The Axeman's Jazz

whole evening, Sonny’s mother spoke up. “You don’t have to be married to be codependent. You don’t even have to be around an alcoholic.” To Missy she said, “Are you in Al-Anon, Missy? I’ve never seen you there.”
    “I don’t want to get into that!” Bull Gerard’s customary ruddy glow had deepened to a florid mask, his brows had come together in the Jehovah-like fury Sonny recognized from drawings in Bible story books.
    All he needs is a long white beard.
    Bull turned placatingly to Missy. “Girl, tell me what I’m going to do. I got one son who won’t do a damn thing anybody tells him, can’t even make an honest living, got the hardest goddamn red head anybody’s ever seen on a human being. I got another that just can’t accept responsibility. You know, Sonny’s mother and I were delighted he picked you, couldn’t have been more delighted. You’re good for him, keep him on the straight and narrow. Sobered you right up, didn’t she, Sonny boy?”
    Missy was clearly puzzled. “He never seemed very—”
    “Oh, he sowed a few wild oats. Ran us a merry chase all through high school. Didn’t you, Sonny?”
    “If you say so, Dad.”
There was the time I got a B in trig.
    “You know what your problem is, Sonny? I really don’t think you have much self-esteem. Missy, did Sonny ever tell you about his grandfather? Sonny was only a kid, didn’t mean to do anything wrong. But you know, he’s never been the same since?” Bull took a long swallow of his wine. “You’ve got to quit blaming yourself, Sonny. It’s over and done now.” He spread his arms, the pictures of expansiveness. “ ’Course nothing will ever bring my daddy back, but the Lord forgives you. You’ve got to forgive yourself, go on with your life.”
    Sonny felt a steel band closing around his middle, knew he wasn’t going to be able to manage dessert.
    Missy massaged her forehead.
    Bull said, “What is it, honey?”
    “It’s nothing. I get these migraines now and then.”
    “Shouldn’t be drinking wine. You got a good neurologist?”
    She smiled. “I have all the right stuff. I just forgot my pills.”
    “We’ll give you some coffee. That’ll knock it out.”
    She shook her head. “I think it’s too late for that. It’s already too far gone.”
    “I guess we’d better go.” Sonny did his best to try to sound reluctant. He didn’t think he’d ever loved her so much.
    Safe in the car, he hugged her to him, laughing to release the tension. “Maybe I will marry you in January.”
    “Let’s go somewhere and get praline parfaits.”
    “That’s probably what Mama was going to serve for dessert.”
    “You’re crazy if you think I’m going back in there. I may not marry into this family at all.” She pulled her head away from his neck. Her eyes were very round. “Sonny! Maybe that’s what he’s trying to do. Turn me off so badly I’ll dump you.”
    Sonny started the car, didn’t answer. She brushed his one lock of hair back. “Do you think he hates you that much?”
    “I don’t think he hates me at all. Why do you say that?”
    “He’s all over you all the time. He can’t leave you alone.”
    “I get off easy. You should see him with Robbie.”
    “He probably hates him too. There’s so much hate in that man!”
    Sonny shrugged. “I don’t really think so. He’s just old-fashioned, I guess. He does the best he can, like anybody else.”

TWENTY-SEVEN
    DI CERTAINLY HADN’T been exaggerating that time at the Napoleon House when she’d told Skip she went to three meetings a day. She was “healing herself,” if Skip remembered correctly; recovering from “disease.” She’d gone straight from Sonny’s to an Al-Anon meeting.
    It was a popular gathering. Alex was also there, along with Adam Abasolo—a curious way, to Skip’s mind, of tailing someone, but Abasolo was so cocky it probably wouldn’t occur to him he couldn’t pull it off. Skip’s mother was there too.
    So Elizabeth went to Al-Anon as well as OA. This was a whole other side of her. She might have been going to OA just to lose weight, but you didn’t go to Al-Anon unless you were in pain. Or else wanted to make new friends.
    But somehow it was nearly impossible to see her mother as an adulteress. Not because Skip had illusions, simply because Elizabeth didn’t seem to have much sexual energy. She could have been the prototype for the jokes about women who won’t make love because they’ve just had their hair