"Are you ladies just gonna stand by the door all night?" Frankie asked, coming around the corner with his arms out expecting hugs.
"Hey Frankie," Laura said, hugging him.
"Hey gorgeous," he said. He looked at Vivian as he took me into his arms. "And how's about this one, huh?"
"I know, right?" Vivian said. "Tony knew how to pick 'em."
"Yes he did," Laura said, smiling sweetly at me.
All three of them stood there and stared at me. Laura and Vivian both looked like they were on the verge of tearing up, but thankfully it didn't seem like it was out of sadness, but rather happiness caused by the reunion.
"Where'd you get that light hair?" he asked, reaching up to gently tug on a lock of my hair.
I had dirty blonde hair that was just curly enough for me not to fight it. I usually let it dry naturally and the curls hung in loose waves. "My dad, I think," I said smiling.
"Whatta ya mean you think?" Frankie asked, confused.
Laura reached up and backhanded him on the arm. It made a loud slapping sound, and he gave her an injured expression. "She didn't know her father," Laura said.
"I'm sorry, sweetheart," he said, shamefaced. "I didn't know."
"It's fine," I said, giving him a reassuring smile. "I never met him, but apparently I have his hair…" I hesitated. "…and his name. My grandma raised me, but my mom made her promise to name me Rae after my dad—only his was spelled R-A-Y like guy's spell it."
"Well your grandma must have done something right. Lu goes on and on about you, and she has good taste." Frankie called her Lu even though he'd already been warned, and again, she didn't correct him. For whatever reason, this was a dose of encouragement that covered me like a warm blanket. It was the first time I felt like there might be a light at the end of the tunnel.
"Thank you," I said.
"I don't know what we're doing standing in here," he said. "Take your shoes off and come get comfortable."
Laura and I slipped out of our shoes and followed Frankie and Viv into the living room. Frankie continued into the kitchen, but us girls took a seat on the couch.
"Does he need help in there?" Laura asked.
"No, the lasagna is baking and we already made the salad. He's just too antsy to come sit down."
"Mike said he saw one of Nic's boys bringing you a package yesterday," Frankie said from the kitchen. He sounded like he was straining when he spoke. I glanced his way to see that he was peering into the oven, watching dinner bake. I figured Laura would respond to his statement, so I just stayed quiet.
"Dominic Russo is the most generous man on the planet," Laura said. "After you of course, Frankie."
Frankie laughed. "I guess he sent you a welcome present or something?"
"He got us phones," she said.
"I thought you had a phone."
"I had a little prepaid, but Rae didn't have one at all, and he sent us these amazing little phones that are basically mini computers."
Frankie stood and stretched his hands onto the cabinet, looking at us. "What service are you gonna use?" he asked. "Viv and I could probably get you a good deal if you wanna jump on our family plan."
"Nic's taking care of it," she said. "He said he'd just put us on the same plan he gets for his managers."
"That was extremely generous," Viv said. She said it quietly, and Frankie took that as a hint that they didn't want to yell across the apartment anymore. He was antsy again anyway. He turned to dig in the fridge and the three of us continued the conversation.
"I already called Maria to tell her what a good boy she raised," Laura said. "And that's not all. He sent a real nice camera for Rae."
"Really?" Vivian asked. She asked it with an expression that told me she might think he did it because he was a guy and I was a girl and maybe he was attracted to me in that way. It was the first time I ever even considered such a thing, and in that split second, I tried to remember our conversation—tried to remember if it felt like that at all.
The answer was no.
He was incredibly respectful of me being Anthony's wife, and didn't seem at all like he had any ulterior motives. Not to mention the fact that he was way out of my league. In fact, a few leagues separated Dominic Russo and me—especially with my baggage. I smiled internally at the thought of Vivian raising her eyebrows like the gift could have been romantic.
"He and I had a conversation where I told him I wanted to get into taking photos," I explained. "He knew I couldn’t afford the kind of stuff he sells at his store, and I think he's just the type of guy that does random kind things like that."
Vivian closed her eyes and shook her head, smiling. "I love that boy," she said. "Isn't he precious?"
"I'm taking this out, Viv!" Frankie yelled from the kitchen. He was nervously watching the dish bubble through the oven's glass window.
"The timer's set, honey, but do whatever you think."
Without further ado, Frankie opened the oven and carefully removed the steaming hot pan with oven mitts.
Dinner was delicious, and our hosts were more than gracious. Viv made us promise to catch up with her again some evenings since she worked at a jewelry store during the day and was always gone when Laura came to clean.
***
Laura and I kept our promise to see Viv regularly. It had been two weeks since we first had dinner at their house, and we'd seen her twice since then. She kept asking when it'd be okay to have a girls' get-together, but Laura just wasn't ready for that yet.
Things were still hard for me, but day-by-day it was getting better. I knew the same was true for Laura even though she'd never admit such a thing. She claimed she was still miserable, but I saw her smiles grow more genuine with each passing day. We both still struggled to understand why we'd lived through such a tragedy, but we were slightly less obsessed by it every day.
I dove into photography as a way of coping. I'd had my camera for two weeks, and officially took it everywhere I went. I was a total nerd—researching and taking photos with every spare second I had. I brought a computer from Arizona with me, and every night I uploaded hundreds of photos I'd taken that day. I shot sidewalks, architecture, graffiti, statues, red lights, trees, animals, and whatever else I thought might be interesting.
I started studying great photographers and had become familiar enough with some of their work that I'd experiment with replicating their photos. Every night I'd show Laura my best ones, and she was extremely encouraging, telling me I had good instincts and things like that.
We had a big print center upstairs at work where I just had 8x10's of my favorites printed. They were currently sitting on my desk, and I was excited to show them to Laura. I loved seeing them on paper. It was different than a screen—better.
I only got ten of them because I was still living on the small change I brought from Arizona. In fact, today was the first time I'd get a paycheck. Just as I had that thought, Debbie came by receiving to notify me that she sent an email with my paystub details, but that the money would direct deposit by midnight per my request. The others heard her talking to me and gave her a hard time about not getting them the money before midnight. She was laughing when she left.
Out of sheer curiosity I checked my email. The math was relatively simple. I knew roughly what I was making before taxes and insurance, but wasn't totally clear on what I'd have left after those got taken out. I didn't have health insurance taken out of my check when I worked at the coffee shop because Anthony and I were covered through the dealership. Anyway, I was expecting about forty percent of my paycheck to go out the window by the time it was all said and done.
I stared at the screen, unable to read the spreadsheet correctly. The numbers were too high. My hourly wage was off. It was significantly higher than the rate at which I'd been hired, and I sighed knowing I'd have to jump through some hoops to get it corrected and it'd probably delay getting my check.
I scanned the whole page. Everything was wrong. The personal information was
all correct, and so were the number of hours, but everything else was messed up.
"I need to run upstairs and talk to Debbie about my paycheck," I said as I walked back into the common area.
"No problem," Matt said, without even looking at me.
I walked upstairs with my phone in my hand so that I could access my email. Debbie saw me through the wall of glass when I approached her office and she smiled, waving me in.
"What's the matter?" she asked, noticing I wasn't smiling.
"I think my paycheck's messed up," I said. I sat in the chair facing her desk.
She shook her head. "I don't think so," she said. "I looked at it before I sent it."
"It's supposed to be way less than it is," I said. "Or maybe I'm just reading it wrong."
She started clicking away on her keyboard and then turned her monitor to show me what she was looking at.
I peered over her desk to view it. "Yeah, see?" I pointed at the box for hourly wage—the one that was fifty percent higher than the price I agreed on when I signed up for this job.
She looked at me with a nod.
"It's more than I'm supposed to be making."
"I know. Dominic had me make that adjustment before he left for his trip."
"That's a big adjustment," I said in disbelief. "That's too much of an adjustment."
She smiled and shrugged. "I just do what he tells me to do. I thought you two worked it out."
"I had no idea. Are you telling me that's correct?"
She nodded.
I was overwhelmed, and almost forgot to ask, but then remembered. "How do I figure out how much comes out for insurance?"
She giggled as she shook her head. "I should have known he didn't talk to you about that either."
"About what?"
"Dominic's not taking insurance out of your check."
I squinted at her, feeling like I couldn't believe my ears. "Do I still get coverage?" I asked.
She smiled like it was sweet for me to even ask such a thing. "Of course you do. Don't quote me on this, but I think he's planning on covering your mother-in-law too. He had his assistant set it up, so I'm not sure, but I heard him mention it."
It was too much. I simply couldn’t believe the way Laura's family stuck by her. I knew Dominic's kindness toward me was aimed at Laura, and I marveled that such families existed in the world. I was quiet while I thought about these things.
"So everything seems right on this end," Debbie said, with a matter of fact smile like our meeting was over.
Chapter 6
"I got a huge raise and they're not taking insurance out of my check," I said when I opened the door to the apartment.
Laura was standing in the small kitchen and she cocked her head at me. "Say it again, slower this time," she said.
"Dominic's paying me way more than we agreed on, and he's covering insurance too. It's not coming out of my check. I held up my phone as a symbol of my paycheck. "It's way more than I thought it'd be," I said, unable to stop a smile. I opened the email and walked my phone over to Laura. I set it on the counter and she squinted down at it.
She instantly pinched the screen, trying to make it bigger then proceeded to inspect it for several seconds before looking at me. "You're kidding me!"
I shook my head. "I made sure with my boss. She said Dominic told her to adjust it. She acted surprised I didn't already know about it."
"We're going to have to do something to thank him."
"I already sent him a card for the camera and phones. I don't even know if he got that yet. Is he back in town?"
"You'd know that before I would," she said. "I'll write a letter thanking him too."
I didn't dare tell her what Debbie said about her insurance. We'd just have to see if anything ever came of that. "I got my prints today," I said instead. I took my backpack off and set it on the counter so I could dig for the envelope containing the photos. I handed it to Laura.
She ran her finger across the envelope where it said Nic's Prints with stripes of blues and yellows and his signature logo of a Polaroid camera. "It's amazing to see his name printed on the envelope like that," she said.
We looked at my photos, and one by one she told me what she liked about them. I learned a lot by hearing her feedback. It was nice to hear what struck people when they looked at your work. I put the photos back in the envelope and slid it back into my backpack. We were silent for several seconds, both thinking.
"I can't believe your paycheck," she said.
"Wanna go out for dinner?"
She smiled. It was a good, genuine smile that made me happy. She was glad Dominic was being nice for my sake and I was glad he was being nice for hers. It wasn't about the money so much as the happy feeling we both got on each other's behalf.
It was a good night.
We went to a place she remembered from when she lived there before. It was a steak house with quote-unquote the best steaks on the planet. It said it right on the door, and after I ate one, I might have just believed it. They didn't have a wide variety on their menu. Basically, you just chose how big of a steak you wanted and what sides you wanted with it. They did one thing and did it well, and we went to bed full that evening.
I laid in bed considering texting Dominic for his generosity, but I had never text him before and thought it might be odd to do so for the first time at 10PM. Instead, I decided to gather a few of my favorite prints along with a thank you note and deliver it to him the next day—that way he could see I'd been using the camera.
I chose my three favorites.
One was a bulldog that was randomly tied to a lamppost outside the deli the other day. He had on a spike collar and was just about the most photogenic thing on the planet.
The second was a colorful chalk hopscotch game with a kid's legs and feet hopping. You couldn't see the whole kid, just from the knees down, and her Converse were positioned in a perfect hopping pose at the top of the photo.
The third was Laura. It was a black and white portrait of her. I captured the pain she'd been through, and the photo was undeniably compelling. Laura didn't think it was flattering of herself, but she liked it because it was a true representation of her feelings over the last month.
I'd taken some photos of her smiling. I knew I could get one of those printed, or just choose another from the prints I had, but I chose to give the melancholy portrait to Dominic. I packaged the three 8x10's in a big envelope along with a note.
Dominic,
I don't know what to say. I assumed my paycheck was a mistake, and couldn't believe when Debbie told me it wasn't. I know this is for Laura's sake, which touches my heart. She is so fortunate to have such a family, and I'm honored and blessed that I was taken into the fold. The raise and insurance were unexpected and so very appreciated. Rest assured that I'll do my best to earn the rate you're paying me. I'm stunned by your generosity and can't tell you how thankful I am.
Sincerely,
Rae
The next morning when I got to work, I gave the envelope to Debbie same as I did with the other thank you card, which Dominic might or might not have gotten by now. When I gave it to her, she told me Dominic was back from his trip.
For whatever reason that made me slightly nervous. I almost chickened out of giving him the photos, but that would mean taking the envelope off Debbie's desk and saying never mind. Basically, I chickened out of chickening out, and now Dominic was gonna see my pictures whether I liked it or not.
None of them were inspired by other people's work, but I was still nervous about what he'd think of them. I tried not to think about it, and had done a pretty good job of it until Debbie came down to receiving to tell me Dominic wanted to see me in his office. I felt like I was being called to the principal's office, and trembled all the way up to the fifth floor. Before Debbie came to me with these instructions, I had no idea Dominic even had an office in this building. I rode to the fifth floor feeling anxious about what I'd find when I got there.
There was a well-dressed woman sitting at a desk that faced the elevator. Facing her in my uniform shirt made me feel way underdressed and a little self-conscious. I smiled as confidently as I could at her.
She smiled back. "How can I help you?" she asked.
"I'm supposed to see Dominic."
"Are you Rae?"
"Yes."
"His office is all the way at the end." She pointed to her right down a hallway. "I'll let him know you're coming down."
I heard her warning him of my approach as I walked toward his office, and his door swung open before I made it there. "Come in," he said, smiling broadly at me.
It had been a couple of weeks since I saw him, and for whatever reason, his smile was like a breath of fresh air.
"What happened in the two weeks I was gone?"
I was in the process of following him to his desk when he asked, and I waited till I sat down to speak.
I cleared my throat. "What do you mean?" was all I could come up with.
Instead of sitting behind his desk like I thought he'd do, he stood near me and sat on the edge of his desk, crossing his legs in front of him casually. He turned to reach for some papers that were sitting on the desk and when he faced me again I realized they were my pictures.
"How did you learn to take these pictures in two weeks? Did you take these?" He held them up, and I nodded. "Do you have photo editing software?"
"Just the program that came with the computer. I don't know much about it, but I'm trying stuff with different filters."
"Rae, I'm not just saying this… these are amazing. I love your work."
I wasn't able to contain a smile. "Don't give me too much credit," I said. "That camera could take pictures by itself."
Another Shot: A Modern-Day Ruth and Boaz Story Page 4