Julie and Romeo Get Lucky (15 page)

“Hi, Mort,” Gloria said, and gave him a brief peck on the cheek.

“Julie,” Lila said tightly, and gave me a little nod. “Gloria.”

“Lila,” we said together. The last time Lila and I had occasion to be in the same room was not too long after Romeo and I started seeing each other. Mort and Romeo got into a fistfight that landed them both in the hospital awhile.

“This is Nicolette,” Nora said, pointing to the little girl who was removing every file from the file boxes one at a time and putting them each in a different corner of the room. “Dad, she might not want to be doing that.”

It was not a particularly Nora-like way of addressing a problem, but we were all aware that this tiny person undoing all of her secretary's work was, in fact, her sister who she had never met before.

“Oh, she'll put 'em back.” Mort called out to the child, “Honey, start putting those back now.” Nicolette then started scooping the files up together pell-mell and cramming them upside down into a wastebasket. “See, she's close.”

I looked at my watch. It was three o'clock; we still had a little time before Sandy picked the kids up from school. “I don't mean to be rude, but might I ask why you're visiting?” It was rude. There was no way around it. Maybe I even meant it as such.

Mort held out his open palm to Nora. “Do I need more of a reason than this? My firstborn baby girl is about to have triplets. I think that calls for a plane trip out from Seattle.”

Suddenly Nicolette dropped all the files on the floor as if she had just been run through with a jolt of electricity. “SIPPY CUP!” she screamed. I almost jumped out of my shoes.

“Inside voice,” Lila said lightly, while she rummaged through the toddler bag for a beverage. She came up with the cup but it was empty.

“SIPPY CUP SIPPY CUP SIPPY CUP!” Nicolette wailed.

Lila cleared her throat. “Julie, do you have any apple juice?”

“Yes, I do.” I started to stand up.

Lila looked at me with some hesitation. “I'm sorry, but is it organic, pesticide-free apple juice? You wouldn't believe what's in commercial apple juice these days.”

Nora's head slipped limply to the side.

“Yes,” I said politely. “I do. Gloria, would you show Lila the kitchen, please?”

“I'd really like that,” Gloria said, then she looked down at the sack in her hands. “Oh, Nora, look, we remembered your ice cream. You don't want ice cream now, do you?”

“No,” Nora said.

“I didn't think so. Come on, Lila, I'll show you the kitchen.” The two of them left, with Nicolette close at their heels. “So how old were you when you had this baby?” I heard Gloria say just before the door shut.

Mort watched them disappear. “She's a great kid, really. But it's a hell of a flight. We took the red eye. Got on the plane just as soon as we heard the news.”

“Nora only told you she was pregnant yesterday?”

Nora twisted in her hospital bed. “Mom, please, this is torture, and I'm not supposed to be tortured, okay? Sarah called Dad and told him about the ticket. They're here for the money.”

“Oh, Nora,” Mort said sadly. “That's not really what you think?”

“No bullshit, Dad—really, my nerves can't take it.”

Mort chuckled to me. “Now she swears at her father. Kids.”

There was a great toddler scream coming from the kitchen, then complete silence. Nora and I both flinched like a gun had gone off.

“You get used to it,” Mort said. “Even at my age.”

“I'm going to go upstairs and check on Romeo.” I stood up and nodded. “Mort, always nice to run into you in my own living room.”

“Cacciamani is living here? You married the bum, and no one told me?”

“I didn't marry him, he's not a bum, and no one would have told you because it wouldn't have been any of your business.”

“But you've got him stashed away up in our bedroom? With kids around? I'm sorry Julie, that's not okay.”

Lila and Gloria reemerged from the kitchen with Nicolette sucking her cup. She had that glassy-eyed stoned look kids get when they finally get the apple juice they've been wanting so badly.

“Nora, sketch things out briefly for your father while I go upstairs.”

“Is everything okay?” Gloria said.

“I need to lie down before I have a heart attack,” I said.

“If that's the case, then I'm going to leave, too. Nora, will you be okay?”

“Eventually,” she said. “Probably.”

I kissed Gloria good-bye. Lila stood there glowering at me in my own living room, and I turned away.

Mort had started to steam, something he did even when we were first married. He would get sweaty and red, then his eyebrows would start to twitch. “Don't walk away from me, Julie, I'm serious. There are little children living in this house, and I won't have you just bringing men in.”

“Dad,” Nora said. “Remember what I told you?”

“I respect your nerves, Nora, but this is very important,” Mort said. “Listen, I'll pack Sandy and those two little children up and take them all out to Seattle with us, where at least they can live in a wholesome environment.”

“Sandy's married now, Mort. Remember that? You missed the wedding. She's married to Tony Cacciamani, so be sure to take him with you, too.”

Mort starting answering me, and Lila was still silent, but I went upstairs anyway. I actually felt bad for Nora. If I'd had the strength, I would have picked her up and carried her with me. But I didn't have the strength, not even a fraction of it.

I went into my bedroom and closed the door, then I just stood there. I felt completely unable to move.

“So here's what I've been able to deduce,” Romeo said. “We have a lot of company, and they're not here to see me.”

“Correct.”

“There's a child with them, a girl, and she's a screamer. You'll notice I didn't run down the stairs this time.”

“Excellent judgment.”

“And it's someone you really don't like.”

“Could you hear all of that?”

“I couldn't make out the words, but I could definitely pick up on your tone. Very clipped. I wouldn't want to be on the receiving end of that tone.”

“As usual, you're right on all counts.”

“Lying up here trapped in bed has made me something of a master sleuth. So who was it?”

I thought about making him guess, but I didn't think his recovery time was going to be that long. “Mort, Lila, and their new daughter, Nicolette.”

“Mort Roth is downstairs?” I saw Romeo's arms jump up, and his head left the pillow for a split second before the pain caught up with him and dropped him back.

His face was flushed, and it reminded me unfortunately of Mort. Our families had pretty much managed to let go of the generations' worth of anger that had thrived between us, but chances were slim that Romeo and Mort were ever going to be pals. That was fine with me.

“So he just showed up in the living room with no warning?”

“He said they'd come to see Nora. They wanted to congratulate her on her exciting pregnancy.”

Then his eyes grew round with disbelief. “He's come for the money!”

I picked up his hand and kissed it. “For someone who's doped up on pain pills, you still have an incredibly sharp mind. He thinks I'm an unfit grandparent. I have a man in my bedroom. He thinks that Sandy and Little Tony and, oh yes, Sarah, should come and live with them in Seattle. I have a hunch they're less than interested in taking along your son.”

“And why can't I kill him?”

“Because you can't sit up by yourself.”

Then Romeo started swearing, a long and creative string of expletives that had an unexpectedly soothing affect on me. I lay down in the bed next to him and closed my eyes while he put words together in a way I hadn't heard since high school. If he couldn't fight for my honor, he would certainly swear in my defense. It was sweet.

J
UST BEFORE HE SLIPPED OFF TO SLEEP
, I
GAVE
Romeo a pain pill. Afterward I looked at the bottle long and hard and wondered how it would be such a crime if I took one or maybe just half of one, but I didn't do it. I had a cold suspicion that one pill this afternoon would mean I'd be selling the television sets by noon tomorrow trying to support my habit. It probably wasn't the time for self-medication.

I lay down beside Romeo and closed my eyes without feeling particularly restful. My mind was showing the greatest hits of Nora and Sandy, whether I felt like watching them or not: Nora and Sandy as babies, as sweet little girls, and as fearsome teens. Nora and Sandy at various graduations, in bridal gowns, in my kitchen at Thanksgiving, laughing. I would always take in my daughters and their families. I would provide for them. I would feed them and nurse them and love them, but I felt absolutely incapable of protecting them from their father.

Where Mort was concerned, they were on their own. After all, they loved him. They should love him. Whatever difficulties they had in their relationship were not for me to navigate. Wasn't it Nora, after all, who had called Mort when I was first dating Romeo, so that he could fly out here to break us up?

Now I was lying in my bed worrying about her having to deal with him alone. I was worried about Sandy, who would soon walk in the house and be ambushed by reports of my bad behavior. And not two minutes later, I heard the voices of the children downstairs. I could hear the stronger voices of adults. Like Romeo, I wasn't able to make out exactly who was saying what, but I could understand it wasn't good.

Then there was a knock on my door. The knock no longer asked a question, “Are you in there? May I come in?” The knock simply made a pronouncement, “Cover yourself! I'm coming in.” Then Mort was standing in my bedroom.

Romeo didn't wake up, and maybe if I had taken the pill, I would be asleep myself. It wasn't a comforting thought to imagine Mort in my room while I was sleeping, but it was easier to manage than the thought of his being in there while I was awake.

“Out,” I said. My mind could not extend to any thought more complicated than that.

Mort took it all in, the draperies and the table lamps and the chair in the corner with the needlepoint cushion. Everything was exactly as he had left it except that now Romeo was in the bed, asleep on what had once been Mort's side. “Oh Christ, I do hate the sight of this.” He shook his head.

Romeo was under the covers in fully buttoned pajamas (though sadly, they were my pajamas, the flannel ones with the roses which he liked because they were softer than his) and I was completely dressed and on top of the covers with an afghan over my feet.

“Out,
out,
” I said.

“In our own room. Our own bed! Julie, my mother made that afghan.”

I kicked it off onto the floor. “Take it.”

Sandy came in behind him, looking wild-eyed. “Mom, I tried to stop him.”

“He can't be stopped.” I closed my eyes and willed them all to go. When I opened my eyes again they had only doubled, then tripled. There was Lila with the bouncing Nicolette, there was Little Tony, and then, finally, here came Sarah. I tried again. “Oh come on people, really—out!”

Mort cleared his throat and pinned on his best smile. “Sarah said she didn't want us to be mad at each other anymore.”

“Super,” I said. “We won't be. Go.”

“I want all my grandparents together,” Sarah said.

“And so we are,” Mort said. “Which is just great. Everybody is getting along.”

Sarah started hopping up and down, up and down, clapping her hands together.

“Hey, settle down. Romeo is sleeping. You know he needs to get his rest.”

“It's just like the movie,” Sarah said excitedly. “It's just like Charlie's house.”

It was nothing like the Bucket house. Poor Charlie Bucket lived in a shack, and his downtrodden mother, the washer-woman, took care of her parents and her husband's parents, the four of whom shared a big bed together in the middle of the living room. The two impossibly ancient couples faced each other, one at each post of the four-post bed, their feet poking up beneath the single cover. There was not the slightest whiff of any funny business going on. The sight of them all piled up together like that was any caretaker's worst nightmare.

“I want you like the movie,” Sarah said.

“Like
Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory?
” Mort asked brightly, as if he thought this was a wonderful suggestion. Oh, what fun!

“What are you saying?” I said to Sarah.

But Mort knew exactly what she wanted, and seeing as how making all of Sarah's dreams come true was his new
raison d'etre,
he immediately steered Lila over to Romeo's feet. “So you'll get in here.”

How could he possibly have understood what she meant? Had tiny Nicolette already fallen into the pit of never-ending chocolate? I will admit, it froze me for a second. I didn't think that I would have to do anything, because surely this was the point where Lila would reach into her back pocket and pull out divorce papers. Surely she would say, When pigs fly, Mort, will I be crawling into your ex-wife's bed. But here she comes, moving gingerly across Romeo's legs as if she has some understanding of a back injury. Her face was set in resignation.

“No!” Sandy said, and grabbed her arm.

“Out!” I said, loudly this time. I pushed in next to Romeo. I felt like I was in the movie where the shark is swimming closer and closer, where the shark is pulling up onto your own tiny life raft.

Romeo's breathing was even and deep. He had no idea what he was sleeping through.

Mort got into bed down by my feet. “Seems like old times,” he said to me.

“Mort, Lila, for God's sake, get out now! Romeo can't be moved around like this!”

“Look how careful I'm being,” Mort said, and slid into place without creating the slightest ripple. He was not happy. No one was happy except for Sarah, who was absolutely mad with joy. She was dancing around the bed and singing both parts of a duet from the movie.

“She's lost her mind,” Little Tony said.

Down on the floor by herself, Nicolette started to cry. She reached up her arms to her mother. “Up,” she said. “Up.”

“She can't come up,” Sarah snapped. “She isn't in the movie.”

“GET OUT OF MY BED!” I roared.

“Honey, wait a minute,” Mort said to his youngest daughter. “Sandy, can you take the baby?”

“Get up!” Sandy screamed.

Sometimes in battle, you unexpectedly find yourself the ranking officer. You have to make a decision as to whether or not you must leave your man behind on the field in order to save him. I did not want to leave Romeo alone in that bed, but I knew I could not rid the room of this terrible plague any other way. I got up.

“Grandma!” Sarah said. “Now you have to dance with me!”

I took Sarah firmly by the arm and walked her to the hall. “Out!”

“What!” she cried. Her mouth made a perfect round ‘O' of incredulity. I slammed the door.

“See this?” Mort said to Sandy. “This is exactly the sort of thing I was talking about. You don't treat a child that way. It's abusive.”

I was ready to go all the way. It was time for Mort and me to enter the battle we had been skirting since the day he left me for Lila, the battle that, when it ended, would allow only one of us to live. I didn't even care if it was me. All I knew was that the world was no longer a big enough place for both of us. I jumped on him, my hands on his neck.

“Mom, no, Mom, don't!” Sandy cried.

I could feel someone pulling me from behind, then I heard Lila screaming, with Nicolette screaming behind her like a weird echo. It was a flailing ball of adults, and Little Tony was crying, “No, no!” He got ahold of Lila and Sandy got ahold of me.

“Your mother's insane!” Mort said. “Isn't this what I told you? You can't raise a child in a house like this.”

“Roth?” Romeo said thickly. “Roth? Is that you?” Suddenly, the bed was bouncing so badly I was worried we had compressed yet another piece of his spine.

For a moment we were all quiet. Mort put his feet on the floor.

Little Tony ran around to the other side of the bed and picked up Romeo's hand. “It's just me, Romeo,” he said in a quiet voice. “Everything's fine. Go back to sleep. I was just playing.”

“Crazy kid,” Romeo said, and reached up to touch Tony's head. Before his hand dropped, he was asleep again.

Nicolette was on the floor crying, and Sandy picked her up and handed her to Lila. “She needs to go downstairs,” Sandy said.

Lila took her daughter in her arms and hugged her. She closed her eyes. “All of you are crazy,” she said quietly.

“You didn't see
me
getting into that bed,” Sandy told her, and herded her out the door.

Mort got out of the bed.

“Julie, we need to talk.”

He rubbed the back of his neck. Maybe it was sore from where I had tried to strangle him. But he didn't seem to be rubbing it to make a point; he didn't seem angry at me at all, now. It was as if none of this had happened. “If we were talking about a hundred thousand, I would be completely hands off. You know that. I'm not a greedy guy. But if it's seven and a half million, that's what it is, right?”

“Get out, Mort.”

“If it's seven and a half million, then I have to tell you, some of that should come to us. I'm the girl's grandfather. I'm sixty-five years old. I have a two-year-old kid.”

“I know the numbers, Mort.
Out.
”

“Business has not been perfect. It's not been bust, but how is a guy my age going to make enough money to send a girl to college fifteen years from now? I might not even be around when she goes to college. Do you realize that? Lila says I've got to make provisions, and she's right, but the chances of me getting far enough ahead to put that sort of money aside at this point—well, unless I win the lottery, I don't know how it's going to happen.”

Mort amazed me. He was like one of those ants that walks in a straight line. If a building is in his way, he just goes over the top of it, never around. He never loses his focus; he never hears what anyone else is saying; he just goes ahead. I could take off all my clothes and stand on my head, and he would just keep talking.

“Could we at least have this conversation in another room so we don't wake Romeo up again?” I said.

“The guy seems to be about as alert as a can of tuna fish.”

“Look Mort, as far as I'm concerned, this is Sandy's decision to make. If they want to cut you in on the ticket, then
mazel tov.
I will do nothing to stand in the way. But I'm not the person you should be pleading your case to. Get out of my bed, my room, and my house. Leave me alone. I have nothing to do with this.”

“Oh Jules, are you really so blind? You've got to know the way things work around here. You're the lynchpin, the compass. Nothing gets done unless you give it the okay. You've got to talk to them for me, plead my case. Otherwise, I don't stand a chance.”

“Roth?” Romeo said again. “Is that Mort Roth?”

“Go back to sleep, Cacciamani. Go back to sleep in my bed.”

Suddenly Romeo's eyes shot open wide as if from a terrible dream. “Julie?”

“I'm getting rid of him,” I said. “It isn't easy, but I'm working on it.”

Romeo reached out with one hand, his fingers clawing at the air. “Where is he?”

“What do you think,” Mort said. “You're going to catch me and squeeze me to death with one hand?”

“It would work if I caught you in the right place,” Romeo said.

I put my hands against Mort's shoulder and pushed, but he was a very solid sixty-five. “Let me give you some advice, Mort. The next time you want me to do you a favor, send flowers. Write up a simple letter and stick it in a huge bouquet and send it to me. Systematically begging and insulting is never going to get you anywhere.”

“Julie, get him out of here,” Romeo said.

“Look at the way he talks to you,” Mort said, and made a tsk, tsk noise that made me want to pull out his teeth. “I'm going downstairs. We'll talk later. I hope you're feeling better soon, Cacciamani.”

“Me too, Roth. I hope I'm feeling better before you leave town.”

I closed the door behind him, but there wasn't a lock. Mort himself had taken it off thirty years ago when Nora locked herself in our bedroom one night. I tried to put a chair beneath the knob the way they do in movies, but either it wasn't the right chair or it wasn't the right knob. I couldn't get it to stay.

“What in the hell just happened here?” Romeo said.