When Smiles Fade (30 page)

Finally Brianna managed to say, “Oh, Em, I’m so sorry.”

Emma turned to Katie, who held Izzy in her arms. Young as she was, even the child knew something wasn’t quite right and looked at her aunt in bewilderment. As the two women embraced, Emma took Izzy from her friend and held on tight to her niece. She shed more tears thinking of the motherless child then remembered how Gracie had died with her daughter’s name on her lips.

From that day on, Izzy would belong to Emma. She would love her more than she had loved anyone in her life and vowed to not only keep her safe, but to do whatever was needed to give her a good life. She resolved to tell Izzy about Gracie when she got older and let her know how much her mother had loved her.

Ethan put his arm around Emma, jolting her back into the present. “Come on, Em,” he said in a soothing tone. “Let’s take our family home.”

Brianna and Katie locked eyes at Ethan’s statement. They wanted to argue with him and tell him to go away and leave Emma and Izzy alone. They knew he didn’t belong there and that he wasn’t good for Emma. But their friend had just lost the person she’d loved the most in her life and they didn’t want to cause her any more hardship.

Over the next three days, while funeral arrangements were made, the apartment filled with visitors. Many of the girls from Doubles came. So did Jay and Shiver. Ethan’s friends came over as well, although Katie suspected it was more for the free beer and food than to express their condolences to Emma. Even some of the neighbors stopped in with a cake or a casserole. The apartment was crowded with people from morning until night, but Emma felt completely isolated, utterly alone. She tried to fake interest in her visitors, but her conversation was half-hearted. The desire to live seemed to have vanished. She was merely going through the motions. It was an effort for her to even breathe.

The day of the funeral dawned, the worst in Emma’s life. It seemed as if the sun had not been allowed to rise that day. The sky was sullen and dark and the clouds looked ominous as they hung motionless like a gray shroud over the earth, making her feel the depth of her emptiness. The rain was relentless, never stopping even once as Emma walked to the plot in the cemetery where she would be leaving Gracie forever.

When it was over and the time to leave arrived, Emma dropped to her knees in the muddied grass and bawled until there were no tears left, her chest rising and falling in dry, gasping heaves. Her fists were clenched on the grass around the hole where Gracie’s coffin hung, suspended in midair.

“Nooooo,” Emma whimpered, “I can’t leave her here. Oh God, why?” she shouted, looking to the heavens for an answer.

Then her shoulders slumped as she cupped her face with her hands and let out a moan that came from the center of her belly, a sound of pure sorrow. She felt as if she were a lost soul forced to walk among the living.

Ethan and Brianna stepped in and took charge. They helped Emma to her feet and led her back to the car, against her will. Sitting in the passenger seat in front with the cold penetrating her bones, she had the sudden urge to run back to where Gracie lay. She could not imagine leaving her there alone and dreaded facing life without her.

Once Gracie’s funeral was over, the crowds of people visiting the apartment dwindled to nothing. Only Brianna and Katie continued to check on Emma every single day. They were amazed at how Ethan had taken on the role of caregiver. He had been staying at the apartment since the night Gracie died and seemed totally transformed. He was so gentle and loving with Emma that it was hard to believe he had been such a bastard to her in the past. He had once again become the man Emma had fallen in love with. Their hesitation over Ethan being with Emma was dismissed.

Since Emma had taken time off from Doubles, the other strippers decided to put together a fundraiser to help compensate for the income she would be losing during her absence. While performing on stage, the girls asked their clients to be generous with their tips, which they planned to hand over to their friend.

“It’s for Amme,” they explained. “She’s hurting real bad and needs our help. So dig down deep.”

That night, Salvatore found Jay and said he needed to talk. The bar manager was quick to respond. “Sure, Salvatore,” he said, “what do you need?”

“How is she? Is she holding up?” Salvatore’s voice was soft with sympathy.

Jay was surprised by the man’s genuine concern for Emma. It was so out of character for a man like him.

“She’s doing the best she can,” he replied. “Her little sister was the only family she had, and from what I hear, she’d been taking care of her since she was a child. Shiver told me she’s been talking to Emma’s friend, Brianna, a girl who worked here before. Amme is apparently pretty depressed. I’ll be surprised if she comes back here anytime soon.”

Salvatore reached into his suit pocket and pulled out a large envelope of twenty-dollar bills. “Here’s five grand,” he said. “See that she gets this money, will you? Just say it’s part of what the girls raised for her.”

Jay was less impressed by Salvatore’s generosity than by the apparent depth of his feelings for Emma. He had no idea the girl had developed such a strong bond with the powerful man who was feared by so many.

“Sure, Salvatore,” he said. “Whatever you want. I’ll give the money to Shiver as an anonymous donation.”

“Good. I like that. Remember that if there is anything Amme needs, anything at all, I want to know about it.”

Salvatore left the bar. On his way back to Philadelphia, he thought about Emma. He was worried about her, especially after he learned from Jay that Ethan was staying at the apartment with her. Then he let his thoughts drift to her niece, Izzy, whom Emma had talked about all the time when Gracie was alive. It was sad for all of them. Emma no longer had a sister and Izzy had no mother. Salvatore knew that this woman he loved would do everything she could to make it right for Izzy. But he couldn’t help worrying about the price she’d be willing to pay for her niece’s happiness.

Weeks turned into months, but the darkness inside Emma would not leave her. Consumed by thoughts of Gracie’s untimely death, she spent little time with Izzy, whom Ethan was now taking care of. He had moved back into the apartment and settled them into a routine. He helped Emma shower every day; he practically forced her to eat; and he sat with her for hours, sometimes yammering about nothing and at other times just sitting with her in comforting silence.

Observing the way he was taking care of her and the child, Emma had looked deep into his eyes and said, “Thank you, Ethan. Thank you for taking care of Izzy and me. I love you so much.”

Many months after Gracie died Ethan broached the subject of Emma going back to work. They had been living on food stamps and welfare checks, something he himself had arranged so that she could get some financial support while she wasn’t working. Ethan had burned through the money received from the fundraiser at Double Visions in record time, spending it on new accessories for his car and clothes for himself. The money they received from welfare just wasn’t enough to keep them going and Ethan had no intention of working some menial job when Emma could make a substantial income by dancing.

Emma wearily contemplated the prospect of going back to Doubles. She knew that she would have to return to work sooner rather than later. The decision was practically forced on her on Izzy’s third birthday, when Emma snapped out of her funk. She was lying in bed, silently staring at the wall, when for the first time in a long while she heard Ethan raise his voice.

“I said eat!” he yelled at the child.

Those words were followed by the sound of a slap. There was a momentary silence. Then Izzy burst out crying.

Emma sprang out of bed and ran into the kitchen. “What happened just now?” she asked, dreading the answer.

“She’s a fucking little brat!” Ethan snapped at her. “
That’s
what happened!”

“Ethan, she’s only a baby!” Emma said incredulously. “Did you hit her?”

“I gave her a little slap. Don’t make a big thing out of it,” he said righteously.

“Well, it’s a big deal to me,” she retorted, looking Izzy over quickly until her gaze stopped on the bright red mark on the child’s arm.

Izzy gave her a bewildered look and said in a hurt voice, “Eatin hit me.”

When Emma lifted her out of her chair, Izzy clung to her so tightly her aunt could sense her terror. It was a telling reminder of how Ethan had treated Emma herself before being thrown out of the apartment. Now he had dared strike her baby niece. People rarely changed, she told herself, realizing that the brute within Ethan was still very much alive.

Emma felt furious and ashamed of herself. She had been so absorbed in her own grief that she had neglected Gracie’s child, the most precious thing in the world, whom she had vowed to take care of as if she were her own. She had received the wakeup call she needed in order to get her shit together and move on with her life. She owed that much to Izzy. She didn’t want her niece living through the ordeal that she and Gracie had endured as children.

She walked out of the kitchen holding Izzy in her arms and declared to Ethan, “I’m calling Jay today. I’m going back to work.”

She understood that the only way for her to give Izzy the life she deserved was to make money. That was what Gracie would have expected of her. She remembered her sister murmuring her daughter’s name with her dying breath. It was a plea to Emma to take care of her baby. And she was determined to do that, even if she had to do it alone. She was grateful to Ethan for all that he had done for her over the past six months, but now his cruel hot temper came creeping back into her life. Emma decided she would overlook Ethan’s behavior with Izzy for now. She would wait to get back on her feet, which she knew wouldn’t take long. She did pledge to herself, however, that until she was back on her feet financially, if he ever touched Izzy again, she would make him regret he had ever been born.

Emma called Jay that afternoon, and he assured her she could go back to work in three days. She called Katie to update her on the most recent developments, and Katie agreed to watch Izzy while Emma worked at night. Emma knew it would make little difference to Ethan; he would be happier having his nights free to hang out with his friend Pete.

However, while Ethan would enjoy not having to babysit anymore, he wasn’t happy about Emma finding her independence again. He vowed to himself he wouldn’t lose her a second time no matter what it took to keep her.

The first night back at Doubles, most of the dancers made a huge fuss over Emma. She had lost a great deal of weight since they’d seen her last and many of them whispered behind her back that she didn’t look good. Her eyes had all but lost their luster and were ringed with dark circles. Her hair was longer now, because she hadn’t cut it since Gracie died, and it looked dull and lifeless. Some of the dancers, the catty bitch ones, were secretly happy that she looked bad. They hadn’t missed her beauty at the club, which had earned her a lot of the tips they believed were rightly theirs.

Foster gave Emma a quick hug and a warm hello as she entered the bar area to get on stage. The moment she stepped onto the first stage to dance that night, there was warm, welcoming applause from the clients in the bar. The unexpected surge of emotion that welled up inside took her breath away. After all the months of misery and emptiness, she was overwhelmed by the response.

After the performance, she made her way around the bar to collect her tips and was deeply touched by the words of encouragement many of the guys had for her. Then she found herself standing in front of Salvatore. Having heard from Jay she was coming back that night, he had made sure he would be there.

He reached out and grasped her hand as she approached him. “I’ve missed you,” he confessed. “How’s Izzy doing?”

Hearing him ask with genuine concern in his voice, she was moved to tears.

“None of that now,” he told her with almost paternal affection. “How about a private dance?”

Emma wiped away her tears and walked him back to the lap-dance room.

As she was about to start performing, Salvatore pulled her onto his lap. “No dancing tonight,” he whispered. “I want to know that you’re doing all right. You’ve lost a lot of weight and you look tired. Tell me how you’ve been.”

“Oh, Salvatore, it’s been unbearable. At first, I had to work on breathing. Even now there are moments when I feel like absolute shit. I miss her so much. I always thought we would be together, you know? I’m doing the best I can with Izzy, but I just can’t shake this feeling of darkness,” she confided.

Salvatore began to run his warm, soft hand up and down her arm, as if he was trying to ward off the cold.

“Since Gracie died nothing is the same. I see life so differently now. I keep wondering if I will ever feel happiness again. She and I had been through so much together as kids and we had finally found a way to make it work out for the three of us. I wish it would have been me instead of her, Salvatore. I wish I had died in her place,” she told him tearfully.

Salvatore listened to her intently for a long time, understanding her better than he had before. She was a good person whom life had dealt a bitter hand. He wasn’t the type of person who felt much for other people, but Emma was the exception. There was something tantalizing about her courage that made him want to be close to her. She didn’t fear him like others did. She had endured far too much pain in her life to be intimidated by a man just because he belonged to the Mafia. In fact, she felt better whenever she was in Salvatore’s company. That made her all the more special to him.