by Kim Savage
“Right,” Ben said.
“I tell you, Ben. Climbing, scuba diving, heli-skiing—I do it all. Some people would call me crazy. But it’s my life, and I’m in my prime. I accept the risk. I do what I want. I figure, it’s my body, and I control what I do with it.”
Ben wiped his mouth. “That sounds pretty good.”
“No risk, no reward. You want something, you go for it. That goes for the ladies, too. You ever need girl advice? You come to me, Ben. And obviously anything you tell me won’t go anywhere.” He leaned over. “That goes the same for anything I tell you, in the spirit of sharing.”
Ben cleared his throat. He might want to talk about Francesca. He seemed like he wanted to. They were buds. Maybe the notes were just girl drama, Francesca mooning over an older guy. It would be good to know that. It would be good to hear it from Mr. Falso.
“Actually, Mr. Falso, I wanted to talk with you about the girls. The Cillo sisters.” Ben cleared his throat. “I’m trying to get a sense of what was going on in the months before they died.”
“I see.” Mr. Falso chugged the dregs of his beer and paused, looking off into the distance. “Now why is that?”
“I think … getting a better understanding will help give me closure.”
“Closure is a tough thing. Some people never find it, no matter how hard they search for answers.” Mr. Falso set to tucking away the trash in his pack. “Carry in, carry out!”
“If everyone could understand why they did it, they would be able to—we would all be able to—find peace. Don’t you think?”
Mr. Falso put his hand on Ben’s knee. “Peace comes from knowing that God has a plan, and that everything happens for a reason.”
“I think Francesca was in love. But Mr. Cillo locked her away like a princess in a tower.”
Mr. Falso drew his hand away as if he’d touched a hot stove. “And that’s why they fell. You must be a pretty amazing kid, to have figured out something their father, their teachers, their relatives, their priest, and their spiritual director didn’t know.”
“They didn’t have a normal life,” Ben said, his courage building. Mr. Falso’s mood was tanking, but the relief of releasing the things he’d been carrying was great, and the words came tumbling out. “Something bad happened around the time Connie died.”
“It did. Connie died.”
“Something made them unravel, mentally. Something bad that no one knew.”
“Think carefully about what you’re saying, Ben.”
“I’m not making this up. I have proof. Mira complained to me.” Ben felt himself going out on a limb, but he couldn’t stop. “She said Francesca was having problems. Not eating. Crying a lot. That Mr. Cillo said her issues were in her head.”
Mr. Falso folded his hands over his knees and squinted up at the sky, as if in pain.“For someone who’s only ever climbed on plastic rocks in a gym, you did a good job today.”
“I’m sorry?” Ben said.
“Thing is, I did everything for you. Did you make sure the rope was threaded correctly through the belay device, and that the locking carabiners were actually locked? Did you double-check to see if your own knot was tied correctly? Tightened? Threaded through the harness, even? Was the tail long enough? Was my knot tied correctly? You didn’t look or ask.”
Ben’s mouth twisted.
“You stood there like a toddler and let me do those things for you. If you’d come out here and tried that descent yourself, you’d have dislocated a finger, shaved the skin off your palms, or cracked your pretty head against a wall.”
“I figured you knew enough for both of us.”
“Rock climbing is a risky activity, and many mistakes are unavoidable. If you’re lucky, your mistakes result in close calls that help keep you vigilant. If you’re not, the results can be tragic.”
The tops of Ben’s cheeks burned. He staggered to his feet, trying to gain height, perspective, something. “You’re saying I’m reading too much into what Mira told me.”
Mr. Falso turned away from the sun and gazed up at Ben with a terrifying calmness Ben had never seen in an older man—not in his father, not in his teachers, not in his coaches. Though Ben towered over him, Mr. Falso was the one in control.
“I’m saying that when you engage in a risky activity, you have to be absolutely sure you know what you’re doing. Maybe it’s not so much a matter of reading too much into something as reading incorrectly.”
Ben turned to storm away, tripped over his harness, and stumbled. He swore and spun around. When he turned, Mr. Falso was directly behind him.
“Did Mira come right out and tell you what was bothering Francesca?”
The note felt alive in Ben’s pocket. “Not exactly.”
“See, Ben. Here’s the thing. We can’t understand what was going on in that household. If Francesca was sad and withdrawn over something done to her, and her father was saying it was in her head, well, there are many documented cases of abuse where the abuser convinces the victim it’s in their head. To the point where it’s almost—God forgive me for saying this—a cliché.”
Ben felt as though someone had sucker punched him. Mr. Cillo had been abusing Francesca? She would have to have told this to Mr. Falso. And what did that mean for Mira? Even though the foundations of their homes were barely eight feet apart, he and Mira had escaped her father’s scrutiny a total of seven times. Seven times Ben had touched parts of Mira Cillo. Never more than seven. Not a lot. What did he really know about what went on behind closed doors? What did anyone know? Ben’s face burned. He thought of what Eddie had said about Mr. Cillo living among those girls, not knowing what to do with them.
What did he do with them?
“Ben? I asked you a question,” Mr. Falso said, his voice a low growl.
Ben looked up, startled. “What?”
“Have you spoken with anyone else about this?”
“No,” Ben whispered.
“That’s good. That’s very good.” He felt Mr. Falso rise to his feet, and watched as his long shadow overtook Ben’s own.
“Mr. Falso, Mira trusted me with information. I can’t look the other away.”
Mr. Falso pointed over Ben’s shoulder to a man taking an overhang, his partner belaying below. “See that climber over there?”
“Yeah, so?”
“Anytime you go out on an overhang, you’re in danger of putting your leg on the uphill side of your rope.” He pointed at the climber’s legs. “If you fall with your leg in the wrong position, you’re in danger of flipping upside down. Smack your skull right off the side of a cliff.”
Ben sniffed. “He doesn’t look like he’s going to flip.” He hated how childish he sounded, but he also couldn’t pull himself out of it.
“He’s not. Because what he’s doing, it’s subtle. He’s developed a sixth sense about when his leg has moved across the line too far. If it does, he corrects it.”
“How?”
“He pulls back. Immediately. Even if it changes his course.”
Ben folded his arms around himself and walked away, despite the fact that there was nowhere to go.
Mr. Falso called to him. “Did you know, Ben, that at one time, Bismuth was a town with no old men?”
Ben stopped and beat his upper arms. The sun had slipped behind a cloud, and the temperature at the bottom of Little Q dropped fast. “What does that mean?”
“Silicosis. Clouds of dust containing crystalline silica stirred up by drilling in the quarries. Exposure to silica dust killed off the men who operated drills and their helpers. Entered their lungs every time they breathed. Silicosis causes lungs to stiffen, making breathing more and more difficult. It makes you susceptible to infections, like tuberculosis. Most of the guys who worked in these quarries half a century ago never made it past age forty.”
“Sounds like a lousy way to die.” Ben no longer cared if he offended Mr. Falso. He wasn’t in the mood for a history lesson. He wanted to go home and reread every one
of Mira’s notes and reconsider what they meant. Mr. Cillo touching Francesca. Her crying over it.
Mira knowing better.
Ben looked up at the wall he’d climbed down, a pleasant hour colored by endorphins and a single-minded focus on where to put his hands and feet. How could he, of all people, not have seen it? He, with his unique vantage. He, with his special knowledge. The deep grooves in the walls suddenly seemed unscalable. He felt a tightness in his chest. Mira knew better. She knew better because whatever Mr. Cillo was doing to Francesca, it was happening to her, too.
Ben leaned over and vomited. Instead of comforting him, Mr. Falso kept talking.
“My point isn’t that they died a terrible death, which they did. My point is, Frank Cillo was the lawyer who helped many of those families sue for lost income after their husbands died. He’s a hero to many of these families. It was decades ago—way before you were born—but they remember.”
At that moment, Ben realized there was only one way out, and to get out, he was going to have to rely on his belaying partner.
“So you can understand your father’s unpopularity when he squealed on Frank Cillo for not reporting everything to the IRS. Frank Cillo is a hero in this town. You don’t cross him. You especially don’t cross him if you’re Paul Lattanzi’s kid.”
Ben dragged his wrist across his mouth hard.
Mr. Falso leaned over. “And you definitely don’t cross him if you were schtupping his dead daughter.”
Ben scanned the other climbers, in stages of resting, or making their way back up or down. He wondered if they would help him, if it came to that. More than anything, he wanted to get out of Little Q. He tried to make eye contact with the closest climber, a guy with wraparound sunglasses who seemed to be watching them. Ben struggled to see exactly where his eyes were. Suddenly the man waved. Ben’s stomach sank as Mr. Falso came from behind Ben and greeted the man by name.
As Mr. Falso passed, he leaned into Ben, his breath yeasty at Ben’s neck. “You need to leave this alone, Benvenuto.”
JANUARY 2016
Francesca’s eyes narrowed as she stood alone in the far corner pretending to survey for tables that needed salt and pepper. Usually when she served meals at the soup kitchen, she felt good about what she was doing. Almost noble. Today, she felt cynical, finding fault with everything. She had served the poor, shown compassion to the vulnerable. It had even made her feel virtuous, like Saint Clare, whom she was into lately. Saint Clare, who said to Saint Francis, “Dispose of me as you please. I am yours.” The website said that Saint Clare became more radiant as she served, and Francesca imagined herself becoming more beautiful to Mr. Falso with every globule she scraped into the steel sink.
It should have been the perfect time to confront Mr. Falso about what he’d witnessed. But so much had gone wrong. First: Francesca felt disgusting. Much as she tried to channel the glorious piety of Saint Clare, dish duty sucked. Her nose was shiny. Steam hung in her hair. Her jeans were crusty with white sauce from the chicken tetrazzini, gelatinous gunk heaped on plates that the busboys tossed in plastic bins shoved through the window to the dish room. Dishwater had seeped through her plastic gloves and mixed with the powder inside, and her bandages smelled funky. Second: Connie had insisted on coming. Francesca had tried to tell her the people who came to the soup kitchen for their free meals stank. They chewed with their mouths open. Didn’t have teeth. Sometimes, they even groped. Connie should stay home. Francesca’s issue with Connie was her potential for distraction. It wasn’t that Connie attracted men; not like Mira, whose cool incandescence drew boys like moths. In fact, Connie suffered (unjustly) in comparison to her cousins, always battling something (a zit, a bad-hair day). Connie knew this, but she didn’t believe for a moment that she couldn’t change her lot. The key lay in studying her cousins’ ways—Francesca’s fiery dignity and Mira’s airy detachment, neither of which Connie was capable of attaining. Francesca knew Connie’s habit of observing her every interaction with boys would make conversation with Mr. Falso nearly impossible.
Francesca scanned the room with barely veiled disgust. The overweight man with the undersized Boston College varsity sweater forever asking for seconds was a fraud, she was sure. She didn’t feel sorry for the weary couple with their premature baby making kitten noises. The baby needed its milk warmed, and if they didn’t know enough to warm it, well, she wasn’t going to tell them. She didn’t identify with the strung-out junkies who might have been her age, ignoring their table, and they ignored her, pushing powdery dinner rolls around their plates. Beyond the main dining room, the smell of warm dishwater and powerful detergents was repulsive and alluring, and the laughter that slipped out over the mechanical chug in the back room pricked her nerves.
Mr. Falso was laughing at her. Remembering the way she’d rolled around on her sheets, like she was having a seizure, caught in some sort of trance. She’d embarrassed herself, she was sure of it. But there was a word for what she’d experienced; she heard him use the word to her father as she lay on her back drenched with sweat—ecstasy—a word he wouldn’t have used unless he thought that was what was happening to her. He had labeled it, and she had heard him.
Francesca twirled the apron string around her finger and smiled. The night wasn’t over yet.
“What are you standing there for?” Mira said. “The five stoned guys in the corner are asking for more bread. It’s your turn, I think.”
Francesca looked at her sister, who, instead of folding her apron down like everyone else, wore hers over her chest and tied neatly beneath her chin. Mira approached soup kitchen service with genuine fear, locking her purse in the director’s desk and covering her body so nothing was left exposed, as if the patrons were going to gang rape her rather than get a meal.
Not saintly at all. Not Christian.
Francesca untangled her finger and spoke in a harsh whisper. “Nick hasn’t spoken to me. Not once. And the fact that Connie’s in there with him makes it ten times worse.”
Mira frowned. “Connie’s not interested in Mr. Falso.”
“Connie likes men,” Francesca said.
Mira moved closer, looking over her shoulder. “You actually think Connie would betray her blood that way?”
Francesca sighed. “Of course not. I’m worried about the fact that he hasn’t spoken to me since he came to our house during my ecstasy. He’s blown off our check-in meetings, and my hands are drying up.” She showed both sides. The bandages, smaller now, were four pristine, nude circles. Across the room, the man in the BC sweater bellowed for more pudding. The girls looked up in sync. Mira grabbed Francesca by the arm and pulled her to the small room off the main dining area where the furry-faced woman with cataracts sat folding napkins. Privately, the girls called her Catwoman because of her resemblance to Connie’s cat, but her real name was Donata. They had never served the poor without Donata in the background. She was already in her seat when they came, and still there when they left, folding and unseeing. Francesca felt sorry for her; Mira thought she was terrifying. Every third or fourth napkin Donata would stop and flex her gnarled hands and rub her thumb along the grain of her palms, massaging. Mira speculated Donata’s presence at the soup kitchen was a mercy job, since she only ever folded about twenty-five napkins in the entire five hours the St. Theresa’s kids worked there.
They huddled and whispered.
“Consider this: the ecstasy takes it to a whole new level. Out of his hands, maybe. So, perhaps he’s paralyzed. He simply doesn’t know what to do next,” said Mira.
“It’s true that I’ve told him I’m not ready to share it with anyone. It’s our secret,” Francesca said. “His and mine.”
“That’s right. Your special secret,” said Mira.
“But what if it’s too much for him to bear alone?” said Francesca.
“Then you tell him I know. Not Connie, though. Just me. Four makes it … less special,” Mira replied.
Francesca’s eyes filled with tears. She
blinked them away and focused on the old woman’s hands, painfully slow. Fold, flex, knead. Fold, flex, knead. Francesca shook off her annoyance and came back to Mira. “But what if my ecstasy is some kind of turnoff?”
“But that’s his thing. I mean, it’s his ‘field of interest.’ It’s precisely what makes you special to him.”
“He needs more proof. He doesn’t yet believe.” Francesca’s voice was coarsened by the tears burning the back of her throat. Her eyes cut to Donata. “Oh for God’s sake. You’re never going to finish at that rate. Let us do it.” Francesca spread her fingers over the old woman’s gnarled knuckles. Confused, Donata raised her head slowly, her baleful milk-eyes searching Francesca’s face. Francesca snatched the green napkin from Donata’s hand and took over folding. “We’ll never get done otherwise,” she said sharply.
Mira folded napkins absently, ignoring Francesca’s angry mutterings and watching Donata. The old woman stared wondrously at the backs of her hands, opening and closing them easily, almost elegantly, Mira thought. Like a younger woman. Donata looked up, sparse eyebrows stretched high, beseeching Mira for an explanation that Mira didn’t have. She searched Mira’s face wordlessly, though as always, Mira doubted that she saw her, the woman’s eyes swimming in their murky pools. As she opened her mouth to speak, Mr. Falso stuck his head in the door.
“Sorry to bother you, ladies. But the kids at the front of the house need your help.” He retreated quickly, almost desperately, and Francesca beelined after him. Mira tried to follow, the dish-room door slamming before her nose.
Mr. Falso didn’t realize Francesca was on his heels until he stopped short. She crashed into his back, a face-plant into a patch of back sweat. She straightened herself out, undignified and doubly pissy.
“Whoa! I didn’t know you were there!” Mr. Falso said.
Francesca threw her hair defiantly over one shoulder. “Can we talk?”
Mr. Falso backed away from Francesca with raised hands. “It’s a tough time, don’t you think? The last shift of patrons comes in five minutes, and we’re way behind in the dish room.”
