by Jen Tirone
“You mocking me, Gia?” he asks me in all seriousness, making me regret opening my big mouth at all.
“I thought professing my eternal love for you was Romeo and Juliet romantic, bella, and you’re cracking jokes at my black, but sentimental heart,” he presses his hand to his chest as if he’s wounded and shakes his head with a smile.
“You have a morbid sense of romance, amore. But I’ll take it,” I tell him, genuinely relieved.
“How about you get yourself ready, baby, and we’ll make a day of it at the park. We’ll take Enzo and sit out on the grass. The weather’s still crisp, but it should be nice enough in the sun. What do you say?”
“Really?” I ask jumping up to my knees, “You promise we get the whole day?” I have to confirm, because it’s that hard to believe.
“Yeah. The whole day, just us three. Go get ready and I’ll have the housekeeper pack a lunch to take along,” he says pushing me from my bottom to get out of bed.
“No need to tell me twice!” I tell him giddy, not hiding it at all by running into the closet.
Finally, just us, doing nothing but being together.
God, it sounded amazing already.
The beauty of doing nothing!
Together.
It was going to be so lovely.
What was I going to wear for the park?
I kept laughing to myself in excitement, and I could hear Gio laugh out loud each time too.
He has to think I’m ridiculous, but my God, he has no idea how happy this makes me.
Especially after last night.
I just realized, I never even thought to ask him about Nora yesterday...
I was that self-absorbed my only friend never even came up in conversation.
It’s no wonder I didn’t have any.
But that’s neither here nor there.
And those ships have sailed.
I’ve got a day at the park with my man and my pup.
I wasn’t going to let anything ruin it.
I had decided on a knee-length, cream-colored pencil skirt, a long sleeve navy blue chiffon blouse, cinched at the waist with dark brown belt and matching dark brown gloves. I had on brown, pointed toe heels I wore for office days at the Italian American Civil Rights Organization, so they were lower in height, and I topped it all off with a cream colored round fedora.
The truth is, I don’t own anything casual and certainly nothing comfortable for a day at the park.
If it wasn’t top-notch threads or sexy, sheer lingerie, than I was naked or naked underneath a silk robe.
Giorgio seemed to have run into the same clothing dilemma, because he went with a suit and fedora, though he took it down a notch by going sans vest from his three-piece suit.
We were ridiculously too well dressed to frolic in the park.
But I honestly could care if it all got ruined with dirt because I was too thrilled to have a moment with Gio and just be.
I really needed this.
Enzo looked just as spiffy as us with a brown tweed doggie coat, one of the many I had made for him, and we were off.
When we stepped toward the elevator, Giorgio held a basket with our lunch and an instrument case.
“Gio, is that what I think it is?” I asked him completely in shock.
“It is exactly what it looks like,” he tells me trying not to let the embarrassed smile win over.
“Amore! Are you really going to play the guitar for me? In public?” I ask him, grabbing his arm.
This is just the cherry on top!
“Gianna, be quiet, bella. Before I change my mind,” he shakes his head at me, bashful.
“Okay, okay. I’ll shut up now. You know, the wine, the lips!” I say, shaking my head and burst out laughing.
He does, too, and reaches over to caress my cheek.
He looks so calm and happy right now.
He looks just like he did on our first couple of dates.
It’s all I want for us.
We get to the lobby and see Charlie at the entrance.
“Mr. Moretti, Mrs. Moretti, good morning! Didn’t I tell you you’d be at the park more often now with that show dog you call a pet? What a fine day! You two kids enjoy yourselves, now,” he wishes us off, making me giddier with every step.
Even Enzo is feeling top notch, trotting next to me with the elegance of a stallion his pedigree is known for.
We’re right outside our building getting ready to cross the street to the park when I hear several police sirens wailing and tires screeching to a sudden stop.
Car doors fly open from their cruisers and uniformed officers jump out from everywhere, charging toward us, swarming everything like an army of ants, faster than I can blink.
We were surrounded and I was yanked away harshly from Giorgio, I was trying not to trip over Enzo’s leash and myself.
So many cops were in between us, some trying to calm me down, but I couldn’t really understand what they were saying with all the commotion, I couldn’t hear anything past the whoosh, whoosh, whoosh sound of blood flushing my ears.
Suddenly, Giorgio’s slammed against the hood of a car, someone pushing their forearm against the back of his neck to keep his face plastered to the hood while they put handcuffs on him.
I finally make out what they’re saying, and whose voice it is.
“Giorgio Moretti, you are under arrest for the bribery, extortion, and blackmailing of a public official...”
“No! Stop this!” I scream, held back by an officer.
“Ma’am, calm yourself,” someone around me says.
“…You have the right to remain silent.”
“Giorgio!” I scream, reaching out for him.
“...Anything you say, can and will be used against you in a court of law.”
“Get away from him!” I futilely tell them.
I elbow the officer holding me away from my husband.
“Michael, stop this! You have to stop this!”
I’m frantic, running toward them as fast as I can in these fucking heels.
“...You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be provided for you.”
I reach them just as Michael straightens Gio up from the hood.
“Gianna, get inside the house, bella. I’ll be fine. Go,” Giorgio tells me, like nothing is happening.
“Ma’am, you just assaulted an officer—” someone says, grabbing my shoulder from behind.
“Go to hell, you bastard!” I turn around and scream in his face, trying to push him off.
“Don’t fucking touch her!” I hear Gio yell as they push him toward the back of the car.
“Leave her alone, Whitman, she didn’t assault anyone. Just get her out of the way,” was Michael’s dismissal.
“Giorgio,” I start speaking to him in Italian, hoping most of these assholes couldn’t understand us, “I’ll call your father right away. We’ll get you out today. Today, goddamn it!” I promise him, not having any idea.
I watched Michael hand Gio off to another officer who roughhoused him into the backseat.
Michael wouldn’t even look at me.
It angered me immensely at that moment.
I needed someone to blame, anyone to focus my anger toward.
I charged right up to him and pushed him in his chest, not giving a fuck I was deliberately assaulting an officer this time and in front of his whole squad.
He grabbed both my hands quickly, stopping me from being able to do anything more to him and gave me a hard look that warned me to stop.
I could vaguely hear Gio yelling from the car.
“Michael, how could you?” I whispered, crying, the fight leaving me as he held my hands.
I know it’s what Gio’s reaped, with all the crimes he’s sowed.
It just felt like he was invincible after so long that nothing’s ever happened to him.
“He’s my husband, please!” I beg him knowing there was no point of it.
I just couldn’t stand it.
He was a good person, deep down inside. To me he always was.
“He’s a criminal, love. I wouldn’t stop it even if I could.”
And with that he let go of my hands and walked off to a car that had the passenger door open waiting for him to get in.
I watched in conflicted dismay as the two men in my life who seemed to split my heart down the middle, drove off in the cavalry of black and whites. One by one in a straight line with their sirens blaring and their lights flashing for all to see just who ranked the true hierarchy in the streets of New York.
For years I’d been against my husband’s line of work.
I was spoiled in luxuries he afforded because of what he did, but I never wanted any of it.
I would have taken a leaky basement apartment and worked two jobs myself, if it meant my husband would be legit.
But alas, my wishes never came true, and my childhood-friend-turned-husband, does what he does and will now have to pay the price of the crime.
Well, only one of the crimes.
I had to light a candle this Sunday, to thank God Giorgio was only arrested for this felony, and not for the uglier crimes.
Believe me, I knew the irony in thanking the man upstairs at all. But that He didn’t let my husband get arrested for his murders, but his bribery—I had to thank him, because things could have been worse.
Once the squad cars took off, I ran inside my building, right past all the onlookers who gathered about to see what the commotion was.
Charlie only got my attention because he had Enzo in his arms and I was grateful he took hold of my little guy somehow when it all happened.
I called Domenico immediately and Gio’s brothers were already with him so I covered all three in one shot. He told me he’d call their lawyer and that they’d all come over to hear in person what had ensued.
I think that was the most my father-in-law and I had ever really spoken to each other.
When they all arrived, I went straight for the bar and served all of us a whiskey.
I could care less I never drank a drop of it in my life. This situation called for the hard stuff.
Chiara, the thorn in my side, was inconsolable and hanging off of me the first few minutes, it was suffocating.
Lord knows I love a good, dramatic cry, but there was a time and place for it, and right now with Gio being carted off to jail, by fucking Michael nonetheless, now was not the time to get lost in a river of useless tears.
Carmine Angelo, the family attorney, questioned me to exhaustion.
“I have to tell you, this doesn’t look good. They’re stating witnesses at the Mayor’s gala last night overheard Giorgio clearly stating to a police officer that he should be accepting the financial contribution he’s been offered,” he says, shaking his head.
“These witnesses are going to testify in court. Bribery will get Giorgio a year or two behind bars. What the hell would make him lose his snap judgment like that and confront an officer at a party?” Carmine questioned out loud.
Domenico, looking straight at me like I’m to blame, asks me to recount the gala timeline again. I tell them the order of events all over again, but each time I tell them, I tell them I didn’t know Michael, having met him for the first time that night.
“Mia nuora, tell me. Why would you be dancing with an officer at the party last night if you only just met him?” Domenico asks me.
What the hell!
“What are you getting at, Domenico?” I answer with a question because the scary bastard is worrying me he knows more than he lets on.
“Well, I wonder how is it, that the officer you just met is one in the same who Giorgio opens his fat fucking mouth to. Then it happens to be the same officer you dance with, and again, the exact same one to arrest my son the very next day?” he muses angrily.
“Are you trying to blame me for this?” I ask crossly.
“I just want to know. You’re the common factor with this cop in all these scenarios. Did you make my son jealous last night, so much so that he would have such a lapse in judgment?”
I jump up from the couch, finally able to push off Chiara, thank God, but not enjoying the insinuating line of questioning from my father-in-law.
I’ve done nothing wrong.
“Domenico, I don’t appreciate your tone with me. You need someone to blame? Look in the fucking mirror! I’m dragged to a stupid party with my husband, that let me tell you— was full of cops and politicians, being a re-election fundraiser for the police commissioner! So when my husband leaves me alone to eat dinner by myself, and tells me to dance, while he’s off corrupting whomever the fuck it is he was out there coercing, and I get asked to dance, guess what? I’m going to do what my husband only moments before told me to do!
“I didn’t throw the fucking party, so I couldn’t choose the guest list, could I? If I ate, and drank, and danced with an officer—at the fucking police commissioner party—so be it! Don’t try to make it out to be like I had anything to do with it! I don’t go around doing your Moretti business,” I spat at him, shaking in fury.
The gall he has.
“Gianna, there’s no need to get upset—” Carmine started, but I cut him off.
“No need? My husband’s been arrested and facing two years in prison for illegal shit that asshole sends him to go do!” I scream, pointing at Domenico.
Chiara tries to chime in, the nitwit, and I lose it on all of them, finally, getting it all off my chest.
“Shut the fuck up, Chiara, you’re no better you goddamn witch. Raising your sons to be a bunch of womanizing, murdering thugs!”
“You better learn to show some respect before I teach you what a lesson feels like!” my father-in-law threatens.
“Get the fuck out of my house!” I spat back, not caring how red in the face he was.
Carmine put a hand to his shoulder trying to calm him down and Matti put his arm around my waist to pull me back from getting in his father’s face any more than I was doing.
“You live in this house because my son does all that shit you think you’re too fucking good for!”
“Get out! All of you! I don’t want to see any of you bastards ever again.”
“Not a problem with me, you little cagna!” Domenico agrees, calling me a bitch.
I grabbed the decanter of whiskey closest to me and threw it his way, fucking missing him completely because Matti pulled me away.
It crashed across the floor by his feet, shattering everywhere.
“You watch yourself, Gianna. Don’t think because my imbecile of a son indulges your little fucking tantrums that I’ll tolerate them!”
“I hate you, every single one of you,” I told them all, as Matti dragged me to my room like an insolent child.
“Gia, I know emotions are running high and all, but you need to cool it, girl. You don’t want to provoke my father any further. Not with Gio gone. Look, anything you need, just call me, alright?” he tried to make peace with me.
But I wasn’t having any of it.
No matter how nice of a brother-in-law he was to me, Matti was part of the problem too.
“Just go. Please. And keep them all away from me.”
For once I didn’t cry.
I didn’t stare at my vain self in the mirror, or sit around on my chaise in nothing but a fucking mink fur coat, smoking a cigarette and trying on all my precious jewels, to feel enveloped in the only material things that usually kept me company when Gio wasn’t around.
No.
For once I didn’t put on a mask of makeup to hide the ugly I harbored inside.
I dressed modestly to court and toned down the flash, avoiding the gaudy.
I finally took a look at myself and saw that changes needed to be made.
But first, I had to get through my husband’s sentencing.
I had to be his rock and show him that when he got out, whenever it be that the judge deemed, that we were going to go back to Italy
and we were leaving all this shit behind if we were ever going to have a chance at all.
It didn’t bode well for us, that every day I attended my husband’s trial, his testifying detective gave me butterflies I wanted desperately to stomp on, when he wouldn’t take his brazen eyes off of me.
It didn’t bode well for Giorgio that I was beginning to resent him.
My husband avoided eye contact with me all throughout the three weeks his speedy trial took to convene, ashamed and guilty for doing this to us.
And he should be.
Maybe my resentment was a little past the beginning stage, and progressing at full speed.
All I know is, loving Giorgio was an isolating undertaking.
In essence, being with him meant being very alone.
It’s what I’ve struggled to accept as my fate being married to him.
And now that I wasn’t talking to the only family I had here, and too much evidence was stacked against my man, I knew I was about to embark on the real journey of solitude.
So I didn’t cry when the judge sentenced him to nineteen months in prison.
And I definitely didn’t cry when they carted my handsome man off to a side door, to transport him to his new home behind bars.
I was actually very offended.
When I received his inmate number, prison address, and visitation guidelines on my own with no help from Carmine because my husband sent his lawyer to give me the message that I was not to visit him there, I went the very first day I was approved to go, but was denied entrance because Gio had refused my visitation.
I tried every single week, for twelve weeks, when finally the warden took pity on me and arranged the visitation during regular visiting hours, even though Gio had me black listed, so to speak.
I couldn’t understand what would make him deny me like this.
I was waiting in the cafeteria with my heart beating wildly.
Angrily.
And then it was apparent as soon as he was released from his pat down, why he didn’t want me to see him.
Not only had he lost some weight and color, he had the remnants of a black eye and a stitch over his eyebrow.
My crying impotence was cured with that sight.
