The Greeks of Beaubien Street (26 page)

It took her a full thirty seconds to realize that she was looking at a portrait of her family. A recent likeness of her father stood in the back of the group, with a young Christina sitting just below him to the left. Their two adult children, Jill and Chris, sat side by side with Jill in the center. The faces were perfectly shaded, almost photo-like in their realism. Alex was in the process of finishing the bodies. Christina’s was the last he had attempted, and he wasn’t sure if he would complete her body or not so although her head and face were finished, the rest was a penciled sketch. It appeared to Jill that her mother was fading from their realm, and the effect was intense and emotional. Her hand went to her throat in surprise.

“Oh Alex, it’s just wonderful. The word trivializes what I am feeling, but there is no other.” She looked at him, her eyes bright. “That’s my family.” She went to embrace him, and no longer able to withstand the tumultuous feelings in her heart, began to cry. He was moved and pleased, although his intention hadn’t been to upset her. After having witnessed the travesty Paula had succeeded in initiating yesterday, Alex wanted to do something that would solidify in Jill’s mind that her family was still intact. It came to him as naturally as one of her psychic episodes came to her, so strong that he thought for a moment she might have been signaling him with her brain. He told her as much.

“I thought you might be trying to send me a message. The impulse to paint was so powerful last night, even the technique I would use and the way I would position the four of you came to me, not exactly in a vision, because I am afraid to use that word. It didn’t occur to me until later that what I was experiencing was sort of a divine inspiration.” He laughed. “Now that would really please my mother!” They stood together viewing the painting, and at the precise moment, they decided it was finished.

“Can we take it with us to the store? I want my dad to see it, my dad and the rest of the family who suffered through that charade last night.” They were also taking Fred. Aunt Sophie wasn’t going to be thrilled. Although somewhat of a germaphobe, she loved dogs as long as they were well-behaved and didn’t get up on furniture or people. Fred was too chubby to do either. Alex nodded his head
yes
, somewhat embarrassed over what he was sure to be a fuss made, in addition to commentary regarding the unfinished side of the painting. Not everyone would
get
it like Jill did. Jill decided not to warn her dad, but to just appear with the painting and show it to the family raw and unprepared as she had. She was not expecting it, and it had taken her a few moments for the recognition to develop and when it did, the effect it had on her was overwhelming. She was hoping for the same thing for her dad.

They went in without knocking on the outside door as was the norm for Jill. She had Fred on his leash and they were allowing him to lead the way. Alex and the painting, covered in plastic and carefully held away from his body in case it was still damp enough to smear, brought up the rear. Gus heard them on the stairs and was waiting with the apartment door opened. He bent over to scratch his grand-dog behind the ears. There was the usual assembly of family at the door when a newcomer arrived. They moved back to give the couple room to get through the door, especially when Alex walked through balancing the large object carefully.

“What’s that?” Aunt Maria asked. Jill was grateful for her curiosity.

“Everyone, Alex surprised me with this today; he went home last night after midnight and made it for us. Alex?” She stood aside and gave him room to hold the painting up. She helped him peel the plastic off. The audible gasp was one of pleasure, and for several of the older people, emotion. Gus was caught off guard, like Jill was. Maria held her hands together at her chest and started to weep.

“Oh Jill, Alex, it’s so beautiful!” she said.

“Absolutely! Wow, that says it all, Alex,” Aunt Anna said, moved to tears.

“That’s my family!” Gus said proudly, repeating Jill’s pronouncement back at Alex’s apartment. “No matter what, that is my family.” He went to hug his daughter and her boyfriend as Jill led Alex to place the painting up on the fireplace mantel. The conversation about the painting continued for the rest of the evening. Everyone agreed that Paula’s negative energy probably had something to do with the
vibe
Alex got.

“What amazes me about it is that I am about as spiritual as a rock,” Alex said. The women in the room murmured in opposition.

“Oh, I don’t know about that,” Jill told him. “You’re more in tune to me than you think. Remember last month when I said I wanted to go to Dino’s for lunch? You had already gone there and picked up exactly what I had been fantasizing about all morning.”

“I’m not sure if a craving for Coney dogs can be called spiritual,” Alex countered, but the aunts would disagree, supporting their niece.

“Jill wouldn’t be with a dud,” Aunt Maria said.

“It just occurred to me that mother is younger than I am in the picture. It is the way I remember, her too,” Jill said. Nodding heads and murmurs of appreciation followed.

Everyone started moving toward the dining room so dinner could get underway when the doorbell rang. Alex ran down the stairs and let Albert and Roger in. They joined in the chorus of accolades given to Alex and during dinner, and Roger raised a water toast, saying, “to Alex, a beautiful Polish man.” Everyone in the room laughed and said “here, here!” It would be another evening of conversation into the wee hours. Alex and Jill took Fred back to Jill’s apartment. Alex was going to spend the night because he wanted to make love to her; he felt so close to her at that moment it had to mean something special. Jill remembered her commitment the previous night that she would make sure those whom she loved would know it, and that night Alex did.

Chapter 34

When John and Liz Zannos dropped the pathetic Nick off at his home in Brighton, they could see as they came up the steep driveway Paula had done some decluttering. Fortunately, their house was on four secluded acres, so the embarrassment of having his underpants thrown onto the front lawn would be limited to Nick’s family. John saw it first.

“Oh Lord, someone’s pissed off as hell,” he said. Liz, who was semi-napping, sat up and looked and Nick leaned forward from the backseat to look out the side window.

“Fuck.” Nick said. “Do you see any of my suits?” John stopped the car. The three of them gazed over the lawn. “Don’t get out,” Nick said. “I better go up alone. Who knows what kind of mood she’s in? She could have my gun out.”

“Don’t say that. Are you sure you don’t want me to come in?” John asked. “It might defuse the situation if an outsider was around.”

“Don’t get carried away, dear,” Liz said. “Nick’s right. We should let them have some privacy.”
Maybe John’s right
, Liz thought. God knew the two couples had lived through more trauma together with false smiles plastered across their faces. Why should they change their
modus operandi
now? They saw some movement in the front door and then it opened and Paula came out. At first she seemed hesitant. She stood on the porch with her hands on her hips, glaring at the carload of people.

“She looks like a fishwife,” Nick mumbled. Liz swung her head around and gave him a dirty look.

“That’s not what we discussed earlier, is it brother-in-law? Be nice,” she admonished. Nick opened up the door to get out.

“You guys better clear out,” he warned. But then Paula started walking toward them, smiling. Liz thought,
Uh oh
. But it was going to be okay.

“I was hoping you would get home before it rained so you could help me clean this mess up. I went a little crazy,” she said. She looked in the car window at her husband’s family. “Do you want to come in? I fixed Lake Perch for dinner with cottage fries and coleslaw.” It was Nick’s favorite. Liz was suddenly saddened. Here, a woman’s life long companion had been discovered in infidelity, with a grown-up child, and she was the one doing the groveling. Liz inched her hand over to John’s. He looked at her and she almost imperceptibly shook her head
no
. She’d had enough of his family for one night.

“I think we’ve had it. We still have an hour more to drive,” John said. He very slowly started to back the car up. There was no point in beating around the bush. “Call me tomorrow, Nicky. Talk to you later Paula!” He backed up with Nick and Paula looking on as the car pulled away.

“I’m glad you didn’t want to stay,” John said. “How much are we obligated to take from those two? Jesus!” He came to the end of the driveway and pulled out, laying a little gravel dust for effect. Liz started laughing out loud.

“If I get a chance, I am going to call her on every single thing she ever said to me, comparing our marriages. I think there might be a point in which two couples become too comfortable with each other, almost like interlopers. I’m sorry I allowed it, but more sorry I believed it.” Liz looked at John intently. “I have never been unfaithful to you, John,” she said. And in return, John said, “Nor I to you. I may not have been able to show you the way you wanted, but I have always loved you.” He felt satisfied that he’d gotten his point across and she could take it or leave it.

“But we do have a few things that we need to straighten out if we are going to stay married. For one thing, I don’t like you finding me things to do every day. I don’t want to do anything, let alone something you found for me,” he told her. Liz was appalled, but held her tongue, wondering silently how was she going to sit back and allow her husband waste his life, and knowing too that it wasn’t hers to save.

~ ~ ~

Nick and Paula walked around their expansive, landscaped yard, picking up his underpants and socks, t-shirts, sweatpants and handkerchiefs from the ground. He was in a passive mood, empty headed and relaxed. There was nothing to do but clean up the mess and then face his wife. She would demand facts and he was ready to give them. He was tired of hiding his other life, the life of a father of a Down’s Syndrome son. He wanted Chris to know, too, although the knowledge that Nick and not Gus was his father might be too difficult for him to comprehend.

When the last item of clothing was up off the grass, Paula went in with a bushel basket load and Nick followed behind her. He decided to allow Paula to start the conversation. He didn’t really have any complaints except that being married to her for all these years was boring. It was a matter of comfort and convenience. She didn’t seem to notice when he was occupied elsewhere. She was beautiful in her youth and would let him have sex whenever he wanted it. But now she’d let herself go and he didn’t want her. She entertained his friends and family, kept a nice house and was a good cook. Nick was rarely home during the week when he was working, and so it was like having a live-in caretaker. What was there not to like? For some reason, she never got pregnant. He knew it wasn’t his fault because of Chris. And then it seemed like a blessing because Liz and John, who were their constant companions, also didn’t have a child. They didn’t investigate fully, either. Nick wondered why that was. Paula never came to him and asked if they could go to a specialist together. She liked their life the way it was. When they had been married about five years and didn’t get pregnant, she asked him one day if he thought just the two of them would be enough. He’d replied with a resounding “yes!”

“We can travel, have a vacation home; there are a heck of a lot of things we can do if we don’t have kids. “ Paula listened to him and believed what he said at the time. Now she was sure he said it so he could be free to do what he wanted while she wasted time at a nursing job she wasn’t crazy about, waiting until she could retire. They’d been so selfish all along and now she was going to be punished for it.

It was two days before Dana’s murder during one of Nick’s many absences that Paula decided to do a thorough cleaning. She was thinking they should sell. The house was ridiculous; many roomed and rambling, much too large for them. She started in the attic bedrooms, once her favorite place with sloping ceilings and cozy dormers. The walls were white painted wood paneling and the furniture reflected the cottage theme. Each room had built in bookcases and over the years she had stocked the shelves with volumes meant for her nieces and nephews. But none of them wanted to come to stay. The house wasn’t on water and was far from town, too quiet and boring for them. The bedrooms were perfectly decorated but lonely spaces. Liz and John and, rarely, Peter and Joan used them when they’d had too much to drink. The empty, unused rooms emphasized her failures in Paula’s mind.

The second floor housed the master bedroom, a spare room Nick sometimes used when Paula didn’t feel good or his snoring was out of control, and his large, bright office. It was one of the first rooms she decorated when they bought the house. There was a low ceilinged storage area in the front of the room where it faced the street and two small dormer windows looked out on the manicured lawns. She placed leather winged back chairs in the windows but they were never used. Nick was never home long enough to sit in one.

“What does a cop need with an office?” he’d asked her. Her father had one and left her great memories of time spent visiting him in his own space. Nick never had a place in the house that Paula could say, “That’s Nick’s.” He didn’t putter in the basement or have a work area in the garage. He knew where the alcohol was kept so he could make his brothers and their wives cocktails when they visited, and that was about it. He was like a visitor there himself.

So it was in this atmosphere of disconnection that Paula felt perfectly justified in cleaning out the storage areas in the dormer spaces. It never crossed her mind that she would find something Nick didn’t want her to see. He rarely used the office; why would he hide anything there?

The first thing she came across was a box of Nick’s memorabilia his mother had assembled for him over the years and when he finally got his own place, she felt safe handing over to him. It didn’t look like he had opened it since. She rummaged through it and saw it was nothing more than some old schoolwork papers, drawings he had done as a small child, awards he had received for good behavior, and a few silly mementos. Basically, it was a box of junk only a mother would care about. When she couldn’t throw it away, she left it to the son’s wife to do so. Paula wondered if Liz and Anna had similar boxes in their houses. She shook her head in disgust; her mother-in-law was a peasant.