Tommy Gabrini 4: Dapper Tom Begin Again (6 page)

After
exiting the airport and handing over their luggage to the cabbie, she and
Chelsey plopped down on the backseat of the smelly cab.
 
Then they both pulled out their smartphones
and got to work.
 
Liz owned Kutana, a
print magazine with a strong internet presence, and Chelsey was her Middle-East
bureau chief.
 
Both ladies had been best
friends since childhood, when they ran the streets of Rosemont, Indiana as if
their lives depended on having fun.
 
They
eventually went their separate ways.
 
Liz
worked for local affiliates, eventually went national, and ultimately became a
war correspondent for CBS before she decided to build her own brand.
 
Chelse worked as a beat reporter for Newsweek,
and then Time, and then finally agreed to work for Liz.
 
They knew it could have blown up in their
faces, given their close friendship, but it worked out.
 
For the most part.

Chelsey
stopped checking phone messages and looked out of the cab’s window.
 
She was going home after four years
away.
 
Although she could only stay for a
couple of days, she knew she
needed
this break.

But
that didn’t mean she was looking forward to the drama that was sure to
come.
 
She wasn’t.
 
She’d rather eat nails.

But for
her mother’s sake, and even her sister Gemma’s, she knew she had to go into the
fire at some point.
 
Since Liz agreed to
go through it with her, and since she knew Liz would always have her back, she
decided it might as well be now.

There
were wall-to-wall people inside the large, suburban house when Sal and Tommy,
with his suitcoat back on, entered the Joneses residence.
 
Rodney and Cassie Jones, Gemma Gabrini’s
parents, came hurrying up to Tommy as soon as he arrived.
 
Cassie kissed his cheek, and Rodney shook his
hand.

“It’s
so good of you to come, Tommy,” Rodney said.

“I
appreciate the invitation.”

“I
didn’t think you would come,” Cassie said.
 
“I thought Salvatore said you had to go to Rome.”

“My
plane is waiting.
 
I’ll take off later
today.
 
But I wanted to drop by and wish
you two a very happy anniversary first.
 
Happy thirty-fifth.
 
Thirty-five
years.
 
You guys have been married that
long?
 
Well one thing’s for sure.”

“What’s
that?” Cassie asked.

“You certainly
are not Gabrinis.”

They
laughed.

“But
hopefully,” Tommy added, “Sal and Gemma reverse the curse.”

“We
will,” Sal said confidently.

“We
heard about Grace’s remarriage,” Cassie said.
 
“I know that couldn’t be easy for you.”

“She’s
happy,” Tommy responded.
 
“That’s what
counts.”

“How
thoughtful,” Cassie said.
 

“But
anyway,” Sal asked, “where’s my wife?”

“In
the kitchen,” Rodney said.
 
“With those
loudmouth friends of hers.
 
Every time we
throw a party, they come.
 
Whether
they’re invited or not, they come.”

“Come
on, Tom,” Sal said.
 
“Let’s go see
Gemma.
 
She misses you too.”

“Oh,
wait,” Tommy said, turning back toward the Joneses.
 
“I almost forgot.”
 
He reached into his suit coat pocket and
pulled out a small wrapped gift.

“Oh,
Tommy,” Cassie said, “you didn’t have to bring a gift!”

“Oh,
yes you did,” Rodney disputed her, as he gladly accepted the gift.

Tommy
and Sal laughed as they headed for the kitchen.
 
But first they had to make their way through one group after another
group after another group.
 
Sal seemed to
know everybody, and was introducing his brother as if he was showing off a
porcelain doll.
 
It was easily obvious
that Sal was very proud of his great looking big brother, and his affection was
contagious.
 
Tommy became an instant hit.

He
also became an instant Instagram pic on various females’ social media
pages.
 
Their phones were clicking and
their hashtags were reading, among other, more graphic things:
look what I found at Gem’s parents’ party
!
  

But
those pics came only after the chatter began.
 
As soon as Sal began circulating Tommy around the room, the talk
began.
 
And the ladies had similar
reactions.

“Girl,
looka there, looka there!” one proclaimed to her group.
 
“That is a gorgeous man over there!”

“Now
that’s what I call good looking.
  
That’s
it.
 
That’s it right there.”

“Damn!
 
That’s a nice sight to behold!”

“Who
is that?”

“Who
is he?”

“Does
anybody know who he is?”

One
man, Gemma’s longtime friend Marvin, slid over toward one group of ladies and
smiled.
 
“So what’s the juice this time,
girls?” he asked.
 
“Who are you gossiping
about this time, and I know you’re gossiping so don’t front?”

“That
guy over there,” one of the ladies said.
 
“With the nice hair.
 
Who is he?”

“Oh
him?” Marvin responded as if it was no big deal.
 
He’d met Tommy before.
 
“That’s Sal’s brother.”

The
ladies were astonished.
 
“Sal’s brother?”
one asked.
 
“Get out! His brother is
better looking than him!
 
And that’s
saying something because, for a white guy, Sal’s hot.”

“I’m
saying,” said another.

“Wonder
if he likes brown sugar the way Sal does?”

“Brown
sugar down the line honey,” Marvin informed them.
 
“I heard the only thing a white woman could
do for Tommy Gabrini was get out of his way.”

They
laughed.

“He’s
like Tiger Woods on the black hand side,” Marvin added.
 
“Tiger like’em white, Tommy like’em black.”

“Um
um um,” said another lady, assessing Tommy shamelessly.
 
“He certainly has the look.
 
I’ll bet he’s big too.”

Marvin
agreed.
 
“Sal certainly has to be
sizeable or Gemma Jones would have never bothered with him.
 
Not my Gemma!
 
So I’d vote yes.
 
He’s undoubtedly
a big’um.”
 

And
they all laughed again.
 

Tommy,
however, had no clue he was suddenly the hot topic of conversation inside the
Joneses home.
 
He was too busy meeting
and greeting and making his way into the kitchen.

Sal
eventually took Tommy’s arm and moved them with more purpose through the thick
crowd and finally into the also crowded, but far less congested kitchen.
   
There were a lot of people attending the
anniversary party: old, young, and in between.
 
Blacks, whites, and all other races.
 
Rodney and Cassie, Tommy concluded, were an extremely popular couple in
suburbia.

Gemma
was leaned over at the center island, sipping wine and laughing and talking
with a small group of friends.
 
When Sal
and Tommy walked in, she beamed.
 
And
stood erect.

“Well
if it isn’t the stranger!” she declared.

“Hey
sis!”
 
Tommy smiled grandly as they
kissed on the lips and he pulled her into his arms.

When
they pulled back, it was Tommy’s time to beam.
 
“You look beautiful as ever.”

“Thank-you,”
Gemma responded.
 
“And thank-you so much
for coming.
 
It means so much to Mom and
Dad.”

“I
wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Tommy responded, meaning it.

“And
I know you can’t stay long.
 
I know you
were headed across the pond, but at least you came.
 
How’s Destiny?”

“You
mean my mama?”

Gemma
was confused.
 
“Your mama?”

“Destiny
is my mama,” Tommy explained.
 
“I don’t
run anything when she’s around.
 
She’s in
charge.”

Gemma
laughed.
 
“Boy quit,” she said and hit
him playfully on the arm.

Tommy
leaned over as he eyed a bowl of what looked to him to be a yellowish
sauce.
 
“What’s that?”

“Salsa.
 
It’s my special recipe,” Gemma said
proudly.
 
She put a heap of the yellow
salsa on a nacho and put it into Tommy’s mouth.
 
Tommy ate the entire nacho.
 
Many
of the ladies in the room stared into his mouth.

“Umm,”
he said, nodding his head as he chewed.
 
“Good taste.
 
Very good.”

Gemma
looked at Sal.
 
“Told you!” she said like
a kid.

“What
do I know?” Sal asked.
 
“It tasted like
shit to me!”

Tommy
laughed.
 
Gemma shook her head and looked
at him.
 
“See what I have to contend with
day in and day out?”

“You?”
Tommy asked with a shake of his shoulders.
 
“I’ve been dealing with that cantankerous old lovable bastard for well
over thirty years!
 
Get in line, sister.”

“Ha
ha very funny,” Sal said.
 

Gemma
hit her hip against his, forcing Sal to smile.
  
“Okay, it’s a little funny,” he said.

“That’s
my man,” Gemma said, put salsa on a nacho, and attempted to put it in Sal’s
mouth.

But
Sal leaned back out of her hand’s reach.
 
“It ain’t that funny,” he shot back.

“What
does he know?” Tommy said as he grabbed a nacho of his own, and dipped more
salsa.

“Tommy!”
Rodney said excitedly as he and his wife entered the kitchen.
 
“Where’s Tommy?”

Tommy
looked up.
 
“I am here!”

Rodney
and Cassie walked up to him.

“What’s
wrong?” Sal asked.
 
Everybody else might
have been lighthearted, but whenever Gemma was anywhere around him he was
always on guard.
 
“What’s the matter?”

“A
boat?” Rodney asked Tommy.
 
“Our
anniversary present is the title to a boat?”

Some
in the kitchen gasped in surprise, with a few mouthing
wow
and
he’s rich too
!

Tommy
smiled.
 
“You and Mom like to go fishing,
no?”

“Yes!”
Rodney said.
 
“We love to go
fishing.
 
And we have a tiny little boat
that we go fishing in.
 
A boat Cass is
always complaining is too tiny for, as she puts it, our old asses.
 
But this is a yacht, Tommy!”

“A
yacht?” Gemma asked, surprised too.
 
“Oh,
Tommy, you didn’t have to buy them a yacht!”

“Shut
up,” Rodney snapped jokingly at his baby girl.
 
“It’s done now!”

Tommy
and Sal laughed.

“Thank-you,
Tommy,” Rodney added.
 
“You made me a
very happy man.”

“You
are welcome, sir,” Tommy replied.

And
they all began laughing and talking even more vigorously.
 
As Tommy stood among Sal’s in-laws and
Gemma’s friends and participated in the laughter and conversation, he realized
just how much he loved being around these people.
 
That was why he went out of his way to come
here.
 
Because they knew what family
meant.
 
They knew what thick and thin
meant.
 
They knew what better or worse
meant.
 
They had something Tommy had been
seeking all of his life, but concluded, after his divorce, that he’d never
obtain.
 

But
as soon as he began marinating on such thoughts, Marvin entered the kitchen
with a cry that, for some reason, chilled him to the bone .
 
“Mr. and Mrs. Jones!” he yelled.
 
“Mr. and Mrs. Jones!”

Cassie
and Rodney, along with Tommy, Sal, and Gemma, all turned in his direction.
 
“What is it, Marv?” Rodney asked.

“You
will not believe who just walked through your front door!”

“Who?”
Sal asked as he pulled Gemma closer against him.

“Chelsey,”
Marvin said.
 
“Chelsey Jones is in the
house!”

The
entire room went silent.
 
And everybody,
including Tommy, looked at Rodney and Cass.

Although
Rodney’s reaction seemed to Tommy to be less definable, as if it was a kind of
happiness mixed with anger, Cassie’s reaction was pure happiness.
 
She left her husband’s side and hurried out
of the kitchen.
 
Rodney hurried behind
her, but with less enthusiasm.
 
Sal
clasped Gemma’s hand and they followed the parents.

Tommy,
however, finished drinking Gemma’s glass of wine and then began to follow the
crowd.
 
Marvin moved next to him as they
headed out of the kitchen together.
 

“Met
Chelsey before?” Marvin asked him.

“She’s
Gemma’s sister, right?
 
The one that
never shows up?”

“That’s
Chelse.”

Tommy
nodded.
 
“I haven’t met her, but Gem
mentioned her a few times.”

Marvin
touched his arm just as they were about to head out of the kitchen.
 
“Can I ask you a personal question?”

Tommy
looked at Marvin’s hand on his arm, and then he looked into Marvin’s big
eyes.
 
He remembered what Sal said was
his childhood nickname: Marvin Gaye.
 
But
without the E.