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I DEPOSITED VINNIE in my apartment and gave him strict instructions. He was to use his own towels. He was to stay out of my bedroom. My bed was off limits, and my clothes were off limits. He was not to finger my panties. He was not to feed Rex or tap on his cage. He could eat my food and drink my beer as long as he didn’t clean me out.
“Sure,” Vinnie had said. “Whatever.”
I’d changed into a little black skirt, white stretchy top with a low V-neck, black lightweight cardigan sweater, and black heels. Lenny Pickeral, the toilet paper bandit, was going to be at Burt Pickeral’s viewing tonight, and I felt compelled to capture Lenny. I’m not sure why, because the bail bonds office wasn’t exactly operational. I suppose this was a way to convince myself of some normalcy.
I called to see if Grandma wanted a ride to the viewing.
“That would be wonderful,” Grandma said. “Emily Klug was supposed to pick me up, but she’s got bleeding hemorrhoids.”
Grandma and I got there a half hour after the viewing started, and the lot attached to the funeral home was packed. I dropped Grandma off at the door and watched her stomp and step to the stairs. She had borrowed crutches, and between the crutches and the ortho boot, she was making the most of her broken bone. I parked a block away and did a fast walk back to Stiva’s.
The air in the funeral home was heavy with the smell of carnations and lilies. I don’t have allergies, but funeral home flowers make my nose run. Too many flowers in too small a space, I suppose, combined with overly perfumed women and Stiva’s inadequate ventilation.
The Elks arrived in full regalia with sashes and hats and medallions and hundred-proof breath just as I entered the lobby. I pushed through the crush, looking for Grandma, looking for Lenny Pickeral. Probably, it was a terrible thing to attempt an arrest in the midst of grief, but it was my job, and it was the law. And the truth is, no one in this crowd seemed overwhelmed by the tragedy of Burt’s passing. Burt led a long, full life, and the Burg is good at accepting death. Lots of devout Catholics who found genuine solace in their faith.
I heard an exclamation go up in front of me. It was followed by murmuring and some movement. I squeezed my way in and saw Grandma standing over Maria Lorenzo. Two men were trying to get Maria up on her feet, but Maria topped the scales at somewhere around two hundred and fifty pounds, and they were having a hard time figuring out where to grab her.
“Sorry I knocked you down,” Grandma said to Maria. “It’s these dang crutches. I haven’t got the hang of them yet, but I got to use them, because my foot is broke all over. I should be in a wheelchair, but I don’t want to look like a sissy.”
I eased Grandma away from Maria and moved her into a less congested area. She tagged two people en route, but no one went down.
“Stay here,” I said. “You can’t do any more damage if you don’t move from this spot.”
“Yeah, but what good is that? I’m not near the cookies. And I haven’t even seen the deceased yet. And people can’t see me with my disability over here.”
“If you keep hitting people in the back of the leg with your crutches, they’ll kick you out.”
“They won’t do that. I’m an old lady and I’m gonna die soon, and they want my business. I got a real expensive slumber box picked out here. Mahogany with gold handles and padded inside with genuine satin. And it’s lead-lined, so the worms won’t get to me. They could have buried King Tut in this slumber box, and he’d be good as new.”
I hoped the funeral home wasn’t counting on collecting Grandma’s funeral money any time soon, because I was pretty sure Grandma wasn’t ever going to die.
“Maybe you could walk better without the crutches,” I said to her.
“I won’t get as much sympathy that way. This is my big chance. Other people get heart attacks and kidney stones, and I never get any of that stuff. I’m healthy as a horse. I don’t even get the flu. All I got is a broken foot. And it wasn’t even broken enough to get us a handicap sticker for the car. I tell you, there’s no justice in this world.”
“All right, let’s compromise. You can hold the crutches, but you can’t use them to try to walk.”
“I guess that would be okay,” Grandma said. “I can’t figure them out anyway. I think I swing when I’m supposed to clomp.”
“Where do you want to go first?” I asked her.
“I want to see the deceased. And then I want cookies.”
TWENTY-THREE
I GOT GRANDMA in the line inching its way to the casket, and I set off to find Lenny Pickeral. After five minutes of circulating through the room, I realized everyone looked like Lenny Pickeral. Even the women. Some Pickerals were older than others, but other than that they were interchangeable.
I stopped a random Pickeral and asked about Lenny.
“I’m looking for Lenny,” I said. “Have you seen him?”
“I was just talking to him,” she said. “He’s here some
where.”
“Did you notice what he was wearing?”
