Susan Pfeffer - The Dead And The Gone

In a week, the hospital would be closed. In a week, Queens would no longer exist.

Did Puerto Rico still exist? Did the Morales family? Did hope?

Friday, June 24

Alex made a point of going to St. Margaret's that morning, after dropping Julie at school. He'd been avoiding reading the bulletin board there, figuring he was following events carefully enough with his nightly radio reports. But if the evacuation of Queens could slip up on him like that, he needed to pay closer attention.

Sure enough, the Archdiocese had sent out an information sheet about Queens. It was dated a week before, and it listed all the times and places for people to board buses that would take them to an evacuation center in Bingham-ton, New York. From there they could make their own arrangements.

Father Franco walked over to the bulletin board, armed with new information. Alex said hello.

"How are things going?" Father Franco asked.

"Pretty good," Alex said. "My sister and I will both be in school this summer." He didn't bother asking Father Franco if he'd heard anything more about Puerto Rico, or even about Bri. There was no point.

"I'll let you be the first to know," Father Franco said. "We just got the news this morning. Starting next Friday, July first, there's going to be a food distribution at Morse Elementary School, on West Eighty-fourth Street."

"You're kidding," Alex said.

Father Franco grinned. "Priests don't kid," he said. "We learn not to in our first year of seminary. It's going to be once a week, and every person in line gets one bag of free food. See for yourself."

Alex read the flyer. The distribution center opened at 9:00 am, Fridays only. He'd miss Friday Mass at Vincent de Paul, but he could still do his work and get to school in time for lunch.

"How much food in a bag?" he asked. "Do you know?"

Father Franco shook his head. "My guess is not enough for a week's worth of meals," he said. "But any food is a blessing these days."

"And the limit is one bag per person," Alex said. "So Julie can come along and get a bag, also."

"It's set up that way so families can get food for everyone," he said. "You should definitely bring Julie with you."

A bag of food each, plus five days' worth of lunches. They wouldn't get fat as kittens, but at least they wouldn't starve.

Wednesday, June 29

The ten people Alex had to check up on lived in four different buildings between Amsterdam and West End Avenues and two on Eighty-sixth Street and two on Eighty-seventh. He was relieved none lived in his building, where he figured the fewer people knowing he and Julie were still there, the better.

The job wasn't too onerous —except for the fact that in one building the woman he needed to look in on lived on the eleventh floor and in another on the sixteenth, with electricity a novelty before noon. The people had all signed up and if they were startled or nervous because he was Puerto Rican and they weren't, they hid it well. Mostly they seemed pleased that anyone cared enough to climb all those flights of stairs. Alex made sure they were okay, asked if they needed anything in particular, and then had them sign the sheet showing he'd actually been there. It was tiresome having to smile and act interested, especially if they were chatty, but that was a small price to pay for a meal.

Julie, it turned out, loved gardening and she talked about nothing else. There was some concern because things were being planted late in the season, but most of the vegetables had gotten a head start in a greenhouse: string beans, corn, tomatoes, squash, zucchini, cabbage, potatoes, broccoli. Holes to be dug, fertilizer to be spread, plants gently bedded, watered, weeded. Marigolds to keep rats away. Sunlight, no matter how hot the day was, to be celebrated.

"And we'll get some of it," Julie said for the third time in three days. "Can you imagine? Real vegetables."

Alex couldn't imagine. He didn't even mind hearing about it day after day. It gave him something else to think about besides what kinds of food would be in the bag of groceries he and Julie would each be given on Friday.

He could see that Julie had lost weight, but he never asked her if she was hungry, and if she was, she didn't whine about it. Actually, she was whining considerably less than she had when things were normal. He guessed he had the moon to thank for that.

Thursday, June 30

Alex walked Julie to school, then raced back home. It made no sense, he knew, to sit by a phone that hardly ever worked, waiting for a phone call that wasn't going to be made, from a mother who was almost certainly long dead.

But that was what he did, Just in case. Just in case on the last day that Queens, New York, existed, Mami might call her family to let them know she was still alive. He was glad he hadn't told Julie, since she would have insisted on staying home as well. This way at least she'd have lunch.

It was hard being alone in the apartment staring at an unringing phone, haunted by the food in the kitchen, which he wouldn't allow himself to touch, haunted even more by the image of his mother drowning in the subway that very first night.

He tried reading. He tried praying. He tried push-ups. He tried counting the cans of soup. He listened to the radio, using up the twenty-dollar batteries. The world was coming to an end. Well, that was nothing new.

In spite of the excruciating boredom, it physically hurt to leave the apartment, but he had to get Julie. The day was hot and sunny. The waning quarter moon seemed larger than the sun. At least it wasn't a full moon, he thought. Alex had really learned to hate full moons.

Julie's topic of the day was insecticides, their uses and history. Apparently Sister Rita, who was in charge of the garden project, felt the girls should learn as many different things as possible about the food chain. Alex was just relieved Sister Rita hadn't gotten to recipes. It was hard enough hearing all the talk about vegetables when he'd eaten lunch. But today, even moths and aphids sounded appetizing.

As soon as they got back, Alex picked up the phone to see if by some miracle Mami had left a message.

"What did you do that for?" Julie asked.

"Because I felt like it," he snapped.

Julie looked at him. "You're really weird, you know that?" she said.

Alex nodded. "Yeah, I know," he said. "It comes from living with you."

Julie smiled. "Well, I guess I'm good for something, then," she said. She went into her bedroom, leaving Alex alone in the living room with a phone that he continued to stare at, a phone that stared back at him.

Friday, July 1

Alex slept on the sofa just in case the phone rang.

At a quarter to seven he gave up and got dressed before waking Julie. She would sleep until noon if she had her way, and she inevitably woke up cranky. He hoped the bags of food would include cereal. They were on the verge of running out, even though all he allowed either of them to eat was half a cup's worth.

That morning, though, Julie was too excited to eat, and her excitement proved contagious. It wasn't like Alex had really expected Mami to call, he told himself. Food was important. They raced through their morning rituals, and left the apartment by seven-thirty. They'd be at Morse well before eight. It would be boring standing on line for over an hour, but they needed to be among the first, since they had to take the food back home and then Alex had to walk Julie to Central Park, make his rounds, and get to school before lunch.

They walked down Amsterdam Avenue, figuring they'd turn east on Eighty-fourth. Julie speculated about what food they'd be given.

"Nothing'll be as good as fresh vegetables," she said. "But that's going to have to wait."+