dismissed his men when Steven arrived. They were already about a hundred yards away, walking back the way they had come.
Adam gestured toward Danny. “Steven, Danny, you remember each other, right?”
Steven nodded and extended his hand. Danny took it in both of his and pumped it up and down. They hadn’t seen each other for years, but Adam had kept Steven up to date about Danny’s more irksome habits, as well as the favors he had asked.
“Adam doesn’t want to have a ceremony,” Danny told Steven. “‘Just a burial,’ he says. “It isn’t right. Will you tell him it isn’t right? Maybe he’ll listen to you. I’m only third generation in the funeral business, so what do I know?”
Adam started to protest, but Danny interrupted. “I’m not asking for me, Adam. This is for Hank and your grandmother and your parents.” Danny gestured at the headstones marking the graves of Adam’s family. “Don’t you think they would want some kind of service? This isn’t how you do a Jewish funeral.”
“Don’t,” Adam said. “Don’t. I don’t need a guilt trip.” He had been so young when his parents died. His memories of them were no more than faint impressions, and they were so enmeshed with stories his grandparents had told him that he didn’t know whether they even belonged to him. He remembered his grandparents telling him the driver who killed them had been drunk. He was sure of that. The memory of the crack in his grandfather’s voice, of his grandmother turning to the wall, trying to stifle her sob as Adam absorbed the words: that memory was his.
“They’re dead,” Adam said to Danny. He took a breath and tried to push the bitterness back down. “You can’t please them. Believe me. I’ve tried. The dead are implacable. Or maybe they just don’t want anything. It comes to the same thing.”
Danny set his jaw. It was an expression Adam knew well. He was digging in. “We’re not going to just bury him without any prayers,” Danny said. “It’s not right. I won’t go along with it. This is a kosher cemetery, Adam. There are some things that you just do. I shouldn’t have let you get your way about not having anyone else, but I’m not giving in on this. We’re having a service.”
Adam knew there was no way Danny could understand. Even Steven probably didn’t understand how personal this was, how private his grief felt. His grandfather had raised him, and Adam hadn’t been there when he was dying. If Adam could have, he would have placed the coffin in the ground himself. He would even have done it with Steven’s and Danny’s help—just the three of them, instead of Danny’s workers—but Danny had convinced him that it was clumsy and difficult work, and they would be likely to drop the coffin. They could bury him, though, Adam thought. He didn’t need strangers intruding on that: people for whom this meant nothing, or almost nothing, just some pious duty, some ritual they could participate in before getting on with the rest of their day. Adam didn’t need some rabbi reading stock phrases from a book. And he didn’t need anyone telling him to pray. Not today. If he had anything to address on high, it wouldn’t be pleasant. It wouldn’t be respectful or submissive. It definitely wouldn’t be any prayer he had ever heard of.
Steven interceded in a soft tone. “Look, Adam. A service couldn’t hurt, could it? Maybe later you’ll wish you did something more traditional. You certainly won’t regret it, right?”
Adam wanted to scream. Sure he could regret it, he wanted to say. He seemed to have a great capacity for regret. But he knew Danny and Steven meant well. “Be amiable,” his grandfather had often told him. “Don’t make things harder than they need to be.”
Adam looked in Danny’s eyes. Soon, this would be just one more horrible memory. “This is important to you, Danny?”
“Not just to me, Adam. It’s important.”
Adam nodded. “OK, Danny. Do it. Let’s go. But no long sermons, okay? No big productions.”
Danny took yarmulkes out of his pocket. He put one on and passed the others to Adam and Steven. Adam gave his back. He was wearing an old, worn Mets cap that he had bought to watch the Mets on television with his grandfather the last time they were in the World Series. He wasn’t taking it off.
“Adam,” Danny asked, “are you going to tear some part of your clothes?”
Adam was surprised that the custom felt right to him. He would want to carry a part of this day with him for a while. But he didn’t want to have to wear his t-shirt or jeans for the rest of the week. “My cap,” he said. “Do you have a scissors?”
Danny shook his head. “I forgot them.” He took the Mets cap and pulled hard with both beefy hands, slowly ripping the fabric about three inches up the side. He handed the cap back to Adam.
“Baruch Dayan Emet,” Danny intoned. “Blessed is the Righteous Judge.” He waited for Adam’s response. Steven looked at his feet.
“Amen,” Adam said. The whole cemetery seemed still except for a few birdcalls in the distance. Blessed is the Reaper, Adam thought. He looked again at the headstones. Blessed is the Destroyer. There was no one left. Adam was the last of the Draschers, now.
Danny said the prayer supplicating God’s mercy for the dead in his expressionless Sunday School Hebrew. Adam translated the phrases in his head as Danny read the words: “the Master of mercy will protect him forever . . . will tie his soul with the rope of life. The Everlasting is his heritage . . .”
Automatically, Adam responded “Amen” at the prayer’s close.
“I don’t think we should say Kaddish, Adam,” Danny said. We don’t have a minyan and the burial isn’t over, so you aren’t a mourner yet.”
“No. Not technically,” Adam said, keeping his voice even. Steven caught his eye and Adam made an effort to unclench his jaw. They were trying to help him, he reminded himself. But he imagined himself reciting the traditional mourner’s prayer, the Aramaic formula tumbling from his mouth like a nursery rhyme when his mouth tasted like ashes. There are limits to amiability, he thought. Out loud, louder than he meant to speak, he said, “let’s skip it.”
Danny fumbled with his prayer book. “Does anyone want to say something now?” He asked.
Adam shook his head. Steven didn’t respond.
Danny bowed his head as if he were addressing the coffin along with Adam and Steven. He said, “Hank was . . .” Adam looked up as Danny’s voice broke. He waited in awkward silence as Danny wiped his forehead and collected himself.
“Hank meant a lot to me,” Danny began again. “I was getting in trouble in school, and my parents were ashamed of me. They always told me I was lazy and ungrateful. They made it pretty clear they didn’t have much use for me. The school sent a letter home one day after I got into a fight, but I got to it before they did. I ran away the next morning.” Adam and Steven were silent, but Danny shrugged as if in answer to a question. “I had maybe thirty dollars on me,” he said. “I don’t know how far I would have gotten if Hank hadn’t found me when he was on his way back home from the newsstand. I knew him a little from the neighborhood and I knew that he knew my mom. I figured Hank would bring me home and I would catch hell, but he didn’t bring me home.” Danny choked back a sob. “He looked me in the eye like I mattered,” he said. “He put his hand on my shoulder and said he would walk me to school. He told me if I ever needed to get away for a while, I could visit. I could just hang out and watch TV, he said, until I felt ready to go home.” Danny turned to look at Adam. “I don’t know what he saw in
