tell lies in that bar. I sometimes give a false name. I tell men whatever I think they want to hear, and once the words are out of my mouth, I half-believe them. I never tell anything close to a whole truth, to anyone.
Unfortunately, I now have a secret that I won’t be able to hide for much longer. There’s no lie, fib, or narrative that will keep people from knowing this truth. Everyone will take one glance in my direction and know my story. My belly will give me away. Twenty-nine-year-old woman, not enough steady income, no husband, pregnant.
Tonight I picture my dead grandfather hugging his dead infants to his shoulder, ruining his fine white shirt forever. Breathing steadily, in and out, aware of the muscles in his calves as he pumps down the stairs, aware of the throbbing at his temples, the dryness in the back of his throat, which means he will have a drink at the first chance he gets. He clutches the babies and feels all these things and thinks, At least I am alive. Then he thinks it as a question, as he rushes past the living children sitting tight as balls on the floor and on the couch.
Am I alive? Is this my life?
CATHARINE
I stop the car because everyone I have ever lost is standing in the middle of the road.
They are lined up across my lane of traffic in front of the Municipal Building. I see them from a distance but don’t immediately recognize their faces. They look like a family on their way to visit the Municipal Building to log a complaint, or to have their day in court. Their body language and slightly formal clothing make them appear serious and purposeful. There is an elderly couple, and behind them a middle-aged man holding an infant, his free hand stretching back to a three-year-old girl with white-blond hair. I wonder where the mother of the little girl and the baby is. Why is the middle-aged man alone with two children? The elderly couple is clearly too old, and too dependent on each other, to be of much help—the man’s hand is under the woman’s elbow, their heads are cocked toward each other as if afraid to miss one word.
I have to remind myself that times have changed. There are single-parent households now, and wives leave husbands, whereas in the past the man nearly always left the woman. There is no telling what might be possible these days. I am, in fact, thinking about what might be possible as I drive along North Central Avenue toward the Municipal Building. Specifically, I am thinking about my granddaughter Gracie. I am on my way home from a visit with her.
I hadn’t seen Gracie or Lila for two weeks, while I was getting over a bad cold. But I noticed the change in Gracie as soon as she walked into the kitchen. There was a heaviness to the way she moved, and a shine to her face. There was more to her than there had been. I didn’t say anything, of course. I told myself that I couldn’t be right. Gracie’s not married. And my instincts are not as trustworthy as they once were. There is no way this young boy-crazy girl—she is still a girl to me— could be with child. I must be losing my mind.
“What’s with that face?” Gracie had asked, her hand on the teakettle.
“There’s nothing wrong with my face,” I heard myself say. “Your grammar is atrocious. Do you even listen to yourself speak? You should pay more attention to language, Gracie. You and your sister don’t speak proper English. Your cousins are even worse, I’m sorry to say. Maybe if you’d spent more time in church, listening to the fathers preach . . . Everything’s been diluted in you.” I had to shake my head to make myself be quiet.
“I know, Gram.” Gracie smiled and rolled her eyes at me. I could tell she was trying to help calm me down. “All my problems would disappear if I went to Mass regularly.”
“It couldn’t hurt,” I said. My head ached. “It couldn’t have hurt.”
I stopped talking then, but I felt no better, no more in control. I couldn’t stop my thoughts from careening after this impossible idea about the girl standing before me making my tea the way I like it, with no sugar and a drop of milk. Leaning against the rickety kitchen table in the house Gracie rents