“I like to sit up high.” Nancy Palazzini looked lovely in a sapphire-blue satin cocktail dress with a matching bolero. Her hair was tinted red; her makeup and nails, as they always had been, were a study in perfection.
“Good to see you again, Aunt Jo, Uncle Dom,” Micky said. He was handsome and well turned out like his father, with the same head of thick hair.
“Same goes for me.” Tricky was shy and didn’t like to speak in public, but everyone knew his heart. He was trim and well manicured, like his mother.
Dom made a circle on the stage floor with the toe of his old black dress shoe.
“I’m sorry about Ricky,” he finally said to his brother, Mike.
Mike’s eyes filled with tears. “What are you going to do?”
“We gave him up for a good cause,” Nancy said. “But we live with the loss every day.”
“Not easy,” Mike said quietly.
“No, it isn’t.” Nancy put her hand on her husband’s back. “But we cope. Jo’s letter got me through.”
“You wrote her a letter?” Dom asked.
“I can write letters without permission from you.”
“Not when they’re on the island.”
“You can get mail to the island, Dominic.” Jo raised her voice.
“Since when?”
“Since I mailed it and it arrived and it was read. All right?”
“Watch your tone, Joanna!”
“I will not! Especially when you’re behaving like a jackass.”
“Can’t argue with her there, Dom.” Mike opened his hands to them.
“You’re on her side?”
“I always liked her better than you.”
“Now the truth comes out.”
“And none of it matters,” Nancy said, gripping her alligator purse so tightly by the handle it seemed it might snap off. “All we are is what we’ve lost. And you boys”—she looked at Dom and then at her husband—“know we’ve lost a lot.”
“It affected all of us. We miss our cousins. Even though we always had our seats together at the Phillies games,” Dominic admitted.
“You did what?” Dom was stunned.
“Ricky, Micky, and Tricky, and Gio and Nino and me. We went to the games together. And when Nicky got old enough, we brought him along too,” Dominic confessed.
“That’s insubordination.” Dom wiped his face with his hands.
“Evidently, they even have sports on the island.” Jo sipped her punch.
“We would’ve done it anyway, Pop. We’re family. You don’t just throw people out like paper plates.” Nino put his arm around his father’s shoulders.
“We have so many good memories. We’d go to Wildwood Crest in the summers. Uncle Mike would blow the horn when we passed the bridge with the burning torches.”
“You remember that, Gio?” Uncle Mike smiled.
“And Pop, you taught us how to fish. You drove the boat when we water-skied. And you took us on all the rides.” Gio looked at Dom.
“Because I had a weak stomach. I still do,” Mike admitted.
“You always looked so beautiful in your bathing suits. And your caps always matched,” Jo said to Nancy with admiration.
“What can I say, I love fashion.”
“Nothing wrong with that,” Jo assured her.
“And when we came in from the beach, you had dinner ready. Every night,” Nancy said appreciatively.
“It was my pleasure,” Jo said. “I’m allergic to the sun. I’m not allergic to pots and pans.”
“Thank God for that,” Dom said.
Nicky took Calla’s hand and joined his uncles, his cousins, and their wives. “There’s something I wanted to tell you.”
“Please say you’re coming back to drive Number 4.” Dom put his hands in the prayer position.
“No, I’ve found a new calling, Uncle Dom. When you become an actor, you learn a technique, and it requires you to use your memory and feelings. And early on, when I first started taking classes, I couldn’t stop thinking about Ricky. He was the one among us that had the soul of an artist. He loved the opera. He read books. Not comic books.”
“Books with hard covers.” Micky nodded.
“He was nuts for the theater. Broadway. He loved to go to a show in New York. He was always begging me to take him into the city for a show,” Mike remembered.
“Ricky had class,” Gio said. “That’s the only word for it.”
“It was nice that one of us had it,” Tricky offered.
“He was my boy that appreciated the finer things,” Nancy said quietly. “But the finest of all were his friendships. He would be happy tonight.”
“To Ricky.” Nicky raised his glass.
“Cent’anni,” Calla said as they touched their glasses.
“No more fights!” Dominic raised his glass.
“Mazel tov!” Elsa clinked glasses with her cousins-in-law.
Calla raised her glass. “To my sisters and my brothers-in-law!” Helen and Portia raised their glasses with their husbands.
“Salute!” Mike tapped his glass with his brother Dom’s.
Hortense tipped her glass to Hambone.
“Refill?” he asked.
“A smidge.” Hambone filled Hortense’s glass.
Two policemen pushed through the crowd.
“Officer, we’re having a party. If we’re blocking the street, we’ll clear the cars,” Nicky promised them.
“The cars are fine,” the officer said.
His partner scanned the crowd. “We’re looking for Giovanni Palazzini.”
“You are not serious.” Mabel turned to her husband and smacked the back of his head. “We’re at a wedding reception.”
“Is he here?” the cop wanted to know.
“Of course he’s here. The entire family is here.” Mabel offered her husband up like a Swedish meatball.
“I’m over here, Officer.” Gio raised his hand.
Aunt Jo stepped between the cops and her son. “I’m sure there’s been a mistake.”
“Is this your mother?” the cop asked Gio.
“Yes.”
“Mothers. Vessels of hope.” The cop shook his head. “Mr. Palazzini, we need you to come down to the station with us.”
“The station?” Mabel moaned. “Will there be cuffs?”
“You guys, don’t let this throw you. Carry on with the party,” Gio said as his hands were clicked into the handcuffs. Gio was led out the stage door and into the squad car parked in the alley. Mabel followed them into the alley.
“Where are you going?” Aunt Jo asked Uncle Dom.
“I gotta bail him out.”
“You can’t leave me here alone.”
“Stay and enjoy.” Dom raised his hands and addressed the group. “Enjoy the party. All will be well. I’ll spring my son and return to the festivities.”
“I saw this coming in 1939,” Hortense shook her head.
Mike looked at his nephews. “Should we follow him?”
*
Calla stood at the window of the Fourth Precinct. There were more cars representing the Palazzini family parked in front than there were official police vehicles.
Nicky emerged from the jail with Gio and Uncle Dom. “We got him!”
“When God closes a door, He opens a window!” Jo exclaimed.
“But not wide enough that I could jump out of it.” Gio rubbed his wrists.
Mabel burst into tears and she embraced her husband.
“I won’t gamble anymore, honeybun,” Gio promised.
“And I’m going to pretend to believe you.”
The family shuffled out of the police station and into their cars. Mike went to Dom. “How much did that set you back?”
“I didn’t pay.”
“Who did?”
“Nicky used la boost.”
Mike shook his head. “That’s bad luck.”
“I couldn’t stop him. It was a bag of cash when cash was called for.”