LAST DANCE, LAST CHANCE - and Other True Cases Read online

  1

  It was so hot,and the air was heavy and muggy with humidity. Even rain didn’t cleanse the air; it only became thicker and harder to breathe. The woman who lay on the couch had been sick for so long that she couldn’t remember feeling well. Sometime earlier—last week or maybe last month—she had been able to walk. But now her feet and legs had become leaden stumps, unwilling to accept any messages from her brain.

  Her brain wasn’t working very well, either. She knew she was still living in her old familiar neighborhood, but it all looked as if it were underwater or as if someone had painted it a different color. She remembered that when she could still navigate, the street signs were wavy and jarring, and she got lost. She remembered vaguely that she had walked into a neighbor’s kitchen, a neighbor she barely knew. She didn’t know why she was there, and the woman who lived there certainly didn’t either. It was embarrassing to be led home.

  When she looked into a mirror, her own face looked alien to her. It was all bloated and puffy, with black circles carved beneath her dark eyes. She looked a hundred years old, but she couldn’t remember growing old. She couldn’t remember when she got sick.

  Sometimes people came and went, and her friends’ faces seemed to float above her, their expressions worried and concerned.

  How do you feel? they asked, but she couldn’t answer them. She couldn’t describe how she felt. Sick. Sick. Sick. And so tired that she could not imagine cooking a meal or making a bed or walking to the mailbox ever again. When she could fix her mind on her children, she wept inside for them. They no longer had a mother, only a useless, swollen blob who sat propped up in a recliner chair while the world went on without her.

  The doctors didn’t seem to know what to do about her. The one man she trusted most assured everyone that she was doing just fine, and that he would take care of her. Sometimes he said that all she needed was to have her gall bladder removed. He didn’t think there was anything really wrong with her. And he, of all people, would surely know.

  But nothing changed. She sat in her chair for what seemed like months. He lay on the couch nearby, rarely leaving her alone. Sometimes it seemed to her that he was watching over her with concern, and sometimes he didn’t seem to notice her any more than if she were a piece of furniture. The ice clinked in his drink as he watched television, clicking the channel changer often. His voice slurred, and he dozed off, but he never did anything, despite the questions people kept asking him.

  Why don’t you take her to the hospital? they asked him.

  They have a skeleton staff on the weekends, he told them. She’s much better off here with me…

  And so, day after day, the sun came up with pale washed skies, grew bright and hot at noon, and faded until the room was again in shadow. And Debbie Pignataro was still there.

  At length, with what rational thought she could manage, she began to believe that she would die there, surrounded by people who loved her—people whom she loved—and yet somehow beyond all hope of rescue.

  2

  Deborah Rago was born in Erie County, New York, on July 22, 1957. Her mother, Caroline, was a housewife, and her dad, Frank, supported the family with hard physical labor. She had an older brother, and she was the little girl her parents had hoped for. They were both children of the fifties, that rather innocent time in America sandwiched between World War II and the Vietnam War, the calm between storms.

  In 1957, the year Deborah was born, the first reports suggesting that smoking might contribute to lung cancer appeared, but smokers weren’t really alarmed. Actor Humphrey Bogart, a heavy smoker, died of throat cancer that year. But a huge segment of the population still smoked, sure that it wouldn’t happen to them.

  Father Knows Best and The Roy Rogers Show were popular on television, and Leave It to Beaver was in its first season. Elvis Presley’s performances on the small screen were deliciously shocking and were only allowed to be filmed from the waist up on The Ed Sullivan Show. John F. Kennedy was a senator, and Billy Graham was a young evangelist. Americans were somewhat worried about Russia and Cuba, but most people felt safe. Young families had four or more children without a thought to the dangers of population explosion. “Young Love” was top-ranked on Your Hit Parade during most of 1957. Pat Boone was a rosy-cheeked twenty-two, and he still wore white bucks. So did a lot of people.

  There was crime and murder and scandal in the fifties—there always is—but it wasn’t omnipresent, because the vast majority of American citizens only read about it in the newspapers or listened to coverage on the radio. Tabloid television was yet to be heard of.

  Debbie Rago grew up cosseted by her extremely close and loving family. Her father worked in construction. He was considered an artist at building forms for concrete and in the timing of its pouring and hardening. Caroline worked part time in Krasner’s, a ladies’ dress shop, and Debbie’s brother, Carmine*, five years older than she was, was a typically protective big brother. They all lived in a nice little house in Williamsville, out Kensington Avenue northeast of Buffalo. “We lived there from the time I was one,” Debbie recalled.

  Frank Rago belonged to the laborers’ union, Local 210, an all-Italian union, and it provided backup and friends. Like many other East Coast cities, Buffalo was—and still is—part Italian, part Irish, and part Polish, part African American with strong ethnic neighborhoods.

  Debbie and Carmine went to Maple West Elementary School, Mill Middle School, and Williamsville South High School, as did all their friends. At Christmas, their extended family got together—all the aunts and uncles and cousins—and Caroline Rago roasted a turkey and made two hundred raviolis.

  Their lifestyle changed dramatically when Frank Rago had a massive heart attack when he was only thirty-eight. Everyone was afraid he wasn’t going to make it, but he survived. However, he never came all the way back to the strong man he had once been. Debbie’s father was disabled and couldn’t return to the rigors of construction.

  Frank became a house-husband long before the concept was generally accepted. Carmine was grown and out of the house, and Frank stayed home to look after Debbie while Caroline worked full time at the mall. Their roles changed, but their family stayed as solid as the concrete that Frank had once poured. Debbie grew closer to her father because he was home taking care of her, unlike her friends’ fathers, who were at work all day. She accepted that there were luxuries she couldn’t have and that she wouldn’t have an easy ride to college. Instead, she had to work for spending money and bought her own clothes and helped her parents as soon as she was old enough.

  “I went to work when I was 16,” Debbie said. “I sold clothes at the mall, too—and then I got a job in a pharmacy. I was a pharmacy technician, and I stayed with Georgetown-Leader from 1975 to 1982.”

  Carmine grew up to be a very tall, husky man and went to work for the Niagara Falls Transit Authority (NFTA) as a bus driver. He was still protective of Debbie, even though she had a feisty personality and insisted she could take care of herself. Caroline and Frank Rago had done a good job raising their children despite Frank’s illness. They didn’t have a big house and financial security, but that didn’t matter. Their church and their extended family meant a lot to them, and to Carmine and Debbie, too.

  Debbie Rago was very pretty, with dark hair, huge eyes, and a great smile. She was five feet four and weighed only a little over a hundred pounds. Like all teenagers, she perceived flaws when she looked in the mirror, and she hated her nose, sure that it was too big, and unable to see how attractive she really was. Debbie dated only casually through her teens, and she had never fallen in love.

  After high school graduation, Debbie lived at home and paid her share. She was skilled at counting out pills, checking them to be sure they matched prescriptions, and dealing with customers. The Ragos were such a solid family unit that she had no particular desire to find an apartment of her own. There would be time for that later.

  Debbie was 20 before she met the man who seemed to e
mbody everything she had ever hoped for—and more. On Friday and Saturday nights, her crowd of friends stopped in one bar or another, not really to drink but to socialize and dance and, hopefully, to meet someone special. It was a summer when young people were consumed with disco dancing, inspired by movies like Grease and Saturday Night Fever. Many years later, it was easy for Debbie to remember every detail of the night she met Anthony Pignataro. Their meeting followed the scenario she had carried in her head for years. It was like a scene from a movie.

  It was in early July, 1978. Debbie knew right away that Anthony was perfect for her. “I met him first in the parking lot of The Lone Star,” she recalled. “I was with a girlfriend and I was driving and I cut the wheel too hard and hit a wall—just grazed it a little bit. Anthony was watching, and he kidded me about my driving. He said I hit the wall because I was too busy looking at him.”

  In a way that was true. Anthony was “very good looking,” almost six feet tall, and Debbie was instantly attracted to him. He had a full head of hair and classic, balanced features, and she thought he could have been a movie star—he was that great looking.

  But he was dating one of her acquaintances, so technically he was off limits. Debbie stood at the edge of the crowd and watched Anthony a little wistfully as he danced with Karen.

  In the days to come, she saw Anthony often at the night spots where they all went on weekends. And then, on the Fourth of July weekend, he asked her to dance. Just as Debbie had pictured it, she fit into his arms perfectly. She had never felt like that with a man before.

  Although she could be strong-willed, Debbie had never been assertive with a man; she was much too shy. That night, she surprised herself. “We were dancing, and the record changed from slow to fast. I remember that it was Donna Summers singing ‘Last Dance.’ I guess the song title got to me; if I didn’t speak up, he would be out of my life. So I looked up at Anthony and I said, ‘I wish I’d met you before Karen did…’”

  He smiled down at her and seemed pleased. She sensed that he apparently felt the same way she did.

  Anthony broke up with Karen that night. He asked Debbie to go out with him on July 8. Would she like to see the movie Grease? She accepted happily.

  It was a golden summer for them. Anthony and Debbie went out several times a week and talked on the phone every single day. With the winters in Buffalo so bitterly cold, summers were packed with events scheduled to take advantage of the balmy weather. They went dancing, of course, and to movies, picnics, concerts, and the beach.

  When they talked about birthdays, Anthony said his was on May 12—her mother’s birthday! Such a coincidence had to mean something. Debbie was surprised to learn that Anthony was actually ten months younger than she was, although he seemed far more sophisticated. He was going to college at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. He was a junior, majoring in mathematics, although he didn’t seem very interested in math. He belonged to one of the top fraternities there: Phi Gamma Delta—whose members were known as Fijis. She dreaded the fall when he would be going back to college, worried that he would drift away from her. Sometimes she was afraid that she was only a summertime girlfriend.

  Anthony’s world was so different from Debbie’s. He had never known anything but wealth and privilege. His father, Ralph Pignataro, was a prominent surgeon in the Buffalo area, and Anthony had grown up in a lovely home in West Seneca. He’d attended the Nichols School, a private school where the tuition was $11,000 to $15,000 a year. Anthony had an older sister, Antoinette, and younger brothers, Ralph Jr. and Steven. None of them had ever known what it was like to wish for something their parents couldn’t afford. Dr. Ralph Pignataro wanted his family to have the best. Anthony told Debbie that his father was wonderful and that he could always count on him for advice. He idolized the older man, and Dr. Ralph was beloved throughout Buffalo.

  Her first months with Anthony were a wonderfully exciting time for Debbie. She was so much in love that her parents worried sometimes that she might end up with a broken heart. When Anthony left in late September, it was as if somebody had turned the sunshine off in her world. Debbie continued to work in the drugstore, but she lived for the weekends and vacations when Anthony came home from Lehigh.

  Debbie and Anthony wrote to each other at least three times a week, and talked on the phone when they could. Anthony came home for Thanksgiving, Christmas, and then Easter. He seemed to be just as interested in Debbie as he had been during their first summer. And she certainly never looked at another man.

  In June 1979, they were together again and jubilant that their romance had survived the long school year. During their second summer together, Debbie and Anthony were with each other constantly. Both sets of parents felt left out sometimes because the couple seemed joined at the hip and spent little time with their families, but they knew it was the natural progression of life. It was only natural that Anthony and Debbie could see only each other.

  Frank Rago was an old-fashioned Italian patriarch and very protective of Debbie. In the beginning, it was fine with Frank for Debbie to date Anthony, but she was afraid her father would hit the roof when she asked to visit Anthony at Lehigh for a weekend. He gave his permission only after she explained that a girlfriend was going with her and that the two girls would share a hotel room off campus.

  By that time, Anthony was in his senior year. They weren’t kids, and they could be responsible for their private relationship. Anthony wanted Debbie to be there when he performed in one of his avocations: boxing. He boxed at Lehigh and was a champion in his weight class. He’d won the Eastern Regional NCAA middleweight tournament in his junior year, and he’d lost only one fight in thirty.

  In 1980, he was so sure he would win his final college boxing match that he insisted Debbie be there at ringside, bragging to her that he’d seen the other finalist and had no doubt he was going to win. He promised Debbie he would give her the championship trophy over dinner afterward.

  Instead, Anthony received the worst beating of his life. His eyes were blackened and swollen, and he could barely see out of the slits between his eyelids. Debbie had rarely seen him lose at anything. His obvious discomfort and humiliation only made her love him more.

  Anthony graduated from Lehigh University in May 1980. Debbie attended the graduation ceremony with his parents, Dr. Ralph and Lena Pignataro. Henry Kissinger was the commencement speaker. It was a glorious, sunny day, and Debbie was very proud of Anthony.

  Despite their intense attraction, Debbie and Anthony were to have a very long courtship. He explained that he didn’t want to marry her until he knew what he was going to do with his life, and he was having difficulty settling on a career. Debbie accepted that. She found Anthony so intelligent and realized that he could do any number of things well; he just wanted to be sure that he chose a profession suited to him. They spent a lot of time discussing Anthony’s future. He knew that his father wanted him to go into medicine. His sister, Antoinette, was already in her first year in med school. Dr. Ralph was happy about that, but what he really longed for was to have his son follow him into medicine.

  Anthony told Debbie that he didn’t want to let his father down, but he explained that he didn’t want to let himself down either. He believed that he had been blessed with special gifts and had intellectual capacities far beyond most men. He saw the tremendous future there would be in computer science, an embryonic industry in the late seventies. Most people had no idea how important computers were going to be, he told Debbie—and he knew he would be a natural. But he was also fascinated by the prospect of becoming a doctor. He admired his father tremendously, and Anthony liked the idea of two physicians—father and son—working side by side.

  Anthony believed he could do anything. He was supremely self-confident. Debbie admired that in him, but she also saw that some people they knew were turned off by Anthony’s ego. He could be full of such braggadocio. In the first years of their being together, she chose to see his confidence as strength rat
her than an overblown ego.

  In the end, Anthony decided to apply for medical school. His father was very pleased. Neither of his brothers had showed an iota of interest in becoming doctors, but once he had decided, Anthony glowed with enthusiasm about his chosen career. He filled out applications to several top medical schools, wondering which one he would choose when the acceptances came in.

  Dr. Ralph had always been very kind to Debbie. Anthony’s mother, however, was another matter. They had dated for weeks before he took her home to meet his parents, and Debbie would never forget the first time she went to the Pignataro home in West Seneca. She was impressed with how beautiful it was, with the landscaping and the swimming pool, and she wondered whether she would ever fit in. As she stood somewhat hesitantly in the foyer, she heard shouting from upstairs. It was Anthony’s mother, Lena. She was shouting at her husband: “What do you think I am? Stupid? I saw you with her!”

  Debbie and Anthony had come at a bad time. Anthony’s parents were having a fight. Debbie was so embarrassed that she wished she could sink into the floor.

  “But his father was very warm,” Debbie remembered, and she recalled what he said about Lena. “He told me that she had no manners—but that’s just the way she was.”

  Anthony had some of Lena’s bluntness as well as her lack of tact. As Debbie began to feel more secure with him, she also saw him with clearer eyes. She was humiliated sometimes when he made loud remarks that hurt people’s feelings. He never seemed to understand that he had done anything wrong. But they had been together for so long. She loved him and considered his occasional rudeness as one small part of his confident personality. She told herself that most people found Anthony completely charming.

  Sometimes, Debbie wondered if Anthony’s mother would ever accept her. Surprisingly, Lena came to be very fond of Debbie and often took her side when she and Anthony had a disagreement. As time passed, Debbie and Lena Pignataro became good friends, and Debbie understood why Lena was sometimes snappish with people. Her own background had been hardscrabble and miserable.