Wiseguys In Love (2 page)

*   *   *

Were all moms like this or just his?

Michael Bonello braced himself, wiped his chin with his napkin, and pushed the plate aside as his mother walked into the kitchen carrying an umbrella.

“Whatsa matter with your eggs?”

“Nothin', Ma. I don't want 'em.”

“Finish the eggs. You need your stren'th,” she said, moving the dish back at him.

He let out a breath as she shook the faded dark umbrella. She walked over to the sink, pulled a wipe out of a basket, and wet it down under the tap. He inhaled the last forkful of eggs and watched her wipe down the umbrella.

“Ma, what are you doing?”

“It's dirty,” she said, rolling her eyes at the question.

“It's raining cats and dogs out there. One minute outside, it's not gonna be dirty.”

“Yeah, 'cause I'm cleaning it. What time you gonna be home?”

“I don't know. Soon as Solly says.” He got up as she began muttering under her breath.

He wasn't sure what was going to happen today, when he was coming home.…

Michael took his jacket off the back of the chair and put it on. Even though it was the lightest-weight cotton, it felt heavy and hot in the humid summer weather. His shoulder holster pulled across his chest. He caught sight of his fuzzy outline in the overpolished fridge. His body was in good shape at thirty-two. He was a little on the small side, only five seven, but good-looking—blue-black hair, high cheeks, sharp nose, with olive skin from the southern Italian side of his family.

He remembered a girl he'd dated when he was an undergraduate at NYU. She was an English lit major who kept telling him he had a “swarthy Mediterranean look.” He couldn't remember her name.

Those days seemed like a dream now.

He adjusted his tie, leaving the tight collar open at the top. He'd do it for real, right before they picked up Solly.

His stomach tightened. Today was the day.

His mother's mumbling was becoming louder as he rubbed a spot off his black wing-tipped shoe.

“Why he can't give you a time like everybody else?”

“'Cause he don't work that way. When he don't need me no more, I'll be back.”

“You need a raincoat.”

“Naw, it's too hot, the umbrella's fine—Ma, stop cleaning it,” he said, taking it away from her. “You gonna wipe all the waterproof off.”

“Let me get you a raincoat.”

“I don't need it. Look, I'm in the car all day.”

He walked down the hallway to his bedroom. She'd already hit the room. His bed was made, and he hadn't even been out of it for fifteen minutes.

It had been the guest bedroom when he was growing up. Once he moved back in, after his father died two years ago, he'd settled in here.

There was something soothing about sleeping in the guest room—maybe because it made living back here with his mother a temporary thing.

He looked around the room. The heavy mahogany furniture set from the fifties was so well preserved by her obsessive cleaning, it still looked as good as the day she'd bought it. Only the wallpaper, a creamy background with a light brown trellis dotted with bunches of little rosebuds, had faded. He stared at the large metal crucifix over the bed. She'd polished it so many times in the last two years, the features had begun to wear away. Jesus' face looked like it was melting, with the raised parts overly polished, contrasting with dingy dips in the features. He heard his closet open behind him.

“Here's a nice coat for you to take,” she said, handing him a raincoat.

“Ma, I don't—”

“It's a good coat—wear it. Your Aunt Gina paid good money for it. You wear it.” She shook it, holding it out for him.

He turned his back on her and opened the top drawer of his dresser and reached inside.

“Okay, where'd you put it?”

“Put what? I din't—” She looked down at the floor.

“Ma, I'm gonna be late,” he said, raising his voice a bit.

He followed her down the hall to the kitchen and watched her open the drawer where she kept things like string and scissors. She pulled out his gun and handed it to him.

“I told you I don't want you going through my drawers.”

“I was dusting.”

“You don't gotta dust inside the drawers.” He held the gun in his hand. “I don't want you touching it. It could … Where are the bullets?”

“I don't know.”

“Aw Jeez—” He looked at his watch: 11:40. “Why you do this to me? Now I'm gonna be late. Where are the bullets?”

“I don't like it when you leave that thing laying around the house. Your father”—she stopped and drew in a breath—“never left his gun laying around.”

“Yeah, Pop hid it so you wouldn't find it and take the bullets out.”

“You coulda been a lawyer,” she said, waving her hands out to him.

He walked back to his bedroom and she followed.

“I can't play this game with you every morning.… I gotta pick up Solly in fifteen minutes.”

“You coulda finished school.”

“They threw me out. Okay?” He glared at her hotly and she looked away.

He breathed out and there was silence for a moment.

“Take the coat,” she said, picking it off his bed.

“I don't—” he began as she held it out.

“I'll make you a
trota alla Piemontese.
tonight, okay?” she said, helping him on with the coat.

“Fine,” he muttered, sticking the gun in his pocket. What the hell, wear the coat, he thought, you're probably going to be dead by tomorrow, anyway.

“Father D'Amico wants to know why you never come to confess no more.”

He knew he had to make a run for it now or he'd be there forever.

“I don't got time now.” He trotted out to the hallway.

“He misses seeing you there.”

“I'm not gettin' up at five-thirty to go tell somebody my sins, okay?” he said, half-running to the front door.

“But if—”

“Ma, you got my bullets, you got me to wear the coat, you got enough this morning. Bye.” He kissed her on the cheek.

He bolted from the door, down the front steps, and ran toward the limo parked at the curb. Tony Mac rolled down the window as Michael ran across the lawn.

“We gonna be late,” he warned, opening the door.

“I don't want to talk about it,” he said, swinging himself into the front seat.

Out of the corner of his eye, he caught sight of his mother, running across the lawn, waving the umbrella at him.

“Start the car,” he ordered Tony as he slammed the door.

“Michael! Michael Antonio! You forgot!” she yelled, almost there. Her frame, smaller now since the death of her husband, still bounced up and down. For a sixty-six-year-old, she could run like the wind. He held his hand out for the umbrella as she got to the car.

Her dark blue eyes shone down at him softly. Her bluish white hair was coiffed high, in the same way she'd worn it for the last twenty years, and added to her height. The blackness of her dress, stockings, and shoes was broken only by the floral apron tied around her.

“Okay, Mom, thanks.”

“Don't be late. I'm making
trota
and it gets dry. You bring him home early, Anthony?”

“Yes, Aunt Sophia,” Tony Mac said, smiling up at her.

“You're a good boy,” she said to him, and stepped back.

Tony pulled the car away from the curb so fast, it squealed. He drove to the corner and made a stop at the sign as Mike rested his head on the back of the seat and exhaled loudly.

“I gotta get a place. She drives me crazy.” He stared at the dark blue roof. “She means well, but since Pop died…” He lifted his head up and looked at Tony.

“Make a right.”

Tony grimaced at him.

“She got the bullets again, uh?”

*   *   *

Sophia watched the car turn right at the corner and then roll out of sight. She felt herself sigh and shook her head as she turned to walk back to the house. What could she do? Gina's words kept coming back to her and back to her.

“He's making his bones. Solly's taking care of him.…” It had echoed slightly as they left church that morning. It had echoed through her brain as they stopped for pastry and espressos, although Gina would never mention anything that sensitive in a restaurant. All Sophia had heard was that terrible news. And she couldn't even say anything to Gina about it. It would insult her, that her son was giving such a big honor to Michael and Sophia didn't want this at all.

Sophia had planned to talk to him this morning, just as she placed his plate of eggs down, but she had looked into his face and stopped suddenly, shocked by what she saw.

She had seen the fine creases beginning near his eyes, just like Vincent's. She had seen the strands of silver on top of his head, breaking up the blackness of his hair, and she'd felt herself freeze for a moment.

When had this happened? She hadn't noticed it. She stopped to pick a leaf off the lawn and looked at the trees. The tips of all the leaves were beginning to brown. The summer was ending. She continued walking back to the house, staring at the leaf.

It must have happened recently to Michael, the age. It wasn't that growing older shocked her. What shocked her and bothered her was that she hadn't noticed it. She stopped suddenly at the front steps.

She hadn't noticed it. She hadn't noticed anything for two years, since Vincent had died. She breathed out, wondering how many other things she had missed.

*   *   *

Michael felt numb as Tony stopped the car.

“Eh, you come in with me.” Tony's voice ordered. Michael nodded and slid outside.

He didn't even bother to look up at the building. Who cared? It was one of the many little errands he and Tony went on that Michael never asked about. Why bother? He sure as hell didn't actually want to know about this stuff.

A creaky elevator took them up to the seventh floor of an old office building. Ancient gold paint on frosted glass formed hand-painted letters in an arc, which read,
DYNAMITERS LOCAL
391.

Tony walked inside and Michael quietly followed. He felt himself hanging back near the door as Tony walked up to the reception desk. Tony turned around.

“You coming?”

“Maybe I'll just wait here.”

Tony shrugged and leaned over the receptionist's desk. In a minute, he was ushered through a small swinging gate. Tony's large torso obscured the woman from view. Michael heard a knock and watched Tony disappear into an office.

He exhaled. His eyes focused on the door Tony had gone through. Black hand-painted letters on the wood, in the same style as those on the outer door, formed the name
G. GEDDONE.

A phone rang and Michael listened to a woman answer.

G. Geddone. Now that name was familiar.

The door to the office reopened and Michael saw a flash of G. Geddone as he quickly shut the door behind Tony.

A dim montage of memory went through Michael's mind, memories of a round, bald man, the kind of person you grow up with as a kid, who shakes your hand too vigorously at weddings and funerals, anniversary parties and retirement banquets. The kind of person you call “uncle” but are never sure if they are actually related to you, but there they are, year after year, telling you, “Look at how big you got!”

Michael felt himself breathe in sharply as Tony walked quickly toward him, slipping an envelope into his breast pocket.

His stomach flip-flopped as he opened the door for Tony. This was
it
—zero hour. He silently followed Tony out into the hallway.

Now they were going to see Solly. Michael would finally find out just what this lunatic was going to give him to do to make his bones.

His mind began assembling a list of the terrible things Solly could come with: breaking parts of guys off, torture …

If he just knew what it was.

*   *   *

Giuseppe Geddone found himself wiping sweat from his forehead the same way he did every time Tony left his office. Only this morning, his whole suit was soaked. With Tony being so late, he thought something had gone really, really wrong. But Tony didn't seem any different, and he breathed out and stared at the ledger on the desk in front of him.

Giuseppe Geddone carefully entered the pension-interest amount in one ledger and then “adjusted” it in another. He could hear the sounds of the traffic and the city from the open window.

He looked back down at the books, closed one, and stuck it quickly in the safe behind his desk, then took out the big union checkbook ledger.

He opened it up and filled out the deposit stub for the day. Underneath that figure, he placed a withdrawal to the Metropolitan Office Maintenance Company in the amount of the interest in the second ledger, to cover the check he'd just given Tony.

That was for Solly. There had been forty new members in the union this quarter, and the Metropolitan Office Maintenance Company was supposed to get a percentage of all the pension dues, balance, and interest, just as it had done every quarter since 1951.

Only, since Giuseppe had figured out his plan, they'd been short. It had taken him a period of time to see that nobody from Solly's side had even ever asked or was ever going to ask to look at the pay rosters and line them up with the payoffs—not so long as he kept the union rosters looking consistent and kept neither a huge rise in union membership nor a consistent drop.

So it was one for him, one for the Soltanos.

Giuseppe licked his lips and began writing out another check.

That was his. It had taken him the last ten years to make it into this position. He had a nice fat bank account in Zurich. When it was time for him to leave, he was going to take the clothes on his back, drive to the airport, get on a plane, and leave behind the boring, fat, married-for-thirty-years person, known as Giuseppe Geddone, and begin living the way God had intended.