Every Single Second (12 page)

“Nella,” she said at last, “please help Clementine distribute the doughnuts. One each—don’t even start, Samuel!”

“What just happened?” Clem whispered to Nella.

“We’re not allowed to have junk food. Only healthy treats.”

“Really? That’s how it was in New York, but I thought things here were more, you know.”

“Ignorant? Primitive?”

“Something like that.” Clem grinned. “Anyway, seize the day!”

“Seize the doughnut!”

Clem laughed. At lunchtime, Mrs. Johnson relented
and let them each take a second doughnut. For the first time, Clem sat with Nella and Angela.

“They really are the best doughnuts ever.” She put hers on her finger and nibbled. “Physicists speculate the universe is doughnut shaped. Torus, it’s called. Umm-umm.” She nibbled. “The universe is so delicious.”

After that, she ate lunch with them every day. She began walking home with them, on days she didn’t have saxophone or karate or astronomy class at the museum. And then one day she invited them to her house. The moment Nella stepped inside, she left behind the neighborhood where she’d lived her whole life. A planet that slipped its orbit and spun loose in the galaxy would feel the way she did then.

Angela was forbidden to go to Clem’s house, of course.

“My father doesn’t know your parents,” she said.

“My mother will call him up!” Clem said. “He can come over and meet them.”

“Oh boy,” said Angela. “That really won’t work.”

Clem didn’t get it. Apparently she’d never met anyone, even a grown-up, who couldn’t be reasoned with.

“Is her father a head case or something?” Clem asked Nella.

“Something.”

“He should see a shrink. He should get on meds.”

Nella knew she ought to explain about him being a war veteran, and how they needed to respect and honor him, no matter what. But she didn’t want to talk about Mr. DeMarco. She was so tired of Mr. DeMarco and all the DeMarco problems. She’d never realized how tired till she met Clem.

Nella promised herself that tomorrow she’d walk home with Angela, same as always. She told herself the same thing the next day, and the next. Every time, Clem invited Angela too. She even got her mother to call up Mr. DeMarco.

“Papa said she’s a big honking snob,” Angela told Nella.

“She’s not. She’s nice.”

“He said she uses all fifty-cent words.” Angela twined her braid around her wrist. “You love vocabulary, so no wonder you like her.”

“Who cares about her parents anyway? Half the time they aren’t even there.”

“That figures. Papa says the people in those town houses only care about money.”

“It’s not that they don’t care about Clem. They trust her, that’s all.”

A pause.

“Anyway, I don’t even want to go.”

Angela wasn’t allowed to go anywhere but Nella’s. Was that Nella’s fault?

Sort of. A little.

All Clem knew was what Nella told her. Which did not include having a father who’d been in jail. Or being an escaped shoplifter. Or once planning to marry Anthony and have six daughters whose names all began with
M
. With Clem, Nella erased her old, tarnished self. She drew a shining new girl.

One afternoon that spring, while Nella was helping plant flowers in front of St. A’s statue, Sister Rosa said how glad she was Nella had befriended their new student.

“Umm,” said Nella.

Sister pulled on her polka-dot garden gloves. She picked up her trowel.

“Make new friends, but keep the old,” she said in her honey-and-cream voice. “One is silver and the other’s gold.”

It’s not my fault, Nella wanted to tell her. Angela’s not allowed to do anything, but I am. It’s just how it is! I’m not choosing, not really. Unless you can choose without choosing.

As they worked, Sister told Nella how years and years and years ago, a parishioner had carved the statue and donated it to the school.

“He wasn’t the most skilled craftsman, I’m afraid.” She patted the dirt with a polka-dot glove. “But I like to think St. Amphibalus would still be pleased. After all, most saints
aren’t known for their good looks.”

Helping Sister back to her feet, Nella hoped she’d forgotten about Angela and Clem. Sister pulled off the garden gloves one finger at a time, smiling.

“You know the story, don’t you? Amphibalus had a very good friend named Alban. When Roman soldiers came to seize Amphibalus, Alban put on his clothes and pretended to be him. They arrested Alban and put him to death. Amphibalus lived to continue his good works. But I bet he had a broken heart the rest of his life.”

“What about Alban?”

“Oh, he became a saint too, of course.”

Nella brought the hose, and they watered the flowers.

“It’s not easy being a saint,” Sister said. “Mercy! None of this is easy, Nella.
Follow your own heart
! People always say that. They mean well, I’m sure. But sometimes, we need to overrule our hearts. We need to be brave. We need to be kind because we should, not because it’s easy.”

“Isn’t that being fake?” Nella blurted.

“Kindness is the truest thing there is.”

Nuns were not plagued by questions. They never had doubts or got confused. So what Sister said next was a surprise.

“Sometimes I’m glad I’m old.” She took Nella’s arm. “Being young is so much work.”

BUONA FESTA!

now

T
he bishop kisses up to the suburbs. The big houses and fat wallets.” Mr. Tucci, Victoria’s uncle, pinched his thumb and forefinger together. “The dollar sign—that’s what matters.”

The other men outside the smoke shop nodded and grunted. Mr. DeMarco wasn’t there today. Come to think of it, Nella hadn’t seen him there in a long time. She struggled to push the stroller past the men, but the thing had taken so much abuse, its front wheels were out of whack. From behind her came the racket of hammers and drills—they were already gutting the school. A sign outside said
FUTURE HOME OF THE HEAVENLY SPA.

“He’s got the church in his sights next,” Mr. Tucci said. “Wait and see.”

“Over my dead body!” said another man. “Four generations of my family got christened, married, and buried out of St. A.”

“Problem is,” said someone else, “nowadays we got way more funerals than baptisms.”

“Hey. Hey, whose side you on?”

“We built this place!” Mr. Tucci jabbed the air with his cigar. “Our families built it with their own hands. Now we’re just doormats. They’re wiping their designer shoes on us.”

“I’ll tell you this. My grandfather’s turning over in his grave about what’s happening here. Back in the sixties, he defended his home. No way he was going to let outsiders come in and . . .” The man spat on the sidewalk.

“You’re a bunch of hotheads. You’re living in the past.”

“The past was better. Turn back the clock.”

That was when Mr. Tucci noticed Nella spinning her wheels. He jumped up to help.

“How’s your nonni?” His cigar breath almost asphyxiated her.

“She’s okay.” And then out came the phrase Nonni always used.
“Così così.”
So-so. Whatever.

Mr. Tucci maneuvered the stroller around the sidewalk chairs.

“Nobody made sauce like hers, you know that?” He smiled. “The other ladies begged for her recipe, but no way she’d give it to them. I remember her and your poppop dancing at my wedding. Heck, the whole neighborhood danced at my wedding, but your nonni outlasted them all.”

Nonni dancing the night away? Cigar smoke must have damaged the man’s brain.

“Boocha!” cried Vinny, pointing at the sky. “Boocha ganna!”

Mr. Tucci gave him a funny look. “Can’t that kid talk yet?” Putting his face close to Vinny’s, he spoke slowly and much too loudly. “Say airplane. Air-plane.”

Vinny put one hand over his eyes and the other over his nose. “Nabba,” he said. Which clearly meant
Please go away, smelly man
.

A few days later was the Feast. Once it had been a mostly neighborhood affair, with a Mass in honor of St. A and a block party afterward.

But over the years it had gotten bigger and bigger, till now people came from all over the city and suburbs. For days before, the church kitchen went 24-7, women in hairnets rolling out miles of pasta and stirring gallons of
tomato sauce with big paddles. They made thousands of meatballs. Everyone prayed to St. Amphibalus for good weather, no rain.

He listened. That night, after Mass, and the procession with the little brass band, and the recent First Communicants riding on the back of a truck, and the Knights of Columbus marching in their sashes and white gloves, the street filled with people. The grills and fryers fired up, and you could practically eat the air. Sausage and peppers, cavatelli and meatballs, stromboli and gelato. Carnival rides and games in the church parking lot, gambling in the basement, drinking and dancing in a fenced-off square behind Mama Gemma’s.

Nella helped Dad work the sausage-and-peppers stand. When he threw the links on the grill, clouds of smoke rose. Sweat trickled down the sides of his face, and his apron was streaked with grease. He clicked the big tongs like castanets, making her smile.

It was almost like before, when he was still her old, trustworthy dad. They worked side by side without talking much, a team, together.

Customers piled up three and four deep. If Clem had been here, Nella would have asked what law of physics explained how so many people could cram into such a small space. Nella got hugs from aunts and cousins who lived
out in the boonies now. Two ugly ducklings who thought they were swans glided by—wait, no. It was Victoria and Kimmy. Nella wiped her brow. It was so hot near the grill, her hair was sweat-glued to her forehead. She was sure the pimples on her chin were swelling in the slippery heat.

“What’s it take to get service around this place?” Mr. Ferraro bellowed. Beside him stood his wife and oh no. Please no. Sam. Her face was already so sweaty, blushing was beside the point.

“Look who’s cooking, hon! Is our life insurance paid up?”

Mr. Ferraro was known for being a joker. When Nella was little, she was scared of him, he talked so loud. Sam smiled at Nella and shrugged. She clamped her arms to her sides in a pathetic attempt to conceal her pit sweat.

“Give me three of those babies, Nick, and throw in some Cokes.”

Dad tucked the sausages into rolls, and Nella added the peppers and onions. Mr. Ferraro handed over the money, and Dad made the change. But as he took it, Mr. Ferraro’s smile vanished.

“Hey, big mistake here.” A human megaphone. “I gave you two twenties!”

“Sorry, Bill. It was a twenty and a ten.”

“Hold on. Hold on a gosh-darn, flat-out, Christian minute.” Mr. Ferraro slapped his pocket like somebody was
trying to pick it. “I don’t make mistakes when it comes to money!”

Nella could see the ten-dollar bill, lying right on top in the cash box. The other customers grew quiet, tuning in to the drama.

“Looks like it comes down to my word against yours!” Mr. Ferraro’s voice took on a hint of menace.

A long pause. Slowly, Dad pulled out some bills.

“The customer’s always right.”

Mr. Ferraro’s face shone with satisfaction. Nella looked to see what Sam would do, but he had vanished.

“Never mind, Nick.” Mr. Ferraro smiled a wide, ugly FART of a smile. “Everybody makes a mistake now and then. Am I right? Am I right? Consider it a donation to the church.” He took his wife’s arm. “Come on, hon.”

Dad quietly clicked his tongs. Open shut, open shut. Then he wiped his brow with his apron and asked the next customer what he could do for him.

Later, Nella stood behind the church, where the rides and games were set up. Bobby and his friend screamed their heads off on the Tilt-A-Whirl. Salvatore won a blow-up baseball bat at the ring toss game and, to Nella’s astonishment, handed it to a girl with sparkly butterfly barrettes.

She peeked into the church basement. No kids allowed.
Mom didn’t approve of gambling, but Dad said it was the church’s biggest moneymaker so what could you do. Nella saw men’s hunched backs, heard someone shout and someone groan. She jumped back as a couple of men, looking unhappy, muttering to each other, came up the steps. Moments later, a few more men trudged up, trailing something—anger, frustration—behind them and out into the night.

Nella squeezed sideways through the crowds. She could smell herself—a walking sausage. The lines were long, and once you got your food there was no room to eat it. People jostled and elbowed, and a plate of meatballs launched skyward and splatted onto the street. A little girl dropped her elephant ear and it was immediately trampled. Babies cried. Some guys who stank like they had taken a bath in beer staggered through, laughing, spouting four-letter words.

Invaders, thought Nella. Overhead, the moon looked farther away than usual.

She saw Sam, standing alone, one foot propped against the wall of the social club. Wheeling in the opposite direction, she pushed deeper into the crowd. By the time she made her way to the lit-up bocce court, she was tired and cranky.