Middlesex

She was still examining me, the lenses of her glasses magnifying her eyes. Had she had all her wits, Desdemona could not possibly have fathomed what I was saying. But in her senility she somehow accommodated the information. She lived now amid memories and dreams, and in this state the old village stories grew near again.

“You’re a boy now, Calliope?”

“More or less.”

She took this in. “My mother she use to tell me something funny,” she said. “In the village, long time ago, they use to have sometimes babies who were looking like girls. Then—fifteen, sixteen—they are looking like boys! My mother tell me this but I never believe.”

“It’s a genetic thing. The doctor I went to says it happens in little villages. Where everyone marries each other.”

“Dr. Phil he used to talk about this, too.”

“He did?”

“It’s all my fault.” She shook her head grimly.

“What was? What was your fault?”

She was not crying exactly. Her tear ducts were dried up and no moisture rolled down her cheeks. But her face was going through the motions, her shoulders quaking.

“The priests say even first cousins never should marry,” she said. “Second cousins is okay, but you have to ask first the archbishop.” She was looking away now, trying to remember it all. “Even if you want to marry your godparents’ son, you can’t. I thought it was only something for the Church. I didn’t know it was because what can happen to the babies. I was just stupid girl from village.” She went on in that vein for a while, castigating herself. She had momentarily forgotten that I was there or that she was speaking aloud. “And then Dr. Phil he tell me terrible things. I was so scared I had an operation! No more babies. Then Milton he have children and again I was scared. But nothing happen. So I think, after so long time, everything was okay.”

“What are you saying, yia yia? Papou was your cousin?”

“Third cousin.”

“That’s all right.”

“Not third cousin only. Also brother.”

My heart skipped. “Papou was your brother?”

“Yes, honey,” Desdemona said with infinite weariness. “Long time ago. In another country.”

Right then the intercom sounded:

“Callie?” Tessie coughed, correcting herself: “Cal?”

“Yeah.”

“You better get cleaned up. The car’s coming in ten minutes.”

“I’m not going.” I paused. “I’m going to stay here with yia yia.”

“You need to be there, honey,” said Tessie.

I crossed to the intercom and put my mouth against the speaker and said in a deep voice, “I’m not going into that church.”

“Why not?”

“Have you seen what they charge for those goddamn candles?”

Tessie laughed. She needed to. So I kept going, lowering my voice to sound like my father’s. “Two bucks for a candle? What a racket! Maybe you could convince somebody from the old country to shell out for that kind of thing, but not here in the U.S.A.!”

It was infectious to do Milton. Now Tessie lowered her voice in the speaker: “Total rip-off!” she said, and laughed again. We understood then that this was how we were going to do it. This was how we were going to keep Milton alive.

“Are you sure you don’t want to go?” she asked me.

“It’ll be too complicated, Mom. I don’t want to have to explain everything to everybody. Not yet. It’ll be too big of a distraction. It’ll be better if I’m not there.”

In her heart Tessie agreed, and so she soon relented. “I’ll tell Mrs. Papanikolas she doesn’t need to come stay with yia yia.”

Desdemona was still looking at me but her eyes had gone dreamy. She was smiling. And then she said, “My spoon was right.”

“I guess so.”

“I’m sorry, honey. I’m sorry this happen to you.”

“It’s all right.”

“I’m sorry, honey mou.”

“I like my life,” I told her. “I’m going to have a good life.” She still looked pained, so I took her hand.

“Don’t worry, yia yia. I won’t tell anyone.”

“Who’s to tell? Everybody’s dead now.”

“You’re not. I’ll wait until you’re gone.”

“Okay. When I die, you can tell everything.”

“I will.”

“Bravo, honey mou. Bravo.”

At Assumption Church, no doubt against his wishes, Milton Stephanides was given a full Orthodox funeral. Father Greg performed the service. As for Father Michael Antoniou, he was later convicted of attempted grand larceny and served two years in prison. Aunt Zo divorced him and moved to Florida with Desdemona. Where to exactly? New Smyrna Beach. Where else? A few years later, when my mother was forced to sell our house, she moved to Florida, too, and the three of them lived together as they once had on Hurlbut Street, until Desdemona’s death in 1980. Tessie and Zoë are still in Florida today, two women living on their own.