prelude part five « Letters from Grenada

prelude part five

Part V

On Friday, August 13, 2004, there was a department meeting at work. We’d just won several awards for one of our advertising campaigns, so even the Dragon Lady was in a good mood. Most of the meeting was spent reviewing our booty and planning how to announce our win. I volunteered to write and translate the press release. Victor would find and secure ad space. Oswaldo would brief the sales reps. Artwork and copy would have to be updated, changes rushed to the printer. We were pumped.

I returned to my desk to discover that the department assistant had ordered lunch from KFC for all of us. It was the first and last time he ever did that. I contemplated the greasy, spicy, boneless animal flesh, and decided I needed a diet Coke. Quarters for the vending machine were in my hand when I noticed the missed call from my grandparents’ house. Not Gene and Vera, Kay’s parents, from South Bend, but June and José, Tony’s parents from Ohio and Puerto Rico, respectively, and currently in Monroe, New York.

When I call back it is Grandpa José who answers the phone. He’d moved to the U.S. when he was 20, so his English was good but quirky and heavily accented. He was short and fiery and Latino. He was a master carpenter, and a Puerto Rican version of Redd Foxx.

“Grandpa? It’s Maria. How are you?”

“O, Mar-í-a,” he says my name as it’s meant to be said. “I am not good. Not good at all. Jeanie was killed.”

“Jeanie? Jeanie!”

“Yes, Jeanie. Michael’s daughter.”

He knows I know exactly who Jeanie is. My first cousin, the only one older than me. My dad’s brother’s daughter. I hadn’t seen her in years and I can’t fucking believe she’s dead. The way José phrased the news, using the words “was killed”, I imagine a shooting, some kind of murder, but it was a car accident.

“Oh no,” I say. I didn’t have a better line.

“Oh yeesss,” says he. Then again, much softer, as if to himself, “oh yes”.

“Where’s Grandma?” Grandma’s birthday was the next day.

“Your uncle Phillip took her to the funeral home.” Tears finally come at the thought of Uncle Phil, who walked Jeanie down the aisle at her wedding. Phil, who has no children of his own and so dotes on all of us, but especially Jeanie, the first and dearest of his nieces.

The first night of Jeanie’s wake I leave work early and spend two hours steaming the wrinkles out of four different all-black outfits. I mesmerize myself with the motion of the steamer. I attempt to mentally prepare myself for the open casket, but even the thought sends my limbic system into panic mode. I am screaming silently. I never want to drive again.

I endure the wake on autopilot, chatting numbly with relatives long unseen. Phil is red-eyed under his sunglasses. His voice is wet and his cheekbones look sharp. Because I ask, he gives me the details. Jeanie and her boyfriend had gone to a party. They’d started home. He was driving; neither of them had been drinking. They waited their turn at a four-way stop. They started through the intersection, and were hit by a 17-year-old girl with three passengers. They’d been playing a chicken-like “game” that featured blowing through stop signs without slowing. Jeanie’s car rolled off the road, and, just like that, she was gone.

The boyfriend, whose name I’ve lost, survived. Immediately upon release from the hospital, he and his sister drove the five hours to the funeral home downstate, getting there just in time. I will never forget the tragic testimony of his grief.

My brother Robert had moved to Ithaca. When he went back after the funeral I really missed him, even more than usual. I ached for my mother. I wanted to go home, but I didn’t know where that was anymore.

Less than a week later Grandpa Gene died. It was the Thursday before the Republican National Convention in Madison Square Garden. Protests were scheduled. One group walked from Boston to Manhattan. I met them at the corner of Broadway and 57th Street. I was taking a video of this political costume party when Mom called from Grenada to tell me.

I cried so much at Grandpa Gene’s funeral, my mom later told me she thought it was “weird”.

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