The Girl She Used to Be (22 page)

I am tipsy. My recent days and nights have been a miserable blur, but I could not be more certain of how I am weak with affection
for Jonathan. I have known him for a few days—hours, really—and my life has never felt so complete.

He holds me and kisses me and I feel like I could let go, yet never drift away.

He is inside me.

Eventually, after some unknown passage of time, our lips move apart and we begin walking again, like we have some important
destination. We watch the boats slowly float into the harbor as others pass them on their journey out. Parents run after escaping
children and the entire waterfront is filled with giggles and laughter and the smell of beer and diesel fumes. The skyscrapers
look down on us like protective deities and it feels like we are here for a reason, safe among the visiting suburbanites and
the urban affluent; it feels like we’re the normal people we long to be.

We start to run out of sidewalk as we approach Federal Hill on the south side of the harbor, and as we do, the foot traffic
recedes.

“Should we eat?” Jonathan asks.

I grab his arm with both hands and curl my wrists around it, like I’m holding on to a pillar. “Okay,” I say, leaning my head
on his shoulder.

“Seafood?”

“With Little Italy on the other side of the harbor? What would the other Bovaros think of that?”

“They’d think what they’ve been thinking for thirty years now: that I’m the unpredictable one.”

I’m sure Gregory Morrison would concur. And though I feel like this evening is on the verge of impeccability, it also feels
like Greg is right behind us, tapping me on the shoulder or whispering in my ear, “Look what Prince Charming did,” and suddenly
I’m staring at caked blood and horizontal teeth. I’d give anything to get rid of these superfluous pieces of Jonathan’s puzzle.

As we turn around and begin walking toward the masses, I try to clear my mind of these thoughts. Though apparently I’m hopelessly
stuck because I ask, “How old were you when you realized your father—or family—was involved in, um… you know.”

He glances at me briefly and laughs. “Well, looking back, I probably should’ve realized it earlier, but the understanding
came in little chunks.” He scratches his forehead and says, “Like how we always had large amounts of cash around the house.
I mean, the eighties were all about credit cards, yet my parents didn’t have a single one. Whenever my mother needed to go
shopping, she’d go into one of several boxes in our house and grab a fat stack of bills. My friend, Billy Barone, showed me
a credit card when I was twelve. I didn’t know what it was. I thought he was pulling my leg. The whole concept made no sense
to me.”

I stare at him and smile. His story, in a way, is a story of innocence; I wish these were the only ones he had to tell.

He continues, this time with a vignette about how, as a kid, all he did was casually mention that he might like to learn more
about baseball, and the next thing he knew he was sitting behind the dugout at the World Series.

“There was a lot of stuff like that,” he says. “But there was other stuff, too, odd things—things I thought were supposed
to be funny but were really a subtle preparation for my upcoming life as a grown-up Bovaro.”

He says no more. He seems to have a real problem with dropping off at critical points in his delivery. I have to nudge him.
“Like?”

He clears his throat. “Well, here’s a little something I heard quite a bit growing up: ‘Sticks and stones may break your bones
and everything after that is irrelevant.’ ”

I laugh. “Get real.”

“How about ‘The pen is mightier than the sword, huh? Well, how’re you gonna use that pen after my sword cuts off your frigging
hand?’ Then, of course, they’d throw in a reference to the person being an incestuous bisexual.”

“Naturally.”

“You know Rock, Paper, Scissors? Turns out nothing beats Rock.”

I stop—because I’m really laughing too loudly for a public place. I bite my lip a little. I make it look like I’m being sultry,
but the truth is I’m trying to suppress further laughter. “So, what was the event that finally brought it all home?”

“It wasn’t one single event. I just finally realized my father did nothing
real
to generate income. When I asked my mom what my dad did for a living, she’d always reply, ‘Tell people he’s in investments.’
I’m like, why do I have to
tell
people anything? What’s the truth?”

“They never told you?”

We start walking again.

“Not really, because what my family does is… dabble. If you really want to know, we handle a lot of carting, we run numbers,
we do some fixing. I don’t get involved in the action end, thank God; all I do is launder some of the money. Just as guilty,
mind you, but at least I don’t have to see much blood.”

He tells me this like he’s discussing the difficulty of running a convenience store. “So,” I say, trying to keep the conversation
informative but light, “your dad wasn’t in investments at all?”

“I suppose, a little.” He shrugs. “He used to fix races up at Belmont.”

“How does that fall under the umbrella of investing?”

“Pretty simple, really. You spend, say, twenty grand fixing a race, paying the jockeys to back off and/or getting the horses
drugged up. Then you bet half that on the horse guaranteed to win, spread over ten or twelve bets. You make five to ten times
what you invested, more if the horse was a long shot.”

“Better performing than a good Scudder fund?”

He glances at me casually. “I have no idea what that means. But I can tell you there is really no guarantee of anything. Ever.”

“Who would dare override a win for a race the Bovaro family had predetermined?”

Jonathan giggles and shakes his head, seemingly thrilled that the memory he’s recalling actually occurred. “Two years ago,
my dimwit brother, Peter, wanted to move all the family’s actions toward fixing races across the country. He was obsessed.
If he could’ve influenced the lawmakers in New York to change the road markers from miles to furlongs, he’d have created a
political action committee. Anyway, he fixed a race at Belmont, and it was gonna be a huge payoff, the biggest yet. All the
jockeys were in on it—a very difficult and risky venture—and we were looking at a quick mid-six-figure payout.”

He giggles again, like there is some sibling rivalry behind the reverie.

“On the second turn,” he continues, “the horse pegged to win slips and falls against the rails and sprains its ankle. Suddenly,
all the jockeys back off and start looking at one another, like, what do we do now? No one—and I mean no one—wanted to be
the guy bringing his horse across that finish line. The other eight jockeys pulled back on their horses and they all sort
of strolled past the finish line in what was the slowest finish to any seven-furlong race held at that track. It was the talk
of all the sports shows in the city and before you knew it, investigations were coming from every direction. And that was
the last the Bovaros ever set foot near Belmont or Aqueduct or any other racetrack in New York ever again.”

So far, the Bovaros have turned out to be utter failures in the areas of music and the equine. Jonathan is emerging as the
star player on a team of bunglers. “I didn’t realize crime was so complicated.”

“You have no idea. That’s why it’s
organized
crime. Without the organization, we’d never get anything accomplished.”

A breeze pushes us forward and my sundress flitters and the chill reminds me of how little I am wearing. We walk a few paces
before I ask, “You ever get involved in any wrongdoing beyond the laundering?”

He looks my way quickly, like he’s going to frisk me down for a wire, but it seems like it’s nothing more than a default reaction.
He turns away and quietly answers, “Sure.”

I swallow and ask hopefully, “Carting?”

He smiles but makes a face like I’m cute for asking, and that I’m now old enough to know there is no Santa Claus.

“Trash has never really been my thing.”

“Running numbers, maybe? Which I could totally respect, by the way.”

“No numbers.”

I gulp again. “Murder?”

“You asked me that before.”

“I know. But I need the truth, Jonathan.”

He shakes his head a little. “I have never taken a life.”

“What about—”

“We’re here!” He points toward a seafood restaurant a few paces in front of us.

“We’re
where
? We’ve passed this place five times already. Suddenly it’s our destination?”

“Look, I’ve never murdered anyone, okay? Besides, no family is in the murdering business, per se; it’s more of a required
action when other business dealings go awry, like firing an employee.”

“Permanently.”

He rolls his eyes.

“What, you’re justifying it?”

“Absolutely not,” he says, “just explaining why it happens.”

Jonathan keeps looking over his shoulder at the restaurant; he’s preparing for another segue.

“Have you ever
wanted
to murder someone?”

Jonathan grunts a little and wipes his face. “Sure. Haven’t you? What do you really want to know, Melody? Have I ever beaten
someone within an inch of his life? You bet. I’ve done what needed to be done, to protect myself, to protect my family. That’s
what you do for the ones you love! It’s what I would do for
you
.”

A few people turn and stare, but keep walking. His comment about beating someone within an inch of his life is offset by the
fact that he sort of said he loved me. I step closer and say, “Tell me the story.”

“Why?”

I hesitate. “Because I have very intense feelings for you, okay? And I need to know this side of you. I need to know what
you’re capable of.”

He stares at me for a long moment, then looks down. “There was, uh… one guy in particular. Turned out very badly.”

“Who?” I silently pray that the name he utters is Gregory Morrison, that I have already seen the worst-case scenario, that
I can finally move on.

“Maybe we should get a table in the restaurant and—”

“That’s fine. If you want to slurp down some crab bisque and sip a nice Pinot Grigio while you tell me how you dismantled
someone, that’s just super—but I want to hear a name first.”

Jonathan shifts in his spot a little. He pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose and studies me, like he’s slightly more
convinced I might be wired. He glances at the folks around us, then farther and farther away, all the way to the top of Federal
Hill, where I imagine he expects to see an unmarked van, envisions federal agents sitting inside who are listening to our
conversation, ready to descend.

Really, why else would I be so obsessed with having Jonathan tell me who the guy was. Wouldn’t the actions be the more important
details?

I turn his face back to mine. “Jonathan, I would never get you in trouble, okay? Now, for the first time, I need you to trust
me
.”

He licks his lips a little and says, “Gregory Morrison.”

I close my eyes and I hug him and whisper, “Thank you.”

He returns my hug and buries his face in my hair, but it’s only a few seconds before I can feel him looking around again.

We make our way to the hostess of a large but cozy seafood restaurant with window views of the harbor and the Baltimore skyline.
She smiles and welcomes us, and before Jonathan can utter the word
two
, he’s reaching into his pocket and pulling out bills. I grab his hand and shove it back into his pocket, give him a look
like he’s nuts.

“What,” he says, “it’s impolite to tip a hostess?”

She grabs two menus and walks us to the back of the restaurant, far from the windows, a few steps from the kitchen.

I sit. Jonathan does not.

He starts reaching for those bills.

“Sit,” I say.

“But—”

“
Sit
.”

“Is there a problem, ma’am?” the hostess asks. I tell her we’re fine; she nods and walks away.

I look up at Jonathan and say, “It’s just a table.”

“You deserve better. You deserve the best—”

“
Sit
.”

Finally, he does. And I can tell he wishes we’d gone to Little Italy after all, where a young, amorous couple would be sniffed
out and given the highest priority.

“Just a table,” he mutters to himself a few times.

The waiter arrives, a guy named Herman, who has the build of a young boy and hair making an aggressive exit from this world.
He introduces himself and asks if he can get us something to drink. He makes the mistake, however, of glancing at my chest
for a few seconds and I can see Jonathan begin to seethe.

“First the table and now
this
?” he says to me.

“Jonathan, it’s just a—oh, for Pete’s sake.” I turn to the waiter and say, “We’ll share a bottle of Chianti.”

The waiter tries to pretend it didn’t happen. “We have several different—”

“Just go. Run along, Herman.”

The waiter backs up a few paces, then scurries away like a rat.

“This is all wrong,” Jonathan says. “I just want the best for you, Melody. The best food, the best table, the best waiter—preferably
one who isn’t lecherous.”

His intense concern for the quality of my day and this meal has me further persuaded he thinks they may be my last. I’m banking
on his Italian heritage being the real motivator. I reach over and touch his hand. “You’re here, so I have the best table,
the best window, the best waiter. It’s the classiest meal I could ever imagine.”

Someone drops a tray of dishes in the kitchen and the sound reverberates to our table. There is some brief arguing.

Jonathan grips my hand and sighs. “If you’re sure.”

Herman returns with the wine and shows the label to us.

“Ruffino,” Jonathan says. “Acceptable, but predictable—sort of like you, Herman.”

“Yes, sir,” he answers, staring straight ahead like a plebe who’s one day into basic training.

“Leave us.” Jonathan snags the corkscrew from Herman’s hands just before our waiter hurries off, then opens, pours quickly.
We hold up our glasses and he says, “To the best table in the house.” We smile and we clink and we drink.