The Storyteller Read online

  Me, I can't be certain.

  What if the stress Leo and I subjected her to was what had finally taken its toll on her? What if the memories we brought flooding back had swept her away?

  What if she was thinking of him in the moments before she died?

  I can't help but believe this is my fault; and because of that, I am a mess.

  But I can't confide in Pepper and Saffron, because I already feel like they blame me for my mother's death, even though they said it was not my fault. I cannot let them blame me for my grandmother's death, too. So mostly, I stay out of their way, grieving in private, and they leave me alone. I think they are a little afraid at how much of a zombie I have become in the wake of Nana's death. I don't mind when they invade my home and rearrange the furniture so that we can sit shivah; I don't complain when they go through my refrigerator throwing out yogurt that is out of date or griping because I don't have any decaf. I stop eating, even when Mary comes by with a basket full of fresh-baked pastries and condolences; when she tells me she has lit a candle for my grandmother before every Mass since hearing of her passing. I don't tell my sisters about Leo, or Reiner Hartmann. I don't try to call Josef, in the hospital. I just say that I've been spending a lot of time with Nana lately, and that's why I'd like a private moment with her at the funeral home, before the ceremony.

  My grandmother lived a remarkable life. She watched her nation fall to pieces; and even when she became collateral damage, she believed in the power of the human spirit. She gave when she had nothing; she fought when she could barely stand; she clung to tomorrow when she couldn't find footing on the rock ledge of yesterday. She was a chameleon, slipping into the personae of a privileged young girl, a frightened teen, a dreamy novelist, a proud prisoner, an army wife, a mother hen. She became whomever she needed to be to survive, but she never let anyone else define her.

  By anyone's account, her existence had been full, rich, important--even if she chose not to shout about her past, but rather to keep it hidden. It had been nobody's business but her own; it was still nobody's business.

  I would make sure of that. After everything I'd done, by involving Leo and having him interview her, it was the least I could do.

  Light-headed with hunger and heat and grief, I move woodenly from Pepper's rental car to the lobby of the funeral home, where Adam is waiting in his dark suit. He greets Pepper first. "I'm so sorry for your loss," he says smoothly.

  Does it even mean anything to him anymore? If you say the same words over and over, do they become so bleached that there's no color left in them?

  "Thank you," Pepper says, taking the hand he offers.

  Then he turns to me. "I understand you'd like a moment alone with your loved one?"

  Adam, it's me, I think, and then I remember that I am the one who pushed him away.

  He steers me through a doorway into the back of the funeral home, while Pepper takes a seat and starts texting--maybe the florist, the caterer, or her husband and kids, who will be landing at the airport any minute now. It isn't until the door to the room is closed behind us that Adam folds me into an embrace. I stiffen at first, and then just give in. It's easier than putting up a fight.

  "You look like hell," he sighs into my hair. "Have you slept at all in the past two days?"

  "I can't believe she's gone," I say, tearing up. "I'm all alone, now."

  "You could have me . . ."

  Really? Now? I bite my lip, and take a step away from him.

  "Are you sure you want to do this?"

  I nod.

  Adam takes me to the anteroom where my grandmother's casket is waiting, ready to be transferred to the sanctuary in time for the service. The small space smells like the inside of a refrigerator, cold and faintly antiseptic. My head spins, and I have to hold on to the wall for support. "Could I have a minute alone with her?"

  Adam nods and gently opens the upper half of the casket so that I am looking down at my grandmother. The door closes behind him as he steps outside.

  She is wearing a red wool skirt with black piping. The blouse that is tied at her neck blooms like a flower against her throat. Her eyelashes cast shadows on her cheeks, which look lightly flushed. Her silver hair is swept and styled, the way she has had it done twice a week at the salon for as long as I can remember. Adam and his staff have outdone themselves. Looking at her, I find myself thinking of Sleeping Beauty, of Snow White, of women who woke from their nightmares and began to live again.

  If that happened to my grandmother, it would not be the first time.

  When my mother died, I did not want to touch her. I knew my sisters would lean down and kiss her cheek, embrace her one last time. But for me, the moment of physical contact with a dead body was terrifying. It would feel different from all the other times I'd turned to her for comfort, because she couldn't hug me back. And if she couldn't hug me back, I had to stop pretending it was possible.

  Now, though, I don't have a choice.

  I reach into the casket and lift my grandmother's left hand. It is cold and oddly firm, like the dolls I had when I was a little girl that were advertised for their lifelike feel, which was never really lifelike at all. I unbutton her cuff so that the sleeve slides backward, exposing the flesh of her forearm.

  The casket will be closed at the funeral. No one will see the tattoo she was given at Auschwitz. And even if someone were to look inside, like I did, her silk blouse would cover the evidence. But my grandmother went to such great pains to keep from being defined by her experience as a survivor that I feel like it's my duty to make sure this continues, whatever comes next.

  From my purse I pull a small tube of concealer, and carefully blot it onto my grandmother's skin. I wait for it to dry, making sure the numbers have been obliterated. Then I button her cuff again, and folding my hands around hers, press a kiss into her palm like a marble to carry with her. "Nana," I say, "when I grow up, I'm going to be as brave as you."

  I close the casket and wipe beneath my eyes with my fingers, trying not to mess up my mascara. Then I take a few deep breaths and walk unsteadily into the hallway that leads to the lobby of the funeral home.

  Adam is not waiting for me outside the anteroom. It doesn't matter, though, because I know my way around here. I walk down the hallway, my ankles wobbling in the black pumps I am not accustomed to wearing.

  In the foyer, I see Adam and Pepper bent in quiet conversation with a third party, whose body is blocked by their own. I assume it's Saffron, arriving before the rest of the guests. When they hear my footsteps, Adam turns, and suddenly I can see that the person they're talking to is not Saffron at all.

  The room spins like a carousel. "Leo?" I whisper, certain I have imagined him, until he catches me the moment before I hit the floor.

  For a long time, I simply cried.

  Every day, at noon, Aleks was brought to the village square and punished for what his brother had done. It would have killed an ordinary man. Instead, for Aleks, it was just a new circle of hell.

  I stopped baking. The village, without bread, grew bitter. There was nothing to break at the table with family, to digest over conversation. There were no pastries to pass to a lover. People felt empty inside, no matter how much other food they ate.

  One day I left the cottage and traveled by foot to the nearest city. It was the one Aleks and his brother had last come from, where the buildings were so tall it hurt to try to see the tops of them. There was a special building there full of books, as many books as there were grains in a flour sack. I told the woman at the desk in the front what I needed, and she led me down a curved set of iron stairs to a place where leather tomes were nestled into the walls.

  I learned that there is more than one way to kill an upior.

  You could bury a body deep in the ground, weighted down in the belly with rich soil.

  You could drive a nail into his brain.

  You could grind up a caul, like the one Casimir had been born with, and feed it to him.

&nbs