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Authors: Paul Griffin

BOOK: Stay with Me
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(Saturday, June 27, just before dinner shift)
 
CÉCE:
 
He comes into the walk-in for take-out Parmesan and finds me having one of my spontaneous meltdowns. I’m an ugly crier, face gets all scrunched up. Mortified he’s seeing me like this. “I’m totally PMS-ing.”
“I don’t mind.”
“I do.”
He sits next to me on the cheese wheel and puts his arms around me. He’s thin but really strong. I bury my head in the space between his neck and shoulder. “I think I’m getting snot on your shirt,” I say.
“A little snot never killed anybody,” he says. “Not right away anyway.” And that’s the exact moment I fall in love with Mack Morse. My mouth aches from all the kissing this past week, like I’ve been doing push-ups with my lips.
“I got six points lower on my SAT II bio than I thought I would.”
“That’s better than seven points lower. Better than nine lower too, for another example.”
“Carmella was so drunk last night she fell asleep on the toilet.”
“Better than wetting the bed.”
I tell him about The Anthony Nightmare.
Mack Morse doesn’t tell me to stop crying or try to hush me. He doesn’t even say it’ll be okay. He just lets me talk, and he listens to me. And he strokes my hair.
“Three days, he’s on that plane, and I’ll never see him again. I swear, I just
feel
it.” I pull a slice of cheesecake, and we split it. “That commencement scene was insane. The whole place exploded when they called his name. They were cheering,
Cooooooch
, and To-
ny
, To-
ny
, like at the end of
Rocky
.”
“I heard of that movie. I wish I could have seen it.”
“We’ll Netflix it.”
“Tony’s graduation, I meant.”
Somebody had to stay back to line cook lunch. Vic trusted Mack enough to leave him in charge. Here I am bitching, and I didn’t even think to ask him how he made out. Holding down the fort at the Too isn’t easy when all you have for help is Marcy. “How was lunch?”
“Slow. I think we turned fourteen. One big take-out hit, though. Forty pies. Some slow pitch tournament going on up at the reservoir fields.”
“Did Marcy at least spin a couple of the pies? No, because she was worried about her nails. The cuticles. Getting flour in them. I’m gonna kill her.”
“She was a bit, well, blue today, I think.”
“She wants to jump you, and she’s pissed you won’t look at her.
Blue
. You mean bitchy.”
“I’d never say that about a girl. Come to think about it, I probably wouldn’t say it about a dude either. Yeah, nah, I definitely wouldn’t. For a
dude
who was acting nasty I would probably say he was being a—”
“Mack?”
“Yeah?”
I know him two weeks, and I feel compelled to tell him I love him. But that would be like giving a guy a blow job on the first date. Must keep impulsive psycho persona in check. Must. Not. Scare away this boy. “Kiss my neck.”
He does.
“You know I’m bananas, right?”
“My favorite fruit,” he says.
We talk between kisses. “Have no idea what I want to do with my life,” I say.
“Because you can do anything you want.”
“Yeah right.”
“Yeah,” he says. “Right. Look at all the stuff you do so great. Doing good in school. Looking after your mom. Being a good sister. A good friend to Marcy, the best girlfriend to me.”
“You did not just call me your girlfriend.”
“Pretty sure I did,” he says. “You’re gonna draw blood from my neck, you bite any harder. It’s got to be tough choosing from a ton of opportunities. It’ll come to you, what you’re called to.”
“How ’bout you?” I say. “Your dream life. What’re you called to do?”
“Tell you what, right about now, I’m hoping it’s being with you.”
“Before I suck your tongue out of your head, two questions.”
“Tell ’em.”
“1.a., do you or do you not love cheesecake?”
“I love what you love.”
“Totally correct answer. 2.b., do you or do you not believe in ESP?”
“If you do.”
“Has to be yes or no.”
“Let’s say I have a picture in my half a mind. I see you and me at the fun park, on that freefall thing. If that comes true, then I guess I’m seeing the future.”
“Can you read my mind?”
“Oh, yeah, of course,” he says.
“Then what am I thinking?”
“Right now?” He puts his hand up my shirt.
“You
are
a mind reader.” I pin him against the tiramisu tray. The stickpin he gave me digs into my boob. I know this is corny, but I’m never taking it off. I’m seeing stars, flashing lights. A phone camera flash. Marcy jumps back from the door.
“We just got Facebashed.” I run to bitch her out, and I smack right into Carmella, arms crossed, tapping her foot.
Mack comes out with his hand in his pocket to hide his hard-on and ducks out the alley door to where he keeps the delivery bike. “Sorry ma’am,” he says as he goes.
“Sorry Ma,” I say as I try to squeeze past her.
“Just a minute, sister. C’mere.”
“I gotta fold napkins, babe.”
“Don’t babe
me,
chica. Look here.” She leans close and looks into my eyes. She nods. “Okay.”
“Okay what?”
“Let’s just keep it that way,” she says.
“What are you not talking about?”
“You
know
what I’m not talking about.” She grabs a rack of pizza dough and swings it into the front kitchen.
I follow her, head down.
“Slut,” Marcy hisses.
“Not yet,” I say.
“Prude.”
Vic’s reading the paper. He puts it to the side, dips his head, and looks over his glasses at me. “How’s the studying coming?”
“Huh?”
“Hello, the G and T?”
“Yeah, no, good,” I say. “Ready to rock.”
“Define
circumspect
.”
I shrug.
“Look it up.” He winks as he heads out to the bar.
Now it’s just me and Anthony. He’s got his arms folded and he’s nodding. “Better be good while I’m gone, kid.”
“You practically smashed us together in the first place, so shut the flip up.”
He headlocks me and knuckles the top of my head.
“I’m still not going with you to the airport.”
“Yeah, you will. After an hour’s worth of Ma’s begging and your repeated, adamant refusal, you’ll fly out of the house as Ma is pulling out of the driveway.”
“Will you stop being such a dick? You’re hurting me.” I pinch his arm to free myself of his headlock.
Marcy was right: Mack pinches the inside of his wrist sometimes.
(Three days later, Tuesday, June 30,
morning of the nineteenth day . . .)
 
“Céce Vaccuccia, you need to stop hugging your pillow.” Anthony is at my door with a basketful of folded laundry under his arm, rifling balled socks at me. “I’m being generous, using the word
hugging
. Let’s go, breakfast is on the table.”
“I’ll die if I have to eat another slice of cornbread.”
“Then you’ve been spared, because this morning she made corn
muffins
.”
A last sock ball bounces off my head.
Total sex-dream hangover. My tongue hurts, means I was glomming in my sleep. Alarm clock says 7:30, and for a second I think it’s a school day, but this is
the
day. He’s leaving this afternoon.
 
He makes me go with him to say good-bye to his teachers. They’re cleaning up, getting ready for summer school, which is always crowded around here.
“Oh man,
another
Vaccuccia?” Anthony’s English teacher says. “Say it ain’t so.”
It ain’t so. I’ll never fill my brother’s shoes.
Everybody tells him they’re proud of him and praying for him. “Not that you
need
prayers,” Mrs. Hardwick says. “You’re going to be just
fine,
Anthony.”
He’s going to be in a war zone in six months. He has nine weeks of basic training, and then they send him to San Antonio for specialized training for sixteen weeks, unless for some reason he doesn’t make it through boot camp, which is impossible. The guy runs a 4:30 mile and his GPA was 98.61.
He signed a 68-W contract: combat medic. My big brother. For all intents and purposes a father to me, even though he’s only three years older, thanks to the fact that my crazy mother is a loser magnet. In the back of our fridge is this leftover takeout that’s been there for three months, and that’s longer than any of Ma’s idiot boyfriends ever hung around.
Here’s my problem with the 68-Whiskey assignment: Take out the line medic, and you cripple the platoon. 68-W’s get shot at a lot.
 
The airport is mobbed. Mack and Ant do that man-hug thing: bang chests, pound backs way too hard—guys are idiots. Next up is Carmella. She’s got her head buried in his chest, and she’s bawling. He’s laughing as he whispers something to her, and pretty soon she’s laughing. Next up is me.
I am so out of here. I turn away, but he pulls me back and swings me off my feet. He throws me high, like when we were kids in the public pool, and he taught me how to swim. He lets me drop, breaking my fall at the last second. I’m trying not to be light-headed, but my stomach is still floating up there, and I can’t help smiling. When he puts me down, I shove him away and run for the parking lot. I am not saying good-bye. If I don’t say it, maybe he won’t die.
I won’t even be able to talk to him for the first couple of weeks, and then only for a couple of minutes on Sundays, if the drill sergeant feels like letting them use their phones. No e-mail either.
Ma hangs on to Mack’s arm as we walk back to the Vic-mobile. He gets the door for her. “Such a gent, Mack.” She settles in behind the wheel. She’s wearing giant sunglasses, her hangover hiders. You’d never know she’s been crying if you didn’t catch the tear splat on her boob. She’s smiling, but her lips are trembling. “Your ESP giving you anything on this one, babe?”
I hold her hand. “It’s telling me everything’s gonna be fine.” I don’t tell her that last night I had a vision. Anthony is walking through a busy street and a car parked next to him explodes.
She nods. “We’re all set, then.”
“Absolutely.” For the next six months anyway. Till he deploys.
Ma turns the key and the car won’t start. Mack notices she left it in gear when she parked.
“Oh.”
Out on the highway, we get stuck in standstill traffic, and the jets look like they’re going to land on us. I climb out of the shotgun seat and swing into the back to be with my boyfriend. He squeezes my hand. Having him here, right now? I’m suddenly calm. I was spinning so fast when I ran out of the terminal. But he’s given me something to focus on: him. He’s clutching a bunched-up envelope. “Tony gave it to me,” he says. “Feels like there’s a quarter in it.”
“Open it.”
“Maybe I ought to read it later.”
“I wanna see,” I say.
He hesitates. He pinches his wrist.
“What’s wrong?”
He tears the envelope and unfolds the paper, a blank page wrapping a thin chain and a medallion. He spills them into his hand. The medallion is worn down, but you can still make out the engraving, a peace sign.
“He had that around his neck for as long as I can remember,” I say.
“Mack?” Carmella says. “Put it on, babe.”
He does.
Ma nods. “It looks good on you.”
THE TWENTY-THIRD DAY . . .
 
(Saturday, July 4, afternoon)
 
MACK:
 
The skies clear, the heat drops off, the air dries out, and Tony’s peace medal doesn’t stick to my chest. The restaurant is closed, but Vic and me are in the kitchen spinning pies for Mrs. V.’s barbeque. She comes in to check the eight trays of Fourth of July cornbread she had me baking all morning. “They’re perfect,” she says. “You are the
king
.”
“All I did was put ’em in the oven, Mrs. V.”
“How many times do I have to tell you: Call me Carmella.”
I nod, but no way I’m calling her that.

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