All These Things I've Done

  I sighed.

  “The offer still stands for me to be your escort on your college tour.”

  “Thanks, Mr. Kipling. I’ll keep that in mind.” If I even went on such a thing, I’d probably take Leo with me.

  “It would be my pleasure, Anya.”

  I hung up the phone. Talking to Mr. Kipling always managed to make me feel less lonely and more alone at the same time. I sometimes imagined that Mr. Kipling was my father. I imagined what it would be like to have a father who had a respectable profession like a lawyer. I imagined what it would be like to have the kind of father who took you on college tours. The kind of father who was still alive. Even before Daddy died, I sometimes imagined asking Mr. Kipling to adopt me.

  But Mr. Kipling already had a daughter. Her name was Grace and she was studying to be an engineer.

  I had finally opened my History reading when there was a knock at the door. It was Leo. “Annie, I’m hungry,” he said.

  So I put away my slate and went to tend to my family’s needs.

  III.

  i confess; contemplate mortality & teeth; lure a boy under false pretenses; disappoint my brother

  I WENT TO CONFESSION Friday morning before school.

  If you were wondering, my father wasn’t Catholic. He, like everyone in the Balanchine family, had been born into the Eastern Orthodox faith. Not that Daddy was observant anyway. I never saw him in a church except for my and my siblings’ christenings, or family weddings. Of course, my mother’s funeral, too. I certainly never heard him mention God.

  My mother was the Catholic, and she talked about God regularly. Actually, she said she talked to Him. She’d even wanted to be a nun when she was little but, obviously, that hadn’t worked out for her. One might even say she’d gone in the complete opposite direction, marrying the head of a notorious crime family and all. But my point is, I was a Catholic because of my mother. Sure, I wanted to believe in the possibility of an afterlife and of redemption and salvation and reunion and maybe, most important, a forgiving God. But when I chose Holy Trinity School (and yes, I had been the one to choose it for me and Natty), it was not God I was thinking of. It was my mother and what she would have wanted. And when I went to church and smelled incense burning in the priest’s vessel, I felt close to her. And when the worn velvet brushed my knees in the confessional, I knew she had felt the same thing. And when I sat in a pew and looked up at the pietà bathed in soft, colored light, I almost saw her sometimes. And there was nowhere else in my life that this even came near to happening. For this reason, I knew I could never entirely walk away from the Catholic faith.

  There were, of course, things that bothered me about my faith, but they seemed a small price to pay when you considered what it gave me in return. So what if I would be a virgin until I was married? Gable had never even had a chance.

  “How many days has it been since your last confession?”

  “Four,” I said, and then I recited my sins, which if you’ve been paying any attention you ought to know already. Bribery, wrath, a few repeats from Monday, etc. I was assigned another minor penance, which I accomplished in time to make it to first period: Forensic Science II. This was my favorite subject, partly because I found it interesting and partly because it was the only thing I took that seemed relevant to the crime-ridden world I lived in and partly because I was better at it than anything else. I had inherited my aptitude. Sometime after she’d given up on her ambition to become a nun and before she’d married the Godfather, my mother had been a crime scene investigator for the NYPD. That was how she’d met Daddy, of course.

  It was my second year having Dr. Lau, and she was by far the best teacher I’d ever had in school. (She’d been my mom’s first FS teacher, too, and she was old though not as old as Nana. Fifties or sixties.) I appreciated that she wouldn’t tolerate any squeamishness, no matter how disgusting what we were studying was. Even if it was a week-old chicken corpse or an ominously stained mattress or a menstrual pad. “Life is messy,” Dr. Lau was fond of saying. “Deal with it. If you’re judging it, you’re not really seeing it.”

  “Today and for the next several days, you’ll all be dentists!” Dr. Lau announced gleefully. “I have seven sets of teeth, and there’re thirteen of you. Who wants to be odd person out?”

  I was the only one to raise my hand. It might seem weird but I actually liked working with the evidence by myself.

  “Thanks for stepping up, Annie. You’ll have a partner next time.” She nodded toward me and then began distributing trays with teeth in them. The assignment was pretty straightforward. Using only the teeth, we were to come up with a detailed profile of the person in life (e.g., Had he or she been a smoker?) and based on this, come up with a likely narrative for cause of death.

  I put on a fresh pair of rubber gloves and began to contemplate my teeth. They were small and white. No fillings. A bit of asymmetric wear on the right molar as if the person had ground his or her teeth in sleep. The teeth seemed delicate—not like a child’s but somehow feminine. I noted my findings on my slate: Wealthy. Young. Stress. Female?

  Almost could have been describing myself.

  Dr. Lau put a hand on my shoulder. “Good news. We found a partner for you, Annie.”

  It was Win. Mr. Too Smart for His Classes had transferred out of Forensic Science I into FS II.

  “Can’t seem to stop running into you,” he said.

  “Well, it’s a very small school,” I replied. I showed him my slate screen. “I’ve not gotten very far. I like to spend time thinking at the beginning.”

  “Makes sense,” he said. He put on a pair of gloves, a gesture I appreciated in a potential lab partner, then he pointed to the backs of her bottom teeth. “Look, the enamel’s damaged.”

  I leaned over. “Oh!” I hadn’t looked at the back yet. “She must have been throwing up.”

  “She must have been sick,” he said.

  “Or making herself sick,” I added.

  “Yes.” Win nodded. He lowered his head so that he was eye to teeth. “I think you’re right, Anya. Our girl was making herself sick.”

  I smiled at him. “Her whole life story right here, waiting for us to read it.”

  He agreed. “It’s sad when you think about it, but also kind of beautiful.”

  It was a strange thing to say, I suppose. But I knew what he meant without having to ask. All these teeth had once been in real, live people. They had talked and smiled and eaten and sang and cursed and prayed. They had brushed and flossed and died. In English class, we read poems about death, but here, right in front of me, was a poem about death, too. Only this poem was true. I had experienced death, and poems hadn’t helped me one bit. Poems didn’t matter. Evidence did.

  It wasn’t even 8:00 a.m. yet. Pretty early for such deep thoughts.

  Still, that’s what I loved about forensic science.

  I wondered if Win had ever had someone close to him die.

  The bell rang. Win gently put away the teeth, marking the tray with a piece of tape that read BALANCHINE DELACROIX—DO NOT TOUCH!!! I slipped my slate into my bag.

  “See you at lunch,” he said.

  “I’ll be the girl in the hairnet,” I replied.

  For my physical education elective (fourth period), I was in Advanced Fencing. The “advanced” designation did not speak particularly to my skill but to the fact that I had completed two previous years of fencing. The sport was kind of ridiculous when it came down to it. Despite being an “advanced” fencer, if I were ever in mortal danger I wouldn’t use one iota of fencing knowledge. I’d use a gun.

  Scarlet was my fencing partner and, though she filled out the outfit nicely, she and I were equally clueless fencers. The thing was, she could actually strike a series of plausible offensive poses, and I had the knack for striking appropriate, corresponding defensive postures. I’m reasonably sure that Mr. Jarre, the fencing master, saw through us, but he didn’t really care. We bolstered the head count in Advanced Fenc
ing, which meant that the class wouldn’t get canceled.

  After warm-ups, which included lunging and stretching, we broke off into pairs.

  Scarlet and I fenced (sort of) and talked (mostly).

  “So it’s Friday, which means we have to ask Win today,” she reminded me.

  I groaned. “Seriously, just ask him yourself. I’ll come, but …”

  Scarlet tapped my shoulder lightly with the foil. “A touch!”

  I yelled, mainly for Mr. Jarre’s benefit. Then I staggered several steps backward.

  “It’ll sound more casual if you’re there. Stop by about five minutes before lunch is over,” she said. “And, Anya, my love, if you think of it, take off the hairnet.”

  “Funny,” I said. I launched my foil into her hip.

  “Ow,” she said. “I mean, a touch!”

  It was the last day of lunch duty, and I think I can say I was finally getting the hang of it. I knew how to pick up multiple trays without getting anything in my hair or on myself, and I knew how to serve Gable’s table with a sarcastic “Y’all come back now” smile.

  As I picked up Gable’s tray, he said, “Hope you learned your lesson.”

  “Oh, I did,” I said. “And thank you so very much for teaching me.” I dropped the tray onto the cart so that a little bit of lunch (ground tofu with mysterious red sauce in a bun—Asian Delight?) splashed on his face. “Sorry,” I said, and then I rolled my cart away before he had a chance to respond.

  I unloaded the trays onto the dish-cleaning belt at which point the head lunch lady gave me permission to eat my own lunch. “Good work, Anya,” she said. I know it was just lunch duty but I was still glad that she thought I had done a good job. Daddy always said that once you’d committed (or were committed) to something, you had to honor it all the way.

  Scarlet was sitting with Win and several of her friends from the drama club. I sat down next to Scarlet and said my line. “So are we still going to Little Egypt tonight?”

  “What’s Little Egypt?” Win asked, which was, conveniently enough, exactly what he was supposed to ask.

  “Oh, it’s kind of dumb,” Scarlet replied. “It’s this nightclub that the city opened in the northern part of that abandoned museum on Fifth. There used to be a collection of Egyptian stuff there, which is why they call it Little Egypt.” There were similar nightclubs in various abandoned structures across the city. They were a modest but steady source of revenue for the government, which was usually on the verge of a total financial collapse. “It’s lame, but kind of cool if you haven’t been there before and, I don’t know, j’adore le discothèque!” (You will recall that Win and Scarlet had French together.)

  I said my next line. “You could come with us if you want.”

  “I’m not sure I’m much of a nightclub person,” Win conceded.

  Scarlet and I had prepared for such a response.

  “A lot of nightclubs in Albany?” Scarlet teased him.

  He smiled. “Well, we used to go on hayrides sometimes.”

  “Sounds fun,” Scarlet said with a flirtatious dash of sarcasm.

  “A lot of hayrides in New York City?” he asked.

  Scarlet laughed. I could tell she was about to have her way with Win.

  We arranged to meet at my apartment—it was the closest to the club—that night at eight.

  When I got back from school, the first thing I did was check on Leo, but he wasn’t home. I told myself not to worry, that there was probably a simple explanation for his absence. I went into Nana’s room. She was sleeping, but Imogen was sitting in the leather wing chair we kept by the bed, the chair that used to be Daddy’s. Three fresh pink carnations sat in the vase on the windowsill: Nana had had a visitor.

  I waved to Imogen. She put her finger to her lips to indicate that I should be quiet. Imogen had been Nana’s nurse since I was thirteen, and she sometimes forgot that I was hardly a little girl prone to stomping into rooms where my grandmother was sleeping. (Not that I ever had been.) I nodded and beckoned Imogen into the hallway. Draping her book over the worn arm of the burgundy chair, she rose and closed the door gently behind her. I asked her if she knew where Leo was.

  “Out with your cousin,” Imogen informed me. “Galina said it was fine.”

  “Did they say where they were going?”

  “I’m sorry, Annie. I honestly wasn’t paying attention. Galina had a rough afternoon.” She shook her head. “For a swim, maybe? No, that doesn’t make any sense.” Imogen frowned. “But I swear it was something to do with swimming.”

  Of course. The Pool.

  “Did I do wrong not to stop Leo?”

  “No,” I told her. The truth was, it was neither Imogen’s job nor her place to watch my brother. That was my job, a job made even more challenging by the fact that, in order to preserve his feelings, I had to act like I wasn’t watching him at all. Also, I did have school to attend. I thanked Imogen, and she went back to reading her book in Daddy’s chair.

  I was about to head across town to claim Leo when he came through the door. He was out of breath and flushed. “Oh,” he said when he saw me, “I was trying to beat you home. I didn’t want you to worry, Annie.”

  “Too late,” I said.

  Leo gave me a hug. He was damp with sweat, and I pushed him away. “You’re smelly,” I told him. Leo hugged me even tighter. It was a game with him. I knew he wouldn’t let go until I said I loved him. “Okay, Leo. I love you. I love you already! Now tell me where you were.”

  “You’ll be proud of me, Annie. I was out getting a new job!”

  I raised an eyebrow. “Imogen said you were at the Pool.”

  “That’s where my new job is, Annie. Just until they reopen the clinic. It pays better than the clinic, too,” Leo said.

  I cleared my throat. “What kind of a job?” I asked softly so that Leo wouldn’t hear how angry I was.

  “Maintenance things. Cleaning the floors and stuff. Jacks says they need a guy, and I’m real good at that sort of thing, Annie. You know I am.”

  I asked Leo how he had become aware of such an opportunity, and he told me that Cousin Jacks had stopped by the apartment to visit Nana that morning. (This explained the fresh carnations.) Jacks had been surprised to find Leo home in the middle of the day so Leo had told him the story of the clinic getting shut down. Jacks then mentioned that they were looking for a maintenance guy at the Pool and that Leo would be perfect if he was interested in making some “easy money” before the clinic reopened.

  “Easy money? Were those his exact words?” I asked.

  “I—” Leo shook his head. “I’m not sure, Annie. Even after the guy at the Pool offered me the job, I told him I’d have to talk to you and Nana first. That was the right thing to do, wasn’t it?”

  “Yes. But the thing is, Leo, our relatives, I mean the guys who work at the Pool, aren’t always the nicest sort of people to be hanging out with.”

  “I’m not so stupid, Annie,” Leo said in a harder voice than I’d ever heard him use. “I’m not so stupid as you think. I know what our family does. I know what Daddy used to do, too. I got hurt because of what Daddy used to do, remember? I know it every day.”

  “Of course you do, Leo. I know you’re not stupid.”

  “I want to pull my weight, Annie. I feel bad that I don’t have a job right now. If Nana dies and I don’t have a job, they could take you and Natty away. And Cousin Jacks is a real nice guy, Annie. He told me you don’t like him, but that was only because you’d heard something he said wrong.”

  I snorted. Nice Cousin Jacks had gotten wasted and put his hand on my boob. Nothing to mishear there. “I don’t think so, Leo.” I looked at my brother. He was wearing gray pants that were too big on him through the waist (they had been Daddy’s) and a white T-shirt. Even though he was wiry, his arms were muscular from all the lifting they had him do at the clinic. He looked capable. Powerful, even. Not like someone who needed to be protected. Certainly not like someone whose little sist
er lay awake in bed worrying about him.

  Leo’s eyes were like Daddy’s ice-blue ones with some of the ice thawed out. They were looking at me with hope. “I really want to do it, Annie.”

  “Let me talk it over with Nana, okay, Leo?”

  Leo exploded. “I’m a grownup! I don’t need you to say yes! You’re a kid! I’m the big brother! I don’t want you in my room anymore!” Then he pushed me toward the door. It wasn’t a hard push but I still fell a couple of steps backward.

  “I’m going to talk to Nana about it,” I repeated. As I stepped over the threshold, Leo slammed the door behind me.

  There was a good chance the ruckus had roused Nana, so I went back to her room. She was indeed awake. “How are you, darling?” she asked. “I heard yelling.”

  I kissed her cheek, which smelled of baby powder and bile, and then I looked over toward Imogen. I shook my head ever so slightly to let Nana know I didn’t want to discuss family business in front of the nurse.

  “Well, I should go.” Imogen put her book in her bag. It was the end of her workday anyway. “I guess you found Leo,” she said.

  “Yes,” I said with a half laugh. “In the hallway.”

  “Always the last place you look,” said Imogen. “Take care, Anya. Sleep well, Galina.”

  After Imogen had closed the door, I told Nana where Leo had been and about the job. “So, what do you think?” I asked.

  Nana laughed, which made her cough. I poured her some water, then held the straw to her lips. A few drops spilled out onto the maroon silk coverlet and to my eye these looked almost like blood. I repeated the question. “What do you think?”

  “Well,” said my grandmother in her desiccated voice, “I can already tell what you think. Your nostrils are flared like a racehorse’s and your eyes are as bloodshot as a drunk’s. You mustn’t let your face show so much of what you feel. It’s a weakness, my darling.”