Postmortem(45)

It was sad and a violation of tradition that Lucy knew nothing of these things. I assumed when she came home from school most days she walked into a quiet, indifferent house where dinner was a drudgery to be put off until the last minute. My sister should never have been a mother. My sister should never have been Italian.

Greasing my hands with olive oil, I began to knead the dough, working it hard until the small muscles in my arms hurt.

“Can you twirl it like they do on TV?” Lucy stopped what she was doing, staring wide-eyed at me.

I gave her a demonstration.

“Wow!”

“It’s not so hard.” I smiled as the dough slowly spread out over my fists. “The trick is to keep your fingers tucked in so you don’t poke holes in it.”

“Let me do it.”

“You haven’t finished grating the cheese,” I said with mock severity.

“Please . . .”

She got down from her footstool and came over to me. Taking her hands in mine, I bathed them with olive oil and folded them into fists. It surprised me that her hands were almost the size of mine. When she was a baby her fists were no bigger than walnuts. I remembered the way she would reach out to me when I was visiting back then, the way she would grab my index finger and smile while a strange and wonderful warmth spread through my breast. Draping the dough over Lucy’s fists, I helped her flop it around awkwardly.

“It gets bigger and bigger,” she exclaimed. “This is neat!”

“The dough spreads out because of centrifugal force—similar to the way people used to make glass. You know, you’ve seen the old glass windows with ripples in them?”

Nodding.

“The glass was spun into a large, flat disk—”

We both looked up as gravel crunched beneath tires in the drive. A white Audi was pulling in and Lucy’s mood immediately began to sink.

“Oh,” she said unhappily. “He’s here.”

Bill Boltz was getting out of the car and collecting two bottles of wine from the passenger’s seat.

“You’ll like him very much.” I was deftly laying the dough in the deep pan. “He very much wants to meet you, Lucy.”

“He’s your boyfriend.”

I washed my hands. “We just do things together, and we work together . . .”

“He’s not married?” She was watching him follow the walkway to the front door.

“His wife died last year.”

“Oh.” A pause. “How?”

I kissed the top of her head and went out of the kitchen to answer the door. Now was not the time for me to answer such a question. I wasn’t sure how Lucy would take it.

“You recovering?” Bill smiled and lightly kissed me.

I shut the door. “Barely.”

“Wait till you’ve had a few glasses of this magic stuff,” he said, holding up the bottles as if they were prize catches from a hunt. “From my private stock— you’ll love it.”

I touched his arm and he followed me to the kitchen.

Lucy was grating cheese again, up on her footstool, her back to us. She didn’t even glance around when we walked in.

“Lucy?”

Still grating.

“Lucy?” I led Bill over to her. “This is Mr. Boltz, and Bill, this is my niece.”

Reluctantly, she stopped what she was doing and looked straight at me. “I scraped my knuckle, Auntie Kay. See?” She held up her left hand. A knuckle was bleeding a little.

“Oh, dear. Here, I’ll get a Band-Aid . . .”

“Some of it got in the cheese,” she went on, as if suddenly on the verge of tears.

“Sounds to me like we need an ambulance,” Bill announced, and he quite surprised Lucy by plucking her off the stool and locking his arms under her thighs. She was in a ridiculously funny sitting position. “Rerrrrrr—RERRRRRRRRRR . . .” He was wailing like a siren and carrying her over to the sink. “Three-one-six, bringing in an emergency—cute little girl with a bleeding knuckle.” He was talking to a dispatcher now. “Please have Dr. Scarpetta ready with a Band-Aid . . .”

Lucy was shrieking with laughter. Momentarily her knuckle was forgotten and she was staring with open adoration at Bill as he uncorked a bottle of wine.

“You have to let it breathe,” he was gently explaining to her. “See, it’s sharper now than it will be in an hour or so. Like everything else in life, it gets mellower with time.”

“Can I have some?”

“Well, now,” he replied with exaggerated gravity, “all right by me if your Auntie Kay says so. But we wouldn’t want you getting silly on us.”

I was quietly putting the pizza together, spreading the dough with sauce and overlaying this with the meats, vegetables and Parmesan cheese. Topping it with the crumbled mozzarella, I slid it into the oven. Soon the rich garlicky aroma was filling the kitchen and I was busying myself with the salad and setting the table while Lucy and Bill chatted and laughed.