“Oh, no,” Mary said under her breath. She didn’t know when Edward had passed, but she assumed it had been in his sleep last night. She didn’t know how much Patrick knew or understood. She realized that he had been here all day, even when she’d come knocking. Evidently Patrick had spent the day shut inside with Edward’s body, keeping the world at bay.
Mary swallowed hard, choking her emotions down. She thought it was bizarre of Patrick, but he was just a kid and he must have been terrified. He hadn’t known what to do. His grandfather was his world. He didn’t want to lose Edward.
Her gaze flitted around the bedroom, and she took in its contents: a night table held his smartphone, a watch, a worn brown wallet, a rosary with opalescent beads, a bottle of Ambien, a silvery CVS glucose meter, a vial of insulin, and a used syringe. Across from the bed was a ladderback chair with a white Oxford shirt hanging from one side, and on the far wall, a simple wood dresser-and-mirror that held several framed photographs.
Mary walked over to the photographs. One was an old black-and-white eight-by-ten of four grinning GIs in sweaty T-shirts and Army-issue pants, their metal dog tags looped around their necks and their strong arms linked around each other. Mary recognized a younger Edward on the end, the only soldier with glasses. She assumed it had to be in Vietnam. She hadn’t known that he’d served.
Next to that sat framed photos of a pretty young woman, grinning and holding a baby. It had to be Suzanne and Patrick. A laminated card from the funeral home showed another photo of Suzanne, propped up on a statue of the Virgin Mary, its plastic yellowed with age.
“Mary?” Patrick said quietly, from the door.
CHAPTER TWENTY
“Patrick, don’t come in,” Mary said gently, heading for the door, but Patrick was already entering the bedroom.
“That’s a picture of my Pops in the war.” Patrick walked past the bed without looking over. “He told me all about it. He was in a jungle and he was with his friends. I know all the names.”
“Patrick, let’s go.” Mary tried to turn him around, but Patrick reached for the photograph on the dresser, picking it up.
“This guy is Tommy and he was from Maine. That’s a state where it snows a lot.” Patrick pointed at the second GI from the left. “And this guy is Shemp. That’s not his real name, that’s what they called him, and he was from Chicago. My Pops went there after the war was over and he visited Shemp. Shemp has a grandson too. His name is Bobby.”
Mary wasn’t completely sure what to do, so she let Patrick talk, resting a hand on his shoulder. She didn’t want to alarm him by rushing him out of the room, making something so traumatic even worse.
“And this guy is Jacob and he was my Pops’s best friend. My Pops says that Jacob was funny and smart and he was going to be a doctor, that’s how smart he was. And he was from Cherry Hill, and my Pops says that it’s near us, but it’s not a hill and it doesn’t have any cherries. It has a mall.”
Mary listened as Patrick moved his finger to Edward.
“This is my Pops, and he was the captain, that means he was the best one of all of the soldiers. He rode in tanks and choppers.” Patrick’s tone changed, echoing a note of a child’s pride, and the very sound of it seemed to reach deep inside Mary, striking a chord she didn’t even know she had. She blinked her eyes clear as Patrick nodded, still looking down at the photograph, his finger on his grandfather’s face, back when Edward had been smiling, young, alive, and at war. “My Pops told me about the war, and we watch the History Channel and he tells me about the battles, about Anzio, Normandy, and D-day. He knows where the cities are, it’s far away, not here. In Vietnam, where he was a soldier, they have jungles and tigers.”
Mary thought of something Edward had told her, that Patrick drew tigers when he was younger. She wondered how long Edward had been telling Patrick his war stories from Vietnam.
“My Pops said one time they were in the jungle and they were eating their lunch, and a bad guy was hiding in the bushes but they didn’t know it, and all of a sudden, the bad guy started to shoot them so they were ambushed. That’s when the bad guy shot Jacob and killed him, and then the bad guy was going to shoot Pops, too.”
Mary let Patrick continue, thinking about the bad guys and the good guys that he talked about so much.
“And then what happened was that the bad guy’s gun stopped working, like, his gun jammed, that means it didn’t work, and so then the bad guy got his bayonet, that’s like a knife, and he came after Pops to kill him with his bayonet.”
“Oh no.” Mary thought of Patrick’s artwork, of the good guy killing the bad guy with a knife.
“Pops didn’t have his gun because he was eating, so he got his knife, and just when the bad guy was going to kill him with the bayonet, Pops killed the bad guy with his knife and so he was saved and he didn’t die and he came home.”
Mary felt a realization come over her, drenching her in a warm wave of sadness. The good guy in Patrick’s drawings wasn’t Patrick, imagining himself as a superhero. It was Edward. Edward was Patrick’s ultimate good guy. His own personal captain. His hero. His grandfather.
“The Army gave my Pops a medal because he did that and he was so brave and he did such a good job, but he doesn’t have the medal because he gave it to Jacob’s mom in Cherry Hill, so I never got to see it. He said he would take me to see the medal but we never went.”
Mary nodded, mute with emotion, and Patrick put the photograph back on the dresser.
“My Pops has a lot of stories, and he knows a lot about war, and every night he prays the rosary for Jacob and for his other friends. He says they didn’t come home from the war but that really means that they got killed by the bad guys”—Patrick kept talking as he turned to the other photographs—“he used to kneel by his bed while he prayed, but then he got older and he has to do it in his bed, but he says Jacob and all of his friends are in heaven now and they’re happy.”
“I’m sure they are.” Mary was raised in the Catholic Church, but she had fallen away. Still she found herself wishing that Edward had had Last Rites, a wish she couldn’t quite explain. “So you never met any of his buddies from the war?”
“No.”
“Does he have any other friends?”
“Dave. He likes Dave. They talk about money and stocks.”
Mary remembered that Edward had mentioned him.
“My Pops said my grandmother was his best friend, but after she died, he didn’t get any new best friends.”
Mary felt a pang. “Did he have any uncles or anything like that? Like any family?”
“No.” Patrick shook his head.
“Do you? Do you know any uncles or aunts or cousins?”
“No.”
Mary wondered if he could be right. “What about Thanksgiving? Does anyone ever come over?”
“No.”
“Do you ever go to anyone else’s house for the holidays?”
“No. We stay home. We get a special turkey that doesn’t have any legs or arms because that’s what we like. White meat. We cook it in the oven. I help make the stuffing. Stove Top.” Patrick pointed to a photo of him with his mother. “That’s me when I was little. That’s my mom. She’s in heaven too. Her name was Suzanne.” Patrick looked up at Mary with a slight frown, his brown eyes troubled. “What’s your mom’s name?”
“Vita,” Mary answered, her throat thick. She felt strange talking to Patrick with Edward lying in bed only a few feet away. She sensed that the boy was in some sort of denial.
“Do you have a daddy?”
“Yes.” Mary realized that Patrick didn’t have a daddy, so he didn’t naturally assume that everyone had a daddy.
“What’s his name?”
“His name is Mariano, but he goes by Matty. People call him Matty.”
“There’s a kid in my class named Matt. He talks a lot.” Patrick turned to the bed. “Pops is still asleep. The diabetes makes him tired and shaky. He needs his sleep.”
Mar
y wasn’t sure what to do or say, but she couldn’t let this go on. “Patrick, I have some very bad news for you. Your grandfather, he’s not asleep.”
“Yes he is.” Patrick nodded, matter-of-factly. “That’s how he sleeps. His mouth always looks like that. He sleeps with his mouth open. Sometimes he snores.”
Mary patted Patrick’s shoulder. “Maybe that’s true, but this time, I don’t think he’s asleep, I think that—”
“He always says he sleeps like a log. Sometimes he sleeps so long he misses dinner. He doesn’t even wake up if I push him. He needs to sleep. That’s why I’m not allowed to wake him up.”
Mary wondered if Edward’s diabetes had been worse than she thought or if he’d had heart problems. It would explain why he’d been so tired yesterday and why he seemed so much older than his years. She felt awful, wondering if the stress had been too much for him.
“Be right back.” Patrick started walking to the door.
“Wait, what? Patrick?” Mary went after him, confused, but he went down the stairs, trailing his hand on the wall, with her following.
“Patrick?”
“I have to do something.” Patrick took a left through the living room, and Mary followed him to the back of the house, into a small, square kitchen lined with white refaced cabinets and white countertops. In the center of the room was a rectangular wooden table with two chairs, one at the head and one catty-corner. An uneaten bologna sandwich sat on a flowered plate at one seat, which had been set with a folded napkin and a full glass of milk, untouched.
“He likes soup.” Patrick grabbed a chair, dragged it across the floor, pulled it up to the counter, and climbed up on top.
“What are you doing?”
“My Pops likes soup. I know how to make it.” Patrick opened the cabinet, slid out a can of Progresso soup, and showed it to Mary. “He loves this soup. This is his favorite. Pea soup. Once I called it peepee soup and he laughed. Now we call it peepee soup.”
“Patrick, why do you want to make him soup?”
“Because he likes it.” Patrick climbed down off the chair, leaving it in place against the counter, as well as the cabinet hanging open, then he started to pull off the tab on top of the can.
“Don’t do that, you’ll hurt yourself.” Mary came over.
“No I won’t. Watch. It’s only hard to get it started.” Patrick stuck his index finger in the tab and yanked it. “See? I do it all the time.” He moved the chair one cabinet over, then climbed up on it again, opened the next cabinet, and retrieved an oversized mug. He climbed down again, saying, “I make him soup if he doesn’t feel good, and he loves it.”
“I see.” Mary watched him, heartsick, but didn’t stop him. She sensed that he knew the truth and she didn’t see the harm in letting him make soup.
“He didn’t wake up for his bologna sandwich but he doesn’t like sandwiches as much as he likes soup. I help him all the time because of the diabetes. He says the soup helps him.” Patrick went back to the can, poured the green glop into the mug, then leaned over the sink, turned on the faucet, and poured some water into the mug. “Pops says to add water because it makes it last longer. They don’t tell you to do that because the company wants you to use up all your money and buy more soup.”
“Patrick, you make the soup, I’m going to go make a phone call, okay?”
“Okay.” Patrick hoisted the mug into the microwave.
“Don’t burn yourself.”
“I never do. I put it on two-and-a-half minutes. He says it gets too hot if you put it on three.”
“Good job.” Mary slipped out of the kitchen, went back to the living room, got her purse from the chair, and reached inside for her phone. She would have to call the police, and they would bring the city medical examiner. Edward’s death was unattended, so by law, that meant an autopsy would have to be performed, since he wasn’t in hospice. The only open question was what would happen to Patrick.
Mary’s gut twisted. Patrick was now an orphan. The very thought was heartbreaking enough, and she dreaded to think of what would happen to him now. She assumed that the police would call DHS and he would be placed in the foster care system.
Mary sank into the chair, holding her phone. She didn’t know much about foster care, but what she knew wasn’t good. There wasn’t a month that went by in Philadelphia when the newspaper didn’t have some awful story about the foster care system. Maybe the stories weren’t a fair representation, and there were undoubtedly wonderful foster parents who took great care of foster children. But that couldn’t be guaranteed, especially for a child with special needs like Patrick.
Mary stared at her phone, frozen. She couldn’t bring herself to call the police yet. As soon as she did, she would set in motion a series of events that would remove Patrick from the only home he knew and place him in the foster system. The authorities would take him, this very night, and he would go to sleep in a strange bed, in a stranger’s house. On the other hand, Mary couldn’t not call the police. It was grotesque that Edward’s body lay upstairs in bed, where it had been all night and all day.
Mary couldn’t wrap her mind around how quickly the boy’s life had turned upside down and her hopes for his future scuttled. He’d been about to enter Fairmount Prep; she had it all rigged. But now all of that hung in jeopardy, and she could only imagine how losing his grandfather would hurt him. Coming on the heels of his assault, it might plunge him into depression.
Mary heard the microwave ping in the kitchen. If she could convince the police to wait until tomorrow to call DHS, she could stay at the house tonight with Patrick. Officer Diamond owed her a favor, and it was the best thing for Patrick. Officers Lee and Muniz had been here only yesterday, and they knew Patrick’s situation.
Mary pressed in the number for the Twenty-fifth Precinct.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Mary hung up the phone. It had taken her longer than she’d expected, but the police were on the way to take Edward’s body and so was the medical examiner, since they happened to be at a “job” nearby. She hadn’t been able to get through to Officers Diamond, Lee, or Muniz but she’d dropped their names, as well as Bennie Rosato’s, then made her request to hold off DHS until morning. The police weren’t making any promises, except that they’d come without sirens.
Mary went back to the kitchen, where Patrick was sitting at the table in front of a glass of water. He seemed more nervous than before, resting his forearms on the table and playing a game with his right hand, tapping each finger on the table, like a slow-motion drumming. An oversized mug of pea soup sat in front of Edward’s empty seat, next to a napkin with a tablespoon. She didn’t know what had happened to the bologna sandwich. The glass of milk had been replaced with a glass of water.
“The soup is ready for him,” Patrick said, with a grimly satisfied set to his mouth that made him look older. “I think he’ll be down pretty soon. He doesn’t mind if it’s cold, he likes it that way.”
“I see.” Mary sat down in the empty chair next to him. She knew she had to say something, but she wasn’t sure exactly what to say. She didn’t know how to prepare a child for what was to come and she hadn’t yet figured out all of the implications. She could only view it from his perspective, which was that his beloved grandfather was about to be taken from their house, never to be seen again. The random thought popped into her head that she could call a priest. It was too late for Last Rites, but it might help Patrick to see his priest right now.
“Patrick, do you go to church?”
Patrick nodded. “Every Saturday, we go to four o’clock Mass and then we go to Lee’s Hoagies and eat Swiss cheese hoagies. He gets peppers and onions but I don’t get that. We used to go to Mass on Sunday morning, but he likes to sleep in.”
“Who’s your priest?”
“Father Pep. Our church is St. Catherine’s. I go to CCD every Wednesday at the school.”
“Would you like me to call Father Pep and have him come over?”
&
nbsp; “No.” Patrick shook his head emphatically. “We don’t know him. He shakes my hand when we leave, that’s all.”
“So you’re not very involved with the church?”
Patrick shook his head. “I wrapped up the milk and the bologna sandwich and I put them back in the refrigerator. My Pops says it’s a sin to waste food.”
Mary ignored the non sequitur and braced herself. “Patrick, I want you to understand what’s going to happen next. The police are coming and they’re going to go upstairs—”
“I already talked to the police. I told them about Mr. Robertson. You were there.” Patrick kept playing with his fingers, and Mary moved her hand lightly on top of his hand, so the drumming stopped.
“This will be different police, and they’re here about your grandfather.”
“They’re not going to be able to wake him up. It’s hard to wake him up when he’s asleep. He knows how much he sleeps every day. He writes it down.”
“He does?” Mary asked, surprised.
“Yep.” Patrick shook his head again, and though his fingers had stopped drumming, his foot started wiggling. “He has an office and he has a big calendar on his desk and every day he writes down in the boxes how much money he spent, what he ate, and how much he slept.”
“Really.” Mary made a mental note. “Is his office where he keeps his papers? Like, his important papers?”
“Yes.” Patrick wiggled his foot.
“Is his office the room upstairs next to his bedroom?”
Patrick nodded. “That’s where he keeps everything and that’s where he pays the bills. He told me that I could go in there but I’m not allowed to touch anything on the desk because I’ll mess it up.”
“I see.” Mary guessed that was probably where Edward had kept his will. Hopefully there would be a lawyer she could contact about probate, as well as maybe tracking down any relatives who could take Patrick in. Edward was such a methodical man, and he must have made some provision for where Patrick could live.
“I wouldn’t mess it up, I never would mess it up, but once I was drawing in there on the calendar, and he didn’t like that, so I don’t do that anymore.” Patrick turned his head toward the window, and Mary heard the slamming of heavy car doors in front of the house and rose quickly.