Ralph Memolo Stories

Lobster Fra Diavolo

 

Rose's declaration of love for George, when it came, sounded to him like a concession, one that was prompted largely by circumstance. The setting was hardly romantic. They were in George’s car, driving home from the medical center, and the timing, too, was less than ideal. Only a half hour before, Rose’s doctor had told them that her latest scan revealed a tiny lesion. Her scan three months before had been "clean."

 

"You know, of course—or you should have figured it out by now—that I love you," Rose said. "Very much, very deeply."

 

She paused, apparently expecting an immediate reply from George, but when he said nothing, she added, "Not from the start perhaps, but isn't that what they say about true love, that it takes time to develop?"

 

That, too, failed to get a response from George. First, he couldn’t say for sure whether true love took time to develop, but more than that, yes, he was fond of Rose, and yes, he knew very well that she cared deeply for him. But he had always hoped that their relationship would have continued to be as light-hearted and jokey as it had been when they met almost three years before.

 

Back then, they laughingly likened themselves, roughly speaking, to the stock situation so familiar in low-budget porn films, the hunky plumber, called in to clear a clogged drain pipe, is greeted by the busty housewife in a half-open bathrobe and they end up, almost instantaneously, engaged in loud and boisterous sex.

 

Amusing as that may have been, it required both of them to ignore vast differences between themselves and that staple setup of porn films. George, the manager of a luxury condominium building in Boston's Back Bay, hardly resembled in dress or appearance that proverbial plumber in rumpled, somewhat soiled work clothes. He was a well-scrubbed and handsome middle-aged man, and his usual attire was a navy blue blazer, grey flannel trousers and a white button down shirt set off by a red and blue striped tie. His shoes were highly polished, his hair was cut short, military style, and there didn’t seem to be an ounce of excess flesh on his body. Standing in the lobby of his building or making his rounds, he had the bearing and manner of the captain of a great ocean liner.

 

Rose, likewise, was hardly the randy housewife with a plunging decollatage. Fiftyish and a widow, she kept her hair gray and in a stylish buzz cut once it grew back after chemotherapy treatments, and though her body had thickened slightly, it was still firm and well toned due to the regimen of exercise supervised by her personal trainer. Her hairstyle aside, Rose blended in quite nicely with all the other well-preserved, tastefully-dressed women of similar age and background living in the condominium building George had managed for a number of years.

 

Rose and George's first meeting had been decorous and businesslike. Two days after she had moved into her apartment she asked George for advice about replacing light fixtures she found to be too bright. George, brisk and efficient as always, made a quick visit to her apartment to recommend what type of light fixtures she should install and the electrician who was best suited to do the job.

 

During that meeting, Rose, more outgoing than George, managed to wheedle from him that he was divorced and had a teen-aged daughter. Quite willingly, Rose had described her own marital background by using a baseball analogy, telling of how she "whiffed" on her first two marriages, struck out swinging both times, as she put it. But her third husband—and here, she let loose with a swoon and placed her hand over her heart—oh, that was a grand slam, a home run for the ages, she said. Alas, that marriage lasted only ten years or so because her husband had a stroke and died just before his sixty-fifth birthday.

 

Now, on her way home from the medical center, raising her voice slightly, Rose said, "George, I just told you that I love you. Either you didn't hear me, or what I said doesn't matter to you."

 

Then, with a smile on her face, and reaching over to pat his knee, she said, "Or maybe it's an old story, all those widows and other men's wives throwing themselves at you. Ho hum, another day, another broad chasing after me."

 

That didn't wrest a response from George either since he was preoccupied just then with easing ahead of the cab driver competing with him for the lane that would allow him to exit the expressway and head off towards the Back Bay. Only when he had completed the lane change—and exchanged a middle-finger salute with the cab driver—did George turn towards Rose and give her a big smile. At the same time, he reached over and placed his hand on her knee. He even gave it a little squeeze.

 

"Oh come now, don't you think I deserve more than a smile and your hand on my knee?" Rose said.

 

Rose was prepared for George's answer. She knew it would be a slight variation of the one he had given her whenever she accused him, in her words, of being too bottled up. This time, however, when he began to describe once again the shock and humiliation of having a wife who ran off with another man (a second cousin, no less) she cut him off. She had no desire that day to hear the next chapter of his sad tale, his detailed critique of a legal system that allowed him to spend only one day a week with his daughter.

 

"Please, George, how many times have I told you? You should be more like me. Unlucky in love? Bounce back. Unlucky again? Try once more. Sooner or later, your luck's bound to change. Look how it worked out for me."

 

"I'm not as bouncy as you are," George told her, still smiling but taking his hand away from her knee because they were approaching one of those Boston intersections in which cars and trucks and buses compete for precious space with daredevil bicycle riders and hordes of college students who can’t quite grasp the difference between a Walk and Don’t Walk traffic signal.

 

With great care, and only one close call—a motor scooter cutting in front of him—George negotiated the turn onto the street that led several blocks later to the entrance of the parking garage beneath their condominium building. When they arrived, and he had parked his car, he hurried around to open Rose's door for her.

 

"George, please," she said, "I haven’t reached the point yet where I’m unable to open a car door. Now, if you want to be a gentleman, you'll come up to my place with me. I have something else I want to tell you."

 

George glanced down at his watch, and when he did, Rose reached out and grabbed his wrist. In doing so she covered his watch with her hand.

 

"Please," she said, noticeably tightening her grip on his wrist, "this isn't going to take that long, and believe me, you won't think of it as a waste of time."

 

Prior to that day, Rose and George had never been seen leaving or returning to the building in each other's company. George wasn't breaking any official rule by consorting with Rose, but he was careful to keep his distance from her in public because he didn't want any resident of the building to perceive him as favoring one owner over another.

 

To get to Rose's apartment, for example, he followed a variety of circuitous routes, taking an elevator to one floor, circling around to the rear stairs to walk up to another floor, where he used an emergency exit to get to the next floor and so on up to the rear door of Rose's apartment on the sixth floor. There, he would softly knock twice on her rear door, wait five seconds, and then knock two more times. He followed a similar procedure, only in reverse (but minus the door knocking) when he left Rose's apartment and returned to his own in the basement of the building.

 

But that day George sensed (as did Rose) that her doctor must have had a reason for wanting to see her so soon after her most recent scan. Thus, gossip be damned, George had escorted Rose from her apartment to the parking garage and drove her to the medical center. Now, having been prodded by Rose, he agreed to accompany her back to her apartment. In something of an unspoken apology, and perhaps an acknowledgement of her declaration of love, he also hooked his arm through hers and pulled her close as they walked through the parking garage to the elevator that would bring them up to Rose’s apartment. He was relieved, nevertheless, that he and Rose, neither when leaving nor upon their return, had run into any of their neighbors.

 

After they entered the apartment, he helped Rose take off her coat and offered to make her a cup of tea.

 

"Just what I was thinking," she said. "I'll be in the dining room when it's ready."

 

When he had prepared the tea and brought it and a tray of cookies into the dining room, he saw that Rose was holding in her hands some sort of legal document.

 

"I'm not going to beat around the bush on this," she said, as soon as George sat down. "A few weeks ago I had my attorney rework my will. Well, to get very quickly to the point, I want you to know that you are now one of my beneficiaries."

 

George had been sipping from his cup of tea, and when he put it down, he took a moment to take a deep breath and then exhaled before replying with a simple thank you.

 

"You could be a bit more enthusiastic," Rose said.

 

"Well, I'm a little surprised," he said. "This is very kind of you and I appreciate it, but I guess I need a moment to absorb what you've just told me."

 

Then, rising half way from his chair and leaning towards her, he gave her a kiss.

 

"That's more like it," she said.

 

"Can I say just one thing?" he said, lowering himself back into his chair. "I hope this is all legal and above board, with no questions left unanswered."

 

"Why, what a funny thing to say. Of course it’s legal, abundantly so. My lawyer happens to be one of the top people in Boston when it comes to estate planning. Also, it’s not some whim on my part. All of us, from time to time, need to update these things, and from the news I got today I’d say this was a timely move on my part."

 

"I understand what you're getting at, but that's me, I worry all the time. Right now, for instance, I'm thinking about what might happen if any of the other residents got wind of this. What about the condominium board? You never know how they'll react to something like this."

 

"You know, George, this is when I realize all over again why I was drawn to you—and why I've come to love you. You look so strong and stable, standing there in the lobby, all decked out. Neat and well-groomed, every hair in place, you're the perfect picture of the man in charge. But underneath you're this mess of anxiety and worries. I tell you I'm putting you in my will and all at once you're as nervous as a teenage boy who's about to go out on his first date. So, yes, I've caught you by surprise, but this is a done deal, a fait accompli, as they say. Of course, you can always refuse, but who the hell would ever do that?"

 

"Look" he said, "you're tired, and I have a thousand things to check on. We'll talk about this later, when I've had more time to think about it."

 

"Not too much later. You saw the doctor's face today. He couldn't hide what he was thinking. Forget all that talk about more tests before he could evaluate what his next steps might be. He was just treading water. It’s like his insistence on using that word, lesion. I hate that fucking word. It's so ugly, but I guess it saves doctors from having to say tumor, which really scares the hell out of people. Personally, I think they should use some word that isn't so medicinal. What about the names of flowers? Why not use that instead? Wouldn't it be better if the doctor said, ‘We've just found some daffodils in your colon?’ Or maybe, ‘Whaddya know, we were looking at your liver and we spotted a lovely bunch of gladiolas.’"

 

 

 

When Rose had moved into her condominium, she waited a month before she invited George to have dinner with her. She even managed to make it seem as if it was a thought that occurred to her simply because she and George happened to have entered an elevator at the same time.

 

When he hesitated just a moment in responding to her invite, she, quite playfully, poking her finger into his shoulder, said, "No, no excuses. You’re busy, I know that, but what’s wrong with taking a little time off for dinner?"

 

Quickly, though, as if she sensed a need to have some reason for suddenly inviting George to dinner, Rose also revealed that the invitation was something of a practical move on her part. That day, or a good part of it, she said, she had been busy preparing lobster fra diavolo for her late husband’s son, Danny. But just a few minutes before, Danny had called to cancel, telling her he was dealing with a crisis at his law firm. The way she said crisis made it unnecessary for her to add air quotes as a way to indicate her doubts about Danny’s sudden cancellation, but she did so anyway. That was the first hint George had that Rose and Danny were not always on friendly terms, but he didn’t think much of it at the time.

 

George did wonder, though, from the moment he entered Rose’s apartment, whether the lobster fra diavolo, along with its accoutrements—champagne, hors d'oeuvres, and then, after dinner, an elaborate dessert and brandy—had ever been intended for Danny. But that was of little concern to him by the time, later that night, when he and Rose were enacting, in real life, the scenario from that porn film. Indeed, he didn’t mind at all that Rose may have fibbed in order to lure him into her apartment.

 

Three weeks later, George was reminded of his initial suspicions about the dinner Rose had prepared for him when he received a call from Danny. After Danny had introduced himself to George, he thanked him for helping Rose to get settled in her new apartment.

 

"Rose tells me that you've been indispensable," Danny said. "She said that everyone in the building feels the same way about you."

 

George thanked Danny for the compliment and said that he was only doing his job, which was to serve in whatever way possible the needs and desires of the condo owners who employed him.

 

He then told Danny how much he enjoyed getting to know Rose. "She's such a gracious lady," he said.

 

"Oh, that's for sure," Danny said. "And generous too. But then again, why not? It's not her money."

 

George decided to let that comment pass, but he couldn’t very well ignore the next question Danny asked.

 

"So tell me, has Rose made lobster fra diavolo for you yet?

 

"What kind of question is that?" George said.

 

"That's her trademark dish, you know. My dad just loved it. When Rose wants to get on the good side of someone, boom, here comes her lobster fra diavolo. God knows, how many times she's cooked that dish and for what purpose."

 

"It sounds to me like you might have a problem with Rose," George said, quietly. "If you do, take it up with her, not with me."

 

George was about to end the call, but before he did, Danny was able to make one more comment.

 

"Be Rose’s friend if you want. Help her if she asks you to replace a light bulb. But don’t think getting into bed with her entitles you to anything else. By my reckoning, she’s still obliged to give back a portion of what she inherited from my dad to his rightful heirs, namely my two little girls."

 

That caused George to hang up without even saying goodbye. He had no idea back then why Danny would think he wanted to get his hands on Rose’s money. Such a notion struck him as so ridiculous that he didn’t feel it was worth mentioning to Rose that Danny had called him. At the same time, he became aware, mostly from other snide remarks Rose made about Danny, that there had always been some tension between the two of them. Rose never went into any detail, but she once mentioned that Danny had never accepted her as a suitable replacement for his sainted mother.

 

More than a year went by without George hearing from Danny, but then, after Rose had been diagnosed and was undergoing her treatments, Danny called him again. This time the ostensible reason for his call seemed to be his interest in learning more about Rose’s condition.

 

"When I talk to Rose, she tells me everything's fine," Danny said, "but that’s Rose. With her, everything’s always blue skies and sunshine, no matter what. I’m just wondering if that’s really the case. But I'll say this, though. Rose may be right when she says she's going to win this battle. She's a scrapper."

 

George agreed that Rose was approaching her illness with a positive attitude and that, so far, it seemed as if she was responding well to her treatment regimen, but seconds later, Danny, lowering his voice so that it was gravelly and husky, suddenly switched the conversation away from Rose's medical condition.

 

"I’m not sure you understand what I tried to tell you the last time I spoke with you," he told George. "So let me be more explicit. A, Don’t think your friendship with Rose gives you special privileges. And b, don’t try to get your hands on that pile of money my dad left Rose. Dad fell hard for Rose, too hard in my opinion. He met her soon after my mother died, when he was in a fragile state. Then, after he had his first stroke, the minute he recovered, he made sure Rose would be very well taken care of after he died. Fine. That was his right, and that was typical of my dad, who was an incredibly decent guy. And yes, after the second stroke, Rose did a fantastic job of caring for him right up until the day he died. Great. Thank you, Rose. You were nice to my dad and he was nice, very nice, to you. But remember to keep my daughters in mind when you no longer need dad’s largesse."

 

"Danny," George said, "It’s a mystery to me what you’re talking about. I have nothing to do with your dad’s money or your two daughters and whatever amount of money Rose inherited from your dad, so I wish you’d—"

 

"Listen, as God is my judge, if my dad was standing here right now, he would agree l00 percent with what I’m talking about. Rose has no kids. When she dies, whatever she leaves, or a good part of it anyway, should be returned to my father's rightful heirs, namely, my little girls. So, consider yourself warned. Don't try to weasel your way into getting your hands on Rose's money."

 

Since this conversation also took place months before George knew that Rose planned to include him in her will, it seemed to him that Danny was talking nonsense. His response, accordingly, was brief and to the point.

 

"Danny, why don't you go fuck yourself," he said, before slamming the phone receiver down.

 

That was the last time George heard from Danny, but then, after a year of treatments, when Rose’s condition had improved, and her hair had grown back in, she decided to celebrate the occasion by combining it with a Christmas party. She invited old friends and a good number of her new neighbors, along with George and Danny and his wife and their two daughters.

 

The party was a festive affair, with a lot of hugs and kisses for Rose from her many friends. A loud cheer went up when she announced to everyone that her doctor was pleased with her progress, and she then toasted not only her doctors but everyone who had helped her cope with her illness. (George was relieved that at his request Rose did not single him out for the support and assistance he had given her during her treatments.)

 

George, grateful that Rose’s condition had improved, and somewhat caught up in the celebratory mood, was quite friendly towards Danny when Rose introduced them to each other. Danny, too, was extremely cordial towards George when introducing him to his wife and two daughters.

 

George was intrigued that Danny, at the party, seemed to have lost the growly voice he had used in his last phone call. Instead, he talked softly, almost too softly. George was also struck by Danny's odd appearance. His stature—he was slim and had narrow shoulders—was that of a teen-ager still waiting for his growth spurt, but he had the kind of beard that left a shadow on his face even after he had shaved, and though he was still in his thirties, he was almost bald. George sensed right away that Danny was one of those men so hung up on his somewhat diminutive size that he tried, on the phone at least, to sound as if he might be supplementing his law practice by working as a Mafia enforcer.

 

That night, however, the exchange between Danny and George was entirely about the remarkable progress Rose had made and how fortunate she was to have had access to first-class medical care. But a while later, George happened to be coming out of the bathroom, when he found Danny standing in his way. It was a narrow hallway and when George, excusing himself, tried to squeeze past him, Danny extended an arm, which prevented George from getting by.

 

"In here," Danny told George, placing one hand on George's chest and nudging him back towards the bathroom. "This will only take a second."

 

George was tempted to push Danny aside, but he didn't want to start a scuffle so he went back into the bathroom, and Danny following him, closed the door and locked it.

 

"So one more time," Danny said, assuming his tough-guy voice. "Rose may think she’s beat this thing, but you know the statistics for the cancer she has. In other words, what I phoned you about is still lying there—something like a grenade that’s ready to go off. I’ve always thought of the bundle Rose inherited from my dad as a loan. So, when she’s done with it, when she no longer needs it, she should make sure she returns what’s left over to my dad’s rightful heirs. It's that simple. No outsider, no boy friend, or possible fourth husband—if you get my drift—is supposed to interfere. And let me tell you something else—I believe I have a valid legal case if I’m forced to go into court on this."

 

"Look, my friend, it's Christmas and Rose is feeling better than she has in months. Let's celebrate the season. Let's celebrate Rose. Now, I'm going to give you about three seconds to get the fuck out of my way. Then, once I walk out of here, I’m going to forget this bullshit you’re trying to peddle. What Rose does with her money is her business. That she was married to your father doesn’t give you any right to poke your nose into that part of her life—or any other part either now that I think of it. So move, before I pick you up and break you in half."

 

Danny knew he was no match for George, who was solid and trim and looked as if he was quite capable of breaking someone into two pieces. Without saying another word, he moved aside so that George could leave the bathroom.

 

Back in the living room, George told Rose that his beeper had just gone off, which meant there was something he needed to tend to somewhere in the building. He said nothing to her, of course, about the incident in the bathroom.

 

 

 

Rose would often chide George about the care he took in getting to and from her apartment and his insistence on leaving her bed while it was still dark outside.

 

"Do you really think people in this building keep track of how you spend your off-duty hours?" she said. "Not a chance. All they know is they’ve got the best damned building manager of any condominium in Boston. So relax and enjoy yourself."

 

"There's no such thing as off-duty in this job," was George’s usual response to something like that. He never made that point without pulling back his jacket to reveal the pager clipped to his belt. ‘My leash’ was how he sometimes referred to the pager.

 

George frequently reminded Rose that certain condominium owners tended to think of themselves as his immediate supervisors. He found most residents, most of the time, to be well-mannered and likable, but he was well aware, he told Rose, that he had, in his words, "one hundred and twelve bosses."

 

Rose agreed, somewhat reluctantly, that because of George’s position it may have been wise for him to be discreet about his friendship with her, but she bridled at some of the constraints he imposed on their relationship.

 

"You shouldn’t have any hangup about consorting with one of your one hundred and twelve bosses," she told him. "Look, you and me, we're equals. We’re not playing upstairs, downstairs here."

 

"I can't help it," he replied. "I care what people around here think—and I'm the kind of person who feels you can never be too careful. I'm what’s known as a belt-and-suspenders man. My father was one, too, literally."

 

Somewhat good naturedly at first, but less so as time went on, Rose went along with other procedures George devised for keeping their relationship well hidden. On Sundays, when they went off to a movie or to dinner, or maybe in good weather to have a picnic, she would drive her car to a predetermined spot where George was waiting for her. Then, with some grumbling, she would transfer into his car for the trip to their destination, which was usually far enough away from Boston so that they were unlikely to run into a fellow resident of their condominium building.

 

Both had prepared stories, each quite different, of course, of where they had been on Sunday afternoon if they happened to get into a conversation with some other resident of the condominium. George even made sure to wait fifteen or twenty minutes before leaving their meeting place to drive home, thereby ensuring that he and Rose didn’t arrive back at the condominium building at the same time.

 

Rose felt a long weekend she and George spent in Maine was less enjoyable than it could have been because she first had to make sure that all her neighbors in the condominium building knew that she was going off for a few days to visit her former college roommate in Connecticut. At the same time, George had gone out of his way to let residents know that he was driving up to New Hampshire for the weekend to go fishing with his brother.

 

Another time they had to cancel a planned trip to the Bahamas because of a minor but smoky fire in the condominium building's basement. George had already told everyone that he would be visiting friends in the Berkshires, and Rose made sure her neighbors knew she would be flying to Florida to attend her high school class reunion. They had even agreed that George would return from the Bahamas a day earlier than Rose lest anyone notice that their departures and returns seemed to coincide. But since George didn't feel that he could trust his assistant to oversee emergency repairs to the building's heating system, he remained in Boston. Rose, of course, had no choice but to follow through with her much advertised trip to Florida where she visited with her sister.

 

Rose's frustration with George's rules of engagement was more pronounced than usual once she had heard from her doctor about the new lesion. She had also seemed a bit distant and preoccupied in the several days since she and George had gone off to the medical center together. She hadn’t mentioned, either, whether she might have had a follow-up conversation with her doctor, nor did she say much about her health in general. That told George it was probably best for him not to force Rose into a discussion of something she apparently didn’t want to talk about just then.

 

Rose’s reticence about her condition may have been one reason why their banter was not as free flowing and light-hearted as usual the following Sunday when they drove off to have dinner at a country inn some thirty miles or so from Boston. Their dining experience that day itself also proved less than satisfactory—George’s dinner cold and undercooked, Rose’s dry and tasteless—and then, on the way back to Boston, they became enmeshed in a huge traffic jam caused by an accident at one of the major exits of the turnpike.

 

Finally, Rose, having emptied herself of all the complaints she could make about their meals, and impatient with sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic, chose to revisit an issue she and George had never been able to resolve, namely when, if ever, she would get to meet George’s teen-age daughter, Melinda.

 

She introduced the topic with one word—"Melinda,"—and the volume and force with which she blurted out that name told George this was a matter he could no longer ignore.

 

Answering quickly, he said, "Yeah, sure thing," but in the distracted way of someone more fully engaged in trying to find an opening that allowed him to gain a car length or two in a line of traffic extending back for at least a mile. Seconds later, though, with a sheepish grin on his face, he added, "But not this next Saturday. I need just a bit more time to explain things to her. She knows I’m seeing you, and she seems fine with that—"

 

"Oh sure, I can see why you might need to prepare her for meeting me. You’re probably thinking about her reaction when she sees that your friend is—well, let’s just say, a bit on the mature side. 'Oh oh,' she says to herself. 'I guess the old man can't attract sweet young things anymore.’"

 

Though Rose flashed a coquettish grin when she said that, George didn't seem to think it was worthy of a reply. Rose, who was more upset than she let on, promptly came up with another reason why George had been so hesitant at introducing her to Melinda.

 

"Then there's this," she said. "Melinda sees you with another woman and suddenly she realizes you've recovered from your divorce. Hey, her broken-hearted dad is no longer broken hearted."

 

"I’m going to be polite enough not to tell you what I'm thinking, but that's only because my mother told me to watch my language when there was a lady present."

 

"Oh, you should feel free to say what you want. But before you do, I've got another idea. When you introduce me you can say that I’m Auntie Rose, her long-lost maiden aunt. I’ve always thought I'd make a great maiden aunt."

 

Rose laughed when she said that, but George didn't seem to find any humor in it. For a moment, Rose thought she might apologize to him, particularly about the broken-heart remark, but, quickly changing her mind, she said—and this without any trace of humor—"Or am I the crazy aunt, the one so loony tunes that the family has always kept her hidden away in the attic?"

 

That last remark may have been one more reason why their trip back to Rose’s car was very quiet. Then, when they got there, they exchanged, in parting, a perfunctory kiss, and Rose said, she was so tired she was going straight to bed as soon as she got home. George said that he, too, was going to turn in early.

 

The next morning, Rose decided to make amends for the testy exchange with George. She called him early and invited him to dinner, and since George was too busy to take her call, she left a message saying she wanted to take back the comments she made the day before.

 

"There's no need for me to drag your daughter into the private business of adults," she said. "Come to dinner tonight so that we can kiss and make up." She made two quick kissing sounds into the phone before ending the call.

 

George, too, when he returned Rose's call, was contrite. "I shouldn't let stuff like that get to me," he said. "I'll try to do better from now on."

 

That exchange between them may have been well meant, but it wasn’t enough to put behind them the issue of when Rose was going to meet Melinda. Neither did the dinner Rose prepared—lobster fra diavolo, of course—create that feeling of delight and bonhomie that invariably prevailed when she served their favorite meal.

 

Instead there was a forced cordiality while they were having drinks and even that seemed to trend downward once they began eating. That’s when Rose reported on the phone conversation she had had earlier that day with her oncologist. From her description, the call was not at all satisfying for either party. She was particularly irritated at her doctor’s difficulty in trying to decide what course of treatment he might pursue in light of the newly-discovered lesion. He was considering two approaches, Rose said, but it didn’t seem to her that he was confident either one of them would be effective.

 

"He’s acting, overall, like someone who wishes this thing hadn’t come up," she said. "It’s as if he didn’t expect this, that it caught him by surprise. And to that, I say, ‘Hey big boy, welcome to the world of cancer.’ Hasn’t he ever heard that saying, cancer does what cancer wants? Or maybe he’s just a sissy. You’d think that someone in his line of work would be better prepared to deal with bad news. Christ, it’s me, not him, who’s facing this thing. So I told him I’m wasn’t too keen on more treatments of any kind, and that seemed to offend him. He wasn’t too happy, either, when I said that right now I’m more inclined—and I’m not kidding about this—to go to one of these countries where they give people with terminal diseases the right to die."

 

George’s response to that was utter silence. In fact, for a very long moment the only sound in the room came from the eating utensils scraping against dinner plates. But then Rose, realizing that neither she, nor George, knew what to say next, managed to make a hurried switch to some gossip she had recently heard about two condominium residents. Two women her age had both become involved in affairs with much younger men.

 

Rose pretended at first to be offended at the news of older women pursuing young men, but she couldn’t conceal her amusement when speculating aboiut what might be going on between women in their late fifties and lovers who had yet to turn thirty. She had also learned just that day of certain details, some quite salacious, about an earlier affair one of the woman had had with an even younger man.

 

Personally, she said, she always preferred dating older men even when she was quite young. All three men she married, as she pointed out, were five to ten years older than her and even though her first two marriages had ended in divorce, she had no regrets over having been married to men who were older than her.

 

George, as was his custom, shied away from discussing in any detail the private lives of condominium residents. He simply said that, yes, he had already heard about the alleged romantic antics of the two older women, but he wasn’t sure whether the people spreading those stories had any real proof to back up what they were saying.

 

Again, there was a short pause, a moment or two when it seemed both of them were still looking for some way to put distance from Rose’s brief mention of assisted death. This time Rose began to recount in some detail two recent movies she had seen, both recommended by close friends, and both highly praised by film critics. Rose, however, found they featured too much violence for her taste. She didn’t appreciate, either, she said, the blatant, and somewhat unnecessary, in her view, nudity in one of the films. She then followed up by wondering whether the proliferation of nudity and sex in films might eventually lead to a counter-reaction, a return, as she put it, to the old Hollywood standards that required even married couples to sleep in twin beds.

 

Now, she had hit on a subject that was much more to George’s liking. Quite eagerly, he talked of his dismay at the way the entertainment industry had glamorized the squalid aspects of sex. He tried to be restrained about it, but it was clear that he was not comfortable with the growing acceptance of same-sex relationships in media and popular culture. He actually sounded apologetic when he admitted that he couldn’t help but look away each time he spotted two men holding hands as they walked down the street. As for films and television, too, he felt it was time for them to be more positive and uplifting, but when Rose pressed him on what kind of films he most enjoyed, he confessed that he couldn’t think of any offhand. He said he was, in agreement, though, with his daughter who felt The Wizard of Oz was the greatest film ever made.

 

Their discussion of movies, somewhat disjointed, led to a matter of much greater concern to George, the customs and mores of the thousands of young college students in Boston. He sounded as if he was commenting on the outbreak of a deadly plague when he described the growing number of young people he spotted every day, male and female alike, he emphasized, who seemed to think torn and tattered jeans were stylish. Why, in the middle of Boston winters, on cold and windy mornings, he had seen these idiots—his word—wearing jeans so filled with rips and tears that only a few threads held them together.

 

"Christ sakes, why not go all the way and walk around in their underwear," he said.

 

Once he landed on that subject, he forged ahead with his puzzlement (and loud complaints) about young woman who were under the impression that they made themselves more attractive by putting metal rings through their noses and covering their bodies with gruesome-looking tattoos. Also alarming to him, both in terms of aesthetics and health, were the number of young women, no more than eighteen or twenty years old, who were grossly overweight.

 

Rose allowed him to go on in that vein for quite some time, but she eventually reminded him that the young people he criticized didn’t really care what he thought about them.

 

"You know what, George?" she said. "Nothing would bring greater delight to the crowd you’re talking about than hearing how much their dress and bodily adornments upset an old fogey like you."

 

By then, George became aware that Rose was growing tired, so as they neared the end of their meal—both agreed that night to forego dessert—George offered to do the cleaning up. Ordinarily Rose would have rejected George’s help, but she more or less stood back, actually went off to prepare for bed, while George finished with putting her kitchen back in order. Thanking him, she gave him a polite good night kiss. That brought to a close an evening far different from when they would laughingly liken themselves, in the broadest sense, to the plumber and the horny housewife.

 

Rose was particularly displeased with how the dinner had gone. She realized that the comments she had made about possibly refusing further treatment for her condition had been premature and unwise. George, she now knew, was not prepared to discuss a matter of such importance. It probably would have been better, she told herself, if she had tried to get from him some reason why he hadn’t shown more gratitude on learning that she had included him in her will. She realized that George, by nature, was not demonstrative, but she still didn’t know what to make of that question he had raised about the legality of her will. That, she told herself, was inexplicable, even for a belt-and suspenders man.

 

It surprised her, too, that he didn’t call her Tuesday morning to thank her for the dinner she had prepared the night before. That was unusual for him, so when she hadn’t heard from him by noon, she assumed that he was probably tending to some emergency. In the afternoon, on her way out to do some errands, she looked in on his office, but found that he wasn’t there. Later back in her apartment, she called him again, and once more, her call was directed to his voicemail.

 

That, too, was puzzling to her, but she decided, after a light supper, to go to bed. Ever since the news of the lesion, running an errand or two, as she had that afternoon, left her feeling draggy and exhausted. So, now just before she went off to to bed, she turned off the ringers on both her home phone and cell phone. Not only did she feel the need for uninterrupted sleep, but she was a bit too perturbed with George to talk with him that evening.

 

George knew that he should have answered Rose’s calls, but it had been a day filled with crises. First, the regular cleaning crew employed by the condominium didn’t show up on time, and when they did, he and the foreman of the the crew got into a fierce dispute, one bordering on a physical altercation, over whether sufficient parking spaces had been set aside for the workers.

 

Soon after that, a group of residents met with him to express their dissatisfaction with planned changes to the landscaping in the condominium’s courtyard. Just the week before, at a meeting of condominium residents, there seemed to be general agreement, and even enthusiasm from some residents about that same plan. It took more time than he imagined before he and the leader of the group agreed to have another meeting to review the plan. Later, the chairman of the condominium board called him to discuss the agenda for the annual meeting of the residents’ association that would take place in two weeks. When he finally did phone Rose, and his call went directly to voicemail, he assumed that she may have gone out for the evening, although it was odd for her not to tell him in advance where she might be going.

 

That may have been why, by the time he went to bed that night—having tried twice again during the evening to call Rose—he was reworking in his mind whether he should finally let Rose know of his concerns being included in her will. He had been hoping that she would have given him some indication, even in vague terms, of the amount of her bequest to him. If it was something like the year-end bonus he received from the condominium board, that would be acceptable to him. But what if it was much more than that, what if it was a significant amount? He didn’t know how, but he was certain that news of such a gift to him would become known to other residents of the building, and he worried about whether that might alter his relationship with them. Yet he couldn’t very well satisfy himself by asking Rose to reveal the amount of her planned gift for him. No, that was out of the question.

 

During a mostly sleepless night, he kept reminding himself that he should be more thankful for Rose’s gesture, no matter how much she planned to give him, but it irked him that she might, in this way, be paying him in advance for the care she would most likely need once her condition worsened, something that was quite likely, given the new lesion. It made him wonder whether she was making sure he would remain by her side, always prepared at a moment’s notice to be of assistance to her. Did she really feel she had to dangle cash in front of him, that he expected to be paid for his loyalty and devotion?

 

It was beyond him why Rose didn’t understand that she might even be jeopardizing his job. What if some owner, out of sorts and looking for something to complain about, didn’t feel George’s workers had been prompt enough, say, in clearing snow from the front entrance of the building? He could easily imagine that owner getting several other owners to sign a letter of complaint to the condominium board. No doubt a few more residents would soon hear of the complaint, and that might lead to some talk about how their building manager didn’t seem to be as attentive as he once was.

 

George could see such a discussion picking up even more momentum, barreling along until someone ventured the thought that he or she had always wondered about the very friendly relationship their building manager seemed to have with that women on the sixth floor, Rose. Oh there, that’s it, says one owner to the other, with a little chuckle added, how can the poor man keep his mind on his job with so many widows around here for him to carry on with?

 

His fevered imaginings about losing his job were troubling enough, but George worried too about possible threats from Danny. He hated himself for allowing the specter of Danny to enter into his thinking, but he told himself that it would be foolish to ignore that issue completely. Particularly troubling to him was Danny’s area of legal expertise.

 

Danny was the partner in a law firm that dealt primarily with medical malpractice suits and he remembered Rose telling him that Danny boasted of how he and colleagues were quite adept at planting news stories about the terrible harm done to a client who then had no choice but to sue a doctor or hospital of some renown. According to Danny, or according to what Danny had told Rose, news stories of that type almost always caused doctors and hospitals to agree to generous out-of-court settlements in order to avoid the prolonged coverage that might result from a full-scale trial.

 

George could well imagine, then, the possibility of Danny mounting a legal challenge to Rose’s will. He could even picture the Boston Globe headline, "Back Bay Building Manager Receives Large Bequest, Romance Alleged By Widow’s Stepson." How was he supposed to defend himself against the charge that he had preyed on a widow who was seriously ill, first by becoming her lover and then her heir?

 

By Wednesday morning, George had determined that Rose’s gift to him might be more trouble than it was worth. But he wasn’t quite ready to tell Rose that she should take him out of her will because he was uncertain of how to reject her generous gesture. A phrase that struck her as thoughtless, or wording that wasn’t crystal clear, and Rose might just respond by breaking off her relationship with him, which was hardly the outcome he was seeking. He also reminded himself that an inheritance from Rose could be helpful to him now that Melinda, having just turned sixteen, would soon be going off to college. Did he have any right, he asked himself, to refuse a bequest that might give his daughter the chance to attend a first-rate, but expensive college?

 

But whenever he thought of what Danny could do to embarrass him publicly, he became even more convinced that Rose’s generosity was bound to disrupt his quiet, relatively untroubled existence. Ultimately, then, the possibility, likely or not, that Danny might drag him into a legal battle made George decide not to accept Rose’s bequest. Still, he put off for another two hours expressing his misgivings to her.

 

Then he was further delayed in telling Rose of his concerns when a resident using the building’s physical fitness center suffered a bad fall and George had to summon emergency medical help. Rose, in turn, was rankled by George’s failure to call her, but she waited until noon to phone him. When she did, she simply said, "Call me when you have a minute." An hour later, calling him again, she said, "Hey lover boy, what’s up with you?" But in her third call, fifteen minutes later, she said, "Look, does this have something to do with me putting you in my will? What’s your problem? What’s so hard about accepting a gift from someone who loves you?" Her fourth call, minutes later, was brief and exceedingly direct. "Yes or no, I want to talk to you about this—and now, not later."

 

The last call worked, so when George returned Rose’s call midway through the afternoon, he first apologized for not calling her sooner. He told her briefly why he had been delayed, but then, without any warning, he said that the more he had thought about it, the more he wondered if he wanted to accept her bequest.

 

"I’ll be honest with you," he said, "I’m thinking it’s best for me not to get too involved."

 

"Honesty always is the best policy," Rose said. "Nobody can argue with that. And it’s the least I expect from someone like you. But what’s with this ‘not too involved’ business? You know, you’re making me feel as though I’ve done something wrong. And please—don’t tell me that Danny boy has been bugging you about this. I wouldn’t put it past him. He’s hinted more than once that I’m obliged, because his father was so generous to me, to include his daughters in my will. Hinted? Hell, he all but demanded that I do so. Look, it wasn’t as though his father failed to include Danny or Danny’s children in his will, too. Their granddad adored those kids. But you know what? I don’t care what that little twerp thinks. You shouldn’t either."

 

"No, this all goes back to what I decided after my wife ran out on me, that it’s best not to get too involved, generally speaking, in something like this. Keep a little distance, a little breathing room. That’s what I always tell myself. I have a good life, a good job. I’m able to take care of my daughter. I don’t need complications."

 

Rose, without bothering to respond, hung up on him, and when George tried to call her back, he got only a busy signal. Two hours later, George, hoping that Rose’s anger might have abated, went to her apartment, even forsaking for once his usual circuitous route, but when he knocked there was no answer.

 

He was tempted, since he had a key, to let himself in, but that would be a serious breach of condominium policy. Except for an emergency, neither he nor anyone else on the building’s staff was allowed to enter an apartment without permission from the owner. As badly as he wanted to see Rose, he was not about to violate condominium rules. Two other calls he made to her that evening also went unanswered.

 

On Thursday morning he couldn't get to talk with Rose because he had an early meeting at the office of an interior decorator who was overseeing an upgrade to the building’s lobby and reception area. Twice during that morning he excused himself so that he could go outside to call Rose, but both times his calls went to her voicemail. Then, later that afternoon, when he finally got back to his office, and had a spare moment, he went immediately to Rose's apartment. There was no answer when he knocked, and that made him decide, just this once, to ignore the condominium's rules. But when he entered Rose's apartment, he found that she was out. He was careful, of course, not to poke around or do anything that might indicate to Rose that he had been there. Later, twice that evening, he let himself into her apartment. Again, he found the apartment was empty, and again he made sure Rose would never know he had entered her apartment.

 

By then, he was so troubled by Rose’s apparent disappearance that he was tempted to ask any of her neighbors if they knew where she might have gone. Quickly, though he rejected such a move since he didn’t know how to explain why he was in need of such information. Or maybe—and this was more worrisome to him—Rose hadn’t been feeling well and decided on her own to go to an emergency room. No, she would have surely called him for assistance before she did that. Or was she so upset with him that she decided, even if ill, to fend for herself?

 

Finally, after another even more restless night, George was on an early morning phone call with the chairman of the condominium board, when in the middle of their conversation about cost estimates for roof repairs, the chairman said, "Hey, did you know that Rose, on the sixth floor, is putting her condo on the market?"

 

The chairman went on to say Rose was at the airport the day before when she sent him an email, telling him of her plan to sell her unit. She was on her way to Florida, she told him, where she was planning to live close by her sister and her family.

 

"She didn’t say so outright," he added, "but I gathered that with her health problems she figured it was best to be near her relatives. Too bad. I always got a kick out of Rose. She was so full of life."

 

George expressed surprise at the news, but made no comment beyond that.

 

Three weeks later, George arranged to be on vacation when Rose's sister arrived, along with movers, to pack up and ship Rose's furniture and clothes and other belongings to Florida. All the while, of course, he had been debating with himself each day about whether he should try to get in touch with her. Several nights he had the phone in his hand, ready to call her and say he wanted to come to Florida to see her. But always at the last minute he decided against it. He was afraid that she would think he was trying to make up with her because he wanted after all to remain in her will.

 

In Florida, Rose was never once tempted to get in touch with George. She might have changed her mind about that eventually, but her condition worsened more quickly than her doctor anticipated and three months after she left Boston she passed away. Not long after that, George’s daughter received a letter from a law firm in Boston informing her that she had inherited a sum of money that would help in great part to cover the cost of her college education. The letter went on to say that the donor of this gift wished only to be identified as Aunt Rose.