Worse Than Being Alone (13 page)

“
I was working in my shop,” he
said. “You must be Roni. Come on in.”

“
I thought you weren’t going to
answer the door,” Roni said. “You didn’t sound too eager to talk to
me when I called.”

“
I wasn’t and I’m not,” Anthony
Cirillo said as he led Roni into a modest living room brimming with
what looked like hand-made furniture. “Let’s sit in the kitchen. I
made some coffee.”

“
Did you make this?” Roni asked as
she ran her hand along a smooth cherry side table.

“
Yeah, I started making furniture
as a hobby after my wife died,” he said. “I retired two years ago.
I can’t keep up with the orders. I keep raising prices but people
keep calling. It’s the strangest thing I’ve ever seen. I’m making
more money now than I ever did working at the factory. I’m going to
open a shop downtown. Whoever said life is strange is right. Have a
seat there and I’ll get you some coffee. How do you take
it?”

“
Black is fine,” Roni said as she
sat down.

Anthony poured two cups and joined Roni at the
table, handing her a large mug of the hot brew as he sat down. “How
do you know Marian?”

“
She just married my father. I
don’t know much about her.”

“
Trying to check her out, huh?” he
asked as a mock stern expression appeared on his face.

“
Every time I say it out loud it
sounds worse. I’m worried about my father. No one seems to know
anything about your sister so yeah, I am checking her
out.”

“
I guess my only surprise is that
someone didn’t come sooner,” Anthony said. “Marian and I don’t get
along as they say. She sends me one of those cheesy Christmas cards
every year. You know the ones I’m talking about. Inside the card
there’s this typed page full of a lot of crap about how rich she is
and how well she and her kids are doing. God, I can’t stand those
cards. I always want to write back and say yeah, my wife died, I
have terminal cancer, I got audited, I smoke crack, you know stuff
like that.”

“
I get cards like that, too,” Roni
said, laughing.

“
Look, you seem like a nice lady,”
Anthony said. “So, I’ll just tell you what I know, which isn’t much
really. Marian and I grew up poor. Our father died when we were
young and our mother worked two jobs and still had trouble putting
food on the table. No one likes being poor but it really bothered
Marian. She made up her mind early on she was going to escape. She
didn’t care what happened to our mother or me. I think she decided
to marry her way to a better life. Working for it or getting an
education wasn’t on her agenda. She dated George Fitzgerald, got
pregnant, got married, and left.”

“
Where did they go?”

“
They moved to Springfield,
Missouri,” he said.

“
Marian told me your mother died
when she was 10.”

“
I guess I left out the part about
Marian being a liar,” he said. “Our mother died in 1972. Marian was
24. It was our father that died when we were young. I wonder why
she would lie about that?”

“
I’m not sure. It does seem kind
of strange, doesn’t it?”

“
I guess I sound bitter and I am
to a certain extent,” he said. “Marian has a cold heart. She
thought she was too good for us and left us behind like road kill.
Even after our mother got cancer Marian still wouldn’t have
anything to do with us. The last time I saw her was at her husband
George’s funeral. That must have been in 1975. I thought I’d pay my
respects and give it another shot, you know?”

“
How did that work
out?”

“
Not too well,” Anthony said. “She
made it perfectly clear she didn’t want to have anything to do with
me. Marian and George had two kids; I guess that was the real
reason I went. I wanted to see them and I was hoping maybe I could
have some kind of relationship with them. She made it clear that
wasn’t going to happen. Other than those Christmas cards, I haven’t
heard from her since.”

“
Anthony, how did George
die?”

“
He fell down their basement
stairs,” Anthony said. “Marian didn’t end up doing too well with
her marriage escape plan.”

“
What do you mean?”

“
Well, George’s brother, Ronnie,
told me George was a drinker,” Anthony said. “He used to talk to
George. Ronnie said that George couldn’t seem to keep a job and his
marriage was on the rocks. One night, George got drunk and fell
down the stairs.”

“
It was an accident,
right?”

“
That was the official verdict,”
Anthony said. “I know Ronnie thinks Marian was responsible. He
still lives here. Maybe you should go see Ronnie.”

“
What do you think, Anthony? Do
you think Marian could have pushed George?”

“
I don’t know,” Anthony said. “I
guess that’s a horrible thing to think about your own sister, but
to be honest, Marian always kind of scared me. I wouldn’t want to
be the one standing in the way of something she wanted.”

Chapter Twenty-Two

Ronnie Fitzgerald owned a small horse farm on the
other side of town. If all Roni had seen of Lexington was the area
where Anthony lived she would have had a much different opinion
than the one she had after driving through the rolling hills and
farms that dotted the landscape on the outskirts of town. Ronnie
Fitzgerald seemed agreeable to her visit after she explained she
had some reservations about Marian.

It seemed like a perfect day to Roni as she drove
along the country roads. Brilliant sunshine and a temperature in
the low 80s cast a warm glow over the acres of green grass and
flowers that had been planted everywhere. Roni turned at the sign
for the Fitzgerald Farm and spotted a short, stocky man with a
walrus mustache sitting on the front porch sipping what looked to
be iced tea. Roni climbed out of the rental as the man came down
the steps to meet her.

“
Mr. Fitzgerald, I’m Roni Edelin,”
she said as she extended her hand.

Ronnie Fitzgerald smiled as he shook her hand and
said. “Imagine that. You’re the first woman I ever met who has the
same name as me. It’s a small world, isn’t it? Why don’t we go up
on the porch? How about some iced tea?”

“
That sounds great. It’s such a
beautiful drive out here.”

“
That’s why I love it so much,”
Ronnie said as they sat down and he poured Roni a glass of tea.
It’s sweet tea. Is that OK?”

“
That’s fine,” Roni said as she
accepted the glass and took a sip.

“
It’s a long drive from Anthony’s
place,” he said.

“
Do you know Anthony very
well?”

“
Yeah, we went to high school
together,” he said. “Back then I lived in town with George and my
folks. Marian, Anthony, and George and I all hung around together
for a while. You were asking around after Marian,
right?”

“
Yeah, Mr. Fitzgerald, I was.
Marian lives in Alton, Illinois now. She just married my father.
Frankly, I’m a little concerned so I thought I’d check her
out.”

“
You want to know if you should be
concerned, right?” he asked.

“
At first, I thought Marian was
OK. A couple of things have happened that have my imagination
working overtime.”

“
George was a great brother,” he
began. “He was a lot of fun. I’m only a year younger. We were all
friends back then. Marian liked to have a good time. She was
attractive and George used to say the ‘the rest of the girls were
made out of rags compared to her’. That’s how it was until
everything changed.”

“
How did it change?”

“
I think Marian decided George was
her ticket out of Lexington,” he said. “Suddenly, it wasn’t a group
thing anymore. She wanted to be alone with George. I remember
telling George she was gonna get pregnant on purpose, but he didn’t
want to hear that. He really loved her, but I don’t think she ever
loved him. Of course she got pregnant and had a girl and then a boy
right away. She was always yelling at George. He started drinking
and everything really started going down hill after that. Marian
had to go to work. She turned into a bitter woman.”

“
How long were they
married?”

“
Almost 10 years,” he said. “I
kept thinking they would get divorced. They were both so unhappy.
George just drank more and more. He lived with me for a while but
eventually he moved back home. He said Marian thought it would be
best for the kids. Two months later, he was dead. I wanted an
autopsy, but by the time I got to Springfield and the funeral home
Marian had already had George cremated. The Sheriff said there was
nothing he could do.”

“
Were you suspicious about the way
George died?”

“
Marian just acted funny,” he
said. “I found out she had taken out a life insurance policy on
George about six months before he died. I think that’s why she
wanted him to move back to Springfield. It was one of those double
indemnities. She collected two hundred thousand dollars three weeks
after George died, did you know that?”

“
No, I had no idea.”

“
A couple of weeks after that,
Marian told me not to call her any more,” he said. “I’ve never seen
or heard from them since.”

“
Do you think Marian had something
to do with George’s fall?”

“
Thinking and proving are two very
different things,” he said. “I’ll say this. If she married my dad,
I’d be watching Marian and your father real close. He might be in a
lot of danger about now.”

Chapter Twenty-Three

After a surprise phone call from Meadow Knull, I was
on my way to St. John’s to meet with her again. She wasn’t exactly
warm and fuzzy on the phone. We agreed to meet on neutral ground,
which made me a little leery about what to expect. For all her
outward poise and determination, I suspected Meadow needed someone
to talk to about the confusing medical information she was
receiving.

I’m sure Meadow remembered the exact moment in time
her childhood ended, far earlier than it should have. It’s a bond
we shared though Meadow wasn’t able to recognize it because she was
still a rookie at identifying a fellow survivor. My mother was a
paranoid schizophrenic. My childhood ended one rainy night when I
was 12. Since my father delivered newspapers for a living, he was
gone a lot at night and that occasion proved to be no
exception.

Lightning flashed and thunder rumbled all around me
as my mother shook me awake and led me into her bedroom. My mother
kept rambling about a miracle and asking did I see her? Barely
awake and profoundly confused, I answered in the negative. I can
still remember the look of extreme disappointment that appeared on
my mother’s face.

She finally explained she could see the Virgin Mary
and looked at me as if the reason I couldn’t must be that I was
unworthy. As I walked back to my bedroom, I also felt disappointed
because I knew my childhood was over. What I didn’t realize at the
time was that my journey as my mother’s keeper had just begun.

I had been aware something was very wrong with my
mother for a long time, but until that night I had been unable to
attach a name to it. Her behavior that night was so disturbing that
I finally had to accept the truth; my mother was crazy.

I suspected Meadow had a similar story. She seemed
to have assumed a role as protector of her mother and siblings that
was designed mostly to shield them from Walter Knull. There was a
history there that had to be ugly. That much was clear.

I made my way to the burn unit waiting room where
Meadow was camped out with several open textbooks spread around
her. When she spotted me she stood up, took her glasses off, and
walked toward me with a look of resigned recognition on her face as
if some unknown entity was forcing her to meet with me.

“
Ms. Talty,” she said as she put
her hand out. “Thank you for meeting with me.”

“
You’re welcome,” I said as I
shook her hand. “Why don’t you call me Kitty? How can I help
you?”

“
I’m having some problems with my
father, Kitty,” she said. “He’s threatening to get a lawyer so he
can try to get power of attorney and custody. He insists he’s clean
and sober and is going to take me to court. I want to be sure the
checks keep going to my friend’s office.”

“
I talked with the adjuster. As
long as you have power of attorney everything will stay the same.
Do you think your father will make good on his threats?”

“
Probably,” she said. “He’s been
hanging around the hospital and talking to reporters trying to get
sympathy.”

“
What does he really
want?”

“
He wants custody of the money,”
she said as a look of disgust spread across her face. “He smells a
possible lawsuit and maybe some kind of settlement. That would be
easy money for him.”

“
There’s got to be some way to
discredit him. You spent a lot of time growing up trying not to
rattle his cage, right? Do the opposite. Make him mad and get it on
video or something. He’s still drinking, right?”

“
Oh, yeah,” she said. “I’ll give
it some thought. That’s not a bad idea. Walter Knull drunk is not a
pretty sight. I’m also worried about my mother. The doctors told me
she has pneumonia.”