Mafia Girl Read online

  “Oh God, Clive…what happened then?”

  “He called an ambulance…there was blood everywhere. I fell on the bathroom floor and nearly passed out…but he screwed it up for me like he ruins everything in my life.” He looks off again, sadness spreading over his face.

  “What happened after that?”

  “Therapy. Lots of therapy. Talking, talking, talking about everything. Pills. I was sleeping, sleeping, sleeping. It was like I was lost in a dream for two months. And nurses here, all the time, like prison guards. And then I stayed with my aunt and uncle.”

  “And now?”

  “Now what?”

  “Tell me you’ll never do it again, Clive, please, please.”

  “I will never do it again,” he says, repeating the words like an obedient child.

  “You mean it, Clive? I want you to mean it, you have to, because I don’t want to lose you. I can’t lose you,” I say as hot tears pour from my eyes because it hits me how much he means to me and I don’t have many people either. And it’s selfish to be thinking about me and what I need when this is all about him, but that’s what I’m feeling and my father is leaving me and Michael is afraid to call me and I have so little left, and he is one of only two true friends I have in the entire world. And I love him so.

  “I can’t lose you, Clive Laurent,” I whisper. “I can’t. Do you hear me? I love you and need you and you are so much a part of my life and you have to be here for me because I am here for you no matter what, no matter when, no matter anything, ever, ever, ever. Do you understand?”

  “I hear you, Gia, I do. And I mean it,” he says. “I was different then. Younger, whatever. I don’t want to lose you either, Gia, so promise me you’ll be here for me.”

  “No matter what. You have my word. And my word is everything.”

  “Because you’re the don’s daughter,” he says, super straight-faced, mocking me, making those stupid quote marks with his fingers.

  “Yes, and just shut up,” I answer, sticking my tongue out at him, which makes him laugh. Although what I want to do is cry because I think of my dad again and how I don’t know when he’ll be back, and how I hate good-byes.

  I suddenly yank my gold earring out of my ear and prick my middle finger with the post, then grab his finger and prick it too. We press our fingers together and our blood mixes, and through my tears I smile at him.

  “You’re now a made man,” I say. “Welcome to my family.”

  And Clive is crying and laughing too and he looks happier than I’ve ever seen him and we hug and hug, and just screw everything else in the world that isn’t right because he’s the world to me and it feels like all the black clouds have lifted and that we’re floating together in this new universe of oneness and happiness and special friendship and closeness and love…

  And then my cell rings.

  TWENTY-ONE

  More shit with my family, of course, because it never ever ends.

  “Somebody whacked Carmine G.,” Anthony says like he’s in overdrive, “and the heat’s on so Ma wants your ass home now.”

  I can’t do this again. I can’t. I don’t want to be part of this.

  “I don’t care, Anthony. I’m with Clive and I’m better off staying here than running home and parading past the cameras and being on the six o’clock news.”

  “Talk to her,” he says, handing my mom the phone.

  “Gia,” she says in crazed mode. “Frankie’s in Jersey somewhere, and I can’t think without the two of you around, and God knows what will happen now because you know how they love to come after us to get your father mad.”

  But for the first time I’m not giving in. I don’t care what my mom needs. I don’t care what Frankie says. I don’t care what Vinnie says. I don’t even care how it looks or doesn’t look for my dad and what he thinks because why is everything in the whole world about him?

  Why doesn’t someone think about me for a change and what I need and what I want and how it affects who I am and what happens to me? I am so tired of everything I have to put up with in school every day because of them.

  And right now the last thing I need is a gang of so-called reporters shoving microphones in my face and asking me if I think my dad had anything to do with it like I would know what it is. Like I would ever know anything or actually tell them if I did.

  All I do know is that the world is a better place without that pig of a gangster because Carmine G. was known for putting coke up his nose and concrete shoes on people he didn’t like and torturing gays because he probably was one and couldn’t deal and setting up middle-of-the-night meetings with my dad so that our whole house went crazy because my dad walked around furious that he had to get dressed and go out at three a.m. And then he’d come home exhausted, in a rage because he had to come to agreements with someone he’d like to throw into a pit of alligators.

  “No one knows I’m here, Mom, and there are a thousand locks on the door and the pope couldn’t breach this security if he wanted to.”

  “Gia…” she says.

  I don’t answer. We both wait for what seems like an hour.

  “Mom, I’m not…”

  “Okay, okay,” she says finally. “Stay there, stay there. But don’t go out. Stay inside.”

  “Okay.”

  “You promise?”

  “I promise.”

  We hang up and then I’m back in default mode and feeling guilty about not caring what she wants, but am I going to spend my entire life running home when there’s trouble or running away until it dies down? And I feel even guiltier because I think about running away from this life and then I stop that because how can you run away from something that you are? And even if you could, it’s not like the world has amnesia.

  Then I have nightmarish thoughts again about my dad and not seeing him and not being with him ever again. It could happen, it could, I know. But I just can’t deal with that and try to push the thought out of my mind the way I do whenever I start going down that road, because it’s unthinkable not to have my dad around anymore and our family ripped apart.

  I think of the families of men in prison and how they spend their weekends and holidays getting on buses to spend the day in depressing visiting areas with armed guards standing by. I tell my head to shut up because Super Mario always saves him and always will, no matter what. He’ll get him out of trouble whatever they try to pin on him, otherwise why would they call him Super Mario or Superman?

  I look over at Clive and think about what he said and the desperation he must have felt, and I feel sick inside to think of him here, feeling alone and desperate. Life doesn’t get more unfair than that. No kid should ever be left alone with no one to talk to, feeling totally shut out with no options.

  I think about my life and I know that no matter what, I will never, ever try to kill myself because death is not a solution. And no matter what happens, you can always find a way to deal. I believe that.

  “What?” Clive asks. “What is it, Gia?”

  I sit there for a few minutes before I tell him and he leans over and takes my hand.

  “Gia, I’m so sorry you are always getting drawn into these messes.”

  “Messes?” I look at him in disbelief and then crack up laughing because messes isn’t exactly the word for what perpetually happens to me and my family and it makes me think of something like spilled Cheerios. But really, it’s so crazy and off the wall that, yes, it does fit.

  “Messes,” I say out loud, trying it out. Yes, messes does fit. Big fucking messes.

  And Clive laughs. “Yes,” he says. “We both live with messes.”

  At some time during the night I hear music, only I’m deep asleep and not sure where it’s coming from. And then I realize it’s my cell because Mick Jagger is singing “I Can’t Get No Satisfaction,” which was the song playing at the bar when I walked in the first time, and it just seemed so symbolic of my whole life that I made it my ring tone.

  Only now at—what is it
, two a.m.?—I am not thinking about satisfaction. I’m thinking about who is calling me and I look down at the phone and see private, which kind of jazzes my brain because I don’t get too many of those. And what I want to do is just not answer and turn off the phone, but since there’s so much going on with my family…

  “Hello…Hello?”

  I wait and hear breathing, but not pervy hard breathing, just soft, normal breathing like someone is there but not willing to break the strained silence and speak. And since Clive is here with me, only one other person comes to mind, but I don’t know if he’d do that. Although the more I hold on, the surer I am that it’s him and he’s up thinking about me, and that’s based on nothing but intuition. But I have this built-in radar so that when I know things, I’m rarely wrong.

  “God,” I say, almost pleading and then keep holding the phone.

  I know he hears me breathing too and this is getting so hard for me because he is so there and it’s like each of us is imprisoned in our separate painful worlds and there’s a barrier between us, like in the visiting room of super max prisons. And what can I do to change that?

  I wait a minute more.

  Say something.

  But he doesn’t. He can’t. Off in the distance I hear the growing whir of a fire engine or an ambulance like a cosmic cry of distress. Is it coming from here or his part of the city? I can’t tell. I feel like I need a compass to show me where on the map I am right now, so I hug the phone to my heart for a few seconds before I press end and then wait.

  Call back, please.

  But he doesn’t.

  The connection is broken.

  TWENTY-TWO

  Back to the bakery. I’m behind the counter, hair pulled back, starched white apron, positioned behind pyramids of sugary cookies like chocolate chip, chocolate fudge, vanilla nut, café au lait, anise, Italian macaroons, chocolate biscotti, lemon drops, raspberry dainties, and butter cookies.

  I wear white gloves and it feels like I’m in a church, only the religion here is sugar worship, and for three solid hours I fold cardboards into snow white cubes and line them with white translucent paper, filling each box just so and then tying them tightly with white string.

  Teddy is forever snooping to make sure I’m being neat and careful, and after do overs and do overs and him muttering something, I’m finally left on my own and I think about people who have this job and do this every day, five days a week and Jesus…

  When he has nothing better to do, Clive comes into the bakery and hangs out even though Ro’s dad doesn’t like kids sitting there like all day and taking up a table if they’re just having a cappuccino and a few cookies. So I keep bringing him more cookies and more and his bill is like a hundred dollars for cookies that he doesn’t eat, but he doesn’t care. I sit with him on my break and drink so much espresso that I get bug-eyed. Finally when it’s seven I can leave and Clive comes with me and we parade past all the reporters outside my house, ignoring them and what they shout. My mom makes rigatoni and sausages and salad and I reach into my pocket and give her the pathetic twenty-one dollars I earned.

  “Eh, good,” she says. “You learn the meaning of work.”

  I make a face behind her back but don’t say anything because then she’d tell my dad and he’d make me work weekends too for being fresh. I go up to my room and Clive comes with me. My mom sits in the living room and makes sketches of fancy Cinderella dresses she’ll never wear and crochets lace doilies as if we need more.

  The phone rings the next night. “Gia,” Clive sighs, “my parents are back, so would you please, please, please go to dinner with us?”

  I hesitate for just a minute.

  “They’re dying to meet you. I told them so much about you. We have a reservation at Le Bernardin, so please say yes.”

  “Um, fine,” I say, staring into my closet.

  What the hell do I wear to meet his parents, who are these major media moguls and world-class sophisticates, and what will they think of the little guidette?

  “What time?”

  “Seven. Thomas will get you.”

  Thomas is now my partner in crime and he’s totally cool, especially after I gave him a joint once and he gave me one back, which we vowed never to tell anyone because it definitely could get him fired.

  I look through everything I have and can’t decide and then just say screw it and go with the backless dress because where else am I going to wear it? I put on one gold cuff bracelet and cranberry heels and lipstick to match and I’m done. I wear a jacket over it though, so that when I leave the house it looks like lah-di-dah, Gia is just dressed in a nice, simple black outfit that’s totally appropriate.

  Thomas is waiting and I get into the car and he takes me to West 51st Street. I bolt out of the car before he has a chance to open the door for me, never mind nearly falling on my fucking head again because there’s this massive pothole that Thomas obviously didn’t know about. But still he apologizes fifty times over and I stop and take a few large gulps of air and then try to relax.

  Le Bernardin is unbelievably friggin’ cool and there’s this giant ocean painting, which is the first thing you see. It looks like if you reach up you’ll get soaked by ocean waves, it’s that real. The maitre d’ greets me and I tell him I’m meeting the Laurents and he acts like yes, yes, yes, how boring, because he already knows that. And after giving me the once over, he walks me back toward their table.

  I had an image of Clive’s parents in my mind and it’s not at all like what I see.

  His mom is pretty in a cool, elegant, chairwoman-of-the-board kind of way. She’s wearing a camel-colored cashmere dress with no jewelry at all except a ring with a diamond that could double as a paperweight. She has beautiful skin and blue eyes and sleek chin-length golden brown hair with amazing highlights. And she glances at my dress and seems to approve, but I haven’t taken the jacket off yet and when I do she’ll freak and think I’m a slut and snub me.

  Clive’s dad looks like he goes with her because he’s wearing a simple tan and brown wool jacket that looks casual perfect and designer expensive with a tan shirt and a slim silk knit tie. His dad’s name, I know, is Claude and his mom’s is Alice, although they pronounce it Aleeze, Clive told me, because her mom is French.

  Just to be on the safe side, I say, “it’s so nice to finally meet you Mr. and Mrs. Laurent and they immediately say please call them by their first names, which obviously makes more sense, so I do.

  “Gia, we heard so much about you,” Alice says, “and Clive was right, you’re lovely. And you like clothes,” she says, touching the sleeve of my jacket. At that moment I feel comfortable enough to slip out of my jacket, and her eyes open wide. Just as I’m thinking oh crap, I just blew it, it’s over, she says, “Oh, Claude, that’s the dress I ordered in Paris but couldn’t get.”

  After all the chitchat about the dress and all, we look at the menu, but duh, I don’t understand anything. I mean, geoduck? Tairagai? But Clive and his parents are familiar with every little morsel. Clive jumps in and saves me and says, “Gia, you’ll love the crab cakes,” so I order them.

  At the end of the meal, Alice starts to talk about a new magazine that they’re doing a prototype for, even though I don’t really know what a prototype is. And she hints that they could use someone like me for an article they’re including on personal style and finally says, “Gia, would that interest you?”

  “I…I’m not sure.” I’m almost stuttering because, whoa, I don’t really know. “What would I have to do?”

  “Just take a quick trip over Christmas to Paris, London, and maybe Milan and Rome to see what you’d buy to lend a European feel to the piece.”

  And I’m like, are you kidding me!? That’s work?

  “Well, only if my parents are okay with it and if Clive could come to keep me company.”

  “Yes, yes, of course,” Alice says.

  Clive nods, never mind the pained expression on his face.

  TWENTY-THREE


  I wake up the day of the school election knowing that it’s going to be the longest day of school ever. We start the morning by voting and the results are usually tallied by the end of the day. Or if not, by the beginning of the next day.

  “You own it,” Ro says, high-fiving me.

  “It’s a slam dunk,” Clive says.

  “It’s not over until the fat lady sings,” I say, which is one of Anthony’s dumb expressions that I really don’t understand, but it seems to fit.

  For the entire day I pretend this is no different from every other day, never mind that Ro already told me that they bought a keg and plan on getting pizza and having everybody over once we find out officially that I’m the new class president. At three o’clock I meet Ro and Clive and Candy in the hall near the principal’s office and we go up to the wall where they post the results. Only no results are up.

  “Crap,” Ro says, “I wanted to celebrate.”

  “I can’t imagine what’s taking so long,” Clive says. “I mean all they have to do is count the ballots. How hard is that?”

  Even though in the real world ballots are counted electronically, at Morgan we do it the old-fashioned way, which they must think is quaint. But it is actually more like how corrupt third world countries do it, with everyone filling out a paper ballot that they slide into a cardboard box marked voting machine.

  We leave school with an empty feeling, wondering if we should celebrate prematurely then decide that would be dumb. So for one more night I remain a candidate and nothing more is said.

  Only the next morning when we get to school and go to the bulletin board the results are still not posted. After lunch we go back to check. And there it is, the new student president of the Morgan School is Brandy Tewl.

  “What?” Clive says.

  “It can’t be,” Ro says.

  “No,” Candy says.

  A vocab word pops into my head, flummoxed. It means bewildered, confused. That’s what I am because maybe it can’t be, but it is, and I get this uneasy feeling. Clive has it too because his face is suddenly paler than usual.