Vanity Insanity (39 page)

Vanity Insanity didn’t lose its electricity, but the cure of the tempestuous time drizzled into my days as I dealt with picking up the debris from the broken plans for the renovation that had crumbled when Sinnot called me shortly after Octavia’s funeral to break up. He informed me that he’d come across a better and more promising deal and that, since he hadn’t signed any final contracts, he no longer wanted to work with me. That chapped my hide since Sinnot had stolen my thunder. I wanted to scream to him in the phone, “You can’t break up with me. I wanted to break up with you first.” When all was said and done, I was left with a mess. I needed to decide if I could afford to move forward with this project alone, or if I even wanted to.

Jenae and Virginia were putting on their coats after a full day in the salon. Virginia grabbed a suitcase that she’d been bringing in all week since she was staying with Jenae while waiting for electricity to come back on. “We’re doing a potluck tomorrow, Ben. What do you want to bring. Paper plates and napkins again?”

“Put me down. I’m always good for plates and napkins.” My tooth was starting to hurt again.

“And plastic forks?”

“Got it.”

The bell above the door rang as the girls left. Tom Ducey came in with a box that he placed on the UP desk. “This stuff does have a unique smell. I’m just saying.” Tom frowned at the meal I was going to take to Theresa’s house.

In August, Michael and Theresa had returned from an appointment while Lucy watched their kids. Lucy watched from the window as Michael and Theresa walked from the car, Theresa limping more than ever. Both wore large sunglasses covering red, swollen eyes. The doctors had told Michael and Theresa that the cancer had spread to Theresa’s liver and that the plan should be to keep her as comfortable as possible in the coming months. The positive couple could no longer call the cancer an annoying
little cold. Just how do you move forward from a “there’s nothing else we can do for you” speech from a team of doctors who specialized in cancer?

Giving up was never an option. A friend told Theresa and Michael about a book by a woman who had also been given the same speech from her doctors when she had breast cancer. The book claimed a special diet could save lives. A strict diet of macrobiotic food as a therapy for cancer patients with recorded historical success was their answer to the bothersome malignant cells that had invaded Theresa’s body. A sister of Michael’s coworker made her meals in which processed or refined foods were forbidden, and beans, fish, seeds, and nuts attempted to achieve a balance in the system by applying the oriental principle of yin and yang to the food. The process of making the food was as important as the food itself, and Lucy told me that she gagged every time she delivered a meal to Theresa’s home because of the smell of the food.

“I sure as hell hope this stuff does the trick for her. She’s not doing too well, Ben.” The last time Theresa had left her house was on Morgan’s first day of kindergarten. She walked her little girl into school, walked back to the car to go home, and had remained in bed since that day.

“Thanks for getting me on the meal delivery list,” I said to Tom. The list had been organized by Lucy and other members of the rosary group. A meal could be an opportunity to see Theresa if she was having a good day, of which she had been having less and less.

Tom grimaced. “Brace yourself, buddy. Just saying.”

“OK.”

“You’ll probably see Michael and Theresa’s mother. We call them the gatekeepers. Protecting Theresa. Man, I wouldn’t want to be in their shoes. Michael took a sabbatical from work to be home with Theresa and the kids. Oh. One last thing, Ben. Not that you’re anything like Lucy.” Tom cleared his throat. “But keep your tears at the door. It’s all hope and smiles while you’re there. Lucy comes home after seeing Theresa with a big headache from holding back the tears. All smiles.” He held out jazz hands.

I followed Lucy’s written directions and drove to Michael and Theresa’s house in West Omaha. As Tom had warned, the smell of the food did take over the car and nauseate me a little. Or maybe my nerves were making
me sick. I parked in front of the house, which looked like a picture out of
Family Circle
magazine. To the side of the white, two-story home were tricycles, plastic bats, and balls strewn across a driveway covered with chalk drawings. A tree swing hung from the front oak tree with a doll lying next to it, and a few feet from the tree was a statue of Mary, a green Frisbee leaning against her. Not one sign that a very young mother was very sick inside this mirage of a perfect world.

I walked up to the front door with a broken screen. I shifted the box to one hand and knocked on the door. Michael opened the door with a gigantic smile on his face.
Smiles everyone. Keep your tears at the door.

“Ben, how the heck are you? Come on in.” Behind Michael stood Theresa’s mother, Mary O’Brien, who looked so much like her sister, Sheila, Stinky Morrow’s mother, that I had to take another look.

“You know Mary, don’t you, Ben? Since our little Mary Elizabeth was born, we like to call Theresa’s mother Big Mary.”

Mary O’Brien laughed and came toward me with a gentle hug. “Please don’t call me Big Mary, Ben. Wow, Ben Keller from Maple Crest. You haven’t changed a bit.” Not something a thirty-six-year-old man likes to hear, but that was all right.

I followed them inside and set the meal in the box on the counter. Toys and kids were everywhere, and I heard
The Lion King
playing on the TV in the other room. An awkward silence transpired as I stood and looked at Michael and Mary, an awkward moment when three people who have a connection with each other meet but the connection was not in the room. I sensed this was my clue to leave. I guess I wouldn’t get a chance to see Theresa. I smiled and mumbled a good-bye as I started walking toward the door.

“I think Theresa’s awake, if you want to say hi. I know she’d love to see you.” Michael picked up a little girl, who held her arms up to him.

“Sure.” I hesitated. I turned toward the direction Michael was walking and looked down into the big eyes of a barefooted wild monkey wearing an Aladdin shirt and holding a ping-pong paddle.

“Who are you?” The boy asked.

Michael laughed and put down the little girl on the couch in front of the TV playing
The Ling King.
A meerkat and a warthog were singing “Hakuna Matada” and proclaiming to the room not to worry, for the rest of your life. Strange advice for the moment.

“Jack, this is Ben, a good friend of Mom’s. He stopped by with dinner.”

“Oh,” Jack said as he ran out of the room. I knew why Theresa’s mom and Michael so ferociously protected the situation. I felt bad for coming.

“She’s upstairs.” Michael motioned for me to follow.

With each step toward the next level of this home, I felt like I could cry. I swallowed, took a deep breath, and stepped to the second level. I followed Michael to a room with a closed door. He opened the door and stepped aside. Theresa was sleeping with a rosary in her hand, her body thinner than I had ever seen it. Her hair looked dark and curly against the pillow. Around her neck were several chains, anchored down by medallions of saints, many hopeful pieces of metal dangling against her heart.

Michael touched Theresa’s arm. “Hey, hon. You’ll never believe who’s here. Ben Keller. He brought dinner.”

Theresa’s eyes popped open, and she smiled immediately. She took a moment to take in what Michael had just said, then tried to adjust herself to sit up as Michael helped her. “Ben, you brought me my macro McMeal? That’s too funny. Doesn’t it smell nasty?”

“Well, actually, I ate half a container at a red light. Sorry about that.”

Theresa laughed, tears gleaming in her eyes. Michael stood in the doorway, removed but present as we talked. Theresa sat up. “I know you’re lying. Are your renovations done yet? I bet your Vanity Insanity looks amazing.”

“Oh, we’re taking a little break.” I tried to think of something funny to say, the tears in my throat were starting to burn. My toothache was my saving grace as I concentrated on the pain to avoid tears from coming to my eyes.

“Hey, did Jenae ever get her naval pierced?” Theresa asked me.

Jenae had her naval pierced last spring. “Yeah, she’s looking for other parts to pierce.” A child cried from a room nearby. I could hear muffled sounds of Theresa’s mother comforting voice muffled through the wall.

Michael cleared his throat. “Ben, Subby Mangiamelli stopped by yesterday to replace the mirror on the vanity. Looks good as new, right, hon?”

“It looks awesome.” Theresa sounded drained as she smiled and looked toward the vanity. “Good as new.” I remembered the vanity when it had been in Lucy’s trunk years ago. “Hey, Ben, we have to figure out what my new hairstyle will be when this mop grows out.” Theresa’s words were starting to slur as she spoke.

“I’ll check my schedule. ‘I might be too busy counting me holy cards, Danny.’”

Theresa closed her eyes.

Michael came toward the bed. “Did you catch that, hon.
Caddyshack
, right, Ben?”

“Sounds like
Caddyshack
. Easy…” Theresa looked up at me. “So good to see you, Ben.”

“Yep, see you later, Theresa.”

“See you later.” She moved her head toward the window and closed her eyes.

I moved much more quickly down the stairs, stepping on a squeak toy at the bottom. I needed to get out of the house.

“Hey, thanks,” I said to Michael and Mary as I moved to the front door.

“Anytime,” Michael lied. “You’re the one who’s helping us out. Thanks for dropping off dinner.”

“Anytime,” I lied.

By the time I got to the car, I turned on the engine, and Sting’s voice played from my CD player. The song “Let Your Soul Be Your Pilot” took over the car. Sting, my constant sage, who had laced the years of my life with background music, found me in my pain. I drove the car to the next block and pulled over. My head hurt. My tooth hurt. I took a deep breath.

When the doctors failed to heal you
When no medicine chest can make you well
When no counsel leads to comfort
When there are no more lies they can tell
No more useless information
And the compass spins
The compass spins between heaven and hell
Let your soul be your pilot
Let your soul guide you
He’ll guide you well

Theresa received the last rites three times in the next week and a half. She died in her sleep on November 2, a day after All Saints Day.

The storm of 1997.

Untimely and ruthless.

39

Theresa’s Funeral: No Morning Appointments

Wednesday, November 5

1997

T
his time Jenae’s note posted on the door to Vanity Insanity looked as though an angry child had scribbled it:

We are closed this morning to attend the funeral for our dear friend Theresa.
We are so sad due to our loss.

“Can we at least try to sit together?” Virginia put some lipstick on as she shut a drawer in her station with her hip.

“We look for each other,” Kelly said, “try to save places. If not, we meet at the lunch.”

We all met at Vanity Insanity that morning and agreed to get back for a few late appointments after the lunch. Caroline was able to find a sitter
for Connor, and Toby and Patti had called all morning appointments to reschedule. Jenae was tying her head into a tight bun at the mirror at her station. She wore a navy dress with a string of pearls.

“I’ve never been to this church. Can I catch a ride?” she said to anyone who could hear.

The staff walked out the back side of the salon, and I followed and locked the door. I put the keys in my pocket and felt the rosary I had put in there following the Rosary visitation the evening before, a rosary that had been given to me by a lovely lady years ago. I looked over to my parking spot and saw A.C. with no coat, wearing dark sunglasses, leaning against my car. “Mind if we go together?”

“Hop in.” The pain in the entire left side of my mouth had been so bad the last several days that I’d lost count of how many Tylenol I had taken. The less said, the less pain, so I hadn’t said much since Theresa died. A.C. got in the passenger’s side of the car, put his seat belt on, and turned on the radio.

The Spice Girls were screaming about what they really, really wanted.

A.C. turned the station.

A high-pitched woman’s voice called out to her Ken that she was his Barbie girl in her world.

A.C. turned off the radio. A.C. turned on the radio.

Barbie Girl.

Spice Girls.

A.C. turned off the radio. “Dumb songs,” he mumbled.

I drove several blocks out of the Old Market before it occurred to me that Toby and Jenae were driving together to the church. Years and years of their childish tension had so subtly and quietly waned that I couldn’t remember the last time those two had bickered or exchanged insults.

Theresa’s funeral at Saint Pius X was on one of the dreariest fall mornings that I can remember. The cloudy sky hovered over a cold morning as we drove onto the blacktop parking lot, which was already packed forty minutes before the funeral was to start. Storm-whipped, distressed trees sagged as they wrapped the landscape of the big box church that I hadn’t seen in ages. A big tree lay on the side of the parking lot, its roots pulled
out of the ground from the weight of the ice during the storm. The tree was now dead. Dead too young, way too young. My mouth throbbed.