Act of God (16 page)

The chubby boy was grunting at his mirrored reflection, his broad back to her. He was easily crunching two hundred and fifty pounds, the canyon between his buttocks widening with each squat. Vida exerted her powers and he spun around, as if a ghost had tapped him on the shoulder. His look of despondency caught her off guard. Whatever demons he was crunching weighed a lot more than two hundred and fifty pounds.

That night she sat down to compose her apology with pen and ink. A handwritten letter seemed the only appropriate way to convey true sorrow, and she felt awful about Edith’s death. But every draft ended up in the wastepaper basket. She couldn’t find the right tone. Should she begin with the apology or the explanation? When she started with the apology, the explanation read like a proviso on her sorrow. When
she began with the explanation, the apology sounded like an afterthought.

Halfway through the fourth attempt she finally realized why. She wasn’t telling the whole truth. The morning that Edith had left the first message about the smell was the same day she had had lunch with her old mentor, eighty-nine and still producing. He’d started in burlesque and never minced words. When she complained to him that no one was considering her for any good parts, he told her point-blank why. “You’re the Ziberax lady. Who wants the media circus your name will bring to a serious project?”

When she came home that afternoon and heard Edith’s voice on her answering machine, she pressed the Erase button. Edith was always complaining about something, and Vida didn’t have the wherewithal to listen to another lecture on building maintenance when her career was dying.

She put down the pen and went to the mirror. If she could act out the apology, maybe she’d find the right tone. Her mouth frowned and her eyes filled with tears. She had captured sorrow, but what did repentance look like? She mentally skimmed the pages of Darwin’s
The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals,
but she couldn’t recall repentance. He must not have included it.

Of course he hadn’t included it. Animals don’t repent.

Dear Katherine,

Please know how deeply sorry I am about Edith’s passing. She was beloved by everyone who knew her and her loss is a tragedy. Had I known she was in danger prior to us all being evacuated I would have taken immediate action.

I never heard Edith’s messages. I never had the
chance. There was an intruder in my house. I only found out about the mold after the police arrived to arrest her. One of the officers found a mushroom in the closet where she’d been hiding.

Katherine, I can’t begin to imagine how difficult and devastating it is to lose a sister, a twin sister. My heart goes out to you.

Sincerely yours,

Vida

Kat read the letter with raw disappointment. “Where is the apology? She takes no responsibility.”

Frank read it with simmering deliberation. “Vida knew about the smell before she called the police on Ashley. She told me to check the basement for leaks.”

They sat on matching armchairs in Stanley’s corner office. He’d stepped outside to give them privacy. This morning, when he had called to tell her that Vida’s letter had arrived, she’d told Frank that all she wanted was finality and peace. She felt anything but peaceful now.

“She blames Ashley, Frank. What does a ninety-pound scared girl hiding in a closet have to do with her not calling Edith back?”

“Tell her to go to hell. She listened to Edith’s messages.”

“My god, all she has to say is ‘I’m sorry I didn’t call Edith back.’ ”

“Tear up the letter and mail her back the pieces.”

“And then what? Make good on my threat? Stanley said a lawsuit could last years. It will only be a constant reminder that I’ve lost Edie.”

“Tell her she’s got to write you another letter.”

“It will only be another chance for her to make excuses.”

“Spell out what you want her to say.”

“I want her to look me in the eye and say, ‘I’m sorry I didn’t call Edith back.’ ”

Dear Ms. Vida Cebu,

My client, Katherine Glasser, found your letter of apology woefully inadequate and is offended by what she considers to be your obstinate avoidance of accepting responsibility for not returning the deceased’s calls with prudent expediency. She wants you to take the remainder of the fourteen-day deadline to reflect on how your actions as the property owner, responsible for her tenants’ health, contributed to the premature death of Edith Glasser. My client loved her sister very much and is devastated by her death. She wants closure to this tragic situation.

The offer to forgo monetary damages will expire unless you appear in person at my offices on March 19 prepared to admit culpability and offer my grieving client a heartfelt and meaningful apology.

Sincerely,

Stanley Flom

Senior Partner

“Will you come with me?” Vida asked Virginia after reading her the letter over the phone. She sat in Jimmy’s private office at the gym.

“Maybe you should get a real lawyer, Vid. You’ll be under oath.”

“Virginia, I’m honestly sorry that her sister is dead.”

“What I meant to say is that the proceeding will be on public record and is open to anyone who wants to attend.”

“Who do you expect to come?”

“What if the tabloids get wind of this?”

“Can’t we ask that the proceeding be closed?”

“I don’t think that’s in the spirit of restorative justice.”

“ ‘Ziberax Lady Apologizes for the Plague.’ I’ll never get another part.”

“Vida, you’re a great actress. You can convince her that you’re telling the truth.”

“I didn’t realize we’d be in the library,” Kat said to Stanley as he opened the mahogany doors. She’d never before seen where Edith had worked. Victorian glass-fronted bookshelves lined all four walls. Leather-bound tomes in muted colors were bricked ceiling high. The only way to reach the top volumes was a library ladder on tracks. How many times had Edith climbed those rungs? She felt as if she were entering the interior of her sister’s soul.

“We don’t really use the library anymore,” he said, pulling out a chair for her at one end of a long conference table. “Everything’s digital nowadays.”

“Will Vida be under oath?” asked Kat.

“It’s a legal proceeding, no different than if we held it in open court.”

“What if she still contends she never heard Edith’s messages?”

“We’ll bring in your fiancé and niece to contest her version of events.”

Back in Stanley’s office, Frank and Ashley waited on the matching armchairs.

A few minutes later, before Kat had time to collect herself, Vida came through the heavy doors and walked to the conference table’s opposite shore, accompanied by her counsel, a plump woman about Vida’s age with a Botox-frozen
expression. Vida hadn’t lost weight, exactly, but she looked tinier to Kat, as if her skin had shrunk from the winter damp and now fit her like a tight leather glove. She must have been to hell and back too, thought Kat.

Stanley’s assistant, a bow-tied young man, positioned a video camera and switched it on.

“I didn’t agree to be filmed,” Vida objected.

The bow-tied assistant shut the camera off and replaced it with an audio device, as thin as a playing card, while Janice appeared with a tray of coffee and some delicious-smelling pastries.

Only Vida’s lawyer helped herself to a croissant.

After Janice left, Stanley asked everyone to state names and addresses for the record and then had Vida stand and raise her right hand.

“Ms. Cebu,” he said when the oath was over, “my client is waiting for her apology.”

“May I move closer? I don’t want to have to shout.”

“Do you have any objection, Katherine?”

“No.”

Yet when Vida sat directly across from her, Kat instinctively moved her chair back an inch or two. She waited as Vida prepared to speak. Vida appeared to be measuring her breathing, a method she must have learned for the stage.

“Katherine, Edith’s death was a terrible tragedy. I think about her every day. I wish I could turn back the clock and listen to her warnings in time to save her, but I can’t. You’ve lost your sister, your twin. I accept all blame for any part I had in her death. I’m sorry I never had the chance to call her back. I’m sorry I didn’t know about the mold’s toxicity. I’m sorry, so deeply sorry for your loss.”

“Why didn’t you call her back?”

“I never had the chance, Kat. There was an intruder in my home.”

“She left more than one message.”

“The police arrived before I had a chance to play them.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“My client would like to call her first witness,” interjected Stanley.

“What witnesses?” asked Vida.

Frank came in looking especially handsome in his new dark gray suit and sat beside Kat. He didn’t console her with a gentle touch: he’d been instructed not to. He unbuttoned his jacket and folded his hands on the conference table, like the obedient schoolboy he must have been. After he was sworn in, he could no longer resist the sugary display, though he took his time selecting a pastry.

Stanley asked, “What is your relationship to Ms. Cebu?”

“She was my boss. Last year she bought the apartment building I took care of for nearly forty years.”

“On August eleventh, did you have a conversation with Ms. Cebu about a foul odor in her basement?”

“She said I should check the cellar for leaks because something smelled nasty down there.”

“Did you then check the basement for leaks?”

“It was too late. The building got condemned.”

Stanley thanked Frank for his testimony, and then asked Vida and her counsel if they had any questions for the witness.

“Yes,” Vida’s counsel said, brushing a flaky crumb off her sleeve. “At any time during the aforementioned date, did you witness, with your own eyes and ears, my client listening to Edith Glasser’s phone messages?”

“She’s an actress, course she listens to her phone messages.”

“I’m not asking you to speculate. Were you inside Ms. Cebu’s apartment on that date?”

“No.”

“Thank you, no more questions.”

“I have a witness who was inside the apartment,” said Kat.

Yesterday she’d given Ashley money to buy something pretty but appropriate to wear to court this morning. Opening the library doors, Ashley appeared in her new red satin dress. She clacked loudly across the floor in her matching red platform heels. The little dress was so tight that Kat could almost see Ashley’s heart beating.

“She’s
your witness?” gasped Vida’s counsel. “She’s a sociopathic liar. I brought her over from Russia to be part of my family and take care of my son. She drugged him with Ambien!”

“What does that have to do with my sister’s death?”

“She should be deported!”

“You’ll have a chance to question the witness when I’m finished,” Stanley admonished. He turned to Ashley and asked her to state her full name—Anna Alevtina Sokolov. Such a lengthy freight train of Slavic syllables. No wonder she’d changed it, Kat thought.

“How do you know Ms. Cebu?”

“House sitter.”

“Illegal squatter,” stage-whispered Vida.

“On August eleventh of last summer, did you reside at Sixty-Six Berry Street?”

“In crummy guest room.”

“On more than one occasion, did you witness Ms. Cebu listen to her phone messages?”

“You joke? She check phone machine like fat man check refrigerator.”

“And what did these phone messages say?”

“Something smell funny in basement. Help.”

Vida looked directly into Kat’s eyes, as if she were trying to exercise some kind of hypnotic power over her. “Katherine, please believe me. I never had a chance to hear Edith’s messages. I had just gotten back from a trip and found
her
in the closet. I only learned about the mushrooms when the police finally dragged
her
out.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“You believe
her
?”

Stanley intervened to ask Vida’s counsel if she had any questions for the witness.

“You bet I do. What did you do to my son? He’s now scared of the dark, scared of strangers, scared of loud noises.”

“She’s not on trial,” Stanley said.

“She should be.”

Vida rose from her chair and set her hands flat on the table, whether for support or for emphasis Kat wasn’t sure.

“Katherine, I’m sorry for your loss. I don’t know what else I can say but I’m sorry, so sorry that Edith died. If you want to sue me, so be it. I have nothing left. I lost everything too. Edith’s gone. I can’t go back in time and change that. You can’t blame me for an act of God. I hope you find it in your heart to forgive me. I hope you find some peace.”

After Vida and her counsel left, Kat asked everyone if she could have a few minutes alone in the library. She was hoping Edith’s spirit would visit. What a quiet room to have spent forty years in. Maybe the quiet was Edith’s spirit. Are you here? Is the silence your answer?

Should I forgive her, Edie?

Ashley had almost fled the library when Virginia threatened to have her deported, but she stuck to her story and stayed loyal to Kat. Now she feared she was going to be shipped back to Omsk.

She sat beside Kat and Frank in a Brooklyn-bound taxi. When they stopped for a red light, she considered opening the passenger door and vanishing, but she couldn’t stand to be invisible ever again. She liked that Kat refused to believe she was fated for a crummy life making babies. She liked having a Polish cook and a cat. She loved her room; she’d never had one before.

The Syzmanskis and Gladys were waiting for them when Kat unlocked the front door.

“Did she apologize?”

“Did she confess?”

“Did you forgive her?”

Ashley went straight to her room, but when she shut the cat out, she heard its claws relentlessly scraping at the door,
she should be deported, deported, deported.
She must leave immediately, but instead she lay down on her bed in her new dress and pulled up the covers.