I felt a soft tap on my shoulder.
With one eye, I peeked up at my grandpa, who was himself again.
His face was warm and regretful.
He crouched on his knees, placed his hands gently on my shoulders, and stared at me with the same blue eyes decorated with bits of glittering gold as mine and my dad’s. “Cara mia. . my sweet, that wasn’t really Grandpa, oh no-no-no. That was just work. . part of being a baker.” He kissed my forehead, patted my cheek, and with a profoundly sad smile, produced a molasses cookie from behind his back.
It was as if the devil had peeled back his mask to reveal Santa Claus.
I was staring at that same mask now, on my dad, except that the mask seemed much more real than what was underneath. My own worst fears-isolation, abandonment, rejection-flooded my brain and gut, leaving me limp and helpless.
“Go to the car, please,” my dad said in a placid tone that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.
I opened my mouth to object, but his eyes froze the words in my throat.
I gladly turned for the door and my uncle did too.
Before Uncle Buddy’s foot even hit the floor, my dad said, “Stop. Sit,” like a stern master training his dog, and my uncle obeyed, quickly finding a chair.
I pushed through the kitchen’s swinging door almost as fast as I had when I was a tiny kid escaping my grandpa, but this time was different. Once I was away from my dad, separated by a brick wall, fear was replaced by curiosity. As the door swung back, I heard him mutter “molasses,” “Nunzio,” and “notebook.” Of course I knew about the Rispoli amp; Sons molasses cookies, and about my dad’s own grandpa, Nunzio Rispoli, who founded the bakery in the 1920s. At the time, though, I wasn’t yet aware of the notebook-that ancient collection of criminal secrets that would become central to my survival-and it intrigued me.
Carefully, I peeked through the door’s porthole window.
My uncle sat trembling in a wooden chair, trying and failing to look defiant.
My dad popped an index finger off of Uncle Buddy’s chest as he spoke.
The look on Uncle Buddy’s face was almost identical to the mumbling man who had stood before Grandpa Enzo, but this time was different too. That giant thug was afraid to make eye contact, while Uncle Buddy held my dad’s gaze. He was scared, that was plain, but not too scared to look at him, and I asked myself why.
I thought, Because he’s determined.
I thought, He’s determined because he wants that notebook.
“I’m gonna get it, Anthony,” my uncle said, his words so soft that they blew past my ears like a breeze. “And no one had better stand in my way. Not you. . and not your family, either. Or else.”
My dad’s hands darted like angry eels and suddenly Uncle Buddy’s feet were dangling above the floor. His face turned purple along with my dad’s hands, which were wrapped around Uncle Buddy’s neck, growing tighter every second. My uncle flailed his arms like he was swimming through air and made wet smacking noises with his tongue while his eyes rolled back in his head. There was a slight crick, like a twig snapping, and a line of scarlet blood trickled from his nostril.
“Come near my family and I will kill you.”
My dad’s statement was uttered in a matter-of-fact tone, as if asserting that “water is wet” or “ice is cold.” And then he dropped Uncle Buddy and turned for the door in a motion so fluid I only had time to push against the wall. As my dad walked away, Uncle Buddy rolled onto his back, gasping for air, and croaked, “Or else, Anthony.”
The door stopped moving, half open, with me cowering on the other side.
I could feel the cool electricity of my dad’s anger a foot away.
He was trying to decide whether to turn and finish with Uncle Buddy, while I silently begged him to leave the kitchen.
A moment later he strode through the bakery and out the front door, the bell jingling behind him. I fled after him without a look back, catching him at the curb where the Lincoln was parked. He must have heard my footsteps and spun quickly, his fist cocked with a car key jutting between the second and third knuckle. I skidded to a stop, my hands going up instinctively to block a punch, and then we were facing off, each in our stance. I could see in his eyes that Evil Dad had retreated to wherever he had come from. Now they filled with alarm as he said, “You were in the bakery?”
I nodded, slowly lowering my fists.
“How much did you hear?” he said. “Tell the truth.”
“I heard Uncle Buddy threaten us. I heard you tell him that you’d kill him.”
“Oh God,” he said, dragging a hand over his face. “Forget it, Sara Jane. Forget what you heard and saw.” He put his hands on my shoulders and tried on a weak smile. “None of it matters now, sweetheart.”
“Of course it matters!” I said, pushing his hands away. It was that word, sweetheart, that set me off, like I was some kind of idiot girl. After his soul-rattling transformation from Dad to Evil Dad, and the horrible scene with Uncle Buddy, he was behaving as if a few reassuring words were all I needed to pretend nothing happened. I felt a small blue flame of anger kindle in my gut as I said, “You were about to tell me something important about our family. You can’t start a conversation like that, especially after what just happened, and ask me to forget it.”
“I’m not asking you,” he said, the smile vanishing. “I’m telling you.”
“To do what? Erase my brain? I saw what I saw and heard what I heard,” I said. “Tell me, Dad, at least about that notebook. Tell me right now.”
“Don’t speak to me like that,” he said, unlocking the old car.
“You said I can handle it and more.”
“I know you can handle it,” he said. “I just don’t want you to have to handle it.” He gazed at the bakery and set his jaw. “Like I said, none of it matters anymore. We’re leaving tomorrow.”
“Leaving where?”
He opened the car door. “Leaving Chicago. You, Lou, Mom, and me.”
“But. . since when?”
“Since now, Sara Jane. Things have changed.”
It was too much, too fast, and I stammered, “But I have school, and my friends. . this is insane, Dad. None of it makes sense. There’s no way we’re leaving tomorrow. .”
“Get in,” he said, starting the engine.
I shook my head. “Not unless you tell me the truth. About everything.”
His mouth was a tight line as he shook his head. “We’re done talking.”
Without another word, I turned and walked down the sidewalk.
He dropped the car into gear and followed me, saying, “Sara Jane, please.”
Silence-walking and looking straight ahead.
“Sweetheart, I’m sorry. I just. . please get in.”
No acknowledgment-still walking.
“Okay, fine. Walk if it will make you feel better. But come straight home.”
And then I watched him drive away, waving sadly.
He assumed the short walk to our house would put me only twenty minutes behind him. That assumption made me less angry than depressed, since he’d obviously forgotten that it was Friday night, the Fep Prep spring dance, and that he was to drop me off at Gina’s house. And that my dress was hanging in the backseat of the Lincoln.
He’d forgotten that I was meeting Max Kissberg.
He’d forgotten that today was my sixteenth birthday, and that the best gift I could’ve received was a date with Max.
I knew what a supremely terrible afternoon my dad had-it’s not every day that formerly loving brothers threaten each other’s lives. If my dad was at the point where he was prepared to flee Chicago in twenty-four hours, it was obviously much worse than I could imagine. Still, it was extremely disturbing how something so important to me could be so easily pushed aside. I’ve never been a person who needs a lot of attention from the outside world. But I grew up in such a protected way that my emotional core is centered within my family; I depend almost fully on them for
attention, approval, and support. So if there’s one thing that sets off a flock of just-about-to-cry butterflies in my stomach, especially when it comes from my parents, it’s disregard-that lonely, empty sensation of not being thought of, or even considered. Those butterflies were moving now, and I wiped at my eyes and began the long trek to Gina’s house.
I was angry at my dad for refusing to tell me those important things about my family, but even angrier that he drove away without a simple “happy birthday.”
Much later, I would remember his sad wave.
I would wish that I’d waved back, since it was the last time I ever saw him.
9
Ten long blocks later, all I could think about was how late it was, how Max probably wondered if I would even show up at the dance, and how the dress I’d sweated and fretted over had driven away with my dad.
Also, how weird it was that Gina and I were going to the dance together.
Over the years, as she honed and perfected her gossip skills by knowing and talking to tons of people (and I pointedly didn’t), we regressed from hanging out regularly to sometimes to rarely. My mom’s warning had kept me away from her, and so did Gina’s ever-growing popularity, but even though we’d grown apart, we still had one of those original-friendship connections. We’d been each other’s first real friend, which never quite goes away, especially when you attend the same schools. So, whether it was out of nostalgia, curiosity, or the old challenge that lies between us-would she ever whisper to me a morsel of gossip so juicy that I’d actually want to know more? — we decided to go to the dance together. Days before, we’d found ourselves jammed next to each other in a crowded school assembly and chatted aimlessly until we arrived at the subject of the dance. She wasn’t currently dating anyone but planned on attending anyway, and I mentioned I was meeting someone there but basically going alone. And then we both sort of shrugged and decided to go together.
When I showed up at her house, sweaty from walk-running the whole way, she took one look at me, raised an eyebrow, and said, “Jeans, Cubs T-shirt, and Chuck Taylors again? For a dance? See, this is why we never hang out anymore. FYI, Sara Jane. . the general consensus floating around is that you’re a very strange kid.” She pulled open her closet to lend me whatever she had, except that I’m sort of tall and definitely on the thin side and Gina is genuinely curvy. I tried on a few skirts but they were too short, and a few tops but they were too airy. Her mom, who had been watching our sad little fashion show, left the room, saying, “We’re almost the same size, Sara Jane. I think I might have something.” She returned pulling plastic from a hanger, smiling ear to ear, saying, “I haven’t worn this since college.”
Gina looked at the dress, at me, and at her mom, and said, “Where’s it been, in a time capsule?” I stared at the dress glittering before me, knowing Gina had a point. The best way to describe it is to say that Farrah Fawcett would’ve worn it if she were working undercover, posing as a disco instructor on Charlie’s Angels.
“It’s a spring dance, Mom,” Gina said. “Not a Halloween party.”
“Well, Sara Jane, if you don’t want it. .,” Gina’s mom began.
“No, it’s great,” I said, mainly because it looked like it would fit and because we were more than an hour late. “I’d love to wear it.”
Gina’s jaw dropped. “You would? Okay, but I’m walking into the gym alone. I mean it. I don’t need it getting around that I associate with a disco queen.”
Nothing could’ve kept me from that dance.
I would’ve gone in a suit of armor.
And then, once I walked into the balloon-filled gym and took a look around, I couldn’t get out of there fast enough.
Right in front of me, encircled by a golden spotlight, Max was dancing with Mandi Fishbaum. A swarm of her look- alikes cruised past me, one of them giving me an up-and-down inspection, saying, “Nice dress.”
I flashed a look at her and said, “Shut the hell up,” as a small, cold flame began to dance in my gut. It was a strange feeling, one that was scary and thrilling at the same time, and I concentrated the sensation behind my eyes. The look-alike froze, her own eyes wide and mouth slightly open, and then I blinked, and she scurried away like a terrified chipmunk. I stared across the dance floor, sure that the right thing to do was exercise my left hook on Mandi’s jaw. But then the flame subsided, the feeling passed, and I turned and hurried from the gym.
“Sara Jane! Wait!”
I was through the double doors and hurrying across the parking lot when Max caught me, touching my shoulder and turning me toward him. “Where are you going?” he said, giving me the same appraisal as the look-alike. He grinned and said, “Nice dress,” except that he meant it.
Without thinking, I pushed him so hard that it made him take a step back. “You were dancing with Mandi Fishbaum!” was the worst thing I could think to say.
“So?” Max said, coming at me with his arms open and grin in place.
“So? Do you like her?”
“Yeah, I do.”
“But you told me she was a knucklehead!”
“That was three years ago.”
“So three years later, she’s not a knucklehead anymore?”
“Oh yeah,” Max said, with his TV-star grin, straightening the lapels of the sport coat he wore over a Triumph Motorcycle T-shirt. He moved brown curls from his eyes and said, “Mandi’s still a knucklehead all right. World class.”
“But you like her?” I said, feeling tears coming, and pushing him away.
“Yeah. Sara Jane. .”
“And she’s a knucklehead?” I said, pushing him again.
“Yeah. Listen, can you stop doing that?”
“You like her and she’s a knucklehead?” I said, and before I could push him again, Max grabbed my arms and held them tightly.
“You know, this is starting to sound like a scene from that movie Doug just showed us. Chinatown, remember?”
“How can you like Mandi Fishbaum, of all people?” I said, trying to yank my arms free while Max held them.
“Because, as I was trying to tell you,” he said, “she’s my cousin.”
“Your. . cousin?”
“Yeah,” he said, with a smaller, more cautious grin. “Everyone has the right to like his cousin and also think she’s an idiot.”
“Max,” I said, the reality of the situation descending on my head like a wet blanket. I had wanted to be so cool, so laid back and funny, but instead I had come off like some type of stalker/maniac. “Max, I’m. .”
“A knucklehead?” he said, and the warm smile that followed made it okay. “I really do like your dress. It’s old school, but not hipster-fake old school. It’s real.”
“That’s for sure.”
“Like you,” he said matter-of-factly. “You just seem like. . you. You don’t try to be anyone else.”
“You mean the look-alikes.”
“The who?” he said.
I explained the term and Max nodded. He understood that I didn’t hate those girls but just wasn’t anything like them-I wasn’t embedded in the type of social circle (or any social circle, for that matter) that dictated how I dressed or who I did or didn’t speak to. Finally I said, “What about the dance?”
“I told my mom I’d be home by ten. I did my servitude and now I get my motorcycle.” He looked at his phone and said, “It’s nine thirty. Why are you so late?”
The day’s drama between my dad and uncle, combined with the anticipation of meeting Max at the dance, had worn me down. I was suddenly exhausted, and said, “It’s a long story. I’m going home, too.”
“Red or brown line?” he said.
“Brown to red.”
“You want to ride together?”
Max talked excitedly about his motorcycle as we walked, and then apologized for talking so much. I didn’t care what he talked about, I was just happy to be together, and then we were at the El stop, swiping our cards and climbing the stairs to the platform.
The train pulled to a silent, breezy halt, sending litter bits cartwheeling in the air.
The doors separated with a zwoosh.
The recorded announcement said, “This is Diversey. Exit on the right at Diversey.”
Max and I climbed aboard the mostly empty car and sat shoulder to shoulder. As the train pulled away, he cleared his throat and said, “Hey, you want to see a movie? I don’t mean a classic one. I mean a go-to-the-theater movie.”
“Which one?” I said, thrilled at the prospect of what sounded like a date.
“See if you can figure it out,” he said. “I’m talking about exploding helicopters, 3-D natural disasters, guys doing the super slo-mo spinning-in-the-air thing while spraying Uzis at each other. Oh, and also a gigantic bomb that could destroy earth.”
“Let me guess. . Ten Seconds to Zero?”
“What gave it away? The gigantic bomb?”
“You like Ashton Willis?”
“He’s not a great actor,” Max said, “but he gets blown up well.”
“Doug would disapprove,” I said. “He’d call it ‘culturally insignificant.’”
“Actually, I think he’d call it ‘cotton candy for little brains.’”
“Doug hates action movies,” I said.
“I know. That’s why I’m asking you instead of him,” Max said, and nodded his head at the Belmont platform that was rumbling into view. “What do you say? Ten Seconds to Zero. . nine, eight, seven. .”
“Yeah, sure,” I said. “You can buy me some birthday popcorn.”
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