All in all, thirteen months of air mail correspondence and overseas telephone conversations, plus three transatlantic crossings (only one of which was made by her) were all it had taken to ease Iris’s slender feet into the pair of bargain basement sandals that separated her white-stockinged soles from the downtrodden carpet of the living room at Chestnut Crest. She wondered why the rough nylon stitching cutting into the skin of her toes now hadn’t bothered her when she tried the shoes on at the store. Probably because they were miraculously both her size and on the $7.99 clearance rack. There was nothing she could do about it now but bear the discomfort, and be thankful for the sensible square heels that would guide her feet through the steps she was about to take.
Iris was tired of standing, but dared not sit for fear of wrinkling the skirts of the frothy white gown cascading around her legs; she stooped to lift the ruffled hem and remove the scraps of toilet tissue stuck to her ankles, hoping that the razor nicks had stopped bleeding. The gown had been a bargain, too, on sale at Best Brides downtown store for ninety-nine dollars, basic veil and alterations included. Rita Esposito had helped her pick it out. Though Lily had seemed a bit cold that evening she and Rita and Frances had met at the diner upon Iris’s return from Italy, the years of separation from Rita had melted like April snow, and they had resumed their childhood friendship with amazing ease. Rita would be waiting now, in the vestibule of Sacred Family, together with Lily and Frances. All three would be decked out in mismatched gowns which, like the girls who wore them, had survived the test of high school proms. Having the bridesmaids wear perfectly good gowns that were already hanging in their closets had seemed the sensible thing to do when there were corners to be cut. With its shortened hem and form-fitting bodice, Iris’s Senior Ball gown actually looked quite lovely on Lily, and flattered her shapely bust nicely, something it had been unable to do for Iris.
“Less is more,” she had heard or read somewhere. Though she wasn’t sure whether that was true when it came to breasts, the philosophy had fit her strategy perfectly as she ticked off the items subject to budget cuts. Recalling how Gregorio had shied from her camera clicking during their first encounter, she decided to do without an official photographer, which had saved her at least a hundred bucks. Deciding what to do about the music had been tougher. Months earlier, on New Year’s Eve, when she had suggested that they celebrate their engagement and at the same time surprise Lily by joining her and Joe at the 2001 Club, the horrified look on Greogio’s face left no doubt that he abhorred disco music. And when, with only two days left in the old year and no plans to ring in the new, she had suggested they might go to dinner at a hotel in the city, where a local band would be playing oldies, he had again indicated a certain reluctance. When she had finally asked him what kind of music he liked to dance to, Gregorio had informed his young fiancée that participating in any form of human aggregation on any dance floor made him feel ridiculous. Keeping in mind that this was Gregorio’s wedding just as much as it was hers, Iris felt she should respect his wishes. What mattered was the ceremony, certainly not the dancing, and doing without a band or disc jockey for the reception translated into further savings. But since music was too important to Iris for her to give it up entirely, she took the liberty of accepting Uncle Alfred’s offer to provide some entertainment during the buffet, in addition to accompanying Lily, who had agreed to sing in church. The Hawaiian melodies would be a novelty to Gregorio and Isabella, and Uncle Alfred also wanted to play some Italian tunes in their honor. She wanted this to be a classy wedding, one that would impress her family-to-be with its simplicity.
As Iris thought back on all the arrangements made in a few short months, she felt proud of the fact that she had been able to pay for everything herself. Not that people were lining up to help; in fact, the only offer had come from Gregorio, but she would have died rather than accept. She had no doubt he would take care of her once they were man and wife, but everyone knew that the wedding was the responsibility of the bride’s family. Once they had become officially engaged, she simply changed her other plans accordingly. Instead of going back to Buffalo, she enrolled in a few night courses at the community college, and stayed on at Kodak, where her commendable punctuality and performance earned her a position as a permanent employee. So what if the job was boring; the money was good, and enabled her to pay off her college loan, with enough left over to buy some new clothes, order a spare pair of contact lenses, get checked out by Violet’s gynecologist (whose recommendations regarding birth control were politely disregarded), and have all four wisdom teeth extracted by the dentist for whom Rita worked, so that she could present herself in marriage debt-free and with no foreseeable extraordinary maintenance expenses.
Everything that needed doing had been done. Now she just wanted to get the waiting over with and celebrate her special day. One of the things she had been looking forward to most was seeing all of her brothers and sisters gathered in the same place one last time before she moved away. And one of the things that worried her most was seeing her forever feuding parents together in the same place; she prayed to God they wouldn’t embarrass her in front of Gregorio and Isabella. She ran a hand over her cheek as she recalled her mother’s words to her the previous day, wishing she could rub away their sting.
As she stood in the empty living room of the empty house, her agitation swelled and receded in waves. She had been so busy planning the wedding that she hadn’t given much thought to how her new life in Italy would really be, on a daily basis. But it was both too late and too early to worry about that now; she was already on her way to finding out, and she would cross that bridge when she came to it. First, she had the wedding, and then the honeymoon to look forward to.
She couldn’t wait to see the house Gregorio had rented for them; from the pictures, it looked small, but incredibly romantic, with a view of the sea, and a spare room for guests. Auntie Rosa would surely come to visit, at least once a year. Maybe her father could come, too. Lily might even make it over sometime; Iris would convince her to make the trip soon, before a little one came along to claim the guest room, together with all of her time and attention. Thoughts of Lily brought tears to her eyes, but she blinked them back; it would be a disaster if she started crying before she even set foot in church. Dabbing at the corners of her eyes with a knuckle, she reflected that maybe it had worked out for the best that Lily had moved in with their mother. If they had continued sharing their room and their lives, it might have been impossible for Iris to leave her sister now. But Lily had chosen to leave, and now it was Iris’s turn.
Inspired to say a prayer for all those she loved and was leaving behind, Iris raised her eyes to the ceiling, but was distracted by five dark specks she spotted through the milky glass of the overhead light. “How could you be so stupid, getting yourselves trapped like that?” she said to the dead flies. “If you flew in, you should have been able to fly back out.” It was so quiet, she could have sworn she heard the dead flies buzz back a reply. So quiet, she started when the floorboards stretched and groaned their relief at this moment of rare respite from stomping feet. So quiet, she flinched with each tick of the kitchen clock as its hands advanced implacably toward the hour of seven, heedless of the consequences of their actions. She stood in the fading light, as the vestiges of an anemic sun were put to rest under a blanket of somber grey, squelching any hope that the drizzle would let up.
Iris closed her eyes, preferring to look at the insides of her eyelids rather than at the walls and floors that held so many memories. Dropping her chin to her lace-covered chest, she lowered her bridal veil over her face. “Dear God,” she prayed. “Please give Dad the strength to manage without me. I already asked you to bring Mom back many times, but you obviously didn’t think that was a good idea. So all I ask of you now is to release them from their fighting, for everyone’s sake. Please keep him and the boys under your wing. And please, please send someone to protect Lily, and make her happy. Joe seems like a good guy, and
he makes her laugh. If he’s the right one, please give her a sign. And never let her forget me like I know I will never forget her. And please look after Auntie Rosa and remind her every day of how much I love her, even though I’ll be far away. Maybe she and Lily can get together sometimes, too. They need each other. Maybe you could help them see that. Amen.”
Earlier in the day, when the clouds had started breezing into town from across Lake Ontario, Auntie Rosa had tried to put on a cheerful front, though the look in her eyes belied her heartbreak over losing Iris to the love story she herself had fostered. She drilled Iris on her Italian vocabulary as she coaxed her to eat a ham sandwich, and taught her a saying meant to console brides cursed by bad weather: sposa bagnata, sposa fortunata. A wet bride is a lucky bride. When Iris had shared the new phrase with the bridesmaids who had come over to dress in her room, they had giggled over another possible interpretation. She had laughed, too, though the whole sex thing made her nervous. She had never felt comfortable discussing intimate details with anyone, not even Lily, who just looked at her sister and shared her silent smile when Frances and Rita teased her about the fact that she and Gregorio hadn’t done it yet.
How could those girls understand that waiting was precisely what made their love story so romantic? Those girls had never been kissed in a boat on Lago Maggiore. They had never received love letters from abroad, or been courted by a real man. They had never been proposed to by a doctor already in his thirties who offered more love and security than a girl could dream of. And they had never believed in fairy tales, like she had. There was no way they could understand.
Standing there in her gown, Iris felt grateful that Gregorio had been such a perfect gentleman, and that he had shown such respect for her. Within hours, their marriage would be consummated the way it should be, in a proper room, on their wedding night. It hadn’t been too much of a sacrifice for them to restrain themselves, and there had been little opportunity to do more than steal a few kisses on the rare occasions they had been alone together; all told, they had only been on the same continent for a couple dozen days since they had met. If her attraction to Gregorio was any indication, she had no doubt that theirs would be an extremely satisfying union, and attracted to him she was. Otherwise, why would she have spent all those nights lying in bed rereading his letters and gazing at his picture and kissing it good night before switching off the light? Why would she have fantasized incessantly all this time about their upcoming honeymoon in Sardinia, dreaming of the clear blue water they would swim in, of how he would chase her playfully on one of those deserted beaches, of how she would pretend to trip and fall on the hot white sand, of how he would stand over her, his tanned body blocking the blinding sun, of how her giggling would subside when he lowered himself onto the sand next to her, of how he would slowly undo the top of her bathing suit, of how her chest would rise when she sucked in her breath, of how he would lick the saltwater from her nipples and of how his finger would trace a line from her dripping breasts down to the tiny puddle in her belly button and then slip inside her bikini bottoms? If she weren’t attracted to him, why would those thoughts make her hand wander beneath her nightie and fondle her breasts until her nipples grew hard, and why would they make her reach for the wetness between her legs and coax out the desire trapped inside her with a hot surge of pleasure that made her blood rush and her ears pound?
All of this waiting was starting to make her nervous, and she wondered what was taking her father so long to come back and get her. He had been shuttling people to the church for the past forty-five minutes, and the bride was the only one left. Walking into the sunroom to get a better view of the road, she was overwhelmed with memories of all the afternoons spent there with Lily: practicing ballet moves to Tchaikovsky, acting out the entire Jesus Christ Superstar rock opera during Holy Week, talking and giggling and sobbing over boys. They had been there for each other, helping each other figure out the boys they were interested in - up until James Gentile, who had been impossible to figure out, and Rick Rotula, who wasn’t worth figuring out. The more she thought about it, the more relieved Iris was that Lily had Joe now. That she finally had someone who could show her a good time, someone who didn’t play games with her, someone who knew how to treat a girl.
It looked like things might work out for them both after all. Lily could still become a performer, even if her original plans had been thwarted. Maybe she could sing with a band, or act in one of those community theatres. It might not be Broadway, but it was better than letting her talent dry up and wither. And she could go on to college any time. Just like Iris could, once she settled in and learned enough Italian. Maybe she would pursue the study of languages; she could become a translator, or an interpreter. Or a mother, if that happened first. She’d see what worked out best, then take it from there. She’d cross that bridge when she came to it.
The honking of a horn and the flashing of headlights snapped her out of her reverie as her father pulled into the driveway. He had come to pick up the prize for today’s lucky winner of the great Capotosti Giveaway.
36. Lily
Joe continued to whisk Lily away for Sunday dinners, holiday celebrations, and countless Diotallevi family birthday parties, where she was enthusiastically welcomed as a displaced child from a broken home, even being awarded her own place at the dinner table. They fed her with home-cooked meals and compassion seasoned ever so delicately with pity. The flavor was sweet on Lily’s tongue. She quickly became accustomed to the routines of her adopted family, spending more time with them and less time at home, where supper often meant a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, or a can of soup warmed on the stove. At home, Lily felt like a boarder; at the Diotallevi’s she felt like one of the family.
Lily hadn’t been able to make a definitive decision when Joe asked her to choose between him and college, so she just never brought the issue up again and put off taking any action. She quit her job at Burger King and took a full time position in customer service at SaveMart. Instead of assembling Whoppers, she spent her days assembling toys and small pieces of furniture for customers who preferred to pay a fee rather than wrestle with cryptic instructions that had probably been translated from Japanese. The job offered her more hours, and even included paid health insurance. Maybe she could try to put some money away toward tuition while she thought about what to do next.
Lily couldn’t imagine losing Joe and all that he had brought into her life - the security, the fun, the passion, the sense of belonging. Yet she hadn’t been ready to close the door on college forever, either. The deadline to start classes for this year had passed months ago. But she could still go next year. Or in two years, or whenever her relationship with Joe came to its inevitable end.
If there was one thing Lily had learned definitively it was that no one stayed, no matter how much you loved them or needed them. It seemed like years since Iris had married Gregorio and shipped her things and her self to her new home across the Atlantic. Lily could remember singing “The Hawaiian Wedding Song” at her ceremony. She remembered the delicate crown of baby’s breath Iris gave her to wear in her hair. She remembered Iris walking down the aisle, arm-in-arm with their father, slowly marching toward Gregorio. She remembered, too, watching them drive away after the reception to make their flight to New York. But for some reason, Lily could not remember saying goodbye. She must have cried; it must have been devastating for her. Wasn’t it? Perhaps Lily had become so accustomed to watching people leave that it didn’t hurt as much anymore, sort of like plucking your eyebrows. It really hurts at first, but if you keep doing it, the hairs just slide right out no matter how deeply rooted they are, and you hardly even feel it.
Joe would soon fade out of her life as everyone eventually did. So what was the big rush? Anyway, he was right - what would she do with a degree in theatre? If she really did have any talent, she would’ve been in class at that very moment. Or maybe already done with her first year, even. Someone else was living that dream now, and
since Lily couldn’t think of anything else for which she would be willing to conform her life - not to mention her restless behind – enough to take on the desks and demands of school for the next four years, she decided not to decide.
On Saturdays, the Diotallevis would meet at Batavia Downs for an evening of horse racing, and then animatedly regale each other over Sunday pasta with the repeated stories of four-figure trifectas lost “by the hair on a horse’s ass”, a defeat which meant that the mortgage, car payment, or dentist bill would have to be put off for another week, at least. The brother who had the worst night at the track was the one who went home with the greatest portion of leftover pasta, accompanied by a fistful of crumpled bills for gas and groceries, donated to him by his slightly less unlucky siblings. If you bet and you won, you had money. If you bet and you lost, you still had money. Those with good fortune bore responsibility for those who had none. They looked out for each other. They depended on one another. As Lucy would always say, “There’s nothing like family.”
Observing them made Lily think of Iris and of the ways she used to look out for Lily - like writing “From Iris and Lily” on all of the Christmas gifts, even though Iris had purchased them by herself with the money she earned as Uncle Alfred’s secretary, or paying Lily’s way at the movies, or leaving her make-up and Gee-Your-Hair-Smells-Terrific shampoo where Lily could have access whenever she wanted. The ache in her belly made her wonder what Iris was doing now.
“Do you know which horse you want to bet on?” Joe asked Lily one Saturday night. They sat together with Anthony and Big Tony around a wobbling table at The Home Stretch Cafe where racing spectators hung out, washing down dried-out turkey sandwiches with bitter coffee as they killed time between races.
The Complete Series Page 58