Jazz Funeral

you never heard, okay?”
    “I’ve just gone deaf.”
    “My firm represents a giant conglomerate that shall remain nameless, but which would very much like to own Poor Boys; they’ve been trying hard to buy out the Brocatos. However, the outcome is still very much in doubt.”
    “And thereon, I gather, hangs a tale.”
    “One simple sentence, my dainty darling; one sentence tells the tale: some members of the board want to sell and some don’t.”
    “Ah.” She sat up straight, alert as a hunter. “And who might they be—these fractious board members?
    “Brocato family members. Every one of them.”
    “Ham was one?”
    He nodded.
    “Which side was he on?”
    “Sorry—that’s as much as I know.”
    She wondered why he had told her this—it was unethical, she supposed, violated some code or other. It was probably because he wanted to give her something, felt close to her tonight.
    But he said, “Use it well, Thumbelina. This isn’t meant to be a precedent-setter. I feel sentimental about Ham is all.”

CHAPTER TWELVE
    Melody woke up on the sidewalk, Chris bending over her. “What’s wrong? What is it?” he said, and she remembered. And would have passed out again if she could have.
    “I don’t know. I just got sick.”
    “Come on.” He helped her up, and she could walk perfectly well, but she pretended; leaned on him all the way back to the apartment.
    “I want to lie down.”
    “Maybe it’s hypoglycemia.”
    She nodded. But when he brought her some toast, she found she couldn’t eat. “I have to sleep,” she said, and rolled over.
    When she awoke again, she was alone. She didn’t know if it had been half an hour or several hours, but she had slept soundly, had fallen asleep immediately. Lying there, on the smelly sleeping bag in the dingy apartment, she felt like puking her guts out. That was the phrase that came to her, and surely the muscle action couldn’t have been that different, but it was sobs, not vomit, that were issuing from her belly; from her pelvis; perhaps from her toes. From the bottom of her being, each one as wrenching as a fit of vomiting, but none so purging. And that was what she wanted. With each sob, she tried to cast out the knowledge that Ham was dead, free herself of this despair, this hopelessness. But it remained like an anchor in her soul, dragging her back, taking her again and again to the depths.
    She screamed, she rolled around on the filthy bed, she tried to think what to do. No plan presented itself, but one thing became obvious: She couldn’t bear to see Chris. Or the other two, Sue Ann and Randy. How was she going to pretend that nothing was wrong? Her brother was dead.
    She said it to herself: My brother is dead.
    But the words had no meaning at all, she couldn’t begin to comprehend them, understood only the dolor that had invaded her body and captured her spirit. Understood only that she wanted to die if she had to hurt like this.
    She got up to go to the bathroom and was surprised that she could still walk, her motor skills were intact, though she occasionally bounced off walls, but that was due to shock and lack of focus, she thought. She hadn’t thought she’d have the strength to make it, had thought she might have to crawl. But strength she did have; she wasn’t actually sick, just out of it.
    On the way back she strayed into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator, not out of hunger and certainly not out of curiosity, but because that’s where her automatic pilot happened to take her. There was some ketchup and mayonnaise, some bottled salad dressing, a box of days-old doughnuts. With no enthusiasm, she opened the box and closed it again, not even registering what kind of doughnuts were in it. And then she happened to notice a can of beer.
    Barely realizing what she was doing, she popped the top and took a swallow. She took it back in the living room and over to a table where she could sit and look down at the street. She swallowed and stared, swallowed and stared, paying no attention to either action, simply letting her mind roam free, and it worked much better than she could have imagined. If anyone had asked her what she was thinking about, she couldn’t have answered. Her mind, though not still—she was aware of movement—was almost literally blank. “Almost” because she knew it really wasn’t, every now and then came into focus to catch the tail end of some thought, almost like seeing it with peripheral vision. But for