“I hear.”
“And stay away from that Satan’s piss you been drinkin’. You’d never have done what you done if you hadn’t gotten yourself all liquored up first. Now put these clothes on. They’re the wife’s. Threw yours out.” He got up to leave. “You be grateful for your life, Darcy. Even when it’s a curse, it’s a gift.”
So Rennie and I went home. The son Luca had so long awaited and with so much hope was dead. Gone to join the other faces that would haunt me and follow me for all my days. But you can live being haunted. Most people do. Each day they beat it back, only to have it rise again each night. But they get along. Somehow.
It didn’t matter anyway. Nothing mattered. Only Rennie, and one good reason to go on can trump a hundred reasons not to. My daughter, who had her father’s face, was alive, and from now on, when those other faces rose up to haunt me, I would beat them back with that.
8.
Turns Ashes
The prison where Luca was serving his time was a three-hour train ride from Galen. I had only been on the train a few times in my whole life and every time the motion had made me sick. This time was no different. Halfway through the ride, I had to go to the bathroom to throw up in the toilet. It isn’t easy to vomit on target on a moving train, and as it turned out, I threw up on my shoes.
All morning, I had labored over my appearance. I washed my hair and rinsed it with vinegar, because Caroline had told me once that it made your hair shine. Then I wound the ends around rags to make them curl, but defying all my winding, my hair remained straight as a poker. I tried putting it up, but the hairpins kept falling out. So I decided to concentrate instead on what to wear. My own clothes were all old and looked it. But in Jewel’s closet, I found the velvet dress that had always been my favorite. Except for being too short at the hem, and too tight in the shoulders, it fit fine. But the memory of how Jewel had looked in it was too sharp, and I put it back in the closet and chose instead a plainer one that conjured no memories.
Having tried so hard to look nice, I got to the prison tired, anxious, and smelling faintly of vomit and vinegar. The stone steps leading up to the prison were cool, and I sat down to steady myself. As I sat there, a man with grey hair who looked like somebody’s grandfather came and spoke to me.
“I’ll bet you’re Mrs. D’Angeli.” He smiled and his face crinkled into careworn lines.
I’d never been called that before and I was taken aback, but I nodded.
“Luca talks about you and that little girl of yours all the time. Are you feeling all right? You look a little peaked.”
“I threw up on the train.”
He laughed but not in a mean way. “I’m the same way on trains. But you’ll feel better when you’re inside and you see Luca. He’s been up since dawn getting ready for you, primping like a girl. He’s been looking forward to this since the first day he came in here.”
“Who are you?” I finally thought to ask.
“I’m the warden here.”
“You don’t look like a warden,” I said. It was always disturbing to me when people didn’t look as they should.
“I suppose not,” he said apologetically. “Are you feeling better? Would you like to see your husband now?”
He led me to a long corridor. It was divided by a metal grate, with rows of benches on either side.
Before he left, the warden said, “Take a seat. Luca should be out shortly.” Then he called a guard. “Bring Mrs. D’Angeli a glass of soda water.” He winked at me. “It’ll settle your stomach.”
But my stomach wouldn’t settle. Unwilling, I kept thinking about Joseph Gibbet. He was one of the people who haunted me. They had an electric chair in this prison. I’d read about it once in the newspaper. What if Luca had been sentenced to death? What if he was behind these walls waiting for his turn? What if Rennie and I never saw him again? Did it hurt to die in the electric chair? How could it not?
I heard him before I saw him, the uneven tread of his one bad leg, and when I looked up, I couldn’t stifle the gasp that rose in my throat. He had lost weight, a lot of weight, and they had shaved off all of his beautiful hair. But he had groomed himself as best he could, and it showed in his freshly shaved face and the way he smelled of talc. We smiled at each other cautiously, as if meeting for the first time, and our hands moved to meet through the grate, but they stopped just short of touching.
“How are you, Darcy?” he said with the old propriety that was there even in the midst of intimacy, and I saw him glance at my waist.
“I’m all right. How about you? Is it terrible in here?”
We seated ourselves on the benches. “Not really. No one mistreats me, and the warden has been kind. He told me to act cheerful. He said people don’t like sad inmates. They might feel sorry for them but they don’t parole them. He says I’m almost certain to be paroled as soon as I am eligible. He knows how much I want to get back to you and Rennie and the baby.”
I looked away from him and down at my hands. My palms were sweaty and I wiped them on the skirt of my dress.
“How
