Cast Me Gently (8 page)

They entered the foyer, and she was aware of the smells of garlic and bread as Ellie sighed. “This is lovely.”

She took Ellie’s coat and hung it on the coat tree. She watched Ellie look around the living room, going over to the fireplace mantel where there were several framed photos.

“Is this your First Communion?” Ellie asked, taking down a photo of two little girls in frilly white dresses, wearing white lace on their heads, their hands in white gloves clasping the new rosaries they’d been given to commemorate the day.

Teresa made a face. “Yes. The last time I was the same size as Bernie.”

Ellie laughed and put the photo back on the mantel. Teresa saw a brief frown flit over Ellie’s features as she turned and saw the crucifix above the sofa.

“Come on back to the kitchen,” Teresa said.

Ellie gasped again as Teresa flipped on the lights. “This is just what a kitchen should look like,” she said.

Teresa looked around. “It’s just a kitchen.”

“No, it isn’t.” Ellie’s eyes shone. “It’s the heart of this home. There’s love here.”

Puzzled, Teresa looked around again. What she saw was a half-eaten loaf of bread covered by a towel on the wooden cutting board. She saw a counter lined with a coffee maker, a small espresso machine, a commercial-grade mixer, a toaster. She saw a marble slab on the table where it had been left to dry after being used to knead the dough from yesterday’s batch of bread. She saw a couple of hanging baskets, one filled with onions and cloves of garlic, another with potatoes.

Ellie smiled at Teresa’s blank expression. “You don’t see it because you’re here in it every day. But if you didn’t have this, you would see it. And you would miss it.”

Teresa didn’t know what to say. She handed Ellie a knife. “Why don’t you slice us some bread and I’ll put some water on to boil. Spaghetti and meatballs okay?”

They busied themselves putting a meal together.

“What about your parents? How much should I cut?” Ellie asked as she laid slices of bread on a plate.

“Do the whole loaf. They’ll have some when they get home,” Teresa said. “Ma will be home soon. The store closes in half an hour. My dad is at our Morningside store today, with my brother. They’ll be in when they get in. My mom will warm something up for them whenever. Heaven forbid any man lift a hand to feed himself in this house.”

A short while later, Ellie said, “Oh, my gosh, this is so good,” as she and Teresa began to eat. She looked at her heaping bowl of spaghetti, topped with three meatballs. “Do you eat like this every day?”

Teresa looked down and gestured to herself. “Don’t I look like I eat like this every day?”

Ellie glanced at her. “You look—”

“Whoa.”

They both jumped at Gianni’s entrance into the kitchen.

“Who do we have here?” he asked, immediately running a hand over his hair as he strutted over to the table.

“Oh, God,” Teresa moaned.

Ellie turned to Teresa. “Your brother?”

“How’d you guess?”

Gianni grabbed the chair next to Ellie and sat. “Well, you know who I am, beautiful. Who are you?”

Ellie laughed. “Does that actually work for you?”

Gianni pulled back a bit. Ellie immediately looked contrite at the hurt expression on his face.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m Ellie. I’m a friend of Teresa’s. We were working on the store window today.”

Gianni, always one to press an advantage, took Ellie’s hand in both of his. “Apology accepted. The store window, huh? You should come to Morningside and do me.”

Ellie whipped her hand away. “On second thought,” she said icily, “I’m not sorry.”

Teresa smirked. “Couldn’t leave well enough alone, could you?”

“Shut up.” Gianni shoved to his feet. “Where’s Ma?”

“She should be home soon,” Teresa said. “But if you want food, you can get it yourself. I’m not waiting on you.”

“Who asked you?” he sneered. “I’m going to Angelina’s tonight.”

“Nice,” Teresa said. “Hitting on another girl on your way to your girlfriend’s.”

Gianni gave her the finger as he turned on his heel and stomped out of the kitchen.

Ellie tilted her head in the direction of the stairs. “Is he always like that?”

“Always.” Teresa shook her head. “The sun rises and sets on Giovanni Benedetto.”

Ellie twirled her fork, wrapping the tendrils of spaghetti around it. “I thought you had another brother?”

“I do,” Teresa said. “My older brother, Robbie. Roberto. But he got divorced a few years ago and now he never comes around.”

Ellie paused her twirling. “Your parents won’t see him because he got divorced?”

Teresa tore a slice of bread and used a piece to soak up some sauce from her plate. “The divorce was bad enough, but then he got remarried.”

“They don’t like her?”

Teresa snorted. “She’s older than him, she’s not Catholic, and she’s not Italian. What do you think?” She reached for a slice of bread. “I really like Karen. But my parents have made it clear she’s not welcome, and Robbie says he won’t come without her. So he doesn’t come home and nobody talks.” She glanced over and started to reach out, but stopped herself. “You have some sauce, just here.” She tapped her own chin.

Ellie lifted her napkin and wiped the sauce away. “Do you see him?”

“Yeah, I do.” Teresa spread a thick slab of butter on her bread. “I like them both, but I don’t get to see them as often as I’d like. Robbie is a real estate agent, so he works crazy hours. Karen works in an insurance office not too far from your bank. I meet her for lunch sometimes.”

Ellie’s face took on an expression Teresa was beginning to recognize. “What?”

Ellie shrugged. “I just think… If your parents knew how easily they could lose your brother —or anyone really—they wouldn’t waste life not talking.”

Teresa stared at Ellie who was busily trying to twirl her spaghetti around her fork again. She heard Gianni moving around upstairs. It was hard to imagine missing him. She had often wished her parents had stopped after Francesca.

The back door into the kitchen opened with a clatter as Sylvia came in. Teresa covered a smile as Ellie stood up and said, “Oh, Mrs. Benedetto, your home is wonderful. Thank you so much for having me over.”

Sylvia, nonplussed, said, “You’re welcome, Ellie. Thank you for all your help with the store.”

Ellie offered to take her coat for her while Teresa filled a bowl. “Here, Ma, come and sit down. Eat while it’s hot.”

Sylvia had just sat down to her dinner when Lou came in. Teresa introduced him to Ellie.

“So you’re the genius helping us out,” Lou said as Teresa filled another bowl.

“It’s my pleasure,” Ellie said.

“Kaufman’s better watch it. I just might hire you away,” Lou said. He chuckled at his own joke as he tucked a napkin into his shirt collar.

Teresa filled a glass bowl with the leftover spaghetti, covered it with plastic wrap and then wrapped the whole thing in aluminum foil.

“I’m going to drive Ellie home,” Teresa said as she tucked the bowl under her arm.

“You don’t have to—”

“It’s dark and cold,” Teresa said, cutting off Ellie’s protest. “I’m not letting you take the bus. Come on.”

They huddled in the cold VW. “Here.” Teresa reached into the back seat and offered Ellie a folded woolen throw that she kept in the car.

“You never know when you might break down and freeze to death,” Sylvia often fretted, ignoring the fact that Teresa never went anywhere where help was more than several blocks’ walk.

Ellie gratefully wrapped the throw over her legs as she gave Teresa directions to her apartment.

The car was just beginning to put out slightly warm air when Ellie said, “This is it.” Teresa pulled up to the curb. “Would you like to come up?”

“Sure,” said Teresa, more curious than she would have admitted. She got out of the car and retrieved the bowl of leftovers from the back seat, and then followed Ellie through a side door and up the stairs to the third floor.

KC came to greet them as Ellie unlocked the door.

“Hey there,” Ellie crooned, picking her up. “Did you think I wasn’t coming home? This is Teresa. This is KC.”

“KC?”

“Kitty Cat.” Ellie smiled ruefully. “I was not very creative with her name.”

Teresa reached out a hesitant hand. KC gave her a sniff and a little meow.

“Y’uns don’t have any pets?” Ellie asked.

“Are you kidding? My mother and her sisters had a fit when my sister got a cat, said it would smother the baby.” Teresa stroked KC’s soft fur. “In my family, dogs and cats are only for farms, not for houses.”

“Too bad,” Ellie said, snuggling KC against her cheek before setting her down. “They’re wonderful company. Come on in.”

Teresa stepped farther into the kitchen. “Wow.” She pirouetted, taking in all the travel posters papering the walls as she set the foil-wrapped bowl on the kitchen counter.

“All the places I’m going to go someday,” Ellie said.

Teresa followed Ellie into the small living room. “Well, for now, they make pretty wallpaper,” she said.

There it was again, that shadow that flitted across Ellie’s face sometimes, only there for an instant and then gone. Teresa felt she’d said something wrong, but wasn’t sure what.

“Hey,” she said as a thought occurred to her. “What are you doing for Thanksgiving? Our family is crazy, and we’ll all be at my aunts’ house and there’ll be lasagna along with the turkey, but I’d love to have you.”

“Oh, um,” Ellie said. “I can’t, but thank you. I already have plans.”

“What plans?” Teresa nearly blurted, certain that Ellie was lying, but instead she just said, “Well, if you change your mind, you’d be welcome.” She walked back out into the kitchen. “I’d better go. I’m sure you’re tired. That’s for you.” She pointed to the bowl on the counter.

“Oh, I can’t—”

“We owe you a week’s worth of food,” Teresa interrupted. “Thank you again for all your help with the window. I never could have done that without you.”

“You’re welcome again.” Ellie threw her arms around Teresa and gave her a quick hug. “See you soon.”

Teresa stumbled as she backed over the threshold. “See you.”

CHAPTER 8

Teresa’s VW chugged through
the snow like a little tank, its rear engine giving the back wheels the traction they needed to churn up and down the hills to the store. The snow that had fallen overnight made everything look fresh and clean—“the only time Pittsburgh looks clean,” she muttered through chattering teeth—but she knew it would quickly become a gray sludge as the city woke up and traffic got moving.

In the back seat was a folded winter coat. “You cannot wear that anymore,” Sylvia had declared when Lou had taken it from the closet a couple of weeks ago. “What will people think?” she said, clucking as she inspected the shiny elbows where the wool was worn thin and the one shoulder seam that had pulled away. She insisted he start wearing the new one he’d received last Christmas, folding this one into the bag headed for the Salvation Army.

As Teresa had come downstairs that morning, she had noticed the snow from the window on the stair landing. Down in the foyer, balancing on one foot to pull a boot on, she had nearly tripped over the bag that had been sitting there for days, waiting for someone to take it to the Salvation Army. Remembering that coat, she’d pulled it out of the bag and brought it with her. When she turned into the alley, she wasn’t surprised to see Dogman behind the store, shaking the snow off his sleeping bag so that he could roll it up and tie it to his backpack. Lucy came to her as she got out of the car. Teresa gave her a scratch behind the ears.

“Wait,” she said as Dogman called to Lucy. He turned to her. “I…” Now that she was face to face with him, his face expressionless except for those eyes—
why is that the only part I can ever remember?
—she wasn’t sure what to say. She held out the coat. “I thought maybe you could use this, now that it’s really cold.” When he just stood there, looking at her, not the coat, she added, “It was my dad’s. It was in a bag for the Salvation Army. I just thought…” She held it to him again, and this time he took it. “And,” she reached back into the car. “I have this for Lucy. To keep her warm at night.” She offered the woolen throw that Ellie had used. Wordlessly, Dogman accepted this also, then turned and limped on down the alley with Lucy beside him.

Teresa watched them for a moment, then closed up the car and worked the key into the lock of the back security grate. She had to wrestle the frozen links before they slid open. Once inside, she rummaged through the storage closet, looking for the snow shovel. She quickly shoveled a clear space for her mother to park. She looked down the alley, but Dogman and Lucy were gone. She couldn’t have said what it was that made her feel a connection to them. She’d never felt like this about any of the other homeless or out-of-work people she saw every day—and there were lots of them lately—but,
there’s just something about the two of them,
and it had something to do with Ellie. She paused her shoveling, enjoying the secret thrill she felt every time she thought of Ellie. She always remembered that the first day she had seen Dogman was the day she met Ellie. For some reason the two things were connected in her mind. And now, it was all tied up with that hug.

Teresa leaned on her shovel and closed her eyes.
That hug.
“Don’t be so stupid,” she’d told herself over and over, but… other than hugs from Aunt Anita every now and again, that was the first hug she’d had from anyone since she was a child. Her parents weren’t huggers, nor were her siblings. She’d never been kissed—not really kissed—never been held, never had a boyfriend, had never been… intimate with anyone.

She felt her face grow hot and knew it had nothing to do with the exertion of shoveling. Every night for the past two weeks, she’d fallen asleep smiling and remembering the feel of Ellie’s arms around her.
How could something so simple be such a huge thing?
She’d avoided going back to the bank, certain she’d make an idiot of herself again, but that didn’t keep her thoughts from turning to Ellie at the most unexpected—
and inconvenient
—times, like yesterday when she’d been in the middle of counting pills for a prescription, and had to start over because she found herself standing there, daydreaming, with no recollection of how many pills she’d counted.

Part of it was every horrible thing Ellie had been through. It broke Teresa’s heart to think about it, and she wanted to hold Ellie and try to make it better, but “you can’t make any of it better,” she reminded herself again and again. “It happened—her parents, her brother, all of it,” but there was still something so vulnerable about Ellie, something that made Teresa feel protective and… tender. It was such a new feeling that she didn’t recognize it at first. “Teresa is tall, she can reach it” or “Teresa’s strong, she can do it”—those were the kind of things she was used to being needed for. Her family relied on her, even if they also forgot about her, but with Ellie, she felt different. It was as if she were being molded into a new shape, a new Teresa –
just by knowing her.
Ellie had a way of turning her inside out, seeing the bits of her that no one else had ever seen.

But she knew better than to try and talk about this to anyone, not even Bernie. For years, she’d listened to Bernie talk about Tom, cry over him, scream at him—and then watched as she went back to him time and again, but “this is different.” Teresa had a feeling no one else would understand, because she didn’t understand it herself.

“Teresa!”

She jumped, dropping her shovel. Mrs. Schiavo was waving at her. Teresa picked the shovel up out of the snow and went around to shovel the back entrance of the bakery. When she was done there, she went out front and shoveled the front walk of both the bakery and the drugstore. By the time she was finished, a small crowd had gathered. Mrs. Schiavo brought out her old bread and let Teresa hand it to the people waiting. They were more orderly with her. “Because I’m big enough to hit back,” Teresa joked. She scanned the street for any sign of Dogman and Lucy, but they were nowhere. When the bread had been given out, Mrs. Schiavo made Teresa come back inside, where she tried to give her a plate of cannoli.

“Mrs. Schiavo,” said Teresa. “Do I look like I need cannoli?”

Mrs. Schiavo cackled and waved her hand at such an absurd idea as anyone having too much cannoli. She shoved the plate into Teresa’s hand and Teresa went back around through the back door of the drug store, leaving the plate on her dad’s desk. “Not that he needs it, either,” she said, but she knew he’d eat it.

By the time Sylvia got to the store, snowplows had cleared paths down some of the streets and traffic was moving. She placed a mop behind the cash register.

“We’ll have to clean up after snowy shoes all day today,” she said. “I don’t want anyone slipping and suing us.”

“We could just close for today,” Teresa said from behind the pharmacy counter.

“What? And lose a whole day’s business?” Sylvia said.

The telephone rang, and Sylvia answered. Teresa could hear her end of the conversation and stopped what she was doing, listening with a scowl on her face.

“What?” she asked when her mother hung up.

“Gianni is stuck at Angelina’s. Your father is going to the Morningside store until Gianni can get there. He wants you to do the deposit and take it to the bank.”

“Stuck at Angelina’s my ass,” Teresa said under her breath. She finished the prescription she was working on and went to the office, still grumbling.

“What are you saying in there?” Sylvia asked.

Teresa didn’t answer for a moment as she got on her hands and knees, dialing the combination on the safe bolted to the floor under the desk. She lifted last night’s moneybag to the desk and brushed her knees off.

“I said, it’s a good thing one of us makes it to work.”

“Your brother always has a good reason if he doesn’t make it in,” Sylvia said.

“Yeah, right. I got out and shoveled this morning. Why can’t he get his butt out and shovel and scrape and get to work?”

“He will,” Sylvia said.

“Why do you always make excuses for him?”

“I’m not making excuses.” Sylvia’s voice sounded far away from inside the candy case.

“You are. If he worked for anyone else and didn’t show up at work, he’d be fired. But you and Pop just let him get away with it. And for not showing up to work, he gets paid more than I do. I haven’t had a raise since I got out of pharmacy school.”

“He’s a man,” Sylvia said. “He has to save up to take care of a wife and family. You just have yourself and you live with us. What do you need more pay for, huh?”

“Maybe I’m not always going to live with you and Pop.”

There was a very prickly silence that stretched on and on, and then Sylvia’s heels clicked on the floor as she came to the office. “So you’re thinking about moving out?”

Teresa shrugged. “Maybe.”

Sylvia threw her hands in the air. “Maybe you should.”

“Maybe I will,” Teresa shot back as her mother stalked away. Breathing heavily, she had to count the change five times before she got an accurate number. She threw the coins into the bag and marked the deposit slip. She finished counting the bills and checks and stuffed everything into the bag. She crammed her feet back into her boots, pulled a hat on, wrapped her scarf back around her neck, and donned her coat over top of the sling containing the moneybag.

“I don’t know when I’ll be back,” she said as she stomped through the store. She didn’t look at her mother and didn’t wait for a response.

Outside, the sidewalk was a checkerboard of untouched snow in front of some buildings interspersed with short lengths that had been shoveled. Traffic was moving sluggishly. She passed more than one car whose wheels were spinning, trying to maintain traction going up a hill. She was glad she’d decided to walk as her legs pumped along like pistons. She was soon breathing hard with the effort of walking through the snow, but the exertion felt good. It wasn’t long before she was away from the commercial section and walking past houses, most of them still quiet, the sidewalks untouched, as the city’s kids had been given a snow day and weren’t outside yet.

As Teresa walked, she muttered to herself, continuing her argument with her mother, until she passed two kids coming down their porch steps with a sled. They looked at her as if she were crazy.

She chuckled. “Yes, I’m crazy.”

She got to an intersection and paused. Instead of continuing straight toward the bank, she crossed the street and headed toward her sister-in-law’s insurance office. The front windows looked dark as she approached, but when she stood in front of the building, she realized the glare of the snow outside masked the weak fluorescents burning inside. She pushed the door open.

Karen was at her desk, phone to her ear. She glanced up, looking harassed. When she saw Teresa standing there, she smiled and held up a finger as she took notes. “We’ll get someone out there as soon as we can to assess the damage. You stay safe, Mrs. Brezicki.”

Karen hung up the phone and took her reading glasses off, rubbing her temples. “I hate snow,” she moaned. “But I love seeing you.” She got up from the desk. Even on a day like this, she looked great, her slim figure shown to its advantage in a pantsuit, her blonde hair perfectly done—
oh, God, what will mine look like when I take this hat off?
Teresa suddenly wondered.

“Want some coffee?” Karen was saying. “You must be freezing. I can’t believe you walked here.”

Teresa stood on the mat inside the front door, stomping her snowy boots as she unwound her scarf from around her neck and flapped her coat. “Some coffee would be great in a minute, but your walk isn’t cleared.”

“I’m the only one to make it in so far,” Karen said with a fake smile. “The phone has been ringing since I got here, and none of the men have dug their cars out.”

Teresa glared at her. “Sounds familiar.” She rewrapped her scarf and buttoned her coat. Reaching for the shovel leaning against the wall, she said, “Have that coffee ready for me. Be back in a jiff.”

Several minutes later, she was back inside, stomping again as she took off her scarf and coat. “That should last you for a few hours unless it piles up out there.”

“Thank you so much,” Karen said, waving her over to a chair by the desk where a cup of steaming coffee was waiting.

Teresa held the cup in her two hands, letting the warmth soak in. “Oh, this feels good. Thanks.”

Karen sat back down behind the desk. “So what brings you down here?”

“I had to go to the bank,” Teresa said. “And I just had to get away from the store before I said something I would be sorry for.”

“What’s going on?”

Teresa didn’t answer immediately. She sipped her coffee, but just as she opened her mouth, the telephone rang.

“Sorry,” Karen said, picking up the phone. Teresa drank her coffee while Karen took down the details of yet another car damaged when someone else slid into it.

“That’s the third one this morning. Now,” Karen said a few minutes later as she hung up. “You were saying?”

Teresa shook her head. “I don’t even know what it is. I get up early to open the store, take care of whatever needs doing. I stay to close most nights. I have no life. Gianni goes in whenever he feels like it, leaves early to go to Angelina’s or out with his friends. He gets paid more than I do because he’s a man.” She stopped, feeling sudden tears sting her eyes. She never cried. She blinked down at her coffee cup as Karen watched her intently.

“It’s good to know some things in this world are constant, isn’t it?” Karen said.

Teresa hiccupped with laughter. “You’re right. It isn’t any different from what it’s always been.”

Karen sat back, still watching her. “Something’s different. Must be. Why is it bothering you now?”

“I don’t know,” Teresa said. “Maybe because it’s been going on for so long…” Her expression darkened. “I am in the exact same place I was ten years ago. And if my folks have their way, I’ll still be in that same place ten or twenty years from now.”

“There’s nothing wrong with that, if it’s where you want to be,” Karen pointed out.

“I guess,” Teresa said. “I never questioned it before, but now… I feel restless. Like my life is just passing me by. Everyone my age is married and having kids. I don’t want that, but I watch my aunts, all single, all heavy and unhealthy. I don’t want that to be me, either.”