2 a.m. at the Cat's Pajamas Read online

  Clare colors her Santa methodically, using classic hues: scarlet for the coat, white for the trim, forest green for the holly leaf that hangs above his head. When she needs red for Santa’s cheeks, she muscles the crayon from diabetic Duke’s hand.

  In the space next to Santa’s outline, Madeleine lists songs she will practice later. “Take the A Train,” “Hey There.” At least there will be caramel apples. Madeleine spies them on the craft table, covered by a festive sheet.

  Each child has been guaranteed one apple to cajole and twist through a pot of caramel. Madeleine will suffer through the hundreds of questions her classmates will ask about each step. She will lay her coated apple with the care of a surgeon on a sheet of wax paper to dry. She will not sprinkle it with peanut butter chips or walnuts or rainbow sprinkles. She has never had a caramel apple and wants a pure experience.

  At the front of the room, Miss Greene clears her throat for their attention.

  “It is eleven eleven,” she informs them. “Make a wish.”

  The children of Homeroom 5A bow their heads and wish. Madeleine discards hers—May Clare Kelly get laryngitis—so she can watch Miss Greene. When her head is bowed her soft hair reaches her collarbone. What do fifth-grade teachers wish for?

  Miss Greene claps to signal the end of wishing. The school nurse has appeared and wants everyone to listen to her. Madeleine assumes she is there to administer the apples.

  “Lice,” she declares, “are bugs that live in your hair.”

  Several of the girls give their pony- and pigtails vague tugs. The nurse snaps gloves on and asks them to line up. “We’ll go one by one.”

  The first to go is Denny Pennypack, who with his brothers and sisters maintains a multigrade bullying contingent. The Pennypacks keep at least five smaller children in tow at any given recess. The purpose of these children seems to be to congratulate the Pennypacks and to offer them a stray glove or scarf if one of the Pennypacks forgets theirs. These children are for parts. If she were interested in minions Madeleine would be a bully, but she doesn’t like weak people hanging around.

  Every Sunday in Saint Anthony’s Church, Mr. and Mrs. Pennypack hand over their contribution in a bright pink envelope. The Pennypack mansion takes up a city block and is visible from the back windows of Saint Anthony’s. Around it, miles of row homes like soiled clouds.

  The nurse digs around in Denny’s hair until she is satisfied. Then Jill goes. Madeleine feels bad for Jill, whose two older brothers keep her in a constant state of fear. Then the Anderson twin. Yawn. Then the other Anderson twin. Double yawn. Then the girl Madeleine always wants to call Lynn who is actually Leigh. Then Brie whose real name is Brianna, but they already had a Brianna. One by one, each kid puts their head under the searching fingers of the nurse then goes back to their drawing.

  It is Madeleine’s turn. The nurse sifts and stops. “This one.” She takes hold of Madeleine’s elbow and steers her toward the hallway. “Please go see Principal Randles.”

  “Can I get my list?” Madeleine says.

  “Your what?”

  “Nose has bugs in her hair!” Denny clutches his stomach with glee.

  Miss Greene tells Denny to stop laughing, but he is addicted to his classmates’ scared tittering. He fakes falling out of his chair with delight. More fearful tittering. More playacting.

  Miss Greene walks Madeleine to Principal Randles’s office and instructs her to sit on the pew outside. She whispers a few words to the secretary, then kneels so she is the same height as Madeleine.

  “Don’t listen to that jackass Denny Pennypack,” she says.

  Madeleine has never heard a teacher curse before. Miss Greene high-heels back to class and Madeleine waits on the hard bench.

  After what feels like an hour, the secretary tells her that no one is answering the phone at her house. “Where is your father?”

  Madeleine thinks of the phone chiming from the kitchen into her father’s bedroom, where he no doubt dozes to an old record. At one time, he was the most respected vendor on Ninth Street. Now, the sound of the oven door scares him.

  “How should I know?” Madeleine can feel the bugs sliding down strands of her hair. She can feel them in her ears, setting up permanent housing. She can feel them burrowing deeper, possibly into her brain. Laughter jangles down the hall from her classroom. She cranes her neck to see inside. Will they save an apple for her? They seem to be cleaning up.

  “Am I getting a caramel apple or what?”

  The sound of her voice jolts the secretary out of her paperwork. “You’ll have to ask the principal, Madeleine.”

  “I’ve been waiting forever. Where is she?”

  “Here I am, Madeleine.” Principal Randles appears in the doorway. She squats so she is the same height as Madeleine. Most adults do this so they don’t appear menacing. “When everyone else goes home for lunch, you will go home and stay home,” she says. “Show this to your father.” She thrusts a comb and a piece of paper into Madeleine’s hands and seems to think this is all the information the girl needs.

  “Do I get an apple?” Madeleine says.

  “Maybe Santa will bring you a caramel apple.”

  “Santa doesn’t exist.” Madeleine dismisses this idea with a wave of her hand. “I feel I should be allowed to get my drawing.”

  “I feel I should win a million dollars,” Principal Randles says.

  “I don’t know how that applies to me,” Madeleine says. “Did someone eat my apple?”

  “You shouldn’t be thinking about apples. You should be thinking about getting the bugs out of your hair.”

  “I made one for her.” Miss Greene stands in the doorway holding Madeleine’s schoolbag in one hand and in the other, an apple covered in dried caramel. Miss Greene can draw the best giraffes. An apple made by Miss Greene is a perfect apple. Behind her, Denny Pennypack smirks. One of the many baffling situations at Saint Anthony’s is his position as hall monitor, enabling him to be anywhere at any time.

  Madeleine takes the apple from Miss Greene. She can see no flaw or seam in its caramel coat.

  “You have your apple. Go before your sass gets you in trouble and tell your father to buy that shampoo,” Principal Randles says. She and Miss Greene turn away.

  With a juvenile delinquent’s knack for timing, Denny karate-chops Madeleine’s apple off the stick, sending it hurtling across the hall where it collides against a display of student papers answering the question: Could World War II have been prevented? Principal Randles and Miss Greene wheel around. The apple sits in a pile of pencil dust and hall dirt. Madeleine can see where the wall forced a mottled wound on its otherwise perfect surface.

  “She threw her apple against the wall!” Denny exclaims. “The lice must be making her crazy!”

  Madeleine balls up her fists. “This is fucking bullshit!” She glares at Principal Randles. “This turd did that on purpose, are you blind?”

  The principal’s mouth falls open. Madeleine is still going. Bitch rag, she tells her. Colossal prick munch.

  “Expelled,” Principal Randles chokes.

  Denny snorts with pleasure. Madeleine bridges the distance between them in two steps. She remembers to bring her arm back like a slingshot and to keep her thumb out of the fist she plants on Denny’s mug. Denny’s nose explodes and releases admirable waves of blood. It can’t get enough of releasing itself, it’s wild over it. Madeleine marvels at how much blood he is able to produce. By the end of the commotion, his nose is wrapped in bandages and Miss Greene is escorting Madeleine speedily down the yellow hallway. Each grade’s efforts at Christmas cheer take up the walls. The third grade’s assignment seemed to be: Do as much damage as you can with green crayons. Madeleine exits the school amid these violent displays.

  The other students file out of their classrooms. They will go to their homes for lunch and are expected to be back within one hour. Those whose parents aren’t home during the day have made arrangements with other families. Those with no arran
gements sit in the cafeteria and eat dry sandwiches under the semiwatchful eye of a teacher who drew the shortest straw.

  “I wish you hadn’t done that,” Miss Greene says.

  “I wanted to sing.” Madeleine shifts underneath the weight of her backpack, then walks away. She can tell Miss Greene is watching her because she hasn’t heard her teacher’s high heels signal an exit. It occurs to Madeleine that she could cry, but she sings instead.

  You must take the A train

  to go to Sugar Hill, way up in Harlem

  Harlem is the crown on top of Manhattan, New York City. Billie Holiday was a singer who squandered her gift on drugs. Madeleine knows this the same way she knows keeping your thumb inside your fist when you punch someone is a good way to break your thumb. Because her mother taught her.

  Sarina watches Madeleine walk away, her flamingo backpack slouched over her shoulder. For a moment, she had been able to see past the girl’s rough exterior to something squirming and hurt. Sarina is a nonpracticing everything, so Christmas is no more than a day off with Chinese food, or a drive to visit her sister and her bleached-looking family. But it is Madeleine’s holiday. Tears push into her eyes. A measly apple.

  Sarina returns to her classroom and listens to the message from her ex, Marcos. He will be in the city tonight, does she want to meet?

  Through the window she can see Principal Randles standing amid the tributaries of retreating students, correcting attitude and posture as they stream by. Her hawkish nose, the surprisingly dainty waist. Always some oozing sandwich for lunch: egg, crab, or tuna salad. Sarina makes the mistake of assuming every principal is good, every teacher selfless, but what kind of principal expels a little girl the year her mother died?

  Sarina deletes the message, thinking of key lime pie.

  11:30 A.M.

  Alex Lorca enters the club: hollering, clapping, popping his knuckles, kissing Sonny on the cheek, kissing his father on the cheek. Always with Alex these days is the girlfriend, dress half off, lips pouting around a Parliament. Alex sings. Tonight! Most holy, sacred night! Alex pretends to play a drum set that explodes, he pretends he is exploding too, grabs onto his girl who shrieks at him to get off. She has a name like Aruna Sha. Her name is Aruna Sha. They are sixteen and skinny. Their collarbones vault in upsetting directions.

  Alex gives the Snakehead a reverent tap. He insists on being treated like a man yet maintains a boy’s tendency to test the height of every hanging thing. He pummels Lorca with fake punches. “It snowed, Pops,” he says.

  “It’s done, though,” Aruna says.

  “Aruna left her coat here last night.”

  “It’s silk,” she says.

  “Ooh la la,” says Sonny.

  Alex’s cheeks are flushed the same color as the scarf he wears winter or summer. The same shade as Aruna’s lipstick: fire hydrant red. These kids are the only colors in the bar. “Tonight’s the night.”

  “I give up,” Lorca says. “Why is tonight the night?”

  “I’m playing with the Cubanistas. You said.” More punches, more snapping. Sonny and Lorca exchange a glance. Alex goes to the back to retrieve the coat. They hear him in the hall, yes-yesing and slapping his thighs.

  Aruna scrutinizes her nails. “Is there a salon around here? Is there anything around here besides warehouses?” She pulls a cigarette from a purse tucked under her armpit and lights it.

  Sonny says, “There’s no smoking in here, honey.”

  Her gaze slides from the ashtrays to the floor, where last night’s cigarettes are murdered. “We were smoking last night.”

  “It’s a new day, I guess,” Sonny says.

  She drops it, kills it. Alex returns with the coat and places it over her shoulders with a delicacy that surprises Lorca. Alex lives in the suburbs with his mother but is forever escaping to the city, begging to stay with his father, begging to play at the club. “You think Max will let me solo or will I just be backing tonight? He’ll let me solo once, maybe?”

  Sonny sighs. Alex reads his face and turns to his father. “What’d I miss?”

  “You’re underage,” Lorca says.

  Alex laughs. “I was underage last night too, when you promised.”

  “A cop came by this morning—” Sonny begins, but Lorca interrupts him. “Things have changed,” he says. “Last night I said you could play. Now you can’t. I said I was sorry.”

  The mirth in Alex’s face vanishes and a murkier expression replaces it—the one Lorca is more accustomed to evoking in his son. “You didn’t say you were sorry.”

  “Of course I’m sorry!” Lorca’s tone is rougher than he wants. He tries to think of something softer to say. Alex lifts Sonny’s guitar from the table and takes a seat, his back toward the men. Aruna sits in the chair next to him. She thrusts a lip toward a compact and reglosses it while he noodles around a melody.

  Francis taught Alex how to hold his guitar the way Django Reinhardt did, like the guys in Italy and Spain do, forward on his knee like he was playing to it. It reminds Lorca of Babe Ruth, pointing his bat to left field. Lorca watches him pin chords to the neck. Django was his Spider-Man. When he was nine Alex read that Django played every gig wearing a scarf, and he had worn one ever since. He slept clutching his guitar like a teddy bear. Lorca misses his father so acutely that for a moment he is unable to gather breath.

  Alex settles on a melody.

  “Is that ‘Troublant Bolero’?” Lorca says. “When did you learn that?”

  Alex ignores him. Expressionless, he picks through the hardest progression, staring at the wall. Suddenly disgusted, he returns the guitar to its case. This jag will go on for a day. Lorca innately knows his son’s moods and tendencies the way you know on a flight, even with your eyes closed, that a plane is banking.

  Aruna shuts her compact and replaces the cap to her lipstick. She is a little girl with a lot of eyeliner, Lorca thinks. He tugs a twenty from his pocket and thrusts it toward his son. Alex pushes past him into the vestibule. “Let’s go,” he says to Aruna.

  Lorca hands the money to her. “Get dinner tonight. You both look like skeletons.”

  “I will.” She folds the bill into her bag and touches the snarled twinkle lights. “Are you going to hang these up today?”

  Lorca nods. “That’s the plan.”

  She looks up to the tin ceiling, the eaves, the walls. “It’ll be awful pretty when you do.” It startles Lorca how different she looks when she smiles. It seems to hit Sonny too. The men straighten up.

  “Merry Christmas,” she says.

  “Merry Christmas,” they say. Then, in the direction of the front door, Lorca calls: “Merry Christmas, son.”

  Alex’s voice sulks in from the vestibule. “It’s not Christmas yet.”

  “He told all our friends,” Aruna says, “… is the thing.”

  They leave. Lorca and Sonny watch them walk away through the window. Jeans and sneakers. Aruna’s floral dress with winter boots. Then the window returns to the gray static of the street. A stray flurry.

  Alex’s mother had been a casual girlfriend of Lorca’s. When she found out she was pregnant, he vowed to pay half of everything. When he couldn’t, his father made up the difference. Or, Sonny did. Or, after they started dating, Louisa. Alexander was the strongest name Lorca could think of and Alex grew up strong, even if he was a little bratty, a little hurt.

  “Why didn’t you tell him?” Sonny says.

  “I don’t want him to worry.”

  “That worked well, then.”

  “We tell no one,” Lorca says. “Not Alex or Gus or Max. Not Valentine.” He knows keeping it quiet will be as hard as getting the money. Gab is what Sonny likes to do most besides play.

  “Nail place!” Sonny slaps the inside of his wrist. “Girard and Susquehanna!” He clamors to catch them. The heavy click of the door.

  Lorca pulls himself a pint. He fishes out the last egg from the fridge and cracks it into the beer. The citation shines on his desk in the ba
ck. He uses it as a coaster. A watery ring grows and dilutes the cop’s signature.

  He picks up the phone by his elbow and dials. After a few rings her machine clicks on. Even her recorded voice unmoors him. He coughs for the first few minutes of his message. He says, “A Good Morning is what you used to call an egg cracked into a beer, right?” Drinking at barely noon will not refute her claim that he spends too much time at the club. “It’s almost Christmas,” he tries. His voice is not the one he wants. He shores it up before he speaks again, searching the room for anything helpful: the citation, Gus’s unfinished plane, Sonny’s crisp, folded bedsheets. There was a joke years ago that had her howling, but he can only remember the punch line.

  He says, “You know damn well I can’t read.”

  12:30 P.M.

  Would it be okay for Sarina to come to the dinner they discussed that morning, over the pie, in the flurries, at the place?

  Georgie says yes into the phone as if she has been waiting all morning for Sarina to call.

  “What can I bring?” Sarina says. “You sure don’t need pie.”

  “Yourself,” she says. “Only yourself.”

  “Who will be there? How many people, I mean?” Sarina stutters. “So I know what to bring.”

  “Me, Bella, and her new girlfriend, Claudia. Pepper, get down! That’s my cat. She jumped on the table. When I’m on the phone she thinks I’m talking to her.”

  “Bella and her girlfriend …” Sarina reminds her.

  “She’s like a furry human being. It’s true what they say.”

  “It is,” Sarina says.

  “So true.” Georgie sighs.

  “Is that all then? Those are the only people coming?”

  “Bella, Claudia, Ben and Annie of course, Michael. He just bought a ridiculous car.”

  Of course, Ben and Annie! Because married people are always together! Sarina wants to retract her acceptance, the phone call, this day, like the cord to her vacuum that rewinds with a powerful thwip! How had she forgotten the pleasure of a carpet sucked clean? Vacuuming is how she’d prefer to spend the evening. Then a few hours at her easel. “So great,” Sarina says, not specifying what would be great: a new car, seeing everyone, pie …