He lights a cigarette, unaware of what he’s missing.
Whatever choof off meant, he’s not going to do it.
I’m barely disappointed. There was never a chance of help from the outside. It’s Dario and me alone against the Colonia, and Massimo has already promised to split us apart with an annulment.
I do church chores in silence. I mop the Dome floor, thinking of my blood and Dario’s mingled on the center stone. I help with the school kids, wondering if we will ever have children together. When I stand in the kitchen, I place him two floors beneath me and imagine he’s looking up while I look down. I make myself small and scarce while my brain turns and turns.
I’ve never felt this cut off from the decisions of the community, and never this connected to the consequences.
Dr. Palmeri’s Precious Blood office stays closed and locked, but he might be at the 18th Street clinic. I doubt he’s in trouble for last night. Massimo is in Daddy’s office in the rectory down the hall. No one who can tell me a thing speaks to me all day.
“You all right?” Denise asks before blowing her nose.
“I’m fine. I think I’m just tired. I didn’t sleep last night.” That’s the truth. It’s just incomplete.
“You should come over for dinner.” She wipes her nose with the balled-up tissue. “You won’t have to cook, at least.”
Cooking with Grandma, who’ll have her own questions about what I said to Dr. Palmeri last night after she was kicked out of my bedroom, isn’t something I’m looking forward to. If there’s one thing she finds less appealing than a chatty woman, it’s a sullen one.
“Yeah,” I say. “I’d like that.”
On Marco’s third after-dinner amaretto, I start to worry. I know it’s affecting him because he’s turned from surly to verbose. When Denise and I come back from putting the kids to bed, he’s pouring another. I stiffen and look at her with a worried expression. She returns the tiniest of shrugs and goes right to the kitchen, which looks like a bomb hit it.
After a tense dinner, we’d piled the dinner dishes by the sink, which is filled with multicolored sippy cups, a half-eaten bowl of cereal, and a three-quart pot crusted with a black and red ring at the bottom. The huge stock pot of lentils sits on the stove. Brown glop has dried in drip-shapes on the side. A few escaped lentils are stuck to the burners.
I’m grateful she’s cooking for Dario, but I’m also annoyed by her complicity.
Would they have her make more food for a man who just “signed his own death warrant?”
Maybe. I should ask her when the meals were requested and when they’re to be delivered.
I tip the roasting pan so the grease drips to the corner.
“Here.” Denise reaches into the fridge and clicks an unlabeled twenty-eight-ounce tin can in front of me. At the bottom sits an inch of translucent white fat flecked with meaty brown spots.
“Thanks.” I pour out the fat while Denise runs the sink water hot. I sigh, remembering the dishwasher in our safe house. What a luxury. On any other day, washing dishes on my feet for an hour wouldn’t be a bother, but right now, even standing still makes me want to jump out a window.
Marco shouts at the television.
“Someone’s gonna sleep good tonight.” Denise scoffs, putting away the leftovers.
“Do you want to come home with me?” I whisper. “You can come back early.”
“Why?” She seems truly baffled.
“Does he get… ‘that way’ when he’s… like this?”
“Not at all. The sweeter the sauce, the sweeter the boss. Now, tomorrow morning I have to get out before he wakes up with a headache.”
I’m about to ask about the lentils when Marco appears in the doorway—glass refilled—and grabs his wife’s bottom with his free hand.
“Ain’t she something?” He slaps open the freezer and grabs a handful of ice.
“She is.”
When the cubes drop into his glass, the amaretto splashes onto the floor. “Ayy, stupid ice.”
“Don’t worry,” Denise says. “I’ll clean it up.”
“Damn right. You’ll be on your hands and knees to do it too.” He kisses her head then turns to me. “You need a lift home?”
“No. Thanks. Timothy is waiting for me.” I snap a paper towel off the roll to wipe out the roasting pan.
“Massimo’s pulling out the stops, eh? Still thinks of you as a princess.” He takes a healthy swig of amaretto. “Like your shit don’t stink.”
“Depends what I eat.”
He laughs so hard he nearly spits his drink.
“Man. You’re something. Were you always a crackup?”
“She was.” Denise dumps a sippy cup of apple juice before sponging it out. “Just not in front of you.”
“Why’s that?”
“Daddy and my grandmother didn’t like when I joked,” I say, sensing danger in his question. “They thought I was drawing too much attention to myself.”
“Yeah, well, I get that. But Sergio likes funny. He’s a guy I can have a beer with, you know? You guys are gonna work out great.”
My insides turn to ice, but I don’t stop wiping out the roasting pan, and I won’t stop until my guts thaw. That may never happen. I may be a robot forever.
Is this the death warrant? I can barely keep my legs under me, much less think around corners.
“We’ll see.” I won’t commit to acquiescence or show resistance.
“You will. See, I love your brother and all.” He leans on the counter next to me. Micro drops of spit fly from his lips when he talks… and the sweetness of the sauce has taken the leash off the boss. “But he’s a little… you know… acts hard but inside, he’s soft. Like a little girl baby. And like I said, I love the guy, but Sergio’s the winning bet. He’s like a soft funny guy on the outside, but on the inside? Mah-ron.” He shakes his hand as if he just burned it. “Like the bear in that DiCaprio movie I let you watch. What was it called, babe?”
“The Revenant?” Denise replies.
“What kinda title is that? Shoulda been called ‘Bear Fucking Up a Guy,’ right?”
“It’s true,” Denise agrees. “That bear wasn’t giving up.”
“On DiCaprio’s damn spine, he wasn’t giving up. So, like I was saying, Agosti’s the bet. He really can’t lose, as long as he hooks you, which he’s gonna do, because all it takes is that fucker in the basement getting out of the way. Then boom, done. And I made the bet early, so I’m in. Boom!” He raises his hands. “He takes his shot! He scores! Marco Caliveri, right hand man. Calling shots and connecting dots.”
He’ll go on all night, and I should let him just talk and talk until he says one thing too many. But I can’t smile and nod. Not while my insides are vibrating with terror.
“Don’t count your chickens.”
“Who’s a chicken? Bok-bok-bok!”
He’s drunker than I thought. Denise doesn’t seem scared of the wild chaos he’s exhibiting, so I don’t have to be either.