His brother Tommy, a freshman at Hofs-tra on a football scholarship, fished in a tub of cracked ice and pitched Pete a twelve-ounce Rolling Rock as he walked up to the stoop. Kids with Game Boys cluttered the steps. His sister Kathleen, just turned thirty, was barefoot on the front lawn, gently rocking an infant to sleep on her shoulder. She gave Pete a kiss and frowned at the patched eye.
"So when's number four due?"
'You mean number five," Kathleen said. "October ninth, Petey."
"Guess I got behind on the count when I was workin' undercover." Pete popped the tab top on the icy Rock and drank half of it while he watched some of the half-court action on the driveway. He laughed.
"Hey, Kath. Tell your old man to give up pasta or give up hoops."
Brother Tommy came down to the walk and put an arm around him. He was a linebacker, three inches taller than the five-eleven Peter but no wider in the shoulders. Big shoulders were a family hallmark, unfortunately for the women.
One of the basketball players got stuffed driving for a layup, and they both laughed.
"Hey, Vito!" Pete called. "Come on hard or keep it in your pants!" He finished off the beer and crushed the can. "Echo make it back from Boston?" he asked Tommy.
"She's inside. Nice shiner."
Pete said ruefully, "My collar give it to me."
"Too bad they don't hand out Purple Hearts downtown."
"Yeah, but they'll throw you a swell funeral," Pete said, forgetting momentarily what a remark like that meant to the women in a family of cops. Kathleen set him straight with a stinging slap to the back of his head. Then she crossed herself.
"God and Blessed Mother! Don't you ever say that again, Petey!"
_____________
Like the rest of the house, the kitchen was full of people helping themselves to beer and food. Peter gave his mom a kiss and looked at Echo, who was taking a pan of hors d'oeuvres out of the oven with oven mitts. She was moist from the heat at her temples and under her eyes. She gave Pete, or the butterfly patches above his eye, a look and sat him down on a stool near the door to the back porch for a closer appraisal. Pete's middle sister Jessie handed him a bulging hero.
"Little bitty girl," Pete said. "One of those wiry types, you know? She was on crank and I don't know what else."
"Just missed your eye," Echo said, tightlipped.
"Live and learn." Peter bit into his sandwich.
'You get a tetanus booster?"
"Sure. How was your day?"
"I did great," Echo said, still finding small ways to fuss over him: brushing his hair back from his forehead with the heel of one hand, dabbing at a drip of sauce on his chin with a napkin. "I deserve a raise."
"About time. How's your mom?"
"Didn't have a real good day," Julia said. "Want another beer?"
"Makes you think I had one already?"
"Ha-ha," Echo said; she went out to the porch to fish the beer from the depths of the cooler. Peter's sister Siobhan, the bride-to-be, followed her unsteadily inside, back on her heels from an imaginary gale in her face. Her eyes not tracking well. She embraced Peter with a goofy smile.
"I'm so happy!"
"We're happy for you, Siobhan." At thirty-five she was the oldest of the seven O'Neill children, and the least well favored. Putting it mildly.
Her fiance appeared in the doorway behind Siobhan. He was a head shorter, gap-toothed, had a bad haircut. A software salesman. Doing very well. He drove a Cadillac, had put a down payment on a condo in Valley Stream and was planning an expensive honeymoon cruise. The diamond on Siobhan's finger was a big one.
Peter saluted the fiance with his can of beer. Siobhan straightened unsteadily and embraced Echo too, belching loudly.
"Oops. Get any on ya?"
"No, sweetie," Echo said, and passed her on to the fiance, who chuckled and guided her through the kitchen to a bathroom. Peter shook his head.
"What they say about opposites."
'Yeah."
"Siobhan has a lot to learn. She still thinks 'fellatio' is an Italian opera."
'You mean it's not?" Echo said, wide-eyed. Then she patted his cheek. "Lay off. I love Siobhan. I love all your family."
Peter put the arm on his fourteen-year-old brother Casey as he came inside from the porch, and crushed him affectionately.
"Even the retards?"
"Get outta here," Casey said, fighting him off.
"Casey's no retard, he's a lover," Echo said. "Gimme a kiss, Case."
"No way!" But Echo had him grinning.
"Don't waste those on that little fart," Pete said.
Casey looked him over. "Man, you're gonna have a shiner."
"I know." Pete looked casually at Echo and put his sandwich down. "It's a sweatbox in here. Why don't we go upstairs a little while?"
Casey smiled wisely at them. "Uh-uh. Aunt Pegeen put the twins to sleep on your bed." He waited for the look of frustration in Peter's eyes before he said, "But I could let you use my room if you guys want to make out. Twenty bucks for an hour sound okay?"
"Sounds like you think I'm a hooker," Echo said to Casey. Staring him down. Casey's shoulders dropped; he looked away uneasily.
"I didn't mean—"
"Now you got a good reason not to skip confession again this week," Peter said. Glancing at Echo, and noticing how tired she looked, having lost her grip on her upbeat mood.
Driving Echo back to the city, Pete said, "I just keep goin' round and round with the numbers, like a dog chasin' its tail. You know?"
"Same here."
"Jesus, I'm twenty-six, ought to have my own place already instead of living home."
"Our own place. Trying to save anything these days. The taxes. Both of us still paying off college loans.
Forty thousand each. My mom sick. Your mom was sick—"
"We both got good jobs. The money'll come together. But we'll need another year,"
Peter exited from the Queensboro Bridge and took First uptown. They were nearing 78th when Echo said, "A year. How bad can that be?" Her tone of voice said, miserable.
They waited on the light at 78th, looking at each other as if they were about to be cast into separate dungeons.
"Gotta tell you, Echo. I'm just goin' nuts. You know."
"I know."
"It hasn't been easy for you either. Couple close calls, huh?" He smiled ruefully.
She crossed her arms as if he'd issued a warning. 'Yeah."
'You know what I'm sayin'. We are gonna be married. No doubt about that. Is there?'
"No."
"So—how big a deal is it, really? An act of contrition—"
"Pete, I'm not happy being probably the only twenty-two-year-old virgin on the face of the earth. But confession's not the same as getting a ticket fixed. You know how I was brought up. It's God's law. That has to mean something, or none of it does."
The light changed. Peter drove two blocks and parked by a fire hydrant a few doors down from Echo's brownstone.
"Both your parents were of the cloth," he said. "They renounced their vows and they made you. Made you for me. I can't believe God thought that was a sin."
Blue and unhappy, Echo sank lower in her seat, arms still crossed, over her breasts and her crucifix.
"I love you so much. And I swear to Him, I'll always take care of you."
After a long silence Echo said, "I know. What do you want me to do, Pete?"
"Has to be your call."
She sighed. "No motels. I feel cheap that way, I can't help myself. Just know it wouldn't work."
"There's this buddy of mine at the squad, he was in my year at the Academy, Frank Ringer. Like maybe you met him at the K of C picnic in July?"