Spoonbenders

“Hey, Loretta,” Irene said. “What’s going on?”

“We’re moving the hell in is what’s going on. We’re God damn refugees.”

Irene stepped out of her way before she was run over. The twins threw themselves into Irene with a four-armed hug. “Auntie Reenie! We got kicked out of our house.”

“Some guys came and they put all our stuff on the lawn!”

“Dad got a truck!”

“You don’t say? Well, go in, and get yourself some chicken, girls.”

Mary Alice climbed out of the U-Haul and crossed the lawn. Frankie followed her, looking not so much like he’d driven a truck as been hit by one.

Mary Alice caught Irene’s eye, then shook her head and went inside.

Frankie looked up at her. “A temporary setback,” he said.

“Who kicked you out?” Irene asked.

“It’s complicated. Is Matty inside?”

“Stay the hell away from Matty.”

“What now? Why?”

“You heard me. You’re not his fucking coach. You wait right here. Do not move.”

“You can’t tell me what to do. I’m a grown-ass—”

She slammed the door behind her before he could finish. Matty stood in the hallway with Mary Alice, talking in a low voice. He was holding a white foam plate loaded with too much fried chicken and a pile of mashed potatoes.

“You,” Irene said, pointing at him. “Upstairs.”

“I thought you wanted to talk to me.”

The kid didn’t know what a stay of execution looked like. “To your room!” she said.

“Can I bring the food?”

“Consider it your last meal,” she said, her voice icy.

Matty traded a dark look with Mary Alice, then went upstairs with his heavy-duty plate.

Irene raised her voice. “Dad! I need you out here!”

He stepped out of the kitchen, still joking with someone she couldn’t see. He saw Irene’s face and frowned.

“You got to hear this,” she said, and went back outside.

Frankie was on the porch now. “Don’t bring Dad into this,” he said. “I’m handling it.”

“You have no idea,” Irene said.

Dad stepped out, which forced Irene and Frankie to move down the ramp. “What’s going on?” he asked.

“Nick took his house anyway,” Irene said.

“Well, you said he was lying through his teeth,” Dad said.

Frankie was bewildered. “You know about Nick?”

Graciella had followed Teddy out of the house. “Which Nick?”

“We’ve got a problem,” Dad said.

“We’re going to need more chicken,” Graciella said.

“Jesus Christ,” Irene said quietly. “I’m done.”

“At least forty-eight pieces,” Graciella added.

“Done with the whole God damn show,” Irene said.

Dad seemed to have finally heard her. “Everybody calm down,” he said. “I’ll fix this.”

“Nobody needs to fix anything,” Frankie said. “I’ve got it handled. Handled!”

Irene screamed without words. Everyone looked at her as if waiting for a translation.

Surely they understood: it wasn’t reasonable to raise a son in this house, under these conditions. He was going to be normal, damn it. He was going to be boring.

She said to Frankie, “Where’d you rent that moving truck?”

20 Frankie

The plan was simple. Pretend to fall asleep. Sneak out of the house. Empty Mitzi and Nick’s safe.

Step one fell apart when he found himself unable to lie still. It wasn’t just nerves, it was the fucking humidity. He’d been exiled to the living room couch, where there were only windows to cool him off.

It took forever for everyone in the house to settle down. The twins were supposed to be sleeping with Loretta in one of the attic bedrooms, but they were too keyed up by the excitement of being in Grandpa Teddy’s house with all these strange kids running around. They kept making excuses to get up. Each of them visited the bathroom, then came down to the kitchen for “cool water” (because bathroom water was too warm?), and then they appeared beside his couch to ask him to make “chocolate milks.” The girls were desperate to find out what the other kids were doing in the basement. Irene and Graciella had gone down there at eleven and told them to turn out the lights, but it was impossible to know from here if they’d obeyed. Buddy had installed some kind of vault-like door, and when it was closed no light or sound escaped.

Twenty or so minutes passed without interruption from the twins. He wanted to wait till midnight, which was about forty-five minutes from now. Midnight seemed auspicious. No one except Matty knew what he planned—and the plan was going forward, damn it. Yes, his father had “talked” to Nick Pusateri. Dad wouldn’t tell him what they talked about, but it obviously hadn’t worked. Outfit guys had still shown up at his house and thrown out his family, then started dumping their belongings on the lawn: furniture, kids’ toys, pots and pans, piles of clothes. Frankie had shown up just in time to pull Loretta away from a guy. Frankie knew better than to try to interrupt or argue with the “movers”; mixing it up with presumably armed thugs was a quick way to get killed. Loretta’s rage had made her fearless, however. Only the presence of her (bawling, scared) children had stopped her from murdering them. And him. Oh, she hadn’t forgotten that this was his fault.