“That’s how you knew he loved you?”
“In eighteen years, he had never made a meal. I mean, he’d help if I asked. He’d cut up melon for a fruit salad for a buffet or he’d pack the Igloo with ice for a picnic or he’d set up the bar for the holidays. But he had never gone to the store and bought the ingredients without asking and then come home and cooked them. That was left to me. And that’s when I knew I had him back. He had changed. You see, that’s when you know for sure somebody loves you. They figure out what you need and they give it to you-without you asking.”
“The without asking is the hard part.”
“It has to come from the heart.”
“Right,” I say and nod.
Mom and I watch the people move through the lobby, patients on their way to appointments, staff returning from break, and visitors jostling in and out of the elevators. The sun bounces off the windows in the pavilion that faces the lobby, and drenches the tile floor with a gleam so bright, I close my eyes.
“Have I upset you?” Mom asks me.
I open my eyes. “No. You’re a font of wisdom, Mom.”
“I can talk to you, Valentine.” She fiddles with the gold post in the back of her hoop earring. “I just-” And then, to my complete surprise, she breaks into quiet sobs. “Why the hell am I crying?” She throws her hands up.
“You’re scared?” I say softly.
“No, that’s not it.” Mom fishes through her purse until she finds the small cellophane pad of tissues. She yanks one out. “These”-she holds up the tiny square-“are worthless.” She dabs under her eyes with the small tissue. “I just don’t want it all to have been a waste. We’ve come so far and I was hoping we’d grow old together. Now, time is running out. After all that, we don’t get the time? That would kill me. It’s like the soldier who goes off to war, dodges gunfire and bombs and grenades, makes it out of the war zone, only to return home and slip on a banana peel, fall into a coma, and die.”
“Have a little faith.”
“That’s coming from the least religious of my children.” Mom sits up straight. “I don’t mean that as a judgment.”
“I mean faith in him.”
“In God?” “No. Dad. He’s not going to let us down.”
Our family, like all the Italian-American families I know, is big on Excuse parties: birthdays and anniversaries that end in a zero or a five. We even have special titles for them, a twenty-fifth anniversary is A Silver Jubilee, a thirtieth birthday is La Festa, a fiftieth anniversary is called A Golden Jubilee, and a seventy-fifth anything is a miracle. So, imagine how thrilled we are to toast Gram, in good health, still with excellent vitality, in fine physical shape save for those knees, and having “all her marbles,” as she calls them, on this, her eightieth birthday.
I also thought, knowing my immediate family would be in full attendance, that this would be the perfect opportunity to introduce them to Roman. I know I’m taking a chance here, but I have learned, when it comes to my family, it is best to introduce a new boyfriend in a crowded public venue where there’s less possibility of a gaffe, slip, or chance that someone will reach for the photo albums and show pictures of me buck naked, wearing only angel wings, on my fourth birthday.
We offered Gram the standard big bash at the Knights of Columbus Hall in Forest Hills, with a DJ; a ceiling of silver balloons; the stations of the cross on the walls, covered with streamers of crepe paper; and a custom sheet cake with Gram’s age embossed on it. But she opted for this party instead, a chic night out, dinner and a show at the Café Carlyle. She’d seen enough and plenty of the extended family at Jaclyn’s wedding, plus, Gram’s favorite singer of all time, Keely Smith, the great song stylist and comedienne, is the headliner at the Carlyle. When Gabriel, my friend the maître d’, told us that she was appearing, we reserved a table.
Keely Smith and her music have a special place in Gram’s life. When my grandparents were young, they used to travel around to catch Keely singing with her then husband Louis Prima, backed by Sam Butera and The Witnesses. The act was a swinging cabaret alternative to the orchestras of the big band era. Gram will tell you that they personified hip.
Italian Americans revere Louis Prima, as we are married and buried to his music. Jaclyn, Tess, and Alfred danced to Louis’s chart of “Oh, Marie” at their weddings, and my grandfather was buried to Keely’s version of “I Wish You Love.” Prima is primo with the Roncallis and the Angelinis.
I check my lipstick in the cab on the way to the Café Carlyle, the Krup diamond of cabaret rooms. When a Village girl crosses Fourteenth Street and heads north, she had better be Upper East Side chic. Also, I want to look good for Roman, who hasn’t seen me gussied up since our first date. How can I look glamorous when I run over to the restaurant kitchen to help him make pasta by hand or shuck clams for chowder? Tonight, he’s getting the best version of his girlfriend.
I’m wearing a midnight blue coatdress with a wide embroidered belt that belonged to my mother. I’ve had my eye on it for years, and this summer, when she purged her closet, I got lucky. There’s a picture of Mom holding me at my baptism in the fall of 1975 and wearing this coatdress. Her long hair is secured with a headband, which is attached to a fall, giving her cascading curls to her waist. Mom looked like a Catholic Ann-Margret with one foot in the sacristy and the other on the Vegas strip.
I wear the coatdress with pants, as it’s much shorter on me. My mother wore it as a dress with sheer L’Eggs stockings, and I know that for certain because we used to collect the plastic eggs her hosiery came in and play farm.
Tess, Jaclyn, and I happily accept Mom’s secondhand clothes because we know how much she treasured them the first time around. Tess ended up with a few structured St. John jackets from the eighties, appropriate for PTA meetings, while I opted for coats and dresses she had made by a seamstress for special occasions. Jaclyn, with her tiny feet, inherited Mom’s collection of Candy platform sandals in every shade of fake python that was available during the Carter administration. Yes, tangerine snakeskin exists. Mom says that you know you’ve been around awhile when you own every possible variation of a heel in your shoe collection. She still has the Famolare Get There sandals with the wavy bottoms. My mother never needed the recreational drugs of her era, she just put on those sandals and swayed.
As the cab makes a quick turn off Madison and onto East Seventy-sixth Street, I see Gabriel outside the hotel entrance, talking on his phone. I pay the cabbie and jump out.
Gabriel snaps the phone shut. “You’ve got the best table ringside.”
“Great. Is Gram here yet?”
“Oh, she’s here all right. She’s on her second scotch and soda. I hope the show begins soon, because there will be a show, just not the one you’re paying to see.”
“Gram’s tipsy?”
“June is worse. The woman can put it away. Evidently, her legs are made of sea sponge. And your Aunt Feen looks stoned. What’s the deal with her anyway? Lipitor with an Ambien chaser? Do me a favor. Check her meds.” Gabriel motions for me to follow him inside. “Is Roman on his way? I hate latecomers.”
“Yep.”
“Have you had sex yet?”
“No.” I yank my belt tightly. Tonight may be the night, but I don’t have to tell Gabriel.
“You bore me. What are you waiting for?”
“I’d like to spend more time with him before I take him on my magical mystery tour. Our relationship is building beautifully, thank you.”
“Who said anything about a relationship? I’m talking about sex.”
“You know they are coffee and cream to me.”
“Go ahead. Have your high standards and enjoy them alone. Follow me, darling.”