Miracle (42 page)

The physician in him became brusque, performing emergency procedures with confident hands. The small boy in him felt helpless and choked back tears while whispering, “No, Pio, no. Pio! I won’t let you go. Pio, it’s
springtime.
”

Pio’s funeral mass was attended by several hundred people. The funeral itself was formal and solemn, in keeping with Pio’s wishes. He was buried where he had been born, in a village south of Orleans. Sebastien stood at the back of the cemetery alone, having left Marie in Paris with her crystals and her meditations. A funeral radiated too much negative energy, she had said.

Sebastien couldn’t agree more. He kept a hawklike watch on his father, who stood near the grave with head bowed majestically, his severe black suit accenting the grief in his posture. Sebastien didn’t doubt that his grief was sincere; Pio had been his father’s lifelong servant, friend, loyal coconspirator.

When the priest finished with the graveside service
Philippe de Savin turned and caught Sebastien’s gaze. His father gave him a hopeful look that hardened when Sebastien didn’t respond.

Sebastien felt a muscle pop in his jaw when his father moved toward him through the crowd. He watched people step aside to let him pass, their attitude respectful but their faces shuttered. His father did not inspire sympathy or affection. A grim realization came to Sebastien: That was how the staff at the hospital regarded
him
.

“I had expected to see you before now,” his father said, coming to a brusque stop in front of him. “I looked for you before the mass, and then during mass, but you never arrived.”

“All that matters is that I was with Pio when he died. I despise the maudlin atmosphere of funerals. I’ve attended a few too many in my life.”

“Perhaps for your benefit we should have had a reading from something by Camus. An uplifting passage about how absurd and unfair life is, and how we suffer because we try to change it.”

“Ah, but we need not suffer ourselves. We can meddle in the lives of others and put the suffering on them. Pio and I were discussing that point just before he died. Your name was mentioned.”

His father regarded him silently, his face tightening. “Not happily, it seems.”

“I want you to search your memory. Go back nine years, to the time when I was preparing to leave the United States for the Ivory Coast. I was involved with a young woman who worked at the Georgia winery. You knew about her. Pio told you.”

“Sebastien! You flatter me! I can’t remember all of your transgressions. And certainly not from so long ago.”

“I think you would remember Amy Miracle. She was a unique problem—too appealing, too different to ignore. Come now, Pio remembered her easily. He remembered visiting her at school after I left the country. I’m sure he remembered why he visited her, and what you instructed him to do about her. But he wouldn’t tell me.”

“There was nothing to tell. Did you badger Pio? My God, did you upset him with pointless accusations?”

“Yes, and I could cut out my tongue for doing it. He wasn’t to blame—you were. I want you to give me the answers that he was too loyal to give.”

His father drew back a blue-veined hand and slapped the back of it across Sebastien’s face. The blow had an emotional force that was far greater than the physical one. Sebastien didn’t flinch, but every nerve pulled tight.

His father’s eyes glittered with fury. “You were not forced to leave your American woman behind when you went to Africa, but you did. You were not forced to marry Marie or come home to France, but you did. You made your own decisions. So there is nothing for me to tell you. God help you for making Pio miserable. He loved you. He wanted the best for you. So did I. But I’ve given up on you, and he never did. You killed him for caring.”

Annette was now standing beside them, her hands covering her mouth in horror. “Stop it! Stop disgracing us, both of you! Everyone is staring! To brawl at Pio’s funeral—it’s unforgivable!”

“Forgiveness remains impossible in this family,” Sebastien said softly, hatred in every word. He held his father’s gaze with vicious intensity. “I made the decisions, true, and they can’t be reversed, but now I know that you manipulated them—somehow. You’re dead to me, do you hear? You don’t exist anymore. If Marie and I have a child, you’ll never see it. There will be no contact … and no mention of you in my home, ever.”

His father gave him an icy, unperturbed smile that hinted at plans yet unveiled, then walked away.

I
t was easy to be funny when the alternative was being homeless. Amy scribbled notes on a thick yellow pad and ignored distractions—the noisy play of her landlord’s five children, the rumble of the freeway, the clacking of the fan in the window that swirled hot night air through the kitchen.

She gnawed the cap of her pen and studied her work.
She’s the kind of girl who goes to her family reunion to pick up men. Her idea of great art is a “scratch-and-sniff” ad for men’s deodorant
.

Amy scanned a dozen other lines written along the same subject. With confidence born of growing experience, she decided which of her clients would be suited to the material and which wouldn’t. Sometimes she felt schizophrenic trying to write gags for a dozen different comics. But she was meeting the challenge. And she was making steady money—twenty-five bucks a joke from the lesser names, fifty from the headliners—and paying her bills. For starters, this apartment—the top half of a small duplex—cost her five hundred dollars a month.

Amy sipped a glass of iced tea, fanned the tail of a floppy sundress at her sweaty legs, and continued working.

She looked up, and listened intently. Footsteps were ascending the wooden stairs to her door. She kept a handgun on the top of a bookcase across the one-room apartment. Of course, if anyone bothered her she could
simply yell, and a swarm of Alvarezes would come racing up with their arsenal of weapons.

She went to the door and waited. When the careful, polite knocking came she cleared her throat and asked in a gruff voice. “Yes? Who is it?”

“Stop doing the Lauren Bacall impression and open the door.”

It was Elliot. He sounded cheerful, teasing. But he had visited her in that mood before, only to switch to anger or tears after she let him inside.

“Just a second.” Amy hid the gun in a dresser near her bed. Then she unlocked the door. He stood there in tie-dyed, knee-length denim shorts, a wrinkled white pullover, and unlaced basketball shoes. He held a pizza box in his arms.

“Pizza-gram,” he said coyly.

“It’s ten-thirty.”

“I just got away from the studio. I was restless. Lonely.”

“What? Nobody to hang out with? How was Miss July? Any fireworks? No cherry bombs, I bet.”

“Well, well, you watched last night’s show.”

“I wouldn’t miss seeing you interview a centerfold babe who’s also an expert on explosives. Too bad she had the I.Q. of a sparkler.”

“Jealous?”

“No, I just hate to see you use the show to pick up women. In the eight months since we broke up your ratio of beautiful female guests to funny skits has become
real
skewed. Stop trying to antagonize me. It’s not good for the show.”

He breezed past her and went to the kitchen in one corner. Tossing the pizza container atop her table, he then ambled around the room, hands on hips. “Oh, I like what you’ve done with the place. Plastic furniture and bean-bag chairs are
so
cool. Did I tell you that I just bought a little bungalow at Malibu? Right on the beach. With an incredible view. You really
must
drop in sometime.”

She crossed her arms and regarded him patiently. “The tip of your nose looks like a tomato.”

He gave a short laugh and scrubbed a hand over the swollen surface. “Cherry or Big Boy?”

“What are you doing here tonight, Elliot?”

“Making you an offer you can’t refuse.”

“Try me.”

“So you still hate my guts. So maybe I deserve it. But you know I love you. You know that I haven’t touched any other woman since you left me—”

“Since
you
left
me
sitting in a street staring at the Reverend Elvis.”

“You’re writing gags for other comics. Don’t do that. Come write for me.”

“I did that once before. Without pay or credit. Forget it.”

“This time will be different. I’m offering you a job on the writing staff. You’ll be our first girl member. Gee whiz, Amy, we’ll let you in the tree house and give you a decoder ring and everything.”

A treacherous thrill went through her. A writing job on a national show—a hit show! She could join the Writers’ Guild. She’d be paid at least fifty grand a year. She knew because as associate producer she’d been privy to the writers’ salaries. Her palms clammy, she searched Elliot’s face. “What’s the catch?”

“No catch. Just be there for me, the same as you used to.”

Her hope died. “You mean get paid to be a writer but instead be your warden—slap your hands when you reach for a drink or a pill or a spoonful of coke?”

“Both.”

“And sleep with you?”

“If I get lucky. No pressure. I swear.”

“Oh, Elliot.” Her shoulders slumped. She pressed trembling fingertips to her mouth and dropped into a chair. “I can’t watch you self-destruct anymore. I care about you, I really do, but you won’t listen to me. You make me play mom and never take responsibility for yourself.”

“I party. I’ve always partied. So what? I’m still in control.”

She groaned. “Don’t kid yourself. I know what’s going on in your life. I talk to the people who used to consider themselves your friends. I know about your mood swings,
your stupid arguments with anybody who disagrees with you, the wasted money, the slick characters who hang around the studio waiting to sell you drugs. I know about the fist fight you had with a stage hand whose only sin was to forget your glass of mineral water. I also know that you totaled one of the motorcycles up on Mulholland one night.”

“You have better informants than the FBI.” He began to pace the small room, no longer able to hide his agitation. “You’re driving me crazy! I could deal with everything if you’d come back and do what you’re supposed to do, which is take care of me!”

“I deserve to be more than your glorified baby-sitter. I’ve got talent! One of these days I’m goin’ to try a stand-up act.”

He halted, pointed at her, and began to laugh in loud, yelping gulps. It was a bitter sound. “Hanging around comedians for six years doesn’t make you a fucking comedian! You’ve never even been up on a stage! There’s no way you can make it on your own. Don’t be a sap, baby. It’s pathetic.”

“Thanks for the lecture and the pizza.” She stood, miserable with the tension these confrontations always provoked, and gestured toward the door. “See ya later.”

He shifted from side to side, his face flushing, fury spewing from him like steam from a cappuccino maker. “You’re trying to ruin me! Somebody’s paying you to fuck up my mind! Who? Who wants me to screw up? Oh, I know they’re out there, trying to get me! They know how important I am, and they can’t stand it! Just like when I was a kid with asthma! Make fun of the geek! Make him look bad! Well, I never let ’em beat me then, and they’re not going to beat me now!”

Amy backed away, her muscles stiff with horror. She wondered how long Elliot had been paranoid. She tried to speak in a soothing voice. “Let’s sit down and talk about this. I’ll get you a beer. How about that?”

“Don’t suck up to me now! Forget it! I’ve had enough of this abuse! You can’t treat me this way!” Spit flew from his
mouth. His face was livid. “I’m getting out of here! I’ll make you sorry! I’m taking my goddamned pizza with me, too!”

He snatched the carton and flung the pizza through the window into the backyard. “Put some salsa and some jalapeños on it and have dinner, you mothers!” he bellowed to whomever might be wandering the neighborhood, waiting to be insulted by a loud-mouthed Anglo-Saxon.

Frozen in place, she listened to Elliot run down the outside stairs, yelling obscenities. She heard a door slam and the patriarch of the Alvarez family cheerfully threaten to pull his asshole over his head. Elliot dissolved into garbled muttering.