Most Precious Blood

by Vince Sgambati

  Frankie inhaled, looked at the walls of dry goods, the waxed cheeses hanging from iron hooks, the sawdust covered floorboards, and he knew that once he left he wouldn’t come back, except as a visitor like his aunts and uncle and his father’s high school friends.

  When he was a small child, he had a recurring dream, one of those dreams where you feel as if you are being chased by something threatening. In the dream, Lenny tripped and fell and was unable to get up, but insisted that Frankie run off without him. Terrified for him and for himself, Frankie ran as fast as he could until he could no longer hear Lenny shout for him to keep running.

  He stared out the window above the displays of canned tomatoes and olive oil and in between the faded sale signs, and he wondered if Big Vinny would reopen his club or if there would ever be another block party. He pictured Napolitano’s stand at the curbside outside the store and tasted the sweet torrone they sold during the Feast of the Assumption, but he couldn’t imagine a Feast without Gennaro’s beautiful tenor voice or Filomena sitting at the head of the table under the grape arbor in the yard, orchestrating the Lasante assembly line of sandwich making. He didn’t know how things would work out in Los Angeles, but he knew that he wouldn’t come back here. Even if his stay with Vi and Ina turned out to be brief, he had already been accepted at several colleges, and he could travel until classes began. Lenny would not only agree to that, he would encourage it.

  A snail slithered down the side of a bushel sack of dry lentils, and Frankie walked around the counter, across the front of the store, and picked up the stray snail, but instead of returning it to its bushel, he slipped it into his pocket. Without thinking, Frankie picked up the basket of snails. He locked the front door, carried the basket into the warehouse, left it there, and then retuned to the store. When Lenny came back from driving Tootsie and Tyrone home, Frankie dumped the basket of snails into a burlap sack, took his bike and the sack of snails from the warehouse without mentioning anything to Lenny. He hung the sack form his shoulders like a knapsack and rode his bike to Woodhaven Boulevard, and then onto to Crossbay Boulevard towards the beaches. He biked in the far right lane of an eight-lane boulevard— four lanes traveling east and four lanes west. Once Lenny biked the same route, and before him Vincenzo, but back then it was a gravel road that meandered through acres of marsh where ibis, osprey, heron, and egret enjoyed the vast wetlands. First two lanes were paved, wooden sidewalks became concrete, gas streetlights became electric, and open land became rows of houses and stores and schools and churches and synagogues on a grid of streets that intersected avenues.

  It was cool, but Frankie pedaled so quickly that sweat formed on his brow and at the back of his neck. He turned into a place once called Bare-ass Beach from the days when Lenny and Big Vinny and other neighborhood boys swam there naked — a weedy area with several lagoons.

  Frankie emptied some of the sack into the weeds, which were mostly brown with only hints of green. He walked a little further and emptied it a little more, and he continued doing this until all of the snails were free. He tossed the sack into the lagoon and watched it float away and disappear into the bulrushes.

  That night Frankie dreamt of Tucci’s place. In his dream, he biked along the path to the falls while carrying something very heavy, but it was dark and he couldn’t see what he was carrying, and it felt as if no matter how fast he pedaled he was making very little progress. Finally he reached the end of the path, exhausted and breathless, but instead of the falls there was a meadow of buttercups washed in sunshine, and whatever weight Frankie carried had vanished.

  34

  Frankie didn’t want a birthday party, but Angie insisted. “At least a little dinner and cake,” she said. Since Frankie was leaving for Los Angeles and more than likely wouldn’t return for graduation — the idea of graduating without Gennaro felt unbearable, he yielded. Angie invited the DiCicos, but explained that Frankie understood if they didn’t attend. Fortunately only Lena came. Frankie’s aunts, uncles and cousins, a few of his friends, including Johnny Pickle, were also there, and of course Tootsie and Tyrone. A little dinner and cake turned into a small banquet. There were too many guests to sit around the dining room table, even with the young ones eating in the kitchen, so Angie, Amelia, and Irish served buffet style, beginning with antipasto, followed by homemade gnocchi, and then roast beef and fresh ham with multiple side dishes. The antipasto was served at 2 p.m., and it was dusk before Lenny carried Frankie’s birthday cake into the dining room — cassata from Panisi’s. This was the first time since Filomena’s funeral that the Lasante house was filled with people. The chatter, laughter, and even the occasional tears felt like a long overdue sigh of relief.

  Tyrone had a difficult time with so many people in such confined spaces, so he spent most of the afternoon and evening watching television in Lenny’s bedroom. Frankie carried each course upstairs to him and sat with him while he ate, enjoying the little breaks from the chaos downstairs, but eventually Tyrone went down to the dining room with Frankie for cake.

  That morning while stuffing artichokes, Angie had mentioned that lit candles and singing Happy Birthday might be difficult, but that Mama believed that if you don’t celebrate birthdays — cake, candles, and all — it was bad luck. “For Grandma’s sake,” she told Frankie. But when Frankie told Lenny what she said, he laughed.

  “Maybe your Aunt Professor shares a few of Grandma’s superstitions?”

  Lenny carried the cassata, lit with 19 candles, one for good luck, into the crowded dining room, and everyone sang Happy Birthday. Despite the few cracking voices, the family celebrated life as always. Tony and his wife held on to the twins so they wouldn’t dive into the cake while Amelia and Irish cut pieces for the children first and told them to go eat in the kitchen where Angie poured them glasses of milk. Even Tootsie pitched in and poured cups of coffee.

  Folks milled about the kitchen, dining room, and living room. Some sat at the dining room table, some on the living room couch, easy chairs, and folding chairs that Lenny had opened earlier along with snack tables. Frankie and his friends sat on the steps between the living room and second floor. Tyrone nudged himself between Frankie and the staircase balusters.

  Lenny handed Frankie his cellphone. “For you,” he said. “I’ll keep an eye on Tyrone.”

  It was Ina, but Frankie could barely hear her above the noise, so he brought the phone upstairs to his room.

  “Hold on and listen,” Ina said, giggling, and Frankie heard two voices sing Happy Birthday.

  He kicked off his shoes and lay down on his bed, and the singing ended with Ina cheering and a barrage of questions. “Yes, I liked your birthday card and the picture,” he told her. And: “Yes, I am excited to be going to Los Angeles.” And: “Yes, I can’t wait until I see you tomorrow,” even though that wasn’t completely true. Finally, Ina asked if Frankie wanted to talk to Mommy. She didn’t wait for his answer.

  “Hello.” Vi’s voice sounded small, almost apologetic. Her “Happy birthday, Frankie” sounded like a question, but he understood why her wishing him a happy birthday was awkward. He felt a little sorry for her. Not a lot, but enough to not cut their conversation short.

  “Thank you,” he said. He didn’t try to fill the silence that followed. He just listened to their breathing

  “Eighteen,” she finally said.

  “Yes.” He was curt, and it felt a bit cruel — like an accusation. That moment meant more to her, or disturbed her more than it did him, or brought up more ghosts for her than it did for him, but she had already said she was sorry when she visited him in the hospital. Maybe his curt “yes” was an attempt to sabotage the visit. If he made her uncomfortable, she might change her mind, or maybe talking to her on his birthday hurt him more than he was willing to admit, but everything hurt. One hurt just bled into another. He thought of the falls at Tucci’s place and as always, Gennaro. He imagined Gennaro saying: You loved me Francesco and I fucked up plenty. We all do things that we’re sorr
y for. Stop being a prick.

  “Thank you for letting me come stay with you,” he said.

  “Would you mind terribly if we celebrated your birthday again tomorrow night? Ina has the whole party planned — decorations and all.”

  “MOMMY!” He heard Ina whine in the background.

  “I would actually like that,” Frankie said.

  “We’ll see you tomorrow ... at the airport.”

  “I’m looking forward to it,” he said, and Ina took the phone. They talked a bit longer, until he heard Vi tell her to let him get back to his guests.

  “Yes, I also can’t wait until tomorrow,” he told Ina and pressed end. He rested his head on the pillows against the headboard, closed his eyes, heard the roar of Tucci’s falls, and smelled its pepper spray. Rainbows flashed behind his eyelids until he saw Gennaro standing at the top of the falls and calling out: “Veni qua, Francesco.” Frankie jumped when he felt a hand take his. Tyrone stood next to his bed.

  “What’s up, buddy?” He propped himself up on one elbow.

  Tyrone climbed onto the bed and curled himself against Frankie’s chest. “Iss ooo,” he repeated several times, and Frankie was astonished, even though he couldn’t make out what Tyrone was saying. Tyrone repeated it again, and Frankie understood: “Miss you.”

  He hugged Tyrone, but felt too overwhelmed to speak. He understood what it meant to miss someone. To miss someone so much that, even though you sit and stand and laugh and cry and eat and shit, every cell in your brain is screaming. Where the fuck are you? Please come back! Please!

  He tried to respond to Tyrone several times before he was finally able to say: “I’ll miss you too, but only for a little while. Not forever.” And the word forever tasted like blood on his tongue. A few more seconds passed before Frankie stood and took Tyrone by the hand and led him from the bed to his desk where he opened his laptop. He sat, and Tyrone rested his head against Frankie’s shoulder.

  He clicked on the video of Gennaro and the waterfalls at Tucci’s, and then pressed pause. Gennaro appeared suspended above the shimmering spray of the falls with his arms stretched out like angel’s wings. “He was very important to me,” Frankie said. “I loved him, but you reminded me that there are also other people I love very much.”

  Tyrone’s head jerked just a little. Frankie closed his laptop.

  Frankie held Tyrone’s pink-finger-nailed hands. “You will always, always be very special to me. I love you very much. You are the bravest person I know. Do you understand?”

  Tyrone laughed and gave his head a jerky nod. They joined the rest of the party downstairs, and Tyrone sat on Frankie’s lap at the dining room table as Frankie finished eating his piece of cake. He hung close to Frankie for the rest of the evening.

  Tootsie stayed later than the other guests and helped Lenny and Angie clean up. When she was about to leave, Frankie mentioned what had happened upstairs.

  “See, I told you he could talk,” Tootsie said. “He just hasn’t had anything important to say for a while, until now.” She gave Tyrone a hug, and his little curly head all but disappeared between her bosoms. She drew Frankie into their embrace, reminding him of the night of the block party when Big Vinny embraced him while holding Gennaro, but unlike that night, this was a joyous embrace.

  “You and Tyrone are making my mascara run. Honey, hand me that purse,” Tootsie said to Angie. “I’m sure I got some tissues in there.”

  Frankie promised that he’d come back from L.A. soon, though he knew that he wouldn’t, and he assumed that Tootsie also knew.

  While Lenny drove Tootsie and Tyrone home, Angie unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher, and Frankie finished packing. It didn’t take him long. He took the Coney Island photograph from Lenny’s dresser and placed it between his folded t-shirts.

  “All packed?” Angie stood at his bedroom door.

  “Just about.”

  “I’m going to bed. We have to get up early. How about a kiss for your aunt.”

  Frankie hugged Angie and planted a kiss on her cheek. “Thank you.”

  “For what?”

  “For tonight. And for always being there. No one can replace that. You and Grandma were always there for me. You were my moms. I’ll never forget that.”

  Angie’s eyes filled. She gave Frankie a tight embrace then turned away and left his room.

  Later, when Frankie went downstairs for a glass of juice, he found Lenny sitting at the kitchen table reading the newspaper. The overhead light exaggerated the gray in Lenny’s hair and the lines around his mouth and eyes.

  “I didn’t hear you come home,” Frankie said.

  Lenny closed the paper. Frankie poured the juice in a glass and joined his father at the table.

  “Are you all packed?”

  “Yep.”

  “Tyrone saying ‘miss you’ was really something. Tootsie talked about it all the way home. She swears that he used to talk but suddenly stopped. She didn’t mention anything about any seizures or fever. It’s curious that he’d just stop talking.”

  Frankie shrugged his shoulders.

  “He’s not the only one who will miss you,” Lenny said.

  “I know that.” Frankie drank the juice, stood and propped up his glass in the already packed dishwasher.

  “Don’t hurt her, Dad.”

  Lenny’s brow wrinkled.

  “I’ve been noticing little changes in Tootsie,” Frankie said. “Losing weight and dressing more like ... well like a cross between Aunt Angie and Vi, like she went to a seminar on how to dress like a college professor. I thought that there might be some guy that she was trying to impress. Tonight I realized who he was. She’s in love with you, Dad.”

  “In love? Don’t you think that’s an exaggeration?”

  “No, I don’t. She looks at you the way you look at Vi.”

  Lenny’s eyes shifted downward as if he were searching for a response.

  “And don’t tell me I’m reading into things. Gennaro always told me that. I know about hurt. So do you. So does Tootsie. All I’m saying is she’s not as tough as she acts.”

  Lenny stood up and hugged Frankie. “And you’re really something,” he said, but then he stepped back. Frankie could barely see Lenny’s tears through his own.

  “This is a good choice you’re making,” Lenny said. “You’re going to be okay — more than okay.”

  He took the newspaper from the table and folded it under his arm. “I’m going up to bed. By the way ...” He took his wallet out of his back pocket and removed Big Vinny’s money. “I think this is yours.”

  Frankie’s stomach tensed, and he shook his head. “I don’t want it.”

  Lenny returned the money to his wallet. “Your choice.” He paused for a few moments. “One more thing. When I arrived at the hospital that night, a nurse handed me a plastic bag with your wallet and cellphone in it.” Lenny slipped his hand into his pocket.” I didn’t recognize this, and with everything going on, I forgot about it until this morning.”

  Lenny pulled his hand from his pocket and held up a gold medal of Saint Francis hanging from a thin chain. It reflected the kitchen light the way it once reflected Christmas tree lights.

  Frankie took the medal from Lenny’s hand and kneaded it between his thumb and fingers. He closed his hand around the medal and threw his arms around Lenny. “Gennaro gave this to me on Christmas Eve. I thought it was lost.”

  “I’m so sorry about all of this, Frankie. I wish I could undo it all.”

  They talked for a while, leaning against the counter, and Frankie looked around the kitchen as if trying to memorize everything. They spoke about Gennaro and about going to Los Angeles. Eventually Lenny went up to bed, but Frankie remained in the kitchen, leaning against the counter and thinking about everything and nothing. He opened his hand and stared at the St. Francis medal. He slipped the chain over his head.

  Lenny’s footsteps faded. The house was quiet except for the hum of the refrigerator and the sound of water
flushing down a pipe within one of the kitchen walls. Frankie removed the cartoline postale of the great-grandfathers from his pants pocket — he had shown them to Lena earlier — and spread the few pictures out on the kitchen table. No stories came to mind.

  The kitchen light was too bright, so he gathered the photos, went up to his room for the rest of the cartoline postale and took them into the office where, under the single light bulb, he sat on the floor crosslegged and fanned them across the threadbare oriental carpet as he had done when he first discovered them. He heard Gennaro laugh and say: The apple, or in this case the zucchini, doesn’t fall far from the tree. Followed by: I love you, Francesco, but I’ll never be who you want me to be. And finally: Don’t expect too much from me. You’ll be disappointed, but I do love you. This time Gennaro’s words didn’t end with the sound of gunshots.

  Frankie dialed the safe’s combination and opened its iron door. He thought to keep at least one of the cartoline postale, the one of the lone boy with two diminutive horns poking out through his thick curly mane — the boy who resembled Gennaro. But instead he gathered all the photos, returned them to the safe, shut the door, and recalled the two small iron and leaded glass coffers containing the relics of Saint Padre Pio in a church he had visited several times with Filomena when he was very young. He remembered Filomena’s euphoric expression as she brought her fingertips to the coffers, as if she were touching something sacred. His fingers lingered on the safe’s iron door as Filomena’s once had on the coffers. He spun the dial to lock the safe and went up to bed.

  35

  “You have your tickets and money? It’s amazing to think that you’ll be in Los Angeles in a few hours. One day I’ll fly in one of those tin cans. Who knows, maybe I’ll be flying out to visit you at UCLA or maybe Berkeley.” Lenny was babbling as if he had downed a dozen cups of espresso.