Sizzling Sixteen

FOUR

THREE MINUTES LATER, we were in front of Stiva’s funeral home. It was on its third owner since Stiva, but it was still called Stiva’s.

“I guess you’re gonna go get your granny,” Lula said.

“Yeah. I’ll just check to see if she’s still here.”

“I’m gonna wait in the car if it’s okay with you,” Lula said. “Not that I’m afraid of dead people or anything, but it gives me the willies.”

Stiva’s is housed in a big white colonial on Hamilton. The front steps are covered in green outdoor carpet, and they lead to a wide front porch that spans the width of the house. I walked into the large lobby and heard Grandma arguing with the funeral director in slumber room number three.

“How do I know she’s in there if you won’t open the lid?” Grandma said.

“You have my word of honor,” he told her.

Mitchell Shepherd owns the funeral home. He bought it a year ago and probably regrets his decision. People in the Burg take their funeral homes seriously, and since the Burg lacks a movie theater or mall, the funeral home is most often the entertainment of choice. Shepherd is a mostly bald man in his fifties. He has a round face, round body, and his funereal uniform is navy suit, white shirt, navy striped tie.

“Just a peek,” Grandma said. “I won’t tell no one.”

“Can’t do it. The family wants the casket closed.”

Grandma Mazur came to live with my parents when Grandpa Mazur passed on to wherever it is that baconeating, whiskey-drinking, gravy-loving people pass on to. She’s five foot five on a good day, has tightly permed gray hair, a body that’s mostly slack skin on spindle bones, and an attitude only old ladies can pull off.

“I made an effort to come here today, and what good is it if I can’t even see the deceased?” Grandma said. “Next time, I’m going to Morton’s Mortuary. They never have closed caskets.”

Shepherd looked like he’d pay Grandma to go to Morton’s. He glanced my way and almost collapsed with relief.

“Stephanie!” he said. “How nice to see you.”

“Well, for goodness sakes,” Grandma said. “Look who’s here. Did your mother send you after me?”

“No. I heard you were creating a disturbance, and I came on my own.”

“Just in time to give me a ride home,” Grandma said. “No reason to stay here any longer, since Mr. Party Pooper won’t open the lid for me.”

I escorted Grandma out of the funeral home and she stopped short when she saw the Jeep.

“Isn’t this a cute little thing,” she said. “This is a pip of a car. I always wanted to ride in one of these. How the heck do I get into it?”

Lula climbed into the backseat and reached a hand down to Grandma. I got my hand under Grandma’s behind, and we alley-ooped her into the passenger seat.

“Good thing you came when you did,” Grandma said. “By the time I walked home, I’d be late for dinner, and we’re having pot roast tonight. It wouldn’t be right to be late for pot roast.”

“I love pot roast,” Lula said. “I bet you’re having mashed potatoes and gravy with it, too. I love mashed potatoes and pot roast gravy.”

“You should stay for dinner,” Grandma said. “We always got extra.”

“If you’re sure it’s no trouble,” Lula said. “I wouldn’t want to impose. And I won’t eat much on account of I’m on this new diet where I only eat one thing. Like, I only eat one piece of pot roast and one glob of mashed potatoes and one green bean.”

“Have you lost weight?” Grandma asked.

“Not yet, but I only just started. I’m still getting the hang of it. Like, what happens when you eat salad? Does it mean you eat one salad? Or does it mean you eat one piece of lettuce and one piece of tomato? It don’t matter a lot, since I don’t understand the whole salad obsession anyway. Lettuce don’t look like a food to me. And if you’re gonna eat a tomato, I say put it on a burger.”

My parents live in a two-family house. They share a common wall with Mrs. Markowitz, and both halves of the house are identical in construction. Living room, dining room, kitchen downstairs. Three small bedrooms and one bath upstairs. Mrs. Markowitz has lived next door to my parents for as long as I can remember. Her husband died years ago, and she lives alone now, making coffee cake and watching television. She’s painted her half of the house lime green. My parents have always had their house brown on the bottom half and mustard yellow on the top. I don’t know why. I expect it’s a Trenton thing.

The house hasn’t changed much over the years. A new appliance when needed. New curtains. Mostly, it’s overcrowded with comfortable non descript furniture, cooking smells, and good memories.

My mom has always been a homemaker. She’s a younger, more filled-out version of my grandma Mazur, and I think I’m cut from some of the same cloth. I have their good metabolism, oval-shaped face, and blue eyes.

My dad is retired from the post office, and now he drives a cab part-time. I get my unruly hair from his side of the family. And also my perverted cousin Vinnie.

The table was set for three when we walked in. My mom quickly added two more place settings, and in minutes, my father had his head bent over his plate, forking in meat and potatoes, and my mother was at the other end, trying not to stare at Lula’s fire-engine red hair and tiny leopard-print top that showed about a quarter of a mile of cleavage.

“Isn’t this nice,” Grandma said, looking around the table. “I love when we have guests. It’s like a party. What were you two doing in the neighborhood?” she asked me. “Were you looking for dangerous criminals?”

“We were looking for Dirk McCurdle,” I told her.

“Wasn’t that a scandal?” Grandma said. “Imagine having four wives. No one even suspected. He was such a pleasant man. I would see him at the funeral parlor when the Knights of Columbus would have a ceremony.”

“Do you have any ideas where he might be hiding?”

“Did you try all his wives?” Grandma asked. “One of them might still have a soft spot for him.”

“I have one left.”

“If that don’t work, you could try Pip’s bottle,” Grandma said.

My mother blew out a sigh, and my father murmured something that sounded like crazy old bat.

“Is that the red bottle you’re talking about?” Lula said. “The one looks like a beer bottle?”

Grandma helped herself to the mashed potatoes. “Pip swore by that bottle. He said it brought him luck.”

“How does it work?” Lula wanted to know. “Is it enough to own it? Do you gotta carry it around? Do you have to rub it like a genie bottle?”

“I don’t know exactly,” Grandma said. “I never saw Pip use it.” She looked over at me. “Didn’t it come with instructions?”

“No.”

“Bummer,” Grandma said.

“The bottle is a bunch of horse pucky,” my father said. “Pip was a nut. He didn’t know enough to come in out of the rain.”

“What about when he won $10,000 in the lottery?” Grandma asked. “How do you explain that?”

“Dumb luck,” my father said.

“Exactly!” Grandma said. “It was the lucky bottle.”

“What about taking a leak in a thunderstorm and electrocuting yourself?” my father said. “Was that lucky?”

“Probably he didn’t have the bottle with him,” Grandma said.

“What happened to my pot roast?” Lula asked.

“You ate it,” Grandma said.

Lula stared down at her plate. She looked in her lap and on the floor. “Are you sure I ate it? I don’t remember.”

“I saw you,” Grandma said. “It was the first thing you ate.”

“Do you think eating something counts if you don’t remember?” Lula asked.

No one knew what to say. And my father wasn’t going to touch it.

Lula looked down at her plate. She had a spoonful of mashed potatoes and a pea. “What’s for dessert?” she asked. “It better not be grapes.”

LULA AND I were back in my Jeep, heading for Stark Street to check out Sunflower’s funeral home. It was almost eight o’clock, and the sun was low in the sky. I’d stopped at my apartment to get a sweatshirt, and Lula had insisted we bring the lucky bottle with us.

“Uncle Pip would probably be alive today if he’d taken his bottle with him,” Lula said. “If nothing else, he could have pissed in it instead of on that wire.”

“Not likely,” I said. “I can’t get the stopper out. I think it’s glued in.”

“Let me take a look at that bottle. Maybe I can figure it out.”

I stopped for a light and pulled the bottle out of my big leather purse.

Lula worked at the stopper, but it wouldn’t budge. “You’re right,” she said. “This sucker’s in for good.” She shook the bottle close to her ear. “Don’t hear anything rattling around in it.” She held it up and looked at it in what little light was left. “Can’t see anything in it. The glass is too thick.”

I think luck is a weird thing. It’s hard to tell if you make it or if it just follows you around. And it seems to me it could just as easily be bad luck as good luck. It’s not like it’s a constant ability, like playing the piano or being able to cook a perfect omelet.

I cruised by the funeral home, and we scoped it out. There were several cars parked at the curb, and a clump of older men dressed in suits and ties stood talking by the open front door. Lights were on inside. Melon’s was having a viewing.

I pulled over and parked half a block away. “I’ll wait here, and you go look around,” I said to Lula.

“Why do you get to wait here?” Lula wanted to know. “I’m the one hates dead people. I should be the one to wait here.”

“You can’t wait here. You’re the friend of the deceased.”

“Fine, but I’m not going in alone. You’re gonna have to make yourself blend in. Just tart yourself up some, and everyone’ll think you’re a ’ho come to visit.”

I ratted my hair, put on brighter lipstick, took my sweatshirt off, and rolled my T-shirt so I had some skin showing.

“This is the best I can do,” I said.

“You’re not all that hot,” Lula said. “You’re never gonna make any money looking like that.”

“Sure I would. I’m the girl next door.”

“You don’t know much,” she said. “You gotta have a short skirt to be the girl next door and you put your hair in two ponytails.”

“I thought that was the Catholic schoolgirl.”

“The Catholic schoolgirl’s skirt is plaid and pleated.”

I put Pip’s bottle back in my bag, hiked my bag up on my shoulder, and swung myself down from the Jeep. We made our way through the clump of men, through the open door, and into the foyer. Several older women stood by a table with a coffee urn and cups. I could see more women and a couple men in an adjoining room. The casket was in that room. So far as I could tell, this was the extent of the public areas.

“Small funeral home,” I said to Lula.

“I guess the embalming goes on upstairs, being that the windows are blacked out, and we know Bobby Sunflower likes to keep rats in his cellars,” Lula said.

“I want to see what’s down the hall to the left. Stand at the front of it, so no one can see me snooping.”

The hall wasn’t long. It led to a small kitchen, stairs going up, and two doors. I opened one door to stairs going down. I held my breath and listened for a moment. No squeaking. I flipped the light on and whispered hello. No answer. I didn’t want to rescue Vinnie bad enough to creep down the stairs. I closed the cellar door and tried the second door. It opened directly onto an alley and a small paved parking lot. A hearse and a black stretch Lincoln were parked in the lot. I stepped out onto the cement stoop to get a better look at the back of the building, and the door blew closed behind me. I tried the door. Locked. Crap!

The funeral home was in the middle of the block, with no breaks between buildings. I was going to have to walk down the alley and around the corner to get back to Stark. Ordinarily, no big deal, but this wasn’t the sort of neighborhood a girl wanted to stroll around in after dark.

I moved to the alley and looked back at the building. Four windows on the second floor. All blacked out and barred, just like the front windows. I called Lula on my cell phone.

“Where the heck are you?” Lula wanted to know.

“I accidentally got locked out. I’m in the alley. Can you let me back in?”

“Negative. Bobby Sunflower just came down the back stairs, and he’s standing in the hall talking to some idiot that’s got killer written all over him.”

“Go ask them if they’ve got Vinnie upstairs.”

“Funny,” Lula said. “Why don’t you rub your bottle and ask for X-ray eyes?”

“Are you being sarcastic about my lucky bottle?”

“Yeah, and I regret it. It’s not a good idea to disrespect a lucky bottle. I’ll meet you at the Jeep. Good thing you at least got your hairspray, ’case you meet up with some of the locals.”