The Girl She Used to Be (27 page)

“He is still, even in his older years, someone who is feared, not only by the public and by his peers, but by his sons, which
is why most of us cave in to his every request. That and the fact that he’s managed to be a successful criminal for almost
five decades—and you can count on one hand how many people have been able to pull that off…”

East Brunswick, New Jersey, 60 m.p.h.

“You may get to visit some of my extended family, which really amounts to cousins and outside associates and, to be honest,
it gets kind of hard to tell the difference. Everyone beyond my immediate family gets grouped into this olive-skinned mess
of psychological problems.”

I close my eyes and inquire casually, like I’m asking for a tissue, “Will your cousin who killed my parents be there?”

He glances at me briefly, then answers, “Uh,
no
. He was killed a few years ago.” He points to his neck. “Bullet right through the throat, choked on his own blood for a long
time before someone found him.”

I am neither unhappy nor disgusted in the slightest.

“You know who found him? Peter. And he let him die right there in an alley in Midtown Manhattan.”

I grimace. “Why?”

“Well, uh… it’s kind of complicated, but we let him get killed. It was payback for a mistake we made against another
family. The whole thing is sort of ridiculous.”

“
Sort
of.”

“Look, I don’t make these asinine rules, and I certainly don’t like playing by them, but we’re talking about life or death
here.”

“Well, I can’t say I’m sorry he’s dead.”

“You shouldn’t be. But the truth is, he just pulled the trigger. My cousin really had no more stake in the murder of your
parents than the bullets that killed them. All he did was follow orders.”

I scowl; I’m furious that the man responsible is still alive. If I wasn’t taken with romantic emotion and a vague sense of
a hopeful end to all this, I’d be seething with rage, focused on violent retaliation. “
Whose
orders?”

Jonathan shrugs and sighs at the same time. “My father’s.”

Bayway, New Jersey, 58 m.p.h.

While Jonathan has been in a slow deceleration for almost three hours, I’m confused as to why he’s not slowing down more abruptly,
putting on his blinker and moving toward the exit.

He passes right by the exit for the Staten Island Expressway.

“I’m not the greatest with New York geography, but wouldn’t that have been the shortest way to get to Brooklyn?”

“Sure. Why?”

I look at him like he might be denser than his little brother. “Doesn’t your family live in Brooklyn?”

He frowns a little and says, “When did I say that?
I
live in Brooklyn but my family lives in Tenafly.”

I twist in my seat. “
Tenafly?
”

“It’s in New Jersey, just north of the George Washington Bridge.”

“I know where it is. Tenafly is barely twenty miles from where I lived before my parents and I went into Witness Protection.
You kept saying we were going to New York.”

“Melody, my family’s house is, like, a mile and a half from the Hudson.”

I’m all befuddled. I was expecting an old brownstone full of thugs in dark clothes with five-o’clock shadows; now I’m envisioning
an English Tudor and golf clubs and comfy slippers. “You never said Tenafly. I’m certain you said Brooklyn. I mean, geez,
Jonathan, a New Jersey address would’ve stuck in my head.”

“Well, my folks grew up in Brooklyn. Maybe that’s where you got it from. Or maybe because you called my father’s business
line in Brooklyn. Or maybe we just got our signals crossed.” Jonathan looks at me and laughs and says, “I mean, we’ve only
been together for a couple days.”

His words echo through my head, on and on, and his laugh makes them all the more poignant. He’s right; we’ve only known each
other a few days. So what in the name of all that is holy am I doing? Who is this guy? Why am I in this car, right now, right
here?

I throw up.

“Whoa! Are you okay?” Jonathan carefully navigates the Audi to the shoulder and rests his hand on my back and tells me to
relax, which is pretty admirable.

This is not
just saliva
.

Newark, New Jersey, 95 m.p.h.

Regardless of what was causing Jonathan to slow the journey to his family’s house—fear, nerves, anxiety—there is a new motivator
getting us moving: a stench. We roll down the windows but the scent coming back in as we progress closer to the Meadowlands
is almost as offensive.

Jonathan, ever creative, reaches behind his seat and finds a half-consumed bottle of Coke and hands it to me. “Shake this
up and cover the mess with it. If it works on dissolving battery acid, it should work on stomach acid.” I glance his way.
“Don’t ask.”

I take the bottle, shake it, and spray it all over the floor mat. We wait a few moments as Jonathan continues his hearty pace.
The Coke seems to work, but not enough.

He points to the mat and says, “Pick it up and toss it out the window.”

“What? You’re joking. I’m not going to litter!”

“Look around you, Melody. We’re in the armpit of the Garden State.”

He’s right; it would be hard to notice a floor mat amongst the mattresses and blown-out retreads.

He slows down and pulls to the shoulder, and out it goes. No one notices or cares.

“That’s one bad scent down,” I say. He looks at me and I point to my mouth.

He reaches over and pops the glove compartment and two unopened boxes of Nicorette drop to the floor. I open a box and give
each of us a piece.

“I’ll take two,” he says. I deliver. “Actually, make that three.”

I take three myself, because I’m not paying attention to dosage and Jonathan is too busy swerving around cars to notice what
I’m doing. The gum is minty—FreshMint, to be specific—and the cool flavor coats my mouth and cleanses my palate. Then the
nicotine kicks in and, considering I’ve never placed a cigarette to my lips, the sensation, the relaxed and calm feeling,
makes me consider starting the addiction should I survive the afternoon.

The Manhattan skyline approaches and fades over my shoulder.

Englewood, New Jersey, 75 m.p.h.

Everything has cooled: the air, the road, Jonathan, me. The images on the side of the road become soothing, a blend of suburbia
and opulence; it’s hard to imagine real criminals living in a place like this.

I’ve developed such a skill for lying that sometimes I even believe myself.

Jonathan reduces his speed and the clicks of the concrete seams under the wheels are like a love song fading out, readying
me for the next track.

Jonathan keeps stealing glances of me and telling me (and himself) that everything is going to be fine.

Tenafly, New Jersey, 15 m.p.h.

As though I’d had some sort of vision, the neighborhood is just as I’d imagined. We drive past the strip malls, the Pathmark,
the small businesses and mom-and-pop stores that somehow managed to survive despite the Wal-Mart a few miles away in Saddle
Brook.

We twist through a series of crumbling streets, where the trees get taller and the houses get older—and larger.

And, as if on cue, Jonathan turns onto a curved driveway leading up to a brick-and-stone Tudor that sits inside an acre of
ancient oaks and maples, a beautiful home that has clearly not seen a woman’s touch in some time. Though the lawn is well
manicured, the trees and bushes have started to engulf the house. It is just the kind of place you’d envision might be full
of creaky wood floors, high ceilings and cross beams, and smoke-stained fireplaces.

The driveway is long, with a string of vehicles parked on it, all large, all American, each with seating for eight—if you
include the trunk. Jonathan’s red Audi sticks out like a pimple on an otherwise blemish-free strip of asphalt.

We sit in the car and face the house. Jonathan leaves the engine running.

“Looks like everyone’s here,” he says.

I take a deep breath and let it out slowly, quietly. “What did you use as an excuse to get everyone together?”

“I didn’t really have to make an excuse,” he says. “It’s Sunday.”

“What’s that mean?”

“My family usually gets together for a big meal here. My dad, he, uh… he likes to cook. It seems to have a calming effect,
so we give him a lot of latitude.” He shrugs a little. “It was a long-standing tradition when my mom was still alive, and
I think we all want to see it continue… you know, to honor her, I guess.”

We both stare ahead, eyes locked on the house.

“You know, you guys sound so normal sometimes,” I eventually say. “That is just the thing I would’ve loved as a kid, and especially
now—a family to spend Sundays with. Even just a
family
would be nice.” I swallow and hesitate to ask my question because it’s going to sound silly. “You think, um… your family
might accept me? I mean, into the family?”

Jonathan breaks his stare at the house and turns to me. “I honestly hope so, Melody.” He smiles a little. “More than you could
ever know.”

We wait some more but I can feel the unrest rising, the subtle need to stop looking at the water and simply take the dive.

“This is a very confusing moment for me. Half of me wants to kill your father,” I say, “and the other half desperately wants
his acceptance.”

“Hmph.” He grins.

“I’m sure he’s a good man, though. He raised
you
, after all.” I turn and look at Jonathan and put my hand on his shoulder and say, “I’m sure he would’ve done anything to
protect you over the years.”

Jonathan’s smile slowly fades.

I add, “I’m sure he would’ve left the world of crime if he’d needed to for one of his sons, right?”

He stares at the dashboard.

Nothing.

“Right?” I ask again.

We sit in silence for a full minute while it seems Jonathan is playing another set of tapes in his mind.

Tapes of failures.

I’ve hit a nerve and I certainly didn’t mean to. Not here, not now.

“My family has never been very comfortable with the notion of sacrifice.” All of a sudden, Jonathan sighs and opens his door.
“Let’s do this.”

I’m not ready; I’m still in stare mode.

“Wait, I…” Jonathan comes around and opens my door. I grunt a little and flip the visor mirror down and check my hair
and my teeth and the collar of my sweater. I flip the visor back nervously.

And now we are taking steps, closer and closer, to a moment I am not only unprepared for, but one I could never comprehend.
Three squirrels bolt in different directions as we stroll up the brick sidewalk. Jonathan takes my hand, and his is warm and
firm, and I glide to his side so that we are almost one person. Bushes spill over the walkway and broken branches and dead
leaves are strewn over the path, and the crunching under our feet announces our arrival. We approach the front door, an ornate
oak masterpiece with a round top in need of refinishing. Jonathan grabs the handle, pushes the latch, and opens the door.
He pulls me in by my hand.

It’s
home
.

The first thing I notice is the smell, the same scent that hits you when you enter a decent Italian restaurant. I close my
eyes and inhale and I can tell Jonathan’s dad has a pot of marinara cooking. And by the lingering, nutty aroma in the air,
it’s clear something has been recently breaded and fried, like eggplant or veal. It even
smells
warm.

The house is open and airy, and there are pictures of the Bovaro boys and their parents everywhere: fireplace mantels, up
the staircase, on end tables, on a baby grand piano in the living room. The floors are all wide-plank maple and have a history
to them—probably more history than they ever wanted to know. And then there’s the music floating from a distant room.

Jonathan pulls me down the hall, to the back of the house. “Tony Bennett?” I whisper. “That’s actually sort of trite, isn’t
it?” My feeble attempt at trying to appear casual.

”It’s trite when the Olive Garden plays it. When a Sicilian family puts him on, it’s as noble as a Scotsman wearing a kilt.”

As we approach the kitchen, voices become audible and just before we enter, I hear someone say, “So I told him, ‘Hey, relax;
you still got nine fingers. That’s nine more lessons!’ ” A half dozen people break into labored laughter.

Jonathan walks up to the brother doing the talking and smacks him on the back of the head and says, “Yeah, except what you
really meant was that he had seven fingers and two thumbs left, right?”

His brother whacks him back and they hug briefly.

I stand directly behind Jonathan.

Everyone stares at us and the room falls silent, except for Mr. Bennett, crooning.

Jonathan’s father, Tony, is chatting in the corner with another older man, thumbing through the contents of a manila folder.
Finally, he gets up from his chair and slowly walks over to us, tugging up on his waistband as does. He is at least 250 pounds—a
good fifty heavier than when I saw him gut that guy at Vincent’s over twenty years ago—and totally gray. He looks weathered,
like he’s been a beach bum for most of his adult life. I peek around Jonathan to get a better glimpse, and I immediately match
his face to the man who wrecked my life years ago, the man who caused so many nightmares in my childhood that I could never
forget him, the man who ordered my parents dead.

There is a small paring knife on the kitchen counter, and for a moment I consider snatching it and jabbing Tony’s neck with
it a few times, even though the odds of my survival would be zero. But weirdly, I’m not consumed by that stress; I want to
make this work. I want to see it through as Jonathan has planned, potentially to live in peace with him forever.

“Who’s this?” Tony asks.

Jonathan steps to the side and suddenly I can see everyone and their micro-images; the snippets that Jonathan gave me in the
car all come clear: Peter, drop-dead gorgeous, just as described, stands to the left and is the brother Jonathan just hugged;
Jimmy is presumably the overweight one with his untucked shirt and the meatball sub in his hand; Gino is sitting down with
his elbows on his knees and is the only one smiling at me; the wives are here too, both size-sixteens and casting a disapproving
eye my way; a few other men linger.