Going in Style (15 page)

“Listen,” said Pete, “we want you to come over to the house for a couple of days, stay with us. Let us take care of you till
this whole thing is over. Whaddaya say?”

Before Al could answer, Joe cut in. “Sounds great to me, Al. You can relax and fool around with the kids. It’ll help take
your mind off things.”

Even with his fatigue-diminished perception, Al could appreciate his friend’s gesture. Joe always made things easy, he thought,
always smoothed over the rough points in a relationship, even at the cost of personal pain. “You think so, Joe?” he said hoarsely.

“Yeah. Sure.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Come on, stop bein’ a baby. Won’t hurt you to sleep away from the apartment. Pretend you’re going to summer camp.”

Al patted Joe’s shoulder. “You’re a good man,” he said. “I’ll go up and get some clothes.”

“We still have the things you left when you sat for the kids,” volunteered Kathy. “They’re all cleaned and ironed and waiting
for you.”

Al hesitated. “Well, maybe I should—”

“Come on, Al,” urged Pete.

Kathy led Al toward the car, but he stopped at the door and pivoted. “You gonna be all right?” he asked Joe.

Joe feigned irritation. “What, I need you to protect me? What are you talking? Get out of here already. Believe me, at this
point, I’d welcome the privacy. Who needs you?”

Al nodded. “See you, Joe,” he said. He squeezed awkwardly into the car, with Kathy following.

“Joe,” said Pete, “we got plenty of room. You’re welcome to join us.”

Joe recognized the formal politeness of the offer and was grateful even for its ritual courtesy. “Thanks, Pete, but I’d kinda
like to be alone tonight.”

“You’re sure? We have two kids, you know. An additional playmate would certainly be appreciated.”

“No, no, really. You go ahead and take care of your uncle. I’ll be fine.”

Pete nodded. “Okay. We’ll see you, uh—”

“Day after tomorrow,” said Joe. “At the funeral.”

Pete got into the car. “If you change your mind,” he said, leaning out the window, “just give us a call, okay?”

“Right,” said Joe.

“You have our number?”

“Yeah, I got it upstairs.”

“Good night,” said Pete.

Joe saw Al twist in the seat, wave weakly, then slump back. “’Night,” said Joe softly. He lingered a moment in the darkness,
then headed back toward the building.

The apartment seemed stifling, unnaturally still, soundless. Joe walked slowly to the bedroom and sat down on the edge of
his bed. After a while, he removed his shirt and shoes, and watched his toes wiggle through his white socks. Completing the
cycle, he thought. An infant could occupy itself for hours, playing with and investigating its extremities. And now, here
he was doing the same thing. He stood up, padded over to the closet, and pulled out an old cardboard box.

The old photographs and documents came out in yellowed bunches. A tattered birth certificate:
Joseph Harris, October 14, 1901.
A photo, artificial color added, of himself at age nine. A sepia of young Joe in uniform, World War I. Army discharge papers.
A faded plaque, J.
Harris-C. Kaneel, Winners, Dance Marathon, Flatbush,
J. C. Carla, Joe thought. Her name was Carla Kaneel. He could not remember what she looked like. He found another photo,
himself at age thirty, hands on hips, hair slicked back, confident to the point of arrogance.

Joe’s gaze drifted to the fingers holding the picture, to the dry and wrinkled skin, to the bulbous, arthritic knuckles with
their sparse white hairs. He began to tremble, and soon his entire body was shaking. Presently he became aware that he was
crying. Then, standing, he saw a dark wet stain spread over his trousers.

“Damn!” he said aloud. “Damn!”

He stuffed the memorabilia back in the carton and waddled down the hall to the bathroom. He removed his trousers and used
a towel to clean himself off. Imagine, he thought, crying and pissing in my pants like a three-month-old baby. The cycle was
literal, he understood now; the helplessness and
dependency were real and inevitable. It would not be much longer before the circle of existence snapped shut forever.

Bender was a small man, immaculately dressed and manicured, with a disturbingly soft voice. Joe did not trust people with
voices like this; it was unnatural to have them, and people who did were clearly covering something up.

They sat in Bender’s tastefully furnished office and went over the arrangements; in a morning phone call, Al had told Joe
that anything decided on would be fine with him. Bender consulted a form as he noted the available options.

“As far as the cemetery, we’ve got space in Woodridge, New Jersey, or Pine Lawn on Long Island. I’m surprised Willie never
bought himself a plot.”

“Maybe he never expected to die,” said Joe.

Bender ignored him. “Unless you want the special section in New Montefiore.”

“What’s the special section?”.

“Concrete vaults only,” said Bender. “Concrete is very big this year, a lot of my customers are taking them. The cost is a
little steep, I’ll grant you, but there’s a lot of dignity in stone.”

“How much?”

“For the vault? Two thousand. But that includes all cemetery fees and tips for the gravediggers.”

“And a regular grave?”

Bender shrugged. “I could get it for you for two-ninety, plus forty dollars to open it up.”

“You mean dig it?

“Yeah.”

“We’ll take the two-ninety on Long Island. What’s next?”

Bender squinted at the paper. “Let’s see… Body preparation we went over, moving fees we went over.… Flowers. You want flowers
in the hearse?”

Joe nodded.

“Okay, that’s a hundred. You want a separate limousine for yourself and family? Yes? Okay, that’s fifty.”

“Fifty bucks just for a car?”

“That includes driver gratuity,” Bender explained softly. “Your funeral director is another hundred, plus… Let’s see—you have
your own priest?”

Joe shook his head.

“We’ll give you Father Scanlon, a very good man, takes only a fifty-dollar fee. Then, let’s see, you’ll need use of the chapel,
use of the waiting room…” Bender’s voice trailed off as he checked the form and jotted down more numbers. “Obtaining of the
necessary permits is another seventy-five, plus—how many death certificates will you be wanting?”

“Gee, I dunno,” said Joe. “Do we need any? I mean, we know he’s dead, we don’t need proof.”

“Well, but there is a death benefit from Social Security, and you’ll need a certificate for that. And maybe some other things’ll
come up, insurance or something—I’ll put down three, okay? They’re only three-fifty apiece.”

“Put ‘em down,” said Joe, disgusted.

Bender rose, his face flushed with anticipated pleasure. “Well,” he said, “I think we’re finally ready to select a coffin.”

The coffins, on waist-high pedestals, occupied two large rooms. “You know what’s coming in this year?” said Bender. “Plastic.
Would you believe it? Yeah, yeah, I’m telling you, with the cost of wood, and workmanship what it is—” He stopped before a
maroon casket and rapped it with his knuckles. “You hear? Fiberglass. Strong as hell, molded in one piece, this is a real—”

“Forget it,” said Joe.

Bender shrugged. “You know, the Jews—it’s in the religion—they have to be buried in wood. But the nice part of being Gentile,
you got flexibility. This“—he indicated a shiny, light tan box—”is a metal model that’s very popular, a very nice buy. Welded
seams, sides twenty mils thick, last for centuries.”

Joe reached out and touched the coffin; it felt cold to his fingers. “I don’t like it.”

“All right,” said Bender, ushering him into the next room. “I see you have a little better taste, fine. You can’t deny a man
his due. Personally I happen to agree with you. My father passed away last year, he should rest in peace, I wanted to give
him a fitting send-off. I came in here, made a selection. The man didn’t have much in his life—I figured, at least let him
go out in style. Look around.”

There were ten coffins, all wood, all with their covers open. Joe passed slowly by each of them, occasionally running his
fingers over a surface to get a feel of the grain. Bender followed, softly quoting prices and supplying information. “Plain
pine, six hundred even. Doweled construction, your religious Jews specify this one.

“Walnut, hand rubbed. Nine fifty.

“This one is mahogany, speaks for itself. You
see the inside? Velvet. A beautiful, beautiful model. Almost makes you want to jump in and lie down. Fourteen hundred.”

“This what you got for your father?” asked Joe.

Bender smiled faintly, led him to an even more luxurious casket. “Dad was buried in cherrywood, ten separate coats of stain.
You see that inside? Go ahead, look.”

Joe peered in.

“Satin shroud,” said Bender. “Best there is.”

“How much is this one?” asked Joe.

“This?” Bender grinned patronizingly. “This is two thousand bucks.” He paused. “But come, let’s go back so you can make your
selection.”

Now it was Joe’s turn to smile. “No need to,” he said crisply. “Right here’s the one I want.”

It was a bright, chilly autumn day. On the small lawn in front of the funeral home, the morning dew sparkled in the oblique
rays of sunlight. Al prodded the grass with his foot, watched the drops of water bead up on his polished shoes. He’d been
there for nearly an hour; he was happy now to see Joe coming up the path to join him.

“Are they open yet?” Joe was dressed in a brown suit. His sparse hair was neatly combed.

“Yeah. No one’s here yet, though.”

“How long you been waitin’?”

“Half hour maybe.”

“How come you didn’t go in?”

Al shrugged. “Ah, you know, I didn’t feel like being there alone.”

Joe nodded. “Come on, we might as well see what’s doin’.”

They headed inside and found Bender in his office. “The coffin’s in the chapel,” he told them. “It’s closed, just like you
specified.”

“That’s the way Willie once told me he wanted it,” said Joe. “Can we see it?”

“Sure,” said Bender. They walked into the small lobby, then down a carpeted corridor and into the rear of the chapel. Another
man joined them, dark-suited, swarthy, curly-haired. “This is Dominick,” said Bender. “He’ll be your funeral director.” Dominick
nodded.

Joe and Al fell slightly behind. “I see we got the Mafia,” whispered Al.

“Sure,” said Joe. “Who do you think owns this type of business? Times get rough, they supply their own customers.”

At the front of the chapel was a pulpit and raised platform on which rested the flower-bedecked coffin. The polished wood
glowed softly under a row of warm spotlights. Bender’s face nearly outshone the casket. “Is it everything I promised?”

“Very nice,” said Joe reservedly.

Al echoed the comment.

“A matter of honor,” said Bender. “Just because you’re returning to dust doesn’t mean you have to go back cheap. This will
make his people proud. He has family?”

“A daughter,” said Joe. “I called her last night. She didn’t know if she was coming.”

Bender rolled his eyes to the ceiling. “Well, of course,” he said, “that’s certainly her privilege.”

Joe cleared his throat. “Uh, I think it would probably be a good idea, before everyone showed
up and all, if we just checked… you know… the inside. I mean, worse mistakes have been made….”

“Of course, of course,” said Bender. “Don’t apologize, you’re entitled.” He looked over at Dominick. “Dom.”

The dark-suited man lifted the lid of the coffin. Inside, Joe saw that it was indeed Willie, his face a frozen off-white,
his head making a slight depression in the wine-colored satin. Dominick and Bender backed away a discreet distance, as Joe
and Al leaned over the coffin.

“Good-bye, Willie,” whispered Joe.

“ ‘Bye, Will,” said Al. He touched his lips to the dead man’s cheek, then drew back at the unexpected coldness.

Joe nodded to Dominick, who came forward and closed the lid.

“The priest’ll be here in a moment,” said Bender, on the way out of the chapel. “He’ll probably want to speak to you a while.”

“Fine,” said Joe.

Five minutes later, he and Al were in a small room, bare except for a table and chairs, facing a short, fat man with a loud
voice. Father Scanlon took notes on a yellow pad, and scanned them frequently through wire-rimmed bifocals.

“Okay, let’s see. So… He has one daughter, Sandra, and two grandchildren, Edward and Tracy. He—”

“They may not be here,” said Joe.

“That’s okay,” said the priest, checking his notes. “He was a cabdriver for most of his life was a member of the Masons, mmm…
lost two sons in the Second World War, sang in the choir at St. Mary’s church—
“

“That was a long time ago, Father,” said Joe. “Very long. As I mentioned, truthfully, Willie… uh… hadn’t really kept up with
the religion.”

“I understand,” said Father Scanlon. “But tell me, was he a charitable man?”