by Rick R. Reed
As much as the music—and the lack of consideration—irritated him, he didn’t mind the music so much because it made him feel less alone.
He rose from the bed and pulled on shorts and a T-shirt. It was already after three, and he needed to be in to work by five. Thank God Rosalie had another chef, Elizabeth, to do lunches pretty much all the time now. Vito liked the late nights and sleeping during the day. He could cocoon himself away from the world more easily.
The girls, alerted by their master’s movements, also rose. They began silently pacing about the room, casting hopeful glances his way.
“Come on.” Vito patted his hip, and the dogs followed him to the entryway, where he leashed them up.
Outside, the day was oppressively hot. Summer in Chicago could be that way, blistering yet moist, almost unbearable. Today was one of those days, and Vito wondered how high the temperature reading on the savings and loan sign across the street would get. One hundred? More? He’d seen it get that high other summers.
He had a flash of memory—Sal outside, dancing in a pair of Underoos in the stream from a fire hydrant some of the neighborhood kids had opened up.
Vito quickly forced himself to think of something else.
Like Henry.
He felt a little guilt. Henry had obviously been upset over something. Vito could tell he’d been crying. And yet all Vito had done for him was give him a cup of coffee and send him on his way. He had asked him what the matter was, sure, but he knew the question was offhand, what anyone would say. It didn’t show Vito cared about what it was that had made him cry and what had most likely kept him up all night.
I should be ashamed of myself.
And yet a part of Vito felt he had done the right thing. This part of Vito wanted him to be alone, shut down, knowing this was the best way of dealing with the hurt and the loss. When that drunk driver on the Eisenhower Expressway had hit the Jeep carrying Vito’s son and the man he thought of as his husband, causing it to flip and killing them both instantly, he might as well have taken Vito’s life too. In a sense, he had. Because what Vito had today, in this emptiness, was not really a life at all.
So he worked… and worked… and worked. He slept a lot, sometimes rivaling his champion sleeper canine kids. He dulled the hours off with mindless TV or endless games of solitaire on his laptop. He didn’t even cook much for himself anymore. He remembered the days, when they were all together, he would spend hours in the kitchen, working on elaborate meals just to see Kevin smile or to hear Sal’s contented “Yum.” He would dream of the treats he would feed them.
But now there was just an endless rotation of monotony that got him through the days but provided little else.
All of this was an escape, a balm on his hurt that really did make it better. By feeling nothing at all, Vito could at least cope with the pain.
Henry threatened that. It didn’t help that he had the same fair looks as Kevin, reminding Vito of his man every time he glanced at the kid. But it wasn’t just the resemblance to his dead lover that awakened something uncomfortable in Vito.
Vito was attracted to him. He thought he had buried sex along with Kevin at Rosehill Cemetery. If he felt anything at all, a hand lubed up with spit usually took care of it. It was no different than taking a shit or grabbing something to eat when he was hungry, ugly as the thought was. But at least masturbation was utilitarian. At least he didn’t have to think about Kevin, about his touch, the taste of his lips and tongue, how the contrast of Kevin’s smooth skin with Vito’s coarse fur-covered body felt a little like heaven, electric.
And yet Vito found himself, at spare moments in the restaurant, looking at Henry in ways he wished he could stop. That old undressing-with-the-eyes thing that Vito thought he was no longer even capable of, he did when he knew Henry wasn’t looking back. Vito sometimes found himself peering too closely at the boy’s ass or the outline of his cock through the jeans he used to wear when he was washing dishes.
Vito stopped in front of his own apartment building, amazed he had taken the girls all the way to the lakefront and back. He couldn’t remember having seen anything on their journey—whether the lake was placid and smooth today or the surf was up.
Digging in his pocket for his keys, he thought he didn’t like how Henry had awakened his emotions, his need, because along with the admittedly good feelings, Vito’s other emotions would waken too. And with those, there was horrible pain and grief.
Vito took the girls inside and fed them. The clock on the microwave told him he would not have to fix himself anything to eat because he had exactly a half hour to shower and get his ass to work.
Where Henry would be….
As he was hurrying into the bathroom, Vito noticed the piece of paper in the detritus of all the other crap littering his coffee table. He wouldn’t have even noticed it if it weren’t for the handwriting on the paper, which was the back of a takeout menu. Vito knew immediately that Henry had left him a note, and he wasn’t sure he wanted to read it. What could it possibly say that would make him feel better? What could further communication do besides invade Vito’s carefully constructed cocoon of numbness he worked so hard to maintain?
Yet the pull of the note was irresistible. Vito plopped down on the couch with resignation and, even though he didn’t have time, picked it up and began reading. The first thing he saw in the note was that Henry had tampered with his family photos. He tore his gaze away to look at the bookcase opposite and saw that Henry had, indeed, set all the photos back up again and maybe even dusted the glass fronting each photo.
He had no right.
Vito continued to read, and when he finished, he closed his eyes and sat back on the couch, letting his head loll. I can’t let this happen. I can’t let the guy in. He’s only going to remind me of what I lost. And besides, who am I kidding? Say I did let him in. Say I did allow myself to get involved. What would happen? Henry’s from the North Shore. He’s a rich kid. Do I really believe he’s going to stick around? Sure, we have a summer fling and I get my heart—and other things—throbbing again. What then? He’ll probably just go away at the start of fall to some Ivy League school. He’s too good to be kitchen help the rest of his life. Or hell, even a chef, if that’s where his inclinations lay.
And then I’d just find myself back at square one. Alone. Hurting again over another loss. Not as bad, but still not something I want. Vito shook his head. No. I can’t let him in. Losing him, as I surely would, wouldn’t be nearly as bad as losing my Kevin and my Sal, but it would still hurt. And that hurt would compound the other hurts, making me worse off than I was before.
Vito tore up the note and took it into the kitchen, where he dropped it where it belonged, in the garbage.
WHEN VITO got to work, fifteen minutes late, Henry was already there. He smiled shyly at Vito when Vito entered through the back door of the restaurant. Prep work was just beginning for dinner, and Henry was at the station next to Vito once again, a chef’s knife in his hand, mounds of onions and garlic cloves, already peeled, before him.
Where was Sammy? His sous chef had been very flaky lately, and Vito knew he was doing cocaine. He knew because Sammy had often tried to get him to have a little “toot,” as he called it, while they were working.
“C’mon, man, it makes you feel good. Gives you energy.”
Vito always turned him down. He’d seen what that white powder had done to other people in the business. It was ironic, Vito always thought, that cocaine was so popular among restaurant workers when one of its main features was that it deadened the appetite.
Vito was reaching for his apron on its hook when Rosalie came into the kitchen, followed by Antonio and Carmela.
“Could everyone stop what they’re doing for a minute?”
Vito could see that Rosalie looked nervous… and sad. She was always serious, but there was something wounded behind the thick lenses of her glasses that was all too apparent to Vito.
“I know we don’t have a lot of t
ime because people—the early birds—will start comin’ in in just a few minutes, so I’ll keep it short.” She wrung her hands. “You may have noticed Sammy’s missing again. The truth is I had to let him go.” She put a hand, which Vito noticed was trembling ever so slightly, to her forehead. “I hated to do it. You know you’re all family to me, and it hurts. I won’t go into why because it’s none of your business. Let’s just say I need people here I can rely on.”
And with that, she hurried away into the little warren she called her office, closing the door behind her.
Carmela spoke first. “Well, we all know why. He was a cokehead.”
Nobody said anything.
Rosalie opened her door and glared at all of them. “I said I need people I can rely on. Get to work!” She closed the door again, and everyone scattered.
Vito glanced over at Henry, who was busy chopping onions into perfect dice. “What? You taking Sammy’s place?” Vito hoped that wasn’t the case. If it was, Henry would be working next to him every night. Close. Shoulder to shoulder, almost. Vito didn’t know if he could bear the proximity. They would have to talk; they would have to get to know each other better. It was natural. And Vito was steadfast in not wanting to open that door.
It was different when Sammy worked next to him. Vito didn’t harbor secret desires for him. In fact, the guy was kind of repulsive. He always smelled bad—sweat and cigarettes.
Henry shoved aside a mound of chopped onions and got to work on the garlic. They went through a ton of the stuff every night. It was important to have it ready to go. “Yeah, Rosalie said I did okay last night and we’d see how it goes.”
Henry smiled at him, and Vito could see the hunger in his eyes. Vito didn’t smile back.
“Make sure that garlic is minced, not just cut up.” Vito turned away to begin removing proteins from the refrigerator—chicken, veal, red snapper, and tenderloin. “And don’t forget the lemons. I need some for cooking, but we need paper-thin slices for garnish.” Vito set down what he’d taken out of the refrigerator and consulted a notebook he kept beneath the racks of pots and pans to see what he’d planned for specials tonight.
Henry nodded and went back to his work, but Vito couldn’t help but notice how he kept casting glances at Vito out of the corner of his eye.
And that made Vito want to smile. Henry’s glances were sweet, seeking approval and maybe more. But Vito kept stern and, beyond barking out orders, didn’t say a word to Henry the rest of the night.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
HENRY COULDN’T stay away from home for another night. His eyes burned. His joints ached. His back felt like what he would imagine the back of an eighty-year-old man must feel like. On his worst day. It almost hurt to simply stand and put weight on his feet. The weariness hung heavy, dragging him down so low it was difficult to even form a coherent thought.
He had said good night to Vito as he left and gotten only a grunt in return. Henry would like to have just said to hell with the guy, but he couldn’t. His aloofness, his brooding manner, his secrets only served to attract Henry more instead of repelling him. Was this what a moth drawn to a flame felt like?
Ah, he didn’t have the energy to ponder these things anymore! He didn’t want Vito. He didn’t want sex. He didn’t want food. All he wanted was to sleep and sleep and sleep for hours on end. He would have traded anything for just the feel of his head on a pillow, the cool crisp of a pillowcase against his cheek. Right now, that goal seemed like winning the lottery or maybe even going to heaven.
Outside Fiorello’s, on Jarvis, it was late. He had watched as the other employees walked out through the back exit for the night, saying their good-nights and heading off in their own directions. He noticed that Carmela and Antonio left together again and felt a little twinge of hatred for the woman he’d thought would be his friend. She wasn’t at all who he’d thought she was, kind of like his mother. Rosalie stopped to ask if he had a way home, and he assured her he did. Vito walked quickly away, toward his home, and didn’t look back at Henry once. Henry knew, because he watched him until he was completely out of view.
There was a bar next door to the restaurant, something with a Celtic name, and Henry stood in front of it, watching as the patrons played pool, drank beer, and added their two cents to the hubbub of conversation.
He glanced east, toward the lake, and realized he simply did not have the fortitude to even contemplate walking home tonight, let alone actually do it. He didn’t know he could be this tired. He forced one foot in front of the other until he reached the ‘L’ station. He went inside, crinkled his nose at the ever-present smell of urine, and headed for the turnstiles. He pulled out his CTA transit card and was pretty sure there was enough on it to get him home, or at least near home—his parents did not exactly live next to the ‘L.’
He sailed through the turnstile with nary a problem and saw that he still had five bucks left on his card even after the deduction for this trip.
On the platform, several people waited. They were loud, raucous, laughing and smoking, and Henry surmised they were coming from the bar down below. He hoped they were headed south. He was looking forward to a nice, quiet ‘L’ car. If he was lucky, he’d have it all to himself.
Fortunately his hopes came true as a southbound train arrived and swept the revelers away, leaving Henry alone on a blessedly silent platform.
When his train came, he got on and looked around. He breathed a small sigh of gratitude that his car was completely empty. He only had one stop to go before he’d have to switch trains for the Evanston Purple Line, but that was okay. Just a few minutes to himself was a tiny bit of heaven.
Even though he felt somewhat awake when he boarded the car, he must have fallen asleep the moment he sat down and let his head rest against the glass, because the next thing he knew, a CTA employee—an African American woman in uniform—was shaking his shoulder.
“You want to spend the night in the train yard, sugar?”
She smiled down at him, and Henry noticed the vivid scarlet of her lipstick. For a moment, in his groggy state, he thought the woman was propositioning him.
Then she said, “’Cause if you don’t, you better get your butt off the train now. Didn’t you hear the announcements? End of the line?” She shook her head and regarded him with pity, or maybe it was disdain.
Henry shot to his feet. “Sorry.” He hurried from the train and heard her snicker behind him. She probably thought he was drunk or maybe even homeless.
Thankfully there was a Purple Line train waiting, and Henry hurried to cross the platform before the doors closed. He just made it and sat down with a big exhale in a seat near the door. He’d be home soon.
And then, he repeated to himself, he could sleep and sleep and sleep.
Even if it wouldn’t be in his old room but in the clutter of the second story of their four-car garage.
Henry tried to make himself rally when they got to the Main Street stop, but it was hard. The distance from the station to his house was only a few blocks, but it seemed like miles.
He trudged along, passing the familiar sites he had grown up around, and at last stood in front of the large red brick house he called home, for better or worse. He looked up at the edifice and wondered how something so grand, something he was sure people envied as they drove by on Sheridan, could be so empty, so devoid of dreams and happiness.
Ah, I don’t have time for this now. Henry took a turn after he passed through the front gate and headed around the side of the house toward the garage. His little twin bed there would seem, tonight, like a king in a four-star hotel.
Henry couldn’t wait.
He let himself into the garage and trudged up the stairs. The garage was quiet, dark, and did not smell of gasoline, oil, or even metal. It was curiously sterile—the way his dad, Tank, liked it.
When he got into his bedroom, all Henry wanted to do was collapse on the bed, but he couldn’t.
It was already occupied. His mother was
sitting primly on the quilt, legs crossed and hands folded in her lap. She looked up at him, her pale eyes nervous in the dim light cast by the floor lamp next to the bed.
Henry stopped. “Mom? What are you doing here?” He had a desperate urge to run from the room or simply back up and try for a do-over. He so did not need to talk to his mother right now. What could she want anyway?
“Sit down.” She patted the bed next to her.
Henry wasn’t sure he wanted to. It was the idea of getting off his feet more than obeying his unfaithful mother that at last caused him to take a seat near, but not next to, her. He regarded her with a gaze he knew must make him look older, certain it reflected not only his weariness but also his lost respect.
She didn’t seem to notice. In fact, she seemed nervous herself, scratching at her leg, flipping her hair restlessly out of her face.
“You’re growing up fast,” she said.
“I know, Mom.” Henry gazed around the cluttered room, perhaps searching vainly for an avenue of escape. He cleared his throat and forced himself to say, “Can we maybe talk in the morning? I am so beat. I can barely see straight.” He flopped over onto his back and shut his eyes.
“I saw you.”
The simple words sent a pulse of nervous electricity through him, like a spark. “What?” he asked, heart beating faster. He didn’t open his eyes.
“I saw you. That night. I saw you watching me.”
Henry sat up again and regarded his mother. There was something plaintive in her expression, something wounded and vulnerable. He was hoping he was mistaken and she was talking about something else, but he knew she wasn’t.
She swallowed, and he watched the movement of her throat, as if the act was difficult.
“His name is John.”
“That’s nice.” Henry turned away, staring at the darkness pressing in against the glass of the windows. “We really don’t have to talk about this.” Henry felt what little food he had eaten that night begin to roil and churn in his stomach. Acid splashed against the back of his throat, bitter and caustic.
