Funeral with a View (3 page)

“Richard, when are you
going to introduce me to this little friend of yours? It’s been what, six
months now?”

Ugh. Little friend. My
mother always called any potential love interests in my life my ‘little friends.’
It started with Tammy Green in the fourth grade and it never stopped.

“I don’t know, Mom,” I
said into the cordless phone as I paced my tiny apartment. “Maybe the Fourth of
July? We were thinking of having a little something. Burgers, dogs, a drink or
two. How about you join us?”

The silence on the line
told me she was thinking it over. I imagined her playing with her curly,
silvering hair in deep consideration.

“Yes, I think that would
work. That sounds like fun, actually.” She sounded excited. “I think it’s about
high time I meet the girl you’ve been sleeping with, don’t you?”

“Mom.”

“Oh come off it, Richard.”
My mother always called me Richard. She was one of the few who did, ever, even
though she knew I preferred Rick or Ricky. “Don’t play games with me, and quit
being such a prude. You know as well as I do your generation is always in a
rush to do the bone dance.”

“Mom!”

It was conversations such
as this that had me dreading the prospect of introducing the two women in my
life. To make matters worse, only four weeks had passed since our amateur porn
hour. Not only did I feel dirty, but I feared Mom would discover our secret
like a drug sniffing dog. I love my mom dearly, but she could be as blunt as a
ballpeen hammer and had a preternatural ability to read my mind.

Catherine wandered into
my living room as I tried to explain the finer points of ‘thinking before you
speak’ to my mother.

“Rick …”

I held up my finger and
told Mom it’s not always the best course of action to say everything that’s on
one’s mind.

“
Ricky.
”

“Mom, can you hold on a
second? Thanks.” I placed my hand over the phone. “What’s up? Talking to my mom.
What do you think about getting together on the—”

“I’m late, Rick.”

“Late for what?
Seinfeld’s not on for at least another half hour.”

“My period, Rick. It’s
late.”

Shock.

Terror.

Oh
shit.

Mom’s voice squawked from
the cordless. “Richard? Richard are you still there?”

I swallowed the dry click
in my throat.

“Mom? I’m gonna have to
call you back.”

I hung up without saying
goodbye.

~~~

“We need to talk, Rick.”

No shit we needed to
talk.

Ring.

Late.

Rinnnnng.

Fuck me.

Rinnnnnnnnnng.

Catherine and I stared
each other, the moment holding us in its tenacious grip.

“Are you going to get
that?”

RINNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNG!

I turned on the answering
machine. Mom would have to wait.

“I think I’m pregnant,
baby.” Catherine’s voice wavered.

Pregnant.

Baby.

My voice came back to me.

“How can that be? We use
condoms. We
always
use condoms.”

Catherine took her eyes
off of mine and looked at the floor. “Nothing’s foolproof.”

She sat next to me, face
devoid of expression.

“It’s not official yet,
Rick. I haven’t gotten a pregnancy test. But usually I’m like clockwork. You
can set your watch by my cycle.” She tried to force a smile. “Not that you’d
want to. Aunt Flo from Red Bank should have visited days ago. I wanted to give
it a couple days, just in case, but … I’m late.”

“We need a test. I’ll go
get you a test. I’ll hit the drug store around the corner and get you a test.
How’s that sound? It sounds good to me. Yeah, a test. That’s what we need. A
test.” I bounced off the couch, blathering like the village idiot.

Catherine offered a
patient smile, brave in the face of impending doom. “That would be great.
Thanks.”

“Noneedtothankme!”

I ran over to the kitchen
table and grabbed my wallet and keys, then I ran to the door, stopped, turned,
and rushed over to her. Catherine raised an eyebrow. Bending down, I gave her a
firm kiss on the lips.

“I love you. I’ll be
right back.”

Her eyebrow raised even
higher. “I … love you too, Ricky.”

With that said, I hurried
to the drug store.

When I got back,
Catherine secreted herself in my bathroom. My body felt charged, filled with an
uncertain and nervous energy. For good or bad, I wanted the uncertainty gone. I
had to know. The sooner I knew the sooner we could plan.

There was still so much
we wanted to do. Catherine wanted to complete her MBA. The degree would help
her move up at the networking solutions firm she worked for. We both wanted to
do some travelling; a cruise, Hawaii, the Grand Canyon, Niagara Falls … hell,
I’d go down the falls in a goddamn barrel if it would get us out of this. The
old Woody Woodpecker cartoon flashed through my mind’s eye and I almost
laughed. Almost.

I put my ear to the door.
Creepy and somewhat voyeuristic, but an eternity had passed since she went in
there.

Everything is going to
be okay. A-okay. Totally okay. Off the charts okay.

I nearly fell into the
bathroom when Catherine opened the door. Once I saw her face, all questions
were answered. The EPT in her trembling hand served as confirmation, the plus
sign in the indicator window clear and unmistakable.

“I’m pregnant, Ricky.” A heavy
tear broke loose from the pool in her eye and fell to the bathroom floor.

Everything was not going
to be okay.

Shock.

Fear.

Denial.

Back to shock and fear.

I said nothing. Rather
than speak, I grabbed Catherine and pulled her to me. Neither of us spoke for
the longest time. We swayed back and forth, the silence surrounding us. She lay
her head against my chest, and I ran my fingers through her silky hair as her
shoulders shook with sobs.

“What’re we going to do?”

Catherine sniffed. “You
mean, what am
I
going to do?”

“Will you—”

“I don’t know, Ricky. I
never believed in abortion, but that was before I got pregnant. Now that it’s
happened to me, I don’t know what to think or do.”

I held her tighter.

“I’m going to have to
call my OB/GYN tomorrow and make an appointment,” she said, pulling away from
me. “First thing in the morning.”

“Yes, absolutely.”

“It may be a few days.” She
grabbed a tissue from the bathroom countertop and blew her nose. “Getting into
that place is like seeking audience with the President, and that’s on a good
day. With the Fourth of July coming up it’ll be even worse.”

Shit. The Fourth of July.
The picnic.

“Ricky, where are you?”

“Hmmm?” She looked at me
expectantly. “Oh, right.” I cleared my throat. “I kinda invited my mom over for
the Fourth. You know, she’s been busting my balls for so long to meet you and …
Jesus. This is a cluster fuck of Class A proportions.”

“Oh,” she said, lowering
her eyes. “I see.”

“But I can cancel it.
Meeting my mom under any circumstances could leave you scarred for life. But
with all this going on? Yeah. Cancelling it would be best. We need time to talk
about things.”

She brushed past me and
sat on my ratty couch with a deep sigh.

“No.”

“Right. You’re right.” I went
to the phone. “It was stupid of me to even bring it up. I wasn’t thinking. We’ve
got enough on our plates as it is. I’ll call her right now and tell her it’s
off.”

Catherine set her hand on
top of mine as I made to grab the receiver.

“That’s not what I meant,
Ricky. I meant ‘no’ as in ‘no, I don’t want you to cancel.’ ”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“Really, really?”

She smiled, and
miraculously it reached her eyes. “Really, really. I can’t just closet myself
away.”

I sat down next to her
and placed my arm around her shoulders. She pulled her feet underneath herself,
nestling closer to me.

“My mother’s going to
love you, you know. Although,” I paused, “I’m not sure the feeling will be
mutual.”

“You make her sound like
such an ogre.”

“Harpy.”

“What?”

“Ogres are male. Harpies
are female. At least, I think so. Shit, I don’t know. I’m a graphic designer.
Mythology wasn’t on the curriculum.” Cat worked at a local bank as an IT
consultant, and I doubted she knew much more about mythic creatures than I did.
“Anyway, I think she’s too short to be an ogre.”

“Rick?”

“Hmmm?”

“About what you said
before you busted out of the apartment like it was on fire.”

Uh oh.
“Yes?”

“Did you mean it?”

Before I bolted I told
her I loved her. In fact, when I got to the door, I made a point of turning back
just to tell her.

Did I mean it?

A part of me knew the
answer from the beginning. A bigger part of me pushed it aside, trained to
think there was no such thing as love at first sight. Silly things like that
didn’t exist in the real world. They’re fodder for bad movies, soap operas, and
novels. People don’t fall in love after a scant few months.

So, did I love her?

Damn straight I did.

“Yes.”

Simple.

To the point.

One word to dispel any
doubt.

She hesitated. “Really?”

“Really.”

“Really really?

“Really really.”

“Me, too.”

~~~

Catherine opted not to
spend the night.

“Nothing against you,
baby, but I’d like some time to myself. I have a lot to think about.”

I agreed. I was prepared
to give her whatever she needed; time to think, personal space, anything. We had
much to discuss, but, as they say, Rome wasn’t built in a day. Catherine
promised to call me after getting in touch with her doctor. After that? We’d
figure it out.

“Ricky, please don’t tell
anybody. I want to see what happens with the doctor before I go down that
road.”

“We,” I corrected.
“Before we go down that road.”

Her mouth twitched with a
slight grin. “God,” she sighed, looking forlorn in the hallway outside my
apartment door. “I can’t believe this.”

“Hey.” I lifted her chin
and looked into her hazel eyes. “It’ll all work out. We’ll deal with whatever
happens. Together. And I won’t tell a soul. Promise.”

“
SHE’S WHAT?”

Bill’s booming voice
reached through the phone and punched me in the eardrum.

My vow of silence was short-lived.
I was scared shitless, and the recent turn of events chipped away at me from
the inside. I felt like I’d explode if I didn’t spew to somebody.

Mom was out of the
question. A sexual progressive dating a guy over ten years younger—who,
according to her, humped like a jackrabbit on speed—or not, telling her that my
girlfriend of less than six months was suddenly pregnant wasn’t high on my
to-do list.

That left Bill, my best
friend since the fifth grade.

“You heard me.”

“Wow. That blows, man.”

“Ya think?”

“She going to keep it?”

“I’m not sure, Bill. I’m
really not. We have a lot to talk about. She hasn’t even made an appointment
with her gyno yet, and I won’t even pretend to know what’s involved with that.”
I sighed. What a mess. Everything felt difficult, from thinking to speaking.

“So, you going to stay
with her if she does keep it?”

“Of course I am! What the
hell kind of question is that?”

“Simmer down, Ricky. I
was only asking.”

“It was a dumb fucking
question.”

“Yeah, probably. Just
thinking that, you know… if she didn’t keep it, life would be easier for you,
both of you, that’s all.”

“Not even my choice, man.
Her body, her choice.”

He sighed. “Yeah, I know.
What’re you going to do?”

“What
can
I do
other than support her and be here for her?”

“True. So … does this
mean the Fourth is off?”

“No, we’re still having
it. Mom’ll be there. With her boy toy.”

“No shit! How old is this
one? What’s his name?”

“I don’t want to know and
I can’t remember”

“Should be interesting.”

“Without a doubt. And
Bill, we never spoke about this, okay? I promised Catherine I wouldn’t tell
anybody.”

A long pause.

“Bill? You still there?”

“I’m here. Don’t worry. I
won’t say a word.”

The Fourth of July
arrived with a vengeance. With the heat index, the weather service predicted it
to be over 100 degrees. Nothing like adding sweltering temperatures to the
overburdened pressure cooker that was my life.

I had a lot on my mind,
and while Catherine handled things with a reserved calm, I’d taken to chewing
the shit out of my fingernails.

Catherine busied herself
with the picnic tables and all the trimmings as I hooked up a new propane tank
to the grill we had set up on my back patio. Big no-no with the association,
but they tended to be more lenient on the holidays. The burners on the Char
Broil ignited with a whooshing sound just as I heard a familiar voice from off
in the distance.

“Richard! Richard, honey,
we’re here. Jesus, it’s hotter than a virgin’s panties on prom night. Look, I
brought potato salad!”

My mother always knew how
to make an entrance.

“And that would be your
mother,” Catherine said. “You were right. She is a little too short to be an
ogre.”

I grunted.

Catherine met my mother
half way and reached for the five pound burden.

“Here, let me help you
with that, Mrs. Franchitti.”

“Please. It’s Beth, dear.
Nobody’s called me Mrs. Franchitti in fifteen years. Glen? Glen!” she called
over her shoulder. “Oh, where is that pain in the ass? Glen, get over here and
take this potato salad, will you?” Huge, dark sunglasses hid her eyes, and her
face was cloaked in a shadow as projected by the brim of her oversized hat,
both testaments to her love for Jacki O.

A short, balding man with
a crooked nose and close-set eyes rushed up to us. His Bermuda shorts displayed
spindly legs, and reed-thin arms sprouted from a sweaty polo shirt.

Glen waved. I waved back.

“I’m here, I’m here,” he
said, a little winded. “I was trying to find a spot. Parking’s a bitch in these
big apartment complexes. Woops. Pardon my French.”

“Don’t worry about it,”
Catherine said, amused. “My father curses with the best of them. Nothing I
haven’t heard before.”

“Good, good.” Glen hefted
Mom’s Epic Potato Salad. “I’ll go put this inside so it doesn’t go bad.”

Mom clucked her tongue. “Poor
man is sweating like a whore in the Vatican. I think he has a glandular issue.
He perspires in the shower … whether I’m in there with him or not.”

“Mom! Please.” I’d made
my way over as she handed the bowl off to poor ole Glen, figuring Catherine
could use all the support she could get. Besides, I was raised to do
introductions. “Mom, this is—”

“Yes, yes, Richard. I
know who this is. Catherine. And aren’t you a sexy little thing? Turn around,
dear. Let me see you.”

Oh, for the love of
God.

Confused, Catherine
humored my mother and spun in a circle. Mom appraised her, from her sandals to
her white shorts to her tank top and ponytail.

“Do you work out,
sweetie? Such a great figure. That ass is to die for. There aren’t enough
spinning classes in existence for me to achieve that body. And I’ve never seen that
big a bust on a girl so athletically built before.”

Danger, Will Robinson,
Danger!

“Moooooooooom,” I said, palm
over my face.

“Don’t be such a stick in
the mud, Richard. If you were any more uptight your ass could turn coal into
diamonds.” Beth Franchitti had stopped editing herself many moons ago. A perk
of her age, or a horribly embarrassing personality trait? My money’s on the
latter.

Mom’s behavior never
failed to humiliate me, but Catherine thought it was a hoot. She laughed at the
lack of decorum and didn’t seem to mind being on display like a prized horse at
auction.

“Richard, look at those
fingernails.” The inky black sunglasses hadn’t affected Mom’s eagle vision.
“You’ve been biting them again, haven’t you?” She turned to Catherine. “Such an
oral fixation on this boy. Always chewing his fingernails over anything that’s
got his dander up. Bad test grades, something spilled on the carpet … any time
he’d attempt to hide something from me” A sculpted eyebrow appeared over the
rims of her Foster Grants.

I waved off her comment.
“How about a drink while I get some food on the grill?” That pacified her for
the time being. I dodged a bullet. Sure to be a momentary respite.

“Glen? Glen!” A breeze almost
knocked off Mom’s massive urban sombrero. She grabbed it, saving us all from a
lengthy diatribe on how much she’d paid for it and the frequency of her trips
to the hair salon. “Where is that man? Glen, please get us a drink before we
dehydrate.”

“Yes, dear,” came Glen’s
resigned voice from inside the house.

“Now, Catherine,” Mom
said, grabbing Catherine’s hand. “Let’s go finish setting the table and have
some girl talk, hmm? I just have to give you all the dirt on my Richard. Did he
tell you about our trip to Miami Beach when he was five? No? Well, he walked
right to the water’s edge, took down his bathing suit, whipped out his little
mushroom cap, and started pissing right into the water! It was …” They made
their way to the apartment, and her voice trailed off. Catherine gave me an
amused shrug, looked down at my crotch, and winked as my mother led her by the
hand, another casualty of Beth Franchitti’s personal tractor beam.

A frosty beer was shoved
in my face, so close the label blurred.

“Here,” said Glen, taking
a pull of his own beer. “I think you’re going to need this. I think you’re
going to need a
lot
of this.

I slugged half the bottle
in one shot and reassessed the man.

“Glen? I think we’re
going to get along just fine.”

~~~

Smoke wafted into my eyes
as I finished up the first round of hot dogs and hamburgers. Mom, Glen, and
Catherine were at the picnic table with their drinks, talking and laughing. I
had a feeling that most of the laughing was at my expense. I hoped Mom wasn’t
telling Catherine the story of when I pooped in the pool at summer camp. The
thought made me thirsty for another beer.

As I finished the
lukewarm dregs of my Newcastle and considered getting another, I heard the
familiar rumble of a Camaro pulling up in front of the complex. I’d know the
sound of the car anywhere. It was the sound of hot summer nights driving down
the strip in Seaside, looking to ‘bag some babes’ with my best friend.

“Oh, Lucy, I’m
hooo-ooome!”

“William!” Mom had a
tendency to call everyone by their full, given name whether they be family,
friend, or foe.

She quickly got up from
the picnic table, almost knocking over her martini, and ran through the browned
grass, arms waving.

“Hey, Beth.” Bill picked
her up and spun her around. Touching. She looked like a baby in his arms, not a
stretch considering he was a foot-and-a-half taller, and one hundred-fifty
pounds heavier. “How are you, hot momma?”

“William, you flatter
me,” she said after he set her down, and swatted his ass. “And I’m doing
much
better now that you’re here, you sexy hunk of man.”

They walked back, hands
clasped and grins plastered on their faces. I imagined them in a mental
hospital together and decided it was plausible.

“Richard. William’s
here!”

“No shit.”

“What was that, dear?”

“Nothing.” I shook Bill’s
hand. “Glad you could make it, buddy.”

“Rick.” He gave Catherine
a tense nod. My mother noticed the exchange, and her lips formed a grim line.
“I wouldn’t miss it for the world, man. You know that.”

“Well,” my mother said,
chipper as ever. “Let’s go get you a drink, William. Your timing is perfect. I
was just telling Richard’s little friend all of his embarrassing childhood
stories.”

Bill threw his head back
and laughed. “Get to the dump in the public pool yet?”

Sigh.

“I was seven-years-old!”

“Whatever you say,
Richard,” Mom said, waving dismissively. “Come on, William. Let’s go sit with
Glen and Catherine and have some more fun at Mr. Uptight’s expense.”

“Music to my ears, Beth.”
Bill winked and flipped me the bird.

Asshole
.

~~~

“Glen? Glen?”

Mom and Glen’s
interactions reminded me of
National Lampoon’s Vacation
: “Russ!” “Right
here, Dad.” She yelled for the poor bastard even if he was right on top of her.

“Yes, dear. I was just
coming back from the bathroom.”

“Oh, there you are. Let’s
go back and freshen up our drinks and get some more of that potato salad. I
don’t know where the boys put all this food. Catherine, are you sure I can’t
you a drink? Something other than iced tea?”

“No thanks Mrs. … Beth.
I’m not really a big drinker.”

I took that moment to
choke on my hot dog.

“Richard, maybe if you actually
chewed
your food you wouldn’t have choked, mmm?” Her mouth formed a
humorless line again. “Right, then. Glen and I will be back in a minute, won’t
we, Glen?”

“Yes, dear.”

Bill broke the silence once
Mom and Glen were out of ear shot.

“Not a big drinker? You
could’ve fooled me,” he mumbled.

Catherine shot daggers at
him. He went back to his hamburger.

“Ricky, your mom is a
trip.” Catherine’s good humor returned having adequately cowed Bill. “I can’t
believe she was a Vegas show girl.”

Ugh. Don’t remind me. You
were probably wondering where my mom’s liberal sexual attitude came from? Well
there you have it. Apparently what happens in Vegas does not always stay in
Vegas. I’m living proof of that. Long story short, Dad was on vacation, met my
mother, bedded my mother, love at first roll in the hay. She followed him back
to Jersey. The rest is history.

“She’s not as bad as you made
her out to be.” Smiling, Catherine rested a hand on my knee.

“She’s an acquired taste.
Sort of like ipecac syrup.” I nodded at Bill. “He’s used to her by now. It’s a
wonder she hasn’t jumped his bones yet. Ever see
The Graduate
?”

“What can I say? She has
good taste,” Bill said through a mouthful of chips. He took a sip of beer.
“Glen’s a nice guy. A bit weird looking, and sheepish around her, but hey,
that’s nothing new. Anyway,” he shrugged, “they seem to be really into each
other. Good for Beth.”

“Speaking of meet and
greets,” Catherine chimed in, “I guess I’m going to have to introduce you to my
mom and dad and my sister sooner or later.”

“Um,” Bill croaked. “I’m
gonna go get another beer. You guys, um, need anything?” He looked between the
two of us and stood.

I held up an empty Newcastle.

“No, thanks,” Catherine
said.

“Right. Be back in a
few.”

“What’s wrong with him?”

I shrugged. “Who knows?
Maybe he’s still weirded out by the you-know-what?” As far as lies go it
sounded pretty plausible. I felt shitty for doing it, but I had no desire to
confess I’d dropped the dime and broke my promise to her.

Satisfied, she gave my
hand a squeeze.