so nice, you know. Maybe because he and Aunt Mary didn’t have any kids. And then after my parents died, we started talking more often. He called me almost every Monday.”
And Honey thought he’d been watching football.
Fascinating, how certain people continued to grow richer, even after they died. Because here was a side of Dominic Honey hadn’t known. She pictured her manly man calling this gray-haired niece to chat about life and love. On Linda’s hands there were two rings: one gold, one silver, both ambiguous.
“Are you married, dear?”
“Divorced.”
“Well, you’re still quite young. You’ll meet someone, I’m sure.”
Linda rolled her eyes, unconvinced.
Honey wanted to shake the girl. Did she not understand that, at forty, she was still a child? She still had a million chances left. Well, maybe not a million, but certainly quite a few. She had time on her side. And the gray hair was only in streaks, it could easily be dyed.
“Linda! Are you coming?” someone shouted.
“Be right there!” Linda shouted back. “My brother,” she explained to Honey. “Listen, do you want to join us for the repast?”
“Oh, I didn’t know there was going to be one.”
“Yeah. We’re all going to a restaurant back in Ferryfield.”
“Not Dante’s?”
“Oh God, no. Bazzarelli’s.”
Honey knew the place. A working-class establishment, more of a pizza joint. “I imagine a lot of Mary’s relatives will be there.”
“Yes, but that’s fine. No one cares.”
The girl was an innocent, and of another generation. She didn’t understand that it was absolutely not fine for Honey to be there.
“Thank you, dear, but I don’t think I’m up to it.”
“Are you sure?”
“Quite sure. Very sweet of you, though, to invite me. Your uncle really was a wonderful man.”
Linda nodded. Her tears came swiftly, and were wiped away in the same fashion.
“You know,” she said to Honey, “you’re not that old, either. I mean, I know you’re younger than my uncle. And so I hope the same for you.”
“What’s that?”
“Just saying, I hope you meet someone too.”
What a peculiar thought. Honey had never even considered it. She was eighty-two, for heaven’s sake.
“I mean it,” Linda persisted. “He would have wanted you to be happy.”
Honey did her best to smile. “Thank you, dear. Now go enjoy your pizza.” She patted the woman’s cheek. “I feel quite certain that your uncle would have wanted you to be happy, too.”
Linda nodded. “Lucky us.”
Honey laughed, touched by the way the woman had so deftly joined sarcasm to the God’s honest truth. To be loved by the dead—it was definitely a pickle.
* * *
She took her time in leaving, driving around the little lanes of the cemetery, many of which had quaint designations such as “Star” and “Flower.” Honey’s parents and brother were in a pink granite mausoleum, near a splendid grove of evergreens. Not far away was another tomb, with the name CROKER chiseled into the stone. One would be a fool not to appreciate the pun. Laugh at life, laugh at death, as Osho said.
At the Fazzinga gravesite Honey didn’t get out of the car; she simply stared at the pompous pink monument through the window of the Lexus. It looked absolutely Napoleonic, with scrolls and wreaths and bas-relief columns. Inside, there was still plenty of room for additional tenants. No doubt her father imagined that his children would be more prolific in regard to offspring. But Enzo had had only the one son, and of course Honey had denied her father completely. Denied—that was her father’s word.
Corrado and his wife, their boys—perhaps they’d take the remaining shelves in the tomb. Honey had no interest in claiming one for herself. What she wanted was to be cremated, have her ashes scattered near a small lake in southern France where she’d spent some time with Mr. Hal. Either that, or at Point Lobos, out in California. Of course, she had no idea who she’d ask to do the scattering. After death, she’d probably be kidnapped, interred against her will inside the ghastly pink palace.
She drove on, toward the Jewish part of the cemetery—and here she did get out of the car. It would be a sin not to pay a visit to the grave of Jeff Hyman, aka Joey Ramone. Not that Honey had ever been a fan of the Ramones. By the time punk had reached its apex, Honey was nearly forty. But as she liked to stay au courant, she’d poked her nose in at the periphery of the scene. The music grated, but the style of the musicians intrigued her—the way they’d made a uniform entirely from scraps and scuffs. She’d seen the band only once, at Max’s Kansas City. Joey Ramone had walked stiffly onto the stage, a homely kid with a bulbous schnoz and beanpole legs. But as soon as he started to hop around and sing in that sweet voice rife with snarls and barks, he completely transformed himself.
Atop his grave, there was a lot of loving detritus. Fans had left stones and sunglasses, a rusty horseshoe, even a hypodermic needle. There was a small silver banner on which someone had hand-stitched an epitaph: Too Cool to Live.
As for the grave of William Carlos Williams, Honey chose not to pay her respects, though she certainly agreed with the man. So much really did depend upon the red wheelbarrow.
Though perhaps that was no longer true. Perhaps that was another world, one in which poetry was possible. A world like the one her great-grandparents had lived in—olive trees, chickens, a fertile patch of dirt.
But then history happened. Wars. Betrayals. The chickens died, the olive trees were burned. Everyone grew hungry and, finally, when they couldn’t take it anymore, they put up their fists. The weak became the strong, some of them even punching their way to America.
And here we are, thought Honey, driving away from the cemetery. Here we are.
* * *
It was early afternoon and there wasn’t much traffic. Maybe she’d stop by that good bakery that was near the cemetery and pick up some biscotti. The place used the perfect amount of anise seed, the cookies neither florid nor bland, but delicately medicinal.
When Honey spotted the bakery, though, she drove right past it. A nice idea, but to be honest she still had no interest in food. Driving was what she wanted, not cookies. The pleasure and power and autonomy of it. She sailed through the green lights, and even through several yellow. Honey had always had a heavy foot.
She sped toward Ferryfield, taking side streets she hadn’t been on in years. Perhaps she was testing her memory. She still knew Bergen County well, despite the starkening of its architectural profile. The streets, for the most part, were the same old streets. Castle Terrace, Bloomfield Avenue, the corner of Chubb and Chester. Honey ticked off the names, like boys on a dance card.
She made a right turn onto Lefters Boulevard, just because she could. A few blocks later she swung around a confusing new roundabout and ended up on Robby Road, once a respectable area, though it seemed to have fallen into disrepair. Most of the large houses had been subdivided into apartments, the sidewalks cracked and cluttered with litter.
