CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
DOMINIC
Before I left for the airport to take the red-eye to JFK, I paid my brother a visit. He was working over at Espo 1, but he agreed to sit down and hear what I had to say.
Gio swirled the ice in his water glass as he listened, and I felt ten years of guilt being lifted off my chest. I wished I’d told him all the details long ago. About me, about Beth, about why I needed to fly to the other side of the country and face the man I’d wronged. A phone call simply wouldn’t do, not if we were going to have any real closure.
When I was done talking, he exhaled thickly, crossed his arms, and sat back in his chair.
“You’ll be back on Friday?” he asked.
I nodded. “I’ll land in New York early in the morning, rent a car, drive out to Long Island, and wait for Steven to show up. My return flight will be the following morning.”
“And you’re sure you know where to find him?”
“He bounces around a lot, but according to Jay’s PI friend, he moved into a rental house in Levittown a few months back.”
Gio raised an eyebrow. “And the girls?”
“I assume they’re with their dad,” I answered, meeting his gaze without a waver.
“Right,” he said softly. He looked sad. “That’s rough, two young girls losing their mother at such a young age.”
“And there’s no Donna to step in and help,” I reminded him. “We were lucky.”
A smile crossed his face. “Yeah, we were lucky.”
I stood up when Gio did. The dining room was getting busier as the dinner hour progressed, but the staff had known enough to leave us alone here in the corner.
“Have you checked in downtown yet?” he asked, referring to Espo 2.
“Briefly,” I said, not really caring to elaborate on the chilly reception I’d gotten from Melanie when I asked her if she could handle everything at the restaurant for a few days because I needed to leave town for reasons I didn’t have time to explain. Her scowl deepened as she realized I wouldn’t be offering details, and she was too proud to ask for them point-blank.
The thing was, I knew I owed Melanie the complete story, not just a hasty couple of sentences. More than that, I owed her the truth about my heart’s intentions, but I needed to do it the right way. I couldn’t just bark some words at her in the back office of Espo 2 before I ran out with my carry-on bag.
Melanie didn’t come willingly when I tried to hug her before I left. I didn’t push her. My eyes tried to plead my case, but she wouldn’t look at me directly.
Just believe in me, honey. I’ll make everything right.
“I’ll be back,” I told her, in my head sounding more like the Terminator than a guy making a promise to the girl he was wild about.
“I’ll be here,” she said, but the challenge in her face made me wonder if she really would be here. Maybe I’d already squandered what we could have had. If only I’d gotten my head out of my ass sooner.
I wanted to grab her up in a kiss that covered my lack of words, but she crossed her arms defiantly like she might bite me if I tried. So instead of a real kiss, I pressed two fingers to my lips and then quickly, before she could react, I reached over and brushed her lips with my fingertips. I left without saying anything else.
Gio didn’t need to hear about those specifics, but I did have one favor to ask of him before I left.
“Do something for me while I’m in New York?” I asked.
He shrugged. “You know I will.”
“Tell Melanie that I left her something in the bottom drawer of her desk. I know she never looks in there, because I found a bag of expired Doritos and a Bath & Body Works coupon from August. Just make sure you tell her I left her something. Tell her tomorrow.”
He was puzzled. “Why all the James Bond nonsense? You could just text her from New York tomorrow and tell her yourself.”
Of course I could. But Melanie and Gio needed to have their own conversation. I knew Melanie respected my brother enormously, and it bothered her that we’d started a relationship without his blessing. This seemed like a good opportunity for them to clear the air.
Gio stroked his chin and leveled me with a serious look. “It’s real, isn’t it? You and Melanie.”
I didn’t hesitate. “Big fat yes in bold neon lights for my part. It’s totally real, man.”
That made him smile and let out a low whistle. “Isn’t that something,” he said. “Dominic’s in love.”
“Keep that to yourself, okay?”
“Come on,” he scoffed. Then he flashed me a rueful grin. “You have a safe trip, brother.”
He stood up and offered me a handshake. Then he pulled me closer for an affectionate man-hug.
My flight left at eleven and would land at eight a.m. New York time. I hadn’t flown in years, and even though I was exhausted, I didn’t think I’d be capable of relaxing in midair, especially considering the plane was nearly full and smelled like stale bagels.
“Excuse me,” said the woman beside me. She’d been trying to get a wiggly toddler settled in the seat beside her since we’d boarded. “Would it bother you terribly to turn off the overhead light? Unless you plan to read or something,” she added.
“No bother,” I said, and switched it off because I’d just been staring at nothing and thinking about the past anyway.
“Thank you,” the young mother said gratefully and settled a blanket over her little boy.
Then I closed my eyes and didn’t open them again until passengers began cracking open their tiny window shades to watch the sunrise. I pried my window open and kept a keen eye out until the Manhattan skyline came into focus. For ten years I’d only seen the city of my birth in movies and in my memory. Laying eyes on it again was like running into a long-lost friend whose face has never completely left your thoughts.
The captain’s voice crackled over the plane’s loudspeaker. “Folks, we’ll be landing in New York’s JFK Airport in just a little while here. Skies are clear on this early October morning, and the current temperature is fifty-two degrees. If you’re in town for a visit, have yourself a grand time in the Big Apple. But if you’re returning, then welcome home.”
The little boy sitting beside his mother began clapping. He smiled at me when I looked over. I smiled back.
Luckily I hadn’t needed to check any luggage, but it still took some time to get off the plane, find the rental car desk, and obtain the keys to a red Honda Accord. By the time I was on the Belt Parkway out to Long Island, it was almost ten o’clock.
Traffic wasn’t bad. Rush hour had passed, and anyway, people usually traveled east to west in the morning, not the other way around. When I was a kid, sometimes we’d ride out here to visit the beach in the summertime on the rare days Papa Leo could bear to turn the kitchen over to someone else. When I thought of Long Island, I thought of sand and the Jones Beach boardwalk. But as I drove through Nassau County, I saw that most of it just looked like ordinary suburbs.
According to the GPS, Steven’s house was only twenty-four miles from the airport. I didn’t really have a plan, other than to hang around near his house and wait for someone to appear. Artie Cavendish’s report was thorough, considering the short notice. He’d found out that Steven had been working as a package delivery driver for five years and that he’d moved around three times in the two years he’d been living in Nassau County. Of course Artie’s report didn’t cover more important questions, like whether Steven was still a gambler with a bottle perpetually in his hand. Or if he was capable of taking care of his girls in the wake of his wife’s death.
At some point I realized I was starving. Long overdue family confrontations shouldn’t be tackled on an empty stomach. I pulled off the parkway and found a diner before I reached Levittown.
While I chowed down on a hearty breakfast of waffles and eggs, I kept mulling over the idea of texting Melanie. Something like “Miss you, babe” or “Wish you were here” seemed corny and inappropriate right now. I could message her under the pretense of asking if everything was all right at work, but that would probably just rub her the wrong way.
Once I was back in the rental car, I was hit by the fact that I couldn’t remember the last time I’d spent an entire day without working. Even on holidays I always found a reason to drop by the restaurant and do something that wasn’t even important. That was a big difference between me and Gio. He was no less dedicated, but he’d found a way to balance work and life. Funny, for a long time I’d thought of work as the same thing as life. Only lately had I realized I was wrong all along.
The house where Steven lived was on a narrow side street with maple trees and front lawns and sidewalks littered with orange leaves. The houses were all well kept and neat, except for one. I knew it was Steven’s rental house even before I double-checked the address. Unlike the houses surrounding it, this one seemed to droop under the weight of being unloved.
I took a couple of deep breaths before I walked up to the front door. In fact if I hadn’t spent the entire night flying to the other side of the country, then I might have lost my nerve before I rang the doorbell. But no one was home anyway. I listened for any hint of sound inside and heard only the echo of the doorbell chime. No car was in the driveway, and the only clue I had that anyone actually lived here was the child’s bicycle that leaned against the house just beyond the side door.
Reluctantly I returned to the car and waited.
I waited for a long time.
At two p.m. I had to piss so bad I couldn’t think straight, so I drove over to a 7-Eleven to use the bathroom. When I returned, a battered black Chevy Malibu was sitting in the driveway of Steven’s house.
This time when I got to the front door, I knocked instead of ringing the doorbell. There were footfalls, the sound of the lock being turned, and then the door opened.
Steven Esposito’s sorrow was written all over him. He was still physically formidable, but his shoulders drooped, his hairline had receded, and his face bore the weariness of grief.
At least that was his expression before he saw me standing at his front door. Then his expression changed to openmouthed shock. I figured fury would follow, but he just kept blinking and looking stunned. He opened the screen door and squinted at me like I was an apparition.
“Dominic,” he croaked.
“Hi, Stevie,” I answered in what I hoped was a humble tone of voice.
Steven shook his head as if he was trying to shake himself awake. I got the feeling he would have been less shocked to find that a talking penguin had arrived to summon him to the North Pole.
I waited for him to invite me inside. I waited for him to punch me in the mouth. He didn’t do either.
He stepped outside and sat down heavily on an old redwood bench. He was wearing what I assumed was his work uniform, a plain brown shirt and pants with the company logo on the left pocket. I watched as he leaned forward and let out a huge sigh. He gave no sign that he wanted me to sit beside him.
“It’s been a long time,” he said.
“Ten years,” I agreed.
Steven looked at me then. In coming here, I had halfway expected to be met with wrath, but when I searched my cousin’s face, I didn’t find it. Maybe the passage of time solved a few things after all.
He scooted over a few inches, rested his elbows on his knees, and made a tent with his hands. “Have a seat.”
I sat. I wanted to break the sad news before he asked what I was doing here, so I just came out with it.
“Grandma Donna died last Saturday.” I paused. “I’m sorry, Steven. The funeral was on Tuesday, but I wasn’t able to track you down right away.”
He didn’t make a sound. He just stared at his hands—big, broad hands that looked like they were used to working hard. Like mine, like Gio’s, like Papa Leo’s.
“Had she been sick?” he asked.
“No. She went into cardiac arrest as soon as she was put under anesthesia to fix a broken hip. We weren’t expecting to lose her. You should know that she talked about you. In fact the last conversation we had, she asked about you.”
“Damn,” he muttered with a wince. “I should have made an effort. It’s just that we’ve been barely hanging on, day to day. I used to think about it, that I ought to find a way to bring the girls to see her out there in Arizona. Beth always talked about planning a trip . . .” His voice cracked and trailed off. His head dropped.
I swallowed. “Steven, I heard about Beth. I’m more sorry than I can say.”
A miserable sound came from his throat, but after a few deep breaths his voice came out even. “It was stomach cancer. One minute she was fine and healthy and taking Alice’s Girl Scout troop on camping trips to the Hamptons. Then she had a few bad days, so she visited the doctor. Four months later she was just gone.”
For a split second I closed my eyes and saw Beth’s bright smile. I saw her wave and blow me a kiss from her front porch. Then I opened my eyes and saw my cousin staring at me.
“Did you hear about Beth because of that article?” he asked curiously.
I was surprised. “You know about the article?”
“Yeah. A buddy of mine from the old neighborhood had my email address. He sent me a link, saying ‘Hey, aren’t these your little cousins?’ And I was like, ‘Yup, those are my little cousins.’” He frowned. “Everything else aside, that was a hell of a bullshit article.”
“Hatchet job is more like it,” I grumbled. “They didn’t get any of that gossip from us.”
He nodded. “I kind of figured.”
We sat there in silence for a moment. A gust of wind stirred up a wave of crisp leaves. The tree branches hovering over the street shivered. I shivered with them.
“Steven.”
He looked at me when I said his name. I tried to sort through the words I wanted to say and then figured I’d be better off just speaking from the heart.
“You probably don’t want to hear it all these years later, but I’m so sorry I hurt you. I’m so sorry, Stevie. At the time I told myself that because you and Beth were separated it wasn’t a betrayal. I was pissed at you for your role in our family’s financial collapse. I was so fucking wrong. I was selfish. I was terrible. But after Beth and I started, things changed, and it was no longer about some sick form of revenge. I cared about her. A lot. When she went back to you, it crushed me, and I’m not telling you that because I’m searching for sympathy. I’m telling you because I thought it would give you some satisfaction to know that I got hurt in the end, just like I deserved to.”
He dropped his arms and leaned back tiredly on the bench. He sighed. “Ten years ago it would have given me satisfaction, Dom. But now I realize there’s already too much hurt in the world. I get no satisfaction from hearing about more.” He coughed and cleared his throat. “I didn’t treat her right. That’s why she kicked me out in the first place. I cheated, I drank too much, I never helped with Maya. It was only after I realized that I might not get her back that I understood what I’d lost. From then on I made it my business to become a better man. I haven’t touched the bottle or placed a bet since. That doesn’t mean I wasn’t furious with her when I found out about you two. Hell, we were angry at each other. But we figured out how to forgive, how to love, how to be a family.” Suddenly his voice got husky. “Beth and I were meant to be, even if we suffered a rocky road along the way. We would have stayed together forever if she hadn’t gotten sick.”
I’d never been a crier. But sitting there on that bench beside my cousin as he talked frankly about forgiveness and heartbreak, a tear traveled down my cheek. And then another one. Steven and Beth had a shaky foundation, but they’d found their love story after all. I only wished they could have enjoyed it longer.
Steven reached into his shirt pocket, withdrew a small pack of tissues, and handed them over. “Allergies,” he explained.
I used two tissues and stuffed them in my pocket, feeling a little embarrassed about sitting outside and weeping like a teenage girl.
“Look, I didn’t have anything do with the restaurant going under,” he said suddenly. “I swear to god, Dominic, that’s not the way it went down. My father had power of attorney over everything, and I was too busy boozing it up and gambling every penny in my own bank account to realize what he was up to. He’d even gotten involved with the mob. The feds determined that I had no part in his schemes, which was a hell of a relief because it meant I didn’t have to join him in prison.”
I tried to think of something diplomatic to say but couldn’t come up with anything beyond a limp, “That’s good.”
Steven seemed to be waiting for me to say more, but I didn’t want to bad-mouth his dead father in front of him, no matter how much the asshole deserved it.
“So how are you, Steven?” I asked him, trying for a friendly tone.
He looked so tired, so worn out. He managed a fleeting smile, though.
“I’m hanging in there. The girls keep me going, and my job’s hours are such that I can be here when they get home from school. They’re still having a hard time with their mother’s death, so I thought moving a few towns over would help. That’s how we ended up here. It doesn’t seem to have made much difference. I just give them everything I can, and I hope it’ll turn out to be enough.” Steven looked pensively off into the distance. “I wish they could’ve known what it was like, though, growing up among family, learning how to roll a perfect pizza crust before you learned how to tie your shoes. I wish they could have what we had, Dom.”
A big yellow school bus stopped at the corner amid squealing brakes and flashing lights. Children poured out the door and scattered in different directions. One of them scattered our way.
My breath caught as I watched the little girl who was the very image of her mother. She scampered across the front lawn, crushing leaves under her sneakers. She stopped in front of Steven.
“Daddy, I made you this in art class,” she said, proudly holding out a watercolor painting of an elaborate butterfly.
Steven accepted the paper with a broad smile. “Thank you, sweetheart. It’s beautiful.”
The girl noticed me. She frowned. “Who’s this?”
Steven glanced at me and then back at her. “Alice, this is my cousin Dominic.”
“You have a cousin?”
“Yup, I have several. Now why don’t you run inside, hang this brand-new artwork on the fridge, and have a snack? I stopped by the baker down the road and picked up cannolis, but you have to save some for your sister too.”
“Oh, yum!” she squealed and darted inside. Then she popped her head back out. “I forgot to say that it was nice to meet you, Dominic.”
I waved. “It was nice to meet you, too, Alice.”
Steven and I were quiet for a few seconds. When he finally spoke, his voice wasn’t bitter.
“She’s not yours, you know,” he said quietly.
“I know.”
He frowned. “You know?”
I nodded. “Beth sent me a letter, explaining. I guess the timeline was close enough that some people had their doubts.”
“What do you mean a letter?” His eyes had narrowed, and I wondered if I should have brought it up.
“I got it about a year after Donna, Gio, and I moved to Arizona. She let me know that your daughter was born ten months after the last time we were together and that Alice was undoubtedly your daughter no matter what the wagging tongues said.”
“Oh.” He looked thoughtful. “Did she say anything else?”
I still had that letter. I kept it in an old cigar box that had belonged to Papa Leo. I hadn’t looked at it in years, but I remembered everything it said.
“She said she loved you,” I told him truthfully. “She said she was happy.”
He looked relieved.
“How’s Gio?” he asked suddenly.
I was glad to switch the topic of conversation to my brother. “He’s great. Married with a baby girl.”
“Happy to hear that.” He smiled. “I always loved Giovanni. He was the most awesome little kid.”
“Well, now he’s the most awesome grown man.”
Steven suddenly looked shy. “I’m proud of you guys, you know. I’m proud of you for finding a way to bring back what our family lost. If only Papa Leo was here to see it.”
I scanned the cloudless sky. “Maybe he does,” I said. “Maybe they all do.”
Steven looked up. “Yeah, maybe.” He elbowed me gently and stood up. “Why don’t you stay for dinner? I’ve got a portable brick oven in the backyard. It won’t be the same as eating at Esposito’s, but the pies still come out pretty decent.”
The invitation surprised me. I didn’t even consider turning it down. “I’d like that, Steven. Thank you.”
Steven’s older daughter, Maya, arrived home a short time later. She’d only been three the last time I saw her. She didn’t remember me, which was probably a good thing. The four of us rolled out pizza dough and laughed and ate. Even though I’d never been to this house before, it felt a little like coming home.
My cousin had offered his battered couch as a place for me to crash, but I didn’t want to impose anymore, so I said goodbye and checked into a motel. As I stared at the hotel ceiling, trying to summon sleep, I kept seeing images of the old restaurant and the people who filled it. I knew that from now on I’d be able to remember it all without a trace of bitterness or regret. Donna and Leo Esposito had raised me with love and with optimism. They were now both gone from this earth, but the lessons they’d instilled remained. I wanted to be the best version of myself. Not just to honor their memory, but for me and for the people I loved.
Early the next morning, as the plane lifted its nose and climbed above the old city, I thought only of Melanie. I remembered how she said she’d always wanted to travel to New York. I had to let her know that if she was willing to take a risk and travel with me, then I’d happily take her anywhere. Absolutely fucking anywhere.