A Small Crowd of Strangers Read online

  And he would say things like, God, you wouldn’t believe this kid today. Or, I have to do something about this kid’s brother. Or, Why do some people even have kids? And she would say something like, I have braunschweiger and zwieback. Or, There’s a Harvey Keitel movie on the movie channel. Because Michael loved braunschweiger and zwieback. Because Michael loved Harvey Keitel. Because she didn’t know why some people had kids.

  The fifteenth of January was her birthday. It was the same day as her father’s birthday. January was all around her. January without a cigarette was daunting. Her New Year’s resolution was to have one. One.

  Michael dumped the chopped onion into the pan, where the butter was already sizzling and, actually, burning.

  She said, “Next Sunday at this very moment we’ll be sitting at my parents’ house at the dinner table.”

  They would all sing “Happy Birthday,” and her mother and Jen would get to that third line, and sing “Happy Birthday, dear Daddy and Pattianne,” cramming both names in there, and she herself would just sing “Dear Daddy,” and he’d sing “Dear Pattianne,” and everybody would watch each other to do it right. It was the only time they even said daddy. Daddy seemed like a word for families that made popcorn or went to theme parks or played Chutes and Ladders around the kitchen table. They always just went off in their corners to read. They always called him Dad.

  “Maybe we should go out to dinner,” she said. “Just us. Instead.”

  The smell of frying onions was one of the things in the whole world that she loved. “Let’s go to dinner in the village.”

  Two bulbs were burned out in the ceiling lamp, leaving one, and the flames under the frying pan were a small blue light.

  “The village?” Michael said. “Instead of you and your dad’s birthday party?”

  The streetlight outside was sodium orange, and it made the kitchen darker instead of brighter.

  “Mulberry Street,” she said. “Fettuccine con gamberetti.”

  “Where’s that new can opener I got?”

  “Tiramisu.” She closed her eyes. “Gattinara.”

  He pulled open the silverware drawer.

  “It’s in the spice shoebox,” she said.

  He said, “Let’s get him some of that whiskey.”

  “What whiskey?”

  “That whiskey you gave me for my birthday.”

  He said, “Hey, there’s chili powder in here.”

  “Hey,” she said, “that was Irish whiskey. And hey, my dad drinks scotch.”

  “Do they have that brand in scotch?”

  Ed School boys were rookie drinkers.

  Lemon cake was her father’s favorite kind of cake, and since she was his birthday girl it was automatically hers, too, and so her mother always made lemon birthday cake. She decorated it with frosting flowers and letters, Pattianne & Daddy, in neat cursive, blue this year. There were seven candles in a circle. Pattianne didn’t know why seven, no reason, except to have candles to blow out. She and Michael stood side by side, viewing the cake as it sat on the sideboard on its china pedestal. Jen leaned against the doorway, watching them watch the cake.

  Michael said, “It’s a beautiful cake.”

  Their hands touched secretly.

  He said, “My mom always buys our cakes from Greene’s Bakery.”

  There was a soft, shaky moment in his voice.

  He said, “This is so sweet.”

  Jen reached out and swiped her finger around the frosting at the bottom of the cake.

  “Not sweet,” she said. “Lemon.”

  “Cue the laugh track,” Pattianne said.

  “Bada-bing,” Jen said, and beat her fingers in a drum roll on the stack of china dessert plates and then stopped and waited for her to say bada-boom. She reeked of perfume.

  “Bada-boom.”

  The table was set with the good china, white with a gold stripe around the rim. The regular china was just plain white with no gold stripe. Michael had a grocery bag with party hats, each a different color and a feather sticking out the top, and he went around the table setting one by each plate.

  Jen put hers on and stood by her chair. She said, “Standard seating configuration.”

  Which was Jen, their mother, Pattianne, their father, around the table, same seats, always. Tonight, however, there were five chairs, and Pattianne pointed to the fifth chair, and said, “What do you call that?”

  Jen pulled at the elastic strap of her party hat and tilted it so it stuck out the front of her head like a unicorn horn. “New standard?”

  Jen couldn’t stand not knowing—are you moving away, are you going to marry this guy?

  “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

  One side of Jen’s mouth smiled more than the other side, resulting in a look she was often advised to wipe off her face as a child. Pattianne pushed the two chairs on the one side closer together.

  Michael took a tall silver box out of the grocery bag.

  He said, “I’ll just set this in the living room for now.”

  Jen pushed her party hat down to her chin so that it stuck out like a party hat sized zit.

  “Dad and I went bowling this afternoon,” she said. “I let him win.”

  And there was finally that moment after dinner, when the plates were cleared, when Jen jumped up and turned off the light, and their mother came in from the kitchen with the cake. The dark room, the lit candles, the moment before singing. There was that moment everywhere at birthday parties. Pattianne always got teary when it was someone else’s shining birthday-cake moment. On January fifteenth, though, she had to pay attention to singing “Happy Birthday,” getting the both-names thing right. Jen sang loud and off-key, which their mother never found funny.

  The parents took their party hats off as soon as the singing was done. Michael left his on, and so did Jen. Hers was a red party hat, which brought out the red in her eyes. Pattianne wanted to take hers off but she didn’t. She handed the china dessert plates to her mother, who sliced thin slices of the cake and handed each one to her and she handed it on. The cake was dry and lemony. Pattianne couldn’t remember what color her party hat was.

  Michael said, “So, great, the same birthday, very cool.”

  Her father rested his forearms on the edge of the table. He had loosened his tie and folded his cuffs partway up his arms, past his gold watch. He nodded toward them all like a small king.

  He said, “She’s my girl.” He winked at her.

  Jen said, “She was born early. Not due till Mom’s birthday. Next month. If that happened, she was gonna be Anne. Mom is Anne. Dad’s Pat. Get it?”

  She had scraped most of the lemon frosting from her cake onto her fork and was licking it like it was an ice-cream cone.

  Jen said, “Our gerbil Mike had babies on Mom’s birthday when I was in fourth grade.”

  Their mother took a neat bite of her cake. She laid the fork down next to her party hat.

  Jen licked. “My birthday is March 7,” she said. “Nothing ever happens on my birthday. I was named Jennifer because Grandma Anthony always wanted to name her daughter Jennifer, and then she never had one.”

  Their mother took a sip of coffee. She said, “Jen, why don’t you get the presents?”

  The rooms around the dining room were dark, no lights left on, ever. You leave a room, you turn out the light and you shut the door. Pattianne left lights on in her apartment, and every time she did she felt the pleasure of being a grown-up.

  Jen brought in four boxes, two wrapped in pink, and two wrapped in paper with golf clubs on it. She said, “Hmm.”

  One of the pink boxes was a Lanz nightgown. Pattianne didn’t even have to open it to know that. The other pink present was from Jen. Pattianne ripped the paper off, and when she dropped it on the floor, Jen said, “Pattianne, what a mess.”

  Their mother picked the paper up.

  It was a three-volume box set of Emily Dickinson. It was a beautiful set, from the used bookstore, with faded brown leat
her bindings and a bookplate in the front of each volume, a name, Miss Sarah Keller, in old spidery writing on the faded bookplates. Pattianne had given them to Jen on her last birthday.

  “Thank you,” she said. “I love it.” The truth.

  Which sent Jen into a full stoned giggle, which got Pattianne going, always.

  Their mother said, “Girls.”

  Their father opened a navy blue paisley tie and a box of dark-chocolate-covered caramels from the Pennsylvania Dutch shop on the turnpike.

  Michael said, “Excuse me,” and he went into the dark living room. Everyone stopped, stopped eating lemon cake, Jen stopped sniffling from the giggles. Their mother held her coffee halfway to her mouth. Pattianne took her party hat off. It was the blue one.

  Michael came back with the tall silver box and set it in front of her father. It was single-malt scotch. He’d picked it out at the liquor store because of its age. It was thirty-one years old.

  “Same as Pattianne,” he said.

  Her father said, “That’s very thoughtful, Michael.”

  If it were up to her, she’d get out the small crystal glasses from the top cabinet and pour some for everyone. She would force Jen to have some and try to convince her it was good stuff. They would toast. Her father set the bottle next to the box of Pennsylvania Dutch caramels, which were next to the navy blue paisley tie, which was next to his party hat, which was green.

  Michael held his hand out. Sitting there on his open palm was a ring-sized box with a gold bow. She had to reach out and take it from him. She had to open it right then and there, with hands that felt shaky, but weren’t. It was only red stone earrings, thank God, beautiful red stone earrings.

  “Garnets,” Michael said. “My mom picked them out. Well, my mom and Claire.”

  Her father said, “Very nice, Michael.”

  Jen said, “Very nice, Michael.”

  Pattianne set the box down next to the blue party hat and took the silver hoops out of her ears. Michael’s lips were a small tight bow, a puzzlement there on his face—did she like them, was it okay—and she worked the garnet studs into her ears, turned her head one way, the other, showed him, yes, she loved them. They were beautiful and she would cherish them, even though studs hurt her ears and she never wore them. She tucked her hair behind her ears.

  Her father said, “Garnet is the birthstone of January.” He cleared his throat.

  He said, “I have always loved the name Garnet. I once knew a girl named Garnet.”

  He straightened his dessert fork across the gold rim of his dessert plate.

  He said, “Garnet did the housework at my mother’s house, but I think Garnet is a very fine name.”

  Garnet. Pattianne had never even heard her father say that word before, ever, perhaps, and now he had just said it so many times in a row that it had lost its meaning as a word and become just a sound that caught her mother in a still moment and turned them all into an Edward Hopper tableau, as if he had never spoken before.

  Jen caught the moment in its free fall, which was her job in their family.

  “And very fine earrings as well,” Jen said. “Very nice, Michael.”

  Her mother’s daughter, backing away from that moment.

  Pattianne said, “They’re beautiful.” And she sounded like her mother too.

  “Hey,” Jen said. “Can I have your silver hoops?”

  Pattianne covered her hoops with her hand. “No.”

  “No,” their mother said. “You don’t need to wear silver hoops, Jen.”

  Jen was twenty-five and their mother still tried to tell her how to dress. Their mother also believed only Italian girls wore silver hoops in their ears. She had similar opinions on pierced ears in general. Her father sat back, straight, and both parents looked at some spot in the air over the middle of the table.

  Jen said, “How about a small aperitif? There’s some Grand Marnier here somewhere.”

  Jen loved Grand Marnier. She loved to say words like aperitif, especially when stoned.

  Michael said, “What’s Grand Marnier?”

  Pattianne said, “Small aperitif is redundant.”

  Her father said, “Aperitifs are taken before a meal.”

  Her mother said, “Pattianne and Michael have a long drive, Jen.”

  The birthday presents were in her lap, along with two pieces of lemon cake in a plastic container, which she planned on eating for breakfast, both of them. Michael drove fast, topping the Volkswagen out at fifty, singing the Beatles “Birthday” song, two lines, over and over.

  He said, “Will you model that nightgown for me?”

  Modeling a Lanz nightgown sounded like a good way to not have sex.

  “It wouldn’t be as much fun as you might think. Besides, it has to stay in its box until next Christmas. Then Jen gets it.”

  “Your mom gives you a nightgown and then you give it to Jen?”

  “My mom doesn’t know.”

  The Madonna of the Dashboard glowed her beige plastic glow.

  By the time they got home, the Volkswagen heater was just kicking on. Michael parked and turned to her while the car bucked a couple times. He took the keys out. His tongue slipped across his lips. They had never fucked in the Volkswagen. Impossible, perhaps.

  He said, “I think it would be awesome to have a baby on your own birthday.”

  There could have been a baby almost here by now. They could be sitting at their own dining room table thirty-one years from now, eating cake and trying to speak, or trying not to speak.

  She said, “Grand Marnier is orange-flavored liqueur.”

  The streetlights on the Madonna’s head made an orange halo.

  She said, “We’ll get some. You’ll love it. Grand Marnier.”

  He sucked on his lip, his lower lip, sucking it in with his teeth. When Michael sucked his lip it went straight to her nipples.

  “I love my earrings,” she said, her voice stopped up back in her throat. “And I love you,”

  He said, “I know.” A smaller voice.

  “And I love lemon cake.” The tears let loose.

  He said, “Silly bones.” A whisper really.

  She loved the name Garnet.

  He couldn’t stay asleep that night. Usually he conked out right away, especially with her right there next to him. It had been so quiet in that house. They kept turning off lights. Even Pattianne got quiet there.

  He got up early and turned on the heater. He made her a cup of coffee with too much cream, the way she liked it. Put it on the table by the futon. She wrapped her bare warm arms around his neck when he knelt down to tell her he was going and tell her it was there. That made him feel a little better. He left the kitchen light and the lamps in the front room turned on. He sat in the car for a while. The O-Bug warmed up. He looked at the windows above the dry cleaner’s. She probably was already back asleep. He liked her sister Jen. She was funny. She was like a parakeet that kept going off. What he would call slightly inappropriate. And her dad seemed okay. Dads always liked him. He was the kind of guy they thought was okay for their daughters to go out with. Probably not to live with without being married, though. Pattianne said her parents didn’t really know they were more or less living together.

  He’d said, “What’s that mean, don’t really know?” She’d said, “It means don’t really care.” He kept turning that over in his head now, driving in to Trenton with the comforting flow of the early traffic. It turned into a Beatles song, except instead of “Don’t Let Me Down,” it was “Don’t Really Care.” He hated it when songs got stuck in his head. He didn’t realize he’d been actually singing it until Johnson, who was working at a table by his desk, said to him, “You know that’s not right.”

  Michael stared at him. “What’s not right?”

  Johnson said, “In the first place, those aren’t the right words. In the second place, there’s that,” and he pointed to a little poster on a bulletin board by the door. Because We Care.

  “That�
��s about not smoking,” Michael said. He thought about them not caring, and he decided that simply couldn’t be true. He didn’t know how they could not care. It made him depressed. And his head ached. He said, “You ever drink Grand Marnier?”

  Johnson said, “That shit is brutal.”

  Father McGivens stood on the steps of Christ the King in the freezing sunlight and smiled a square white smile. He said hello to Mr. Bryn and he kissed Mrs. Bryn on the cheek and then Michael and Claire. Mrs. Bryn wore a dark blue coat dress with a velvet collar. Claire wore a little dark red jacket and a short black skirt. Nobody looked cold.

  They all stood on the steps there and smiled, and Father McGivens took Pattianne’s hand in his hand. He had huge hands. She felt like she’d stuck her own hand into a baseball mitt. A warm baseball mitt. They only stood there for a little while, the names part of the introduction, and then they went back to the rectory. She walked next to Mr. Bryn, who had a long wool overcoat with a warm chemical smell, like the dry cleaner’s.

  “Mother,” he said over his shoulder to where Mrs. Bryn walked with Michael. “This young lady needs one of Aunt Shirley’s scarves,” and he looked down at her and he said, “You look cold,” and he put his big arm around her shoulder.

  She was shocked at the lovely warmth of it. At how much she liked it. At how easy it was to walk alongside someone with his big arm around your shoulder keeping you warm, moving you along.

  “Dory’s Aunt Shirley crochets and makes lace and knits,” he was saying. “I know you kids aren’t wearing a lot of that stuff these days, but these are really warm scarves.”

  When he said you kids she knew that Michael hadn’t said anything about her not being a kid, about her being thirty-one, or maybe he had, and maybe she wouldn’t worry about it for now. Maybe it really didn’t matter. Michael said it didn’t matter. Five years wouldn’t matter if it were the other way around. It didn’t matter to Michael, it didn’t matter to her.