No Place Like Home (25 page)

I smiled. “Thanks. But it’s not the same thing.”

“Sure it is.” Something crossed his mind, and he scowled.

“What is it?”

“Nothing.” He shook his head. “You never see yourself like everybody else does, Mom.” To my amazement, his eyes filled with tears, and I knew it was the sorrow coming out, the sorrow over Michael, over the big changes Shane was facing in his life, the fact that our chances to sit like this, talking quietly in the softness of a summer dawn, were narrowing. “You’re cool, Mom. And beautiful. And I like it that you didn’t cave in to what everybody else wanted for you. I wouldn’t even be here if you had.”

And my own eyes grew wet. “Thank you. That’s one of the nicest things anyone has ever said to me.”

We didn’t hug. Not right then, even if I would have liked it. It would have been too icky. “Are you hungry?”

“Starving.”

I stood. “Let’s go get something to eat, then. Maybe later you can play some of what you wrote this morning.”

“It’s not ready yet. I will when it is.” He sat up, his hands in his lap. “Mom?”

Twisting my hair into a knot, I turned with raised eyebrows.

“I was a jerk about—well, that one morning.” He bowed his head, lifted a shoulder. “If you like the guy, you should do what you want.”

“Mmm.” He meant well, so all I said was, “Thanks.”

“But I hope you’ll be careful,” he added. “I mean, I just don’t think the guy’s gonna stick around, after . . .”

“No, I’m sure he won’t.”

He let go of a held breath. “Green eggs and ham?”

I wrinkled my nose. “How about some blueberry muffins?”

Looping an arm around my neck, he said, “You make the muffins. I’ll handle the eggs. Michael likes them. He’ll need to eat when he gets back.”

There were a million things left to do and I had no time for anything except panicked, last minute wedding business the rest of the day. I ran from shop to house to church to hall in the heat, heat that finally broke at five, when a swift downpour cooled the air off for the rehearsal dinner. I’d been worried about the wedding preparations all week, knowing I’d have to deal with the presence of my father, but the mercurial fluid of family provided a buffer for us and it never even became a problem. I relaxed and laughed with my sisters about a million things. Jane was jittery but almost ablaze with happiness.

Saturday morning dawned clear and dry. By prior arrangement, Jordan was going to pick me up and we’d get ready at the church with our sisters, in order to leave the car for Michael and Shane. Malachi would ride his motorcycle in. I showered and washed my hair, combing out the long, tangled curls as I sat with Michael, who ate an entire plate of scrambled eggs and had a kind of cheery good humor that bode well for this day. When Jordan honked, fifteen minutes late, I grabbed my bag of makeup and kissed him on the forehead. “See you later.”

He grabbed my hand. “Be yourself, Jewel. Promise me.”

“Who else could I be?”

“You know what I mean. The real you. Don’t let them take all that away.”

“I promise, Michael. Cross my heart and hope to die.”

“Stick a needle in your eye?”

Jordan honked again, urgently. “Yes. I have to go. See you at the church.”

Be myself
. As we drove into town, commenting on the predictions for heat, then torrential rains that were the day’s forecast, I mulled that over. I pretended I knew what it meant, but did I? There were so many ghosts of me in a family gathering like this that I had a hard time picking which one was the real Jewel. I’d run into all of them over the past few months. There was the little girl who loved Mass and hung upside down in the orchard at her aunt’s house. The socially responsible preadolescent who earnestly participated in food drives and reading programs. The wild child who became the restless one who turned into the woman who could throw a backpack over her shoulder and climb on the back of a motorcycle and leave home without a backward glance. The mother, the wild woman, the little girl, the business owner, the friend, the lover, the sister, the daughter.

It made my head hurt. And we all have these splits in our personalities, I know that—no one is all one thing or all something else—but there was a bigger schism in me than in most of the women in my world, and I didn’t know where the bridges lay between the parts of myself. The daughter and the lover did not seem to coexist all that peacefully, for example. If I denied one, the other had to go, and I wasn’t willing to do either.

The wedding was to be held at one of the best churches in town. It was my favorite place as a child, but in my years away, they’d pulled down the old brick building, leaving only the gymnasium, and built a grand and beautiful new building, which I naturally hated. The Shrine of Saint Terese. When I was a girl, the priest was a small Irish man with a wonderful, lilting brogue who was much beloved by the parishioners, and he was still around, though the duties had been overtaken by a younger priest.

This morning, I discovered that the church was beautiful after all, a slate colored arch against the brilliance of the sky. Jordan and I followed the sound of women’s voices down a hallway to a room bursting with the notes of a dozen perfumes and powders and cosmetics and high, lilting chatter, the dazzlement of stockings and ribbons and girls in pristine bras and women powdering their bosoms against the heat.

I stopped just inside the door and closed my eyes, breathing it in. It smelled like Sunday mornings. Someone had brought doughnuts, and their fresh sugary smell mixed with a hint of coffee and baby powder. I thought of patent leather shoes and ribbons for my hair, and I laughed in purest joy when my grandmother said, “Jewel Sabatino, stop mooning around and get over here and get dressed.”

I put down my bag of cosmetics and looked for Jane, peeking around her young attendants who looked like calla lilies in their satins. Jane sat on a chair near the table with the doughnuts, dressed in a long slip, stockings, and shoes. Her hair was swept into a French knot through which had been strung tiny pearls, work I recognized as my mother’s. She was eating a glazed doughnut with a serene kind of radiance that was totally at odds with the uproar around her. “Hey, kid,” I said. “Aren’t you supposed to be freaking out by now?”

She grinned at me. “I think they have that covered.”

I laughed. “Should we give Mama her dress now?”

“Get dressed first, so Nana doesn’t have a coronary. Then we’ll do it.”

“I have a surprise for you.” I gave her a box that contained the corset, black leather mini, garter belt, and fishnet stockings. “Don’t open it until the fourth day of your honeymoon.”

“Fourth, huh?” She raised wicked eyebrows. “I can’t wait.”

“Jewel!” Nana Lucy bellowed.

“Okay, okay!” I shimmied out of my jeans and T-shirt, revealing the scarlet corset and black panties beneath. I’d made a special trip to get a second corset. Jane cracked up, and my grandmother huffed, and Jordan gave a little squeal. “I
want
that!”

My mother, pins in her mouth, looked at me. For a minute, I couldn’t tell if she was annoyed, and a pinch caught me. It was meant as a little joke, not any kind of defiance. Then she shook her head, but she was smiling. “Daredevil.”

I grinned and clasped my hands on the lower swell of my breasts. “Good support, eh?”

Nana put the dress over my head while another girl helped Jordan with hers, and we turned toward the long mirrors to look at ourselves. My mother had changed the colors for both of us, that beautiful blue for me, a deep rich gold for Jordan, and we smiled at each other in the mirror. “You’re so beautiful,” I said.

“So are you.”

For the first time, I saw why people often thought we were twins. Standing there in blue and gold, our shoulders glowing against the satin, long curls and plenty of cleavage and identical smiles. “Wow,” I said. “When did you start looking so much like me?”

“No, you look like me, lucky thing.”

The brazen rose tattoo on my breast caught my eye and I brushed my fingers over it, turning to dig in my bag for the cover. Carefully, so as not to mar the edge of the dress, I bent into the mirror and started dabbing it on.

Jane, watching calmly from her corner until that minute, stood up. “Jewel, what are you doing?”

“Covering it up.”

“No! I love that tattoo.” Drawing herself up to her full height, she swiveled her blond head around to my mother and grandmother and Jasmine, who had opened her mouth but then closed it. “I’m the bride and I get to say. Leave it.”

“But Daddy—” I said.

“Is fussy and old-fashioned and really needs to get over himself.”

I heard Michael say in my head,
Be yourself.
With a tissue, I wiped away the cover. “You’re the boss, babe.”

FROM THE
PUEBLO CHIEFTAIN
, AUGUST 29:

Sabatino-Candelario

Steven Candelario, son of Rick and Shirley Candelario, Pueblo, and Jane Sabatino, daughter of Romeo and Rose Sabatino, also of Pueblo, were married recently in a Mass at the Shrine of Saint Terese in Pueblo.

Maid of honor: Jennifer Corsi; bridesmaids: Jasmine Abruzzo, Jo Gutierrez, Sally Pacheco, Jordan Olivas, Jewel Sabatino, Elizabeth Hair, and Sharyn Cerniglia.

Best man: Mario Quintana; groomsmen: Brandon Mascarenas, Peter Stroo, Adam Pino, Robert Santos, John Romero, Alex Candelario, and Elias Candelario.

The newlyweds will reside in Pueblo.

Chapter 18

There is nothing in the world like a big Italian Catholic wedding. Unless maybe it’s a big Spanish Catholic wedding. That brilliant August day, we got both at once.

The church was packed, every pew brimming with well-dressed well-wishers. As we attendants marched up the aisle, I reveled in the beauty of them all, the children in their first patent leather shoes and precious toddler-sized suits and ties; the grandmas in their pearls and pumps and matching handbags and hats; the young girls self-consciously beautiful in dressy dresses they didn’t get to wear very often; the boys tugging at their ties when the girls looked their way.

We took our places and turned to wait for the bridal entrance. It made me nervous, knowing my father would escort Jane up the aisle, and to calm myself, I looked into the crowd. In the second pew were Shane, Michael, and Malachi.

Malachi. I’d never seen him dressed up and the sight was not calming. He’d had a haircut and a shave, and looked as smooth and clean as a spread in
GQ
. The suit was sand-colored linen, with a silk shirt and a red tie beneath it. With a start, I realized it had belonged to Andre, though it had never looked quite like this on him. Spying me, Malachi looked me over very slowly, head to toe, lingering at the expanse of tattooed cleavage as he licked his bottom lip.

With a dignified lift of my chin, I looked at my son, who sat on the other side of Michael, and grinned. Shane had slicked back his long dark hair and put on a black suit with a charcoal shirt and tie. He looked like nothing more than a modern day version of a gangster, and when he pulled out a mock gun and shot me, I realized he’d done it on purpose.

Between them sat Michael, so thin that his suit hung on his bony shoulders, a fact I was sure pained him. And yet he managed to look dapper in spite of it, a red handkerchief sticking out of his pocket, a red carnation in his lapel. A bowler hat rested in his lap. He gave me a thumbs up and touched his chest to indicate the tattoo.

Impossible he would not always be here in my life. For a long time, I held his gaze, hoping he knew how much I loved him.

Then the music swelled and Jane came in on my father’s arm, and my eyes blurred dangerously. He had a proud look on his face, the father who’d managed to raise a virgin bride in the modern world. A beautiful, dutiful, wonderful girl who would go to her wedding bed unsullied. A woman who was feverish with joy in this moment, a woman who would say her vows and mean them, who would take her place in the world he understood in ways he understood.

They marched up the aisle triumphantly, dotted with colored light falling through stained glass, and for me the world narrowed in a strange, powerful way. Narrowed to the smell of incense and candles, to this bride and her groom, who shattered us all. Brides are radiant, joyful, beautiful. This groom was all of that and more. His face held hectic color, and none of us missed the way he had to keep wiping his eyes as she advanced or when she took his arm with pride and excitement. We endured the Mass, all of us, and then the vows were said, and when Jane, in a clear, fluting voice said, “I do,” her poor groom had tears of joy on his cheeks, and he wasn’t ashamed of them. When it was his turn, he said, “Yes!” so loudly that a pleased roll of laughter went through the room.

There wasn’t a dry eye in the house. Especially mine. I tried for a while to discreetly wipe away the emotional tears with a tissue, but the thing got so soaked and everybody else was so obviously moved, too, that I gave up and let them drip.

And I admit it, one of the things I wanted, standing there, was to be married like this, in a church with a Mass by a priest. The real thing. I wanted to take my place in this community,
my
community.

But did I even fit anymore? Had I ever?

I just didn’t know. I didn’t know where I fit or where I belonged or what the future would hold, and that was the terrifying part. Not knowing. Maybe that was the good side of tradition. My sisters and mother and grandmother all knew where they fit, what function they performed. Even Jordan, who had adopted a slightly unusual lifestyle with her mixed marriage and counterculture ways—she was Sylvia, and all the healers before her. Jasmine was the pampered beauty who raised the social standard. Jane was the salt of the earth, and somehow I knew she’d be the mother of many sons. My mother was the wizard, running everything, and would take her place in the matriarch position when my grandmother vacated it.

I’d never be matriarch, queen of the clan. I’d never be salt of the earth or the healing woman or the social standard. I’d always be the bad girl, the woman the others pointed to as an example of what not to do—because it was a sure way to end up alone. Take a chance on a wild man—and he’ll leave you behind. Take a chance on the big world, and what did it get you? Right back where you started, only your father will never speak to you again, so you’ll have lost, no matter how much you were trying to win.

Standing there branded with my rose tattoo, I lifted my chin and focused on my beautiful sister, on her beautiful, wonderful day. It wasn’t as hard as you might think to smile and be glad for her.

From the wedding, we all drove to an old warehouse–turned–banquet hall in Blende. My mother had wanted the Colorado Building at the fairgrounds, but since the state fair was starting the following week, there was no possibility of that. And it wasn’t, I thought, ducking out of the blistering noontime sun, that there was much difference between them. This was a long rectangular building, with a stage at one end and the kitchens at the other. My sisters and I had been in here for hours the night before, hanging the decorations—reliable crepe paper and silver cardboard wedding bells and even some thin, gauzy fabric over the windows. A band in crisp summer uniforms was assembling on the raised dais that served as a stage, and the cake—a masterpiece of intricate layers—was situated beneath a pagoda of the same thin netting.

Within a half hour, the buffet was opened and a long snaking line formed around the edges of the room. It moved slowly and left no one unsatisfied. Our whole family had been cooking for a week, but so had Steve’s, and it was as if all of Pueblo culture had come together right there at my sister’s wedding—tamales in their husks piled next to enormous trays of lasagna and a steaming Crock-Pot of green chile stew, with piles of thick, homemade tortillas next to a huge tray of antipasti, my grandmother’s special cracked olives at the center.

So much food. It perfumed the air. I filled a plate for Michael with a little of everything, hoping to tempt him into eating something, and carried it with my own brimming plate back to the table where he was holding court.

I don’t know how many times I’d seen him do this. He just settled somewhere and people gathered around. Once, I thought it was his great beauty that drew them—a beauty both earthy and ethereal, so striking you couldn’t help staring a little when he first came into a room. But I’d learned it wasn’t his beauty. Even now, when his illness had left him scarecrow thin, and he sat in a wheelchair, people still gathered around the flame of Michael, as if he truly were the king of fairies, the benevolent granter of all wishes.

I halted a few feet away, admiring him amid his admirers. Some of them, especially those about my age, knew he’d enjoyed a few minutes of fame and wanted to breathe it in, but even they were drawn in by that indefinable something. I plucked an olive off my plate, watching as a little girl gave him a Tootsie Roll pop, and her little brother, no more than four, showed off his truck. A cluster of guys my age or so approached and offered their adulation.

He caught my eye and winked. I put his plate down for him. “Your highness.”

He chuckled, sounding like himself, and I forced myself to simply sit down and enjoy the moment without judging his condition every five seconds. “D’you see your child?” he asked, immediately picking up his fork. He lifted his chin toward the platform at the back.

“What is he doing?”

“Looks to me like he’s gonna play.”

And that was exactly how it looked. Shane was bustling around with the other members of the band, connecting equipment, testing mikes and sound levels, moving with such sure expertise that I was a little taken aback. “Did he tell you anything?”

“Not a thing.” Michael shook his head, a smile on his mouth. “Maybe it’s just seeing him on a stage, but he really looks like Billy to me today.”

Malachi, who had two brimming plates filled with everything from chicken wings to tamales to three kinds of salad—potato, bean, and green—said, “Who does?”

I gestured toward the stage and grinned again at how wonderfully clean and dangerous Shane looked. The girls had to be swooning. “Who gave him the Al Capone idea?”

The brothers shrugged and said together, “Not me.”

“It looks good on him.”

A woman in a navy linen dress and spectator pumps, her hair cut into a glossy black fall, came up to the table. “Jewel?” Her perfectly madeup face said she expected me to remember her. She touched her chest. “You don’t remember me, do you?”

But her voice brought her into focus. “Oh, my God!” I laughed and stood up to give her an impetuous hug. “Callie Perez, right?” I stepped back to admire her. “You grew up great.”

“It’s Martinez now,” she said, but with that breathless laugh that showed she was pleased. “I was such a dweeb in high school, it wouldn’t have been too hard to improve.”

“No, you weren’t,” I protested, and looked at Michael. “You two would have loved each other. She’s read everything in the universe.”

He gave a polite nod, having learned that not everyone wanted to shake hands with a person who obviously had AIDS, but Callie immediately stuck out her hand. “You’re Michael Shaunnessey. I’m awed.”

He winked. “Don’t be, darlin’.”

“Oh, but it’s fun.” Her smile was white and genuine. She turned to Malachi. “Hi, I’m Callie.”

“Nice to meet you,” he said with every ounce of his southern charm on stun. She blinked a little and I gave him a look. He wiggled his eyebrows over her head, unabashed.

Callie turned her attention to me. “I won’t keep you,” she said. “But I promised myself I would come tell you something.”

Intrigued, I prompted, “What?”

She glanced toward the guys, hesitating, and with that particular kind of female body language that’s so unmistakable, stepped back a few feet. I followed, as I was meant to do. “I can remember that day in front of the school like it was yesterday,” she said. “October. The light coming through the leaves, and Billy Jake standing there by his motorcycle, his hair lifting on the wind. . . .” She grinned, shaking her head fondly. “My heart was in my throat, watching you walk toward him. We just froze, all of us, that whole lawn full of kids, watching you take something so boldly that none of us would dare.”

Unexpected emotion welled in my throat and I swallowed.

“It was like a movie, Jewel. And you weren’t just my hero that day. You gave a lot of us courage.”

I hugged her, as much to hide my sudden tears as to thank her. “You will never know how much I needed to hear that today.”

“Oh, I think I do.” We separated, only a little awkward, and she stepped back, as if I were the ex–rock star, not Michael. She gave a little shrug. “I just wanted to tell you.”

“Thank you.”

When I sat back down, I couldn’t help glancing over to where my father sat at the head table with Jane and Steven. My father was laughing at a joke someone made and his whole face lit up, making his eyes crinkle, showing off his fine, straight teeth. He leaned over to return the joke in some way, stabbing his finger in the air to emphasize the point, and both of them cracked up even more.

He was getting old. There were wings of white across the sides of his head and sprinkles of it through the rest. His hands, ever capable, were looking a little gnarled at some of the joints.

Malachi reached under the table for my hand. “Does having Daddy in the room mean you’re not going to dance with me today?”

“No way.”

“No way, you won’t dance with me?” His eyes glittered. “Or no way Daddy’ll stop you?”

I looked at his mouth. “No way he’s going to stop me.”

“Good girl.” He pretended to take something out of his pocket, mimed licking a pencil. “I’ll save you a reel, then, before my dance card gets full.”

I remembered his expert dancing at the club that night. “You’re going to be busier than you know, sweetie.”