The Murderer's Daughters (16 page)

I jumped in front of Doctor Cohen to show him what he was supposed to do for the guard. I lifted my arms, saying as I did, “My grandma died.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. Your grandma was a lovely one, a true lady.”

I wanted to hug Officer McNulty.

“So who is this bringing you today?” he asked.

“I’m Doctor Cohen.” He put out his hand, which Officer McNulty took with a look of surprise. “Merry lives with my wife and me.”

“Isn’t that nice? Aren’t you lucky, Merry?” Officer McNulty patted down Doctor Cohen quickly and with an air of deference.

“It’s been wonderful,” I said, looking through the crowded room for Daddy. There he was, sitting at their regular table, at the opposite end from Pete and his so-fat-you-couldn’t-help-but-stare wife, Annette. People tended to stick to the same tables each week; still, I hadn’t expected things to look so much the same. Didn’t they ever paint the walls or anything?

“Merry!” Daddy cried as I ran to him. I fell into his arms, ignoring the rules. He hugged me hard, so hard it made up for the fact he had to let go a moment later. I wanted to crawl into his lap and feel him hug me—I didn’t care if I was twelve.

“Oh, Jesus, you look so beautiful. Stand up. Spin around. Let me see you.”

I twirled for him, glad I’d worn clothes that made me look special.

“You look like a million bucks. You’re as gorgeous as your mother, and that is some bit of gorgeous, sweetheart.”

Doctor Cohen looked startled. No Cohen ever referred to Mama, acting as though saying her name would be a mortal sin.

“You must be Doctor Cohen,” my father said. “A pleasure to meet you.”

“Call me Paul, please.” He took my father’s offered hand.

“How was the trip out?” my father asked as he slid into his seat at the picnic-style table. I sat across from him, gesturing at Doctor Cohen to sit next to me.

“Fine, fine,” Doctor Cohen said. “We took the Verrazano. Not much traffic.”

“Any trouble finding the place?”

Doctor Cohen’s shoulders softened from the locked position they’d been in since entering the prison as Daddy put him at ease. “Easy as could be. The
place
gives good directions.” He said “the place” as though saying “Richmond Prison” would embarrass my father.

“So how’s my girl been?”

Doctor Cohen shocked me by putting an arm around my shoulders; he’d never touched me before. “Good as gold. I’d have brought her report card, but—”

“How’d she do?” Daddy interrupted, probably not wanting Doctor Cohen to remind him
the place
didn’t let you carry in anything.

“Great. We’re proud of her. She’s a model girl.”

I wanted to reach over and pat my father’s hand, his cheek. He looked older. His mouth hung looser in a sad way. I counted on my fingers. He was thirty-five years old.

“How’s Lulu?” he asked me. “Does she read my letters?”

“Um, most of them,” I said. “I got an A on my history and spelling tests last week. And did you remember that I wrote you about getting into the SP class?”

“That’s the special progress,” Doctor Cohen cut in. “It means she’ll be doing the more difficult work.”

“I know what
SP
means.” Daddy sounded less friendly now. “So how about Lulu? How’s my older girl doing in school?”

Doctor Cohen hesitated a moment; then he spoke slowly and without inflection. “Very well. She’s in advanced classes for science and math. Lulu has a flair for the technical.”

“Probably gets it from me.” Now my father sounded plain argumentative. “I made fittings for ships to exacting standards, you know. Did Merry tell you I’m almost a licensed optician now?”

“I don’t think I heard that.” Doctor Cohen nodded. “But good for you.”

“You don’t need to patronize me, buddy.” Daddy’s chest puffed up. Just a little, but enough that I could see it.

Doctor Cohen leaned an elbow on the table and spoke softly. “Mr. Zachariah, you have no argument with me. My wife and I are happy to care for Lulu and Merry.” He twisted his gold cuff link. “My wife quite fell in love with them at Duffy-Parkman. They’re like family now. I’m not your enemy. Nevertheless, I’ll brook no insults from you.”

I folded my hands and stared down at the table, twisting my ankles around each other, and pressing them together where no one could see. My hands twitched toward my chest again, but Lulu’s invisible hand held me back. I looked sideways at the guards lurking in every corner.

“Now, then,” Doctor Cohen continued when my father said nothing. “Merry tells me you like books. Shall we see what we can do about getting you some reading material?”

Daddy gave me a look that frightened and saddened me at the same time. “Merry knows what I like.” He sounded deflated. “She can take care of me.”

“Don’t you think that’s a bit more responsibility than a young girl needs?”

“Family takes care of family.” Daddy crossed his arms.

Doctor Cohen looked as though he’d just licked a lemon slice. I knew what he was thinking. Daddy knew what he was thinking.

“You think I’m a monster, Doc. Maybe I was.” Daddy paused. “Yeah, I guess I was the worst kind of monster. But I was drunk and heartbroken. You think that doesn’t excuse me, but I’m paying my dues.”

Doctor Cohen leaned in and spoke quietly. “It seems your girls are paying those dues as much as you.”

“I guess it looks that way to someone like you, but from where I’m sitting, it looks like they’re doing okay. They have you, right? From what Merry writes, your wife is a real doll.” My father took off his glasses. His eyes reminded me of Grandma’s. “The girls are getting good marks in school. Lulu is going to college.”

“But they don’t have parents, do they?” Doctor Cohen said. “Nothing makes up for losing a mother.”

I couldn’t think of what to do to stop this.

“My girls have me. Their father.”

“Hardly,” Doctor Cohen said.

“I love my girls.” Daddy’s eyes narrowed. “And Merry looks out for me. She always will. Right, Merry?”

I held my breath and closed my eyes, wishing I were far away. Then I opened them. “Right, Daddy.”

Anatomy class began today. In half an hour, I’d be facing a room of draped cadavers. I couldn’t get down more than a cup of coffee for breakfast that morning.

Despite autumn being just weeks away, Boston still looked like summer. This city seemed positively bucolic. Even the crummiest neighborhoods had breathing space compared to New York City.

I walked down Commonwealth Avenue, reveling in the wide sidewalks and the grassy mall parting the road like a green river. In a few months, magical white Christmas lights strung up for blocks and blocks would decorate the trees. Even when Comm Ave—as the locals called the street—became ordinary, turning from Back Bay brownstones to student-ridden Kenmore Square lined with dorms, cheap delis, and Burger Kings, I loved it, because no matter what, I wasn’t in New York City.

This was my first year at Cabot Medical School, the only place I’d applied. Cabot was in Boston, my birthplace of freedom, where I’d gone to
college. In Boston, I’d started over. In Boston, no one knew me. In Boston, I’d killed Murder Girl.

During college, no one thought of me as anyone but the quiet girl who spent all her time studying. As far as everyone but my roommate could tell, I lived in the library, and for as much as I talked to her, I might as well have slept in a library carrel. By my second year, I’d rented an apartment so small and unwanted that between a dribble of Cohen money and what I earned working part-time in the State Medical Lab, I could afford it.

The only way I’d felt safe in college was by keeping my own counsel. Only solitude gave me peace. Loneliness had seemed a small price for four years of relaxed obscurity after my life at Duffy and at the Cohens’. I supposed it would be a long time before the enforced mean togetherness I’d endured at Duffy and the impenetrable guard I’d worn at the Cohens’ wore off. The cover story I’d invented during high school had come at the price of constant vigilance.

Sometimes I remembered my brief flush of excitement at thinking I could become part of the Sachs family, when I’d dreamed myself into becoming Hillary’s adopted sister. I’d wonder if they’d felt my hunger for their lives and if it had scared them away. Maybe that’s why Hillary had disappeared after she’d brought me to her house. I imagined her mother and father warning her away from me.
Find another place to volunteer, dear,
they’d said in my scenario.
That girl is too needy.
My humiliating visit with the Sachses taught me to give nothing away.

Now, when I joined the line of young men and women walking up the steps of Cabot, I didn’t recognize anyone, not one person to whom I could say hello or give a friendly nod. Since beginning my medical school studies, just as in college, and high school, I’d concentrated on books and made no real friends; today I wished I’d been friendlier. You wanted someone to have your back when you met a roomful of dead people.

Inside, I ran down the flight of steps to the basement and entered the anatomy lab. Formaldehyde, fresh paint, and the smell of fear surrounded me. Everyone stood frozen, waiting for our professor to speak.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I’m Doctor Eli Haslett. Welcome to death.” His gentle smile showed he wasn’t out to hurt us, but his words made me shiver. His white coat was stiff and clean. His clear, pink complexion belied
his graying hair. He had the face of a guilt-free man, a man with no reason to fear the dead.

“Please approach your tables,” he said. “Take note that the table number correlates to your group number.”

Doctor Haslett’s fatherly voice seemed designed to help scared students slice a corpse. He nodded with approval as we made our way down the line of blue-sheeted bodies lying on surgically clean metal tables.

Most of us clutched yellow papers, our introductory instructions from Doctor Haslett to Gross Anatomy, Section 1. Mine read: “Group Five: Ronald Young, Henry Yee, Marta Zayas, and Louise Zachariah.”

“Personal Suggestions” were underneath. Doctor Haslett’s wisdom included what to wear: clothes suitable for trashing later; and the best way to remove the stink of formaldehyde: lemon Joy dishwashing soap. He gave hints for emotions and feelings: Nauseated? Use Vicks. Feeling faint? Put your head between your knees. Horrified? Time heals. For emotional or spiritual crises, he suggested we speak to our clergy, our friends, our family, all of which left me swinging in the breeze.

When I reached table five, my shoulders stiffened.

A sheet hinted at the faint outline of a human body. My donor seemed tiny. Good God, they didn’t give out children, did they? Henry Yee—we all had small name tags pinned to our short white coats—claimed the place by the cadaver’s right shoulder. Did the body offer better and worse places to stand? I took our donor’s left shoulder, sure that Henry, Chinese, wearing a crisp blue shirt and standing at attention, knew something I didn’t.

Marta Zayas and Ronald Young joined us. Ronald put out his hand. “Ron.”

“Lulu,” I said without thinking.

“Family nickname?” Ron asked. LOUISE was printed on my badge.

I shook my head and claimed Lulu as one of those affected Muffy, Kiki, Puffy prep names. “School name.”

Ron nodded knowingly and exchanged a quick glance with Marta, bonding, black man and Latina woman against the entitled European woman. Table five was the United Nations of anatomy class, and I was going to represent privilege. Marta gave me a warm smile, and I let a tiny chip of ice drop off my shoulder.

I shivered. The room was chilly and windowless. Pungent particles of formaldehyde seeped into my skin, lined my nostrils. I briefly brought my arm up to my nose, sniffing the Vicks VapoRub I’d dotted on my wrist like perfume that morning.

Ron, Marta, Henry, and I looked at each other.

After you, after you.

Steeling myself, I reached out and took hold of the edge of the cold sheet. Slowly, I uncovered the facedown body. I reminded myself to breathe. Thin white gauze wrapped our cadaver’s head. My knuckles brushed against cold skin that reminded me of a plastic doll. The bumps of her spine—I could see now the body was female—were visible as strung pearls.