“I remember her.”
“Anyone that ever met her never forgot her. Your aunt still cries, she misses her so much.”
“Do you miss your brother?”
Dom grunted. “No, I do not.”
“He’s still alive.”
“Yes, he is.”
“So it’s different. If he were dead, you’d feel differently. Or maybe you wouldn’t. I don’t want to speak for you.”
“I try not to think about it. I can’t change the situation.”
“You could. You could walk over to Fitzwater Street and talk to him any time you wanted.”
“I don’t go where I’m not wanted.”
“If he came to you?”
“My door is always open.”
“So you do miss Uncle Mike.”
Uncle Dom swatted the crumbs from the front of his shirt. “Well, you miss the history. He knows things only he could know about me, and vice versa. That has value when you get to be my age. But you have to weigh it against the Sturm und Drang, the tumult and the agita. And when it comes to your uncle, it’s obvious what teeters and what totters.”
“If I had a brother, I don’t think I could live so close to him and not see him.”
“I know he’s there.”
“But you don’t speak to each other.”
“But I know he’s there.”
“And that’s enough?”
“It has to be. You can’t go out and fix it now.”
“Why not?”
“Too much. Too much.”
“And that’s that?”
“It’s something you have to accept. I went to see a priest about it. And he told me a story about the Renaissance. Funny, it always takes an Irishman to tell an Italian a good story about our people. Anyhow, I told him my troubles because I was guilty about the situation—I’m the oldest brother and I take responsibility, you know? Primogeniture is a concept that goes back to the Bible, Isaac and Jacob and Esau, it’s the basis of law itself. The firstborn son gets everything. No fooling around there. So this priest says that Mike and I were rivals, like Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci. When we worked together, we went at each other, and there were problems. But when we separated, my business did well, and his business did well. The priest said, go talk to your brother and just be his brother. Keep business out of it. But I couldn’t do it. It was too late.”
*
Dom pulled into Lou Caruso’s Cars New & Used on Empire Street and glided the cab next to the glass box in the center of the lot. “Take the basket,” he said to Nicky.
Nicky waited outside with the basket as Uncle Dom went inside. He watched the men shake hands. Lou Caruso sat in his chair as Uncle Dom negotiated the return of Car No. 4 to the lot. Uncle Dom had his arms outstretched for much of the wheeling and dealing, looking a lot like the trapeze artist who walks the high wire between skyscrapers, holding a crossbow and wearing nothing but ballet slippers and a wrestler’s tank suit. It was as if his uncle were balancing the return of the car with the value of a new one in his hands.
Fascinated, Nicky began to copy his uncle’s stance, looking at his own shadow on the sidewalk. He remembered how Sam Borelli insisted his actors observe behavior, and how emotions move through the body. There was something about the way Uncle Dom held his body that made the men inside listen to him and do his bidding. Nicky could see Lou Caruso through the glass, mesmerized, or maybe entertained. It didn’t matter. It appeared that Uncle Dom was effective. If there’s anyone in the world who has seen the gamut of human emotion, from lust to greed to indifference and back again, it’s the used-car salesman.
Uncle Dom emerged with a set of keys that he tossed to his nephew. “We’re taking a lightly used 1946 Chrysler. This one’s used less miles than old number four, if you can believe it, and it’s got a posh interior. Lou Caruso is very particular. You’ll be riding in style, Nicky.” Dom took the basket and led Nicky to the spot where the newest addition to the Palazzini fleet was parked.
The mustard-yellow cab gleamed in the sun. Nicky peered inside. Uncle Dom wasn’t kidding. Black leather seats, pin-tucked, with flat turquoise leather buttons and a shiny licorice trim, looked fashionable and chic, almost too upscale for a Philly cab. Nicky flipped the hood on his way to the driver’s seat. The engine was an orchestra of tubes, wires, bolts, and boxes in mint condition.
“How is she under the hat?” Dom asked as Nicky climbed into the new used cab and turned the key over. Uncle Dom climbed into the passenger seat.
“What a stunner.” Nicky grinned.
“And she’s all yours. Say hello to the new number four.” Uncle Dom pushed his seat back.
“Almost makes me happy to be a hack, Uncle Dom.” Nicky turned the key. The engine purred like Eartha Kitt holding a blue note as Dom and his nephew headed for home.
*
Nicky waited for Peachy on the sidewalk outside of Wanamaker’s. He took the final drag off his cigarette when he saw her coming through the revolving doors. She smiled at him through the spinning glass.
She kissed him. “Where’s number four?”
“Uncle Dom traded it in.”
“It was practically new.”
“Yeah. But he had his reasons.”
“You better watch him. You know he’s getting to that age where their arteries harden and they go stunod and make stupid decisions. I’m not going to let that happen to you.”
“It might be too late.”
“What are your symptoms?”
“All kinds of them.”
“Well, keep them under wraps until after the wedding. I don’t need any aggravation. Ma wants us to go and see the priest this Sunday because the banns of marriage in the church bulletin lock in our date in the church calendar, and it’s already packed—we are penciled in, of course, but we need to get it in ink—or, as my mother prefers, in blood. A lot of people get married at the end of a decade.”
“I didn’t know that. Why?”
“It’s a hard deadline. A girl says, Look, you either marry me by the end of 1949 or there will be no us in 1950.”
“Makes sense.”
“I think so. Nothing worth doing in life ever gets done without a deadline.”
Nicky took a turn to the parking lot of the King of Peace Church.
“What are we doing here?”
“Let’s go sit in the garden.”
“But it’s not my parish. Or yours.”
“But it’s quiet.”
“Can’t we ride around and listen to WFIL? It’s Mellow Night. They got the Cloone. You love the Cloone.”
“I’m not in the mood for music. And I haven’t seen you since you came to the play.”
“I’ve been so busy planning the wedding. The details. My mother has so much to do. Samples everywhere. Cocktail napkins with our initials. Matchbooks! Our names and the date in silver—oh, Nicky, and you’ll love this. When you open the matchbook, Ma put a surprise in there. There’s a quote printed in there: ‘Strike one for love.’ How cute is that? Ma’s doing all accoutrements in shades of blue. Tablecloths. Charger plates. I didn’t know that ‘ocean wave’ was a color, did you?”
“Never heard of it.”
“Me neither. I’ve heard of seafoam, but not ocean wave. It’s a deeper blue.”