When the World Was Young

by Tony Romano

  Nine months later I came along, the only Peccatori child to be born in Italy, an irony which is not lost on me. Without me they might have all turned on each other, aimless and bewildered. But more likely, I was not their savior. They would have plodded along and found distraction or more elsewhere, I’m sure. All except for Papa, who may have suffered the most since his distractions were either hopeless or juvenile. His love for me, though real, seemed always reserved, as if he were trying to protect one of us, though I’m not sure whom. I often felt as I grew up that I had two mothers and no father.

  Having played out my role in the family, I’ll be leaving soon. I may have been a painful reminder at times of what they’d lost, especially early on, but I’m fairly certain I did some good on Superior Street. I provided a target for their love when they needed it most.

  I had hoped to do more. There was a brief span before high school when I’d hide amid the stacks at the library on Chicago Avenue, searching through records of all the children who’d died in Illinois around the same time as Benito, trying to discern a pattern. Something they’d all eaten or drunk. A toy they’d chewed on. Places they’d visited. Common medicines. Days of transferring names from the obituaries to my composition book made me feel important. When I showed the 213 names I’d collected to the librarian, she gazed at me warily over her mauve-rimmed glasses. I studied the rims, how they compressed her face and made it seem distant, and explained I needed more information for a school project. She considered this, her eyes shrinking further, then turned abruptly to the reference desk, where I followed. She showed me how to write a letter to the medical examiner’s office and made several phone calls, excited by this unusual task that took her away from the stamping and sorting that filled her days. After weeks of culling through documents and charts, I learned about abrasions, contusions, shaken babies, apnea, malnutrition, poisoning, and other unsettling ways to die. The charts revealed patterns, of course, but the one category that most interested me—Unexplained Deaths—revealed little, and I felt no closer to understanding Benito’s passing than when I’d begun. I had seen the death certificate at the bottom of Papa’s strongbox, the word Unknown listed unobtrusively next to Cause of Death. I imagined a stiff-postured secretary scanning her notes, precisely tapping out the seven letters that meant nothing to her, and I had hoped to march into Mama’s kitchen with raised pages that would shed light on everything. Look, here’s the cause. There’s nothing you could have done. You’re off the hook, for Christ’s sake.

  Maybe I’ll do some good, too, by leaving. Mama can take care of Papa, Vicki can get on with her life instead of dropping by the apartment every few days, Freddy won’t need to feel guilty about not stopping over, Anthony can stop his praying for me, and Santo, I can’t say that I’ve ever mattered much to Santo. He was off on his own before I learned to walk. After I leave, we can all get together, the seven of us, as unlikely as that may be, and enjoy one another’s company on a Sunday afternoon, with the red gravy simmering and the spoons stirring espresso, and wonder why we don’t gather more often.

  But for now I’ll settle for the usual Sunday dinners with Mama and Papa and Victoria and every so often Anthony. Papa will take his nap afterward, Mama will wash the dishes, and Vicki and I will play cards and talk about school. She’ll ask me if I’m going to play baseball next year, and I’ll say that no one has offered me any money, so probably not, and she’ll say that’s too bad, and the conversation will be easy and I’ll feel like I belong, like I’ve always belonged, and I’ll ask about her husband, who usually can’t make Sunday dinners because he works a second job on weekends, and I’ll wonder aloud whether they’re going to have children, and Vicki will turn shy and shrug off my suggestion. Later we’ll hug good-bye and she’ll tell me to stop by the house anytime, I’m always welcome, and I’ll tell her, I know I know, and we’ll hug again. And I’ll tell myself as I watch her descend the stairs and disappear from sight that I know what love is.

  6

  SEPTEMBER 1958

  After Santo had alphabetized the whiskey bottles along the bar—Ballantine’s, Canadian Club, Chivas Regal, Early Times—all the while listening to Uncle Vince tell his father about the vacation that Angela Rosa and Agostino needed to take, he borrowed Vince’s Cadillac and drove to the A&P, where Ella Paolone had gotten a job as cashier.

  Gordon’s, Grant’s, Haig & Haig, Old Kentucky, Old Smuggler. Twenty-five labels and no one ever asked for any by name. But Vince liked the display. Whatever bottle Vince happened to grab would be the bottle he’d recommend to the customer. And if Uncle Vince liked the display, there was no sense arguing because his persistence always wore you down. So when Santo heard him insisting that Mama and Papa take a trip back to Italy, Santo knew the trip was inevitable. The passports would be stamped, the tickets would be bought, and Santo would be in charge of the apartment for three weeks or longer.

  These were the things he hoped to talk to Ella Paolone about, the circumstances of his life, the ordinary daily concerns that two people enjoyed sharing with each other. He’d been to the A&P several times in the past month, sometimes just buying a bottle of 7-Up and a bag of Jay’s, and she’d been cordial to him at least. She hadn’t called the manager to boot him out, as he’d feared.

  When he got to the store, Ella was ringing up a big order for a mother with three kids, one of them trying to wriggle out of the mother’s arms. Santo swung around, picked up a quart of chocolate milk and a packaged sweet roll, and stood in line behind the mother. The other cashier, a young girl with too much lipstick, eyed her empty lane, glanced at Santo waiting in line, then drew her attention back to her nails and her chewing gum.

  “You’ve got your hands full,” Santo said to the mother.

  Ella peeked up from the cash register to see whether Santo was talking to her. Assured, she turned back to the groceries.

  The mother sighed and said to Santo, “You can’t even imag—could you please push that jar here please?” The woman’s cheeks were flushed.

  “Sure,” Santo said. “Would you like some help getting all this to your car?”

  With a quarter turn of her head and a partial roll of her eyes, Ella let Santo know that she wasn’t that easily impressed.

  “That would be great,” said the mother.

  Once the woman paid and got her Green Stamps, Santo put aside his milk and pastry and turned to Ella. “Now don’t go selling this to anyone. I’ll be right back.”

  Ella shook her head. “Yeah, sure,” she said. “Like there’s going to be a big run on chocolate milk in the next five minutes.”

  When he returned, the other cashier was busy with a customer, and Ella was ringing up an order of flour, eggs, milk, and a package of Hydrox cookies. Santo was tempted to comment but decided to wait his turn. He noticed that Ella’s hair had been set or arranged or whatever women called it when they went to the beauty shop. Which worried Santo. Whenever he thought of Ella, he thought of her sitting at home with her baby, not getting herself ready for a night out. Her hair did look pretty, he had to admit, short and wavy and fuller than he remembered, falling just over the edge of the collar of her A&P smock. The smock was an ordinary brown, sleeveless shirt worn over Ella’s own blouse, a new name tag pinned to the orange-yellow plaid pocket, but Ella made the smock look shapely and stylish.

  “How’s the baby?” he asked after the customer ahead of him had left.

  “Not such a baby. He’ll be walking any day now.”

  “You don’t say.”

  “I do say. That’s why I said it. That’ll be eighty-seven cents, I do say.”

  “It’s just an expression.”

  “It’s a stupid expression.”

  “I guess.”

  “You have anything smaller than a twenty?”

  He searched in his pocket and found exact change.

  “So you’ll be taking him for walks soon.”

  She put the milk and roll in a brown paper sack and pushed it toward him. “
Yeah, I guess…maybe,” she said. She glanced behind her at the light pouring in from the glass doors. “Good weather for it,” she added.

  He leaned in toward her and said softly, “You know, we’re not strangers, you and I.”

  She leaned forward, too, so that their heads nearly touched. “You’re crazy if you think I’m going to get involved with you.”

  Out of the corner of his eye he noticed another customer approaching Ella’s lane. “Involved?” he said. “What does involved mean?”

  “It means have a nice day.”

  The customer behind him began unloading her groceries on the belt. A woman in her sixties, she’d put on jewelry to come shopping at the A&P.

  “Look, I’ve got my uncle’s car. Let me come back when you’re through here and I’ll give you a ride home.”

  The old woman offered them a polite smile, a trace of embarrassment in her smile over having overheard.

  “You have to leave,” Ella said. “I’ve got work here.”

  “A short ride. What’s going to happen?”

  “Please.”

  “I won’t leave till you say okay.”

  The old woman smiled again, at Ella this time. She seemed to be encouraging Ella to say yes.

  “Please,” Ella said. “Please go.”

  Santo reached into the sack and pulled out the quart of milk and began tugging at the spout.

  “Okay okay,” she said. “I’m done at seven.”

  “Seven,” Santo said. He liked the sound of that. “Seven…good. I’ll see you at seven.”

  As he neared the door he heard the old woman. “He seems like such a nice boy, that one,” she said.

  “You got a haircut,” Ella said as she scooted into the Cadillac.

  “I like the smell of a haircut,” Santo said.

  “I don’t smell anything.”

  “I should get my money back. What good’s a haircut if you can’t smell it?” He clicked on the radio and a rapid-fire voice announced an auto race coming Sunday Sunday Sunday. “Did I tell you your hair looks nice? That’s what I was thinking at the A&P waiting in line, that your hair looks nice.”

  He could see she wasn’t used to hearing this. He placed the car in gear and eased out of the parking lot. “I mean it,” he said.

  “I believe you,” she said. She gazed out the window.

  “Aren’t you going to ask me about the car? I figured the first thing you’d mention would be the Caddy.”

  “I guess I don’t care much about cars.”

  The Platters came on the radio and he tapped the steering wheel.

  “Look, I’m just going to drive you home. A five-minute ride. I thought we could have a pleasant five-minute conversation.”

  “I’ve been standing for six straight hours.”

  “That’s better.”

  “That’s better?”

  “Sure. Tell me about your day.”

  “You saw my day.”

  “C’mon. Tell me. Who did you want to slap? What was your biggest bill? Did anyone pay with pennies?” As he thought about it now, he really wanted to know. “How about your most obnoxious customer today?”

  She crossed her arms. “I think you know that one. Turn left here.”

  Santo took in her sneer and her sarcasm but wasn’t much bothered by either. She was in his car. And talking to him.

  “You want a cigarette?”

  “I don’t smoke.”

  “I thought everyone smoked. Even my sister smokes.”

  “Well, not me.”

  “You want to stop by Battiste’s a minute? Get an Italian lemonade?”

  She smoothed her skirt and gripped her knees. “I have to get home.”

  “I understand.”

  “I’m not sure you do.”

  “So tell me.”

  She turned. “What are you, eighteen?”

  “Nineteen soon.”

  “I’m twenty-two. I have a kid. Not just any kid. What do you want from me? And my mother, she would rip you apart. I think it would be a good idea all around if you left me alone. Turn right at the corner.”

  “Let’s just suppose. For a minute. What if I were twenty-two and you didn’t have a baby and your mother liked me?”

  “My father used to tell his friends, ‘You talk like a jackass.’ You’re not twenty-two, I do have a baby, and my mother wouldn’t like you.”

  He wanted to unbutton her smock. “Just pretend,” he said.

  “What’s the point?”

  He placed his arm across the seat back. “For the sake of argument, that’s all.”

  “The sake of argument? You call this an argument?”

  “Another stupid expression. Forget about it.” He took his arm back. He felt himself sliding away, saying things he imagined some other person would say. “I have to tell you. I’m getting a little discouraged here.”

  “A little discouraged? What did you think? That you’d pick me up in your big Caddy and tell me my hair looks nice and that I’d just spread my legs? Is that what you thought? The father comes in first and then the son…”

  Her words this time cut into him. She’d had hours to decide why she should resent him, Santo thought, and this is what she’d concocted, a deranged conspiracy between father and son.

  Santo felt himself slipping further away. He gripped the steering wheel with both hands and squinted hard out the windshield. He took control of his breathing. “I remember when I was a boy,” he said, “and I’d be sitting in the kitchen with my father and his coffee. He’d take a sugar cube and put it in his mouth whole and then he’d take a long sip of coffee. He’d do that every time, swallow about six or seven cubes with each cup. I tried it with my milk one time, and my mother slapped me across the ear when she caught on. I still see my father with his sugar cubes and his coffee. But, you know, I haven’t done that with my milk since I was a kid. I’m not going to apologize for my father or try to explain him. But I’m not him. I am not my father.”

  He turned onto Hubbard Street. “You’re tired,” he told her. “You’ve been standing for six hours. I know how that can get to you. I’ll leave you alone. I promise.” He stopped at the end of her block. “Here. I’ll let you out here.”

  As Victoria made her way to the corner of Ohio Street and Marshfield Avenue, she thought about the tight grid of city streets and how they’d defined much of her life. She grew up on the 1700 block of Superior, and anyone living a mere block east or west on the same street didn’t exist. And you could forget the other streets altogether. As she got older she made new friends at school, of course, but they existed only until the school bell sounded. When she was older still, her network of friends broadened, but only relatively so. Her life was still dictated by the chance turns within a narrow strip of neighborhood streets.

  She’d been thinking about those chance turns almost obsessively lately, struck by their power. If Santo hadn’t battled Eddie Milano, Eddie would not have turned away so quickly and Victoria wouldn’t have been so despondent. And if Darlene hadn’t gone to her cousin’s house in Michigan last Christmas break, Victoria wouldn’t have gone walking after school that day to overcome her despondency. And if Willie weren’t crazy, he wouldn’t have been out walking and she wouldn’t have run into him. And if she hadn’t done that, if she hadn’t befriended him, if she hadn’t ignored the taunts of Darlene and more than a few others over walking with Crazy Willie, she would have never met Willie’s brother, Richard.

  She’d seen him before, of course. Everyone knew him because he was Willie’s younger brother. At the end of the day, when they were kids, he’d always be out looking for Willie and steering him home. Since Richard was one of the Publics, though, one of the kids who went to Otis Elementary and then to Wells High School, none of the St. Columbkille kids really knew him. When he came around they all averted their gazes and talked quietly among themselves, trying to look like altar boys, trying to hide their shame for the kid with the crazy brother. Or maybe they were try
ing to cover up their own guilt over having harassed Willie earlier in the day.

  When Victoria first met Willie’s brother at the beginning of that summer, he introduced himself using his full name, Richard Kazenko, which struck Victoria as odd. But he was polite and thanked Victoria for walking with his brother—Willie had mentioned her name over dinner—and he was especially grateful because he’d been away all year at the University of Wisconsin in Green Bay, and he wondered how Willie would manage by himself. Willie apparently knew how to reach home when he was hungry, but without Richard, he’d walk all night. It didn’t take Willie long, however, to realize that his brother wouldn’t be there anymore, and he soon learned to read the sky for signs of darkness.

  Willie called his brother Richie and clapped with a fury every time he saw him. The clap was virtually silent, the palms coming together, the fingers remaining splayed and rigid, but the gesture never failed to move Victoria. Before long, she began calling Willie’s brother Richie, too.

  Looking at them, no one would ever guess they were brothers. Richie was lanky with a long face and a strong jaw with big teeth. Like Willie and most of the other boys she knew, he wouldn’t look you in the eye much, but he had what Victoria considered patient eyes. She’d never seen that quality from a distance, and maybe the patience wasn’t there until recently, but up close his eyes told her what years of watching out for his brother had done for him.