The Things You Kiss Goodbye (11 page)

There had to be something I could feel good about, something to be in charge of. I hauled out the newsprint pad with my dozens of sketches for the
Steam & Bean at 66 Green
. I split away the pages and stuck them on my wall. I stood back and looked. Not bad. I began to think and work, and finally, I felt
a normal, quiet breath make its way through me.

A while later came our household war cry. “Hoya! Hoya! Hey-yah-hey-yah!” My brothers came flying into my room and threw themselves into handstands on my bed, then came bouncing down on their knees.

“Ack! Mini-man alert!” I pretended to protect my artwork, arms spread wide.

“Bampas says to tell you to they’re going out. You have to babysit us tonight,” Favian said. He began to jump on my bed, hands making swipes toward the ceiling. My bed pillow caught air and landed on my night table, which was always piled with art mess. Magazines, glue stick, and a big pair of scissors all slid to the floor.

“Ack! Enough!” I said. I restacked my materials.

“Yeah. And you owe us,” Avel reminded.

“Not
still
,” I said. “That was months ago.”

“We can still tell on ya. For all the times we saw you sneaking out.”

I stared them down. It seemed my duty to pretend to believe they’d actually rat me out. “Well,
stink
me,” I said, and they burst into fits. They were so easy; all I had to do was say the sort of thing neither of my parents would ever say and my brothers would practically pee themselves.

“So, let’s hear it. What do you want?” I put my hand on my hips.

“Double servings of ice cream, and we walk to the river,” Avel said.

“Is that all you got? So lame,” I said.

“Ice cream
while
we walk.” Favian upped the ante.

So after Momma and Bampas went out, I made fudge parfaits in the fluted-glass dishes, just to give the boys a sense of living dangerously. Avel strapped one of those spelunker’s lamps on his head, “So I’m hands-free for the parfait,” he said.

“Yeah, well, we’re coming back before dark,” I warned. “This is dessert and a sunset. Not a walk under the moon.”

Then, because they insisted on it, we all climbed out my bedroom window instead of using the back door. We headed through the garden and spooned ice cream as we walked the swath to the river.

I thought about stopping my brothers before River Road, but then found myself following them across to the riverbank. They headed down the wooden stairs, then off to play at the water’s edge.

“Just a little while, you guys. The sun drops fast now. Try not to muddy up your shoes,” I added. I made a mental note to hose them off before we went back into the house.

I sat down on the last, weathered step next to a pair of empty parfait dishes. I hugged my knees. My father’s piece of riverfront had a scary, abandoned feel to it, even while a gorgeous, pink sun melted on its waters. Off and away, upriver
and down, were homes that actually celebrated having waterfront. The gardens and patios seemed to reach toward the river and frame the view. But Bampas’s stretch was long and empty. Not welcoming. Or maybe it was just me. He’d never brought me to the bank the way he’d brought the boys. They were used to it here, with their boats and skipping rocks. For me, the mud and stained grasses made it look like a place where you could lose something, or someone—the slip-in-and-never-be-found-again part of the river.

“Hey, boys!” I leaned forward to see along the bank. Fave and Ave were pushing sticks into the mud at the shore about a hundred feet away from me. “Back this way! Now!” They hopped a few steps toward me. I gave them a few more minutes to play.

I was the first one back up the stairs. I held three parfait glasses with spoons clanking inside of them tucked against my chest with one arm. We stopped at the edge of the road, checked traffic, which was never much. Yet, sure enough, a pickup truck was coming. A glint of pink sun popped off the chrome. I could tell by the way it was slowing down that the driver could see us and would probably wait for us to cross.

“Hold on. Let’s make sure we’re safe. . . .” I warned the boys.

“We know, we know. . . .” Favian complained.

The truck came closer and closer, then stopped in front
of us like a school bus coming in for a pickup. Instead of a door folding open, a window rolled down. My heart spread beneath my ribs. I broke into a grin.

“Well, what are the chances?” Cowboy said—in a voice that could melt butter. He hung an arm out and drummed the side of the truck with his fingers.

“Hey,” I said back. “Where are you coming from?”

“A sunset.”

Apparently alone, I could not help noting.

“And what are you doing out here?” he asked.

“We took a walk,” I said. “And same as you. The sunset.” I glanced at my brothers, all round-eyed and curious, and maybe even nervous in that don’t-talk-to-strangers way. I felt Avel take hold of the back hem of my hoodie. I rubbed my hand over his head to let him know all was well.

“So, everybody’s okay?” Cowboy asked.

It was so good to see him. And that was such a
nice
question. And outside the garage, he was different somehow—not under a car and not distracted. His face was giving back the last little glow of the sun, especially along the bridge of his nose and the tops of his cheekbones. How good it was to have time to look at each other here in the road—and
oh
, here I was in my ugly sweatpants. Awesome.

“Hi, guys,” Cowboy addressed Favian and Avel. “Hey, I’m a friend.” He put his thumb to his chest. “Not some creepy
dude. You get that, right?”

“That’s right,” I said. “We’re all good here.” Maybe I should have thought up an introduction. But I was totally thrown, running into Cowboy this way. He was a secret of mine. I didn’t want to give that up.

“So, where’re you heading with your . . .
ice-cream dishes
, is it?” Cowboy squinted.

I laughed a little and Favian piped up. “Home. We live across there.”

Cowboy craned for a peek out the passenger’s window. “Down that path?”

“That’s right,” I said.

“Oh. Okay. So you’re not lost and you don’t need a ride?”

“Nope,” I said. He was making me wish otherwise.

“Okay.” He hung a second, grinning at me. He checked his rearview. “Why don’t you go ahead and cross now then?”

“Thanks!” Favian called. Both boys shot ahead of me.

“Well,” I said, feeling a little awkward. “Nice to see you.” I took one parfait glass in my hand and walked it along the hood of the truck as I passed in front.

Cowboy leaned toward the passenger’s side window and said, “Good night, Beta.”

I started slowly back along the swath. The boys crisscrossed ahead of me as if lacing the path like a shoe.

I sniffed a laugh.
Saturday night and I got to see Cowboy
, I
thought.
And
, I realized, I had forgotten to feel so bad about everything else that had happened in the last twenty-four hours. I turned to look back at River Road, noted the narrowing of the path—the perspective.

“The bad stuff goes away when I’m around you.” I whispered it. Suddenly, my eyes burned. Tears surprised me. Oh, oh, and why? What was this? I shook my head. I didn’t have time to cry. I had to catch up to the boys—with their muddy shoes. I tucked the ice-cream dishes closer and switched from stroll to stride.

“Hey, dorks!” I called, and I heard them laughing out of the dusk. “Wait up!”

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T
HE LIGHTEST RAIN WAS FALLING ON
M
ONDAY MORNING
—the kind where you don’t think you are getting wet until you feel the dryness of stepping indoors. It was like that for me as I arrived at Unit 37. As soon as Cowboy saw me he said, “Well, that was a day-topper.”

“Day-topper?” I asked. I handed off his coffee. He set the cup on the hood of the silver Chevy—the one he called “the ’57.” He reached into his back pocket, pulled out a twenty, and held it toward me. “For the coffee fund.”

I didn’t want his money but he flapped the bill at me and I took it rather than get into a thing over it. But I gave him an eye-roll to say,
Ridiculous
.

“What’s a day-topper?” I asked again.

“Oh, that. I’m not sure. I might have made it up. But seeing you out on River Road on Saturday evening—it was a nice way to top off the day.”

I steeled myself not to go all smiley and dopey. “Yeah, for me too,” I said, and I sounded wistful even to myself. I recovered. “Well, because otherwise Saturday night was just another night of babysitting. I mean, I like my bitty bros and all.”

“They seem like good men,” he said.

I grinned. “
Men
. They’d like it if they heard you say that about them. Sorry for not introducing them. Favian is the big one and Avel is the little one. I call them Fave and Ave.”

“Well, you’d have to,” he said, and we both laughed. Then suddenly, Cowboy’s face changed. Dead serious. He was looking at something behind me, outside the door. Before I could turn around, he spoke.

“Hey, Beta, duck in, will you? And just stay inside while I do this. . . .” He took a couple of huge steps to get by me. One of his hands closed over my shoulder for a split second and he tucked me gently to the side of the doorway. I heard tires on the pavement outside, a car arriving.

I stood stock-still. When I heard voices, I leaned just the littlest bit so I could peek between the sections of thick, metal track that carried the overhead door. There was a patrol
car out in front of the shop. No lights flashing. But there were two cops in it, and Cowboy was leaning down by the open passenger’s side window to talk to them. The cops had their once-in-a-wipers going to clear the windshield. I watched the spritz hit Cowboy’s shirt sleeve.

I flashed back to the day I had met him, the way he’d been helpful, but also peevish, about my crushed fingers. I remembered that I’d gotten creeped out in the shop’s bathroom for a moment. But I had been wrong that day. He
was
nice. The
nicest
.

So, why were the police here?

Dozens of thoughts flooded my head. Maybe they were his friends. But they were both older with salt-and-pepper hair. Maybe there had been a break-in at one of the units. Maybe this one. Old cars were valuable and parts were hard to get a hold of. I’d learned that much. But Cowboy hadn’t mentioned any trouble, and things looked easygoing out there. He rose slightly and I slipped back into the recess. I listened as the patrol car drove away. I stayed against the wall and waited for Cowboy to come back inside.

“What was that about?” I asked.

“Aw, nothing, really.”

“But why were they here?” I pushed for an answer. “Cowboy?”

He took a big breath in. “It’s not a simple story, Beta. My
family . . . is kind of broken.”

“Okay . . . so, what do you mean?”

“You know, problems.” He sounded annoyed. Again, I waited. “There was this bad night,” he said. “Been a while now, but there was trouble at my ma’s house—”

“And what? You got arrested?” I tried to sound unconcerned.

“No.” He sighed. “But I took the heat.”

“For what?”

“Doesn’t matter. Those two guys answered the call and now they kind of check up on me a bit. It’s friendly . . . well, as friendly as cops get, I guess. But it’s better if they don’t see you hanging around here. I don’t need them thinking I’m into jailbait.”

That stung. I guess because suddenly I felt like a thing and not a person. Cowboy lifted the hood of the ’57 Chevy and leaned toward the engine. I knew it was his way of letting me know he was done talking to me.

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“H
A
! I
KNEW IT
!” R
EGINA
C
OLLETTI SAT FORWARD IN
her bed. “Great legs—almost as alluring as my own,” she said.

I stood before the queen in my leather skirt, having forgotten that she’d recently tried to make me drop my pants. While she gave me a good looking over, I wished I’d worn jeans. I wished I’d skipped the visit. I wished I were at SWS Classic Auto.

Tony Colletti shifted over by the door, embarrassed by his grandmother’s gawking. “Nonna, can I get you anything?”

“Yes,
mio nipote
, you can get
out
,” she said. “Leave Bettina and me alone. We want to talk, and you are a fox in the hen house.” She motioned at me then, patting the bed beside her.
“Come. Come sit.”

I glanced at Tony. He shrugged apologetically. “I’ll come back in twenty,” he said, and I thought,
Ten, please
.

Regina told him, “Make it thirty.”

So there I was on that damn, uncomfortable edge of the bed again, feeling like a sucker—make that a sucker in a very short skirt.

“Closer, closer!” Regina reached and tugged on my bare thigh. “Oh, feel it! That’s a good, firm leg!” She held her hand cupped on my quads. “I remember now,” she said. “You’re a dancer.”

“I was,” I said. I was surprised when a little wash of longing filled me.

“No more?”

“No.”

“But don’t I remember that you were pretty good? Yes.” She answered for herself. “Little medals on ribbons, and shiny trophies.” She squinted like she could see them lined up on the windowsill back at the old house.

“I guess I was good,” I said. “But it was Bampas who loved the prizes. I loved the dancing. But it’s funny,” I added, “I didn’t realize you even knew I danced.”

“Me? I knew everything about everyone,” she said. “You should go back to the dancing! You are young with your beautiful, strong body. You’ve got to keep doing these things while
you can.” She stopped and said, “Oh, poopa! Did I really just say that? I sound like a sick, old woman—someone I don’t want to be.” She sneered at the notion. I felt obligated to distract her.