The Temptations of St. Frank (27 page)

Fuck! Frank thought. It's my father! He's in Mrs. Trombetta's bedroom with Mrs. Trombetta and the door is closed. Holy fucking shit! That's why her wishes were his command when it came to mowing her grass and making the yard look perfect. That's why he did everything for her and didn't insist on getting paid. He was taking it out in nooky. Jesus Christ!

He heard Mrs. Trombetta through the door. “You don't have to go right away, do you?”

Frank didn't hear a reply. He didn't want to believe that it was his father in there. His father would never do something this dumb. Mr. Trombetta would kill anyone who touched his wife. Frank carefully opened the office door, glanced at the file cabinet, and peered out the window. The driveway was empty. No sign of his father's truck.

Still, there was a path through the woods behind the house that led to the next street. His father could've parked there and walked through the woods. Frank knew that path very well. There was a clearing back there where they dumped grass clippings and leaves.

Frank refused to believe it, but part of him could believe it. His mother wasn't exactly sexy and Mrs. Trombetta was. Really sexy. He had never really thought about his parents doing it, but his mother was so religious and up tight, he couldn't imagine that she would ever agree to have sex. Getting pregnant with his sister was probably the last time she did it. So he couldn't exactly blame his father. But why with Mrs. Trombetta of all people? His mother hated her. And her husband would chop him up into little pieces if he ever found out.

Frank stepped back into the hallway and took slow, careful steps toward the Trombettas' bedroom. He had to know for sure. If he could hear the man's voice better, he'd know. He hoped to God it wasn't his father, but in his gut he had a bad feeling that it was him.

Frank tiptoed closer to the door. He didn't hear anything. Neither one of them was talking now. Were they kissing? He glanced to his left at a picture on the wall, a studio photograph of Johnny and Annette when they were little kids, Johnny in a plaid sports jacket and a red bow tie, pre-school Annette in a puffy pink party dress sitting on his lap. Johnny was scowling into the camera, the exact same way he scowled now. Annette looked like she was about to cry.

Frank glanced to the right at another photograph of little Annette in her first Holy Communion outfit. Her little hands in white gloves were pressed together in prayer, a tiara was on her head. The photo was basically black and white but her eyes, lips and cheeks had been lightly colored in.

Frank turned his ear toward the door. He still didn't hear anything. He leaned in and put his ear right on it. His skin clung to the glossy white paint.

Frank heard the man say, “So long, hon',” loud and clear, and suddenly the door pulled away from Frank's ear. It was opening.

Frank leapt back in a panic. He was standing in the middle of the hallway, his feet frozen, not knowing where to go, what he should do.

But when the door swung open. It wasn't his father or Mr. Trombetta. It was Mr. Nunziato, Dom's father, buckling his white belt as he walked.

Startled, Mr. Nunziato looked up at Frank. Crazy mad blue eyes caught in the headlights.

“Bye-bye, baby,” Mrs. Trombetta said sweetly from inside the bedroom. Frank saw her in nothing but her panties and a tight-fitting lime-green tee shirt, walking barefoot into the bathroom.

Mr. Nunziato lunged at Frank and grabbed him by the throat. His madman expression was frightening. Frank had never seen him like this. He shoved Frank into Johnny's room.

“What the fuck you doin' here, kid?”

Frank could feel Mr. Nunziato's hot breath spewing out of bull nostrils.

“I'm hanging out with Annette,” Frank jerking his thumb toward her room. “We're kinda going out now.”

Mr. Nunziato's eyes rolled up to the ceiling as he digested this piece of information. His grip on Frank's throat loosened. The sound of a running shower made them both look toward the Trombettas' bedroom.

Mr. Nunziato smiled his usual nice-guy smile as he smoothed Frank's shirt. “You startled me, Frankie. I didn't think anybody was home.” He checked his wristwatch. “Oh,
madonn'
, it's later than I thought.” He glanced out the window. “Anybody else here besides the daughter?”

“I don't think so.”

Mr. Nunziato nodded. “Okay… good.” He paused and listened to the shower. He was still nodding as he reached into his pants pocket.

Frank's heart jumped into his mouth. He's gonna fucking shoot me.

But instead of a gun, Mr. Nunziato pulled out a wad of cash. He peeled off the top bill—a hundred-dollar bill—snatched Frank's hand and pressed the money into his palm. “Here,” he said. “Show your girl a good time.”

Frank stared at the money. “No, Mr. Nunziato, I can't—“

“Ssshhh.” He put his finger to his lips and whispered. “Yes, you can. Take it. Have a good time.”

“But—“

“But nothing. I only ask that you do one thing for me.”

“What's that?”

“Do the
right
thing. You know what I'm talking about?”

“Yeah… I guess.”

“You know what I'm talking about, Frankie. You did not see me here. You understand? You never ever saw me here.”

Frank nodded. “I understand.” Mr. Nunziato was fucking Annette's mother. Mr. Trombetta's wife. His
boss's
wife.

“Don't even tell Dom. I know you two talk, but this is between you and me. I know him. He'll tell his mother, and she won't understand.”

“I understand.” Not that he and Dom were confiding in each other anymore.

“Okay.” Mr. Nunziato pointed to the hundred-dollar bill in Frank's hand. “Now put that in your pocket before you lose it. I'll see you around, kid.” He cupped his hand around the back of Frank's neck and let it slide to the side of his face, smiling like a kind father. “Be good,” he said and slipped out of the room.

Frank waited a few moments before he stuck his head out into the hallway. It was empty. He could hear the shower coming from one side of the hallway. From the other side he heard Cream playing “White Room” on Annette's stereo. Clapton's killer solo.

He went to the window and saw Mr. Nunziato walking fast across the lawn and into the woods behind the house, taking the path that led to the next street. Frank was surprised that he wasn't running hunched over like a burglar after a heist. The man was screwing his boss's wife, but he walked away with his head high and his usual happy-go-lucky strut. He had balls.

“Hey! Who's home?”

Fuck! Frank jumped. He recognized the gruff voice. It was Mr. Trombetta. The front door slammed.

“I'm home, Daddy,” Annette called from her room. She poked her head out into the hallway and saw Frank poking his head out of Johnny's room.

“What the hell,” she whispered. “Did you fall in?”

The clomp of her father's heavy footsteps on the carpeted stairs.

Annette motioned for him to come out of Johnny's room. He rushed out and made it to her doorway just as Mr. Trombetta appeared at the end of the hallway. He scowled as soon as he saw Frank.

“What're you two doing up here?” he said.

“Just listening to records, Daddy,” Annette running out of her room and giving her father a big hug.

Mr. Trombetta stared at Frank over his daughter's shoulder. Frank tried to smile, but he had a feeling he wasn't succeeding.

Trombetta let go of Annette, walked to the doorway of her room, and looked in. The bed was still made, thank God. Frank's heart was pounding in double time, competing with Ginger Baker who played with little mallets instead of drumsticks, Frank had read somewhere. Little mallets doing a crazy tom-tom inside Frank's chest.

“Hi, Mr. Trombetta,” Frank said, clearing his throat so his voice didn't crack.

Annette's father stared hard at Frank. “Hello,” he said in the most unfriendly way possible

“White Room” ended and the next cut started. “Sitting On Top of the World.”

“We were just getting ready for the prom,” Annette said. “Practicing our dancing.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah,” Annette said. “That's all.”

Mr. Trombetta stared at Frank, accusation blasting out his eyes like death rays.

The $100 bill in Frank's pocket burned like a red-hot coal. Like Kryptonite. Like a tell-tale Sacred Heart. It was evidence.

Mr. Trombetta walked past Frank without another word and headed for the master bedroom. Frank swallowed hard on a dry throat and listened for the shower, but all he heard was Cream.

He frowned at his reflection in the men's room mirror as he rinsed his hands in the sink. He hated the rented tux he was wearing. He hated the satin bowtie and the curly lasagna-edge shirt, and more than anything he hated the pleated cummerbund around his waist. He looked like an asshole.

He turned off the faucets, and the attendant, an old black man wearing a red short-waisted jacket and a black tie, handed him a paper towel. Frank looked at it and looked at the bowl on the counter that contained several coins and a couple of dollar bills. The tip bowl. Frank didn't see why he had to tip the guy just for handing him a paper towel.
He could get his own goddamn paper towel.

But Frank didn't know the protocol for fancy events at swanky places like the Pavilion, so he took the paper towel from the man. It was softer than your average paper towel. He dried his hands and noticed the line of bottles on the counter behind the tip bowl.

“Cologne, sir?” the attendant asked.

“No thanks.” His mother had bought a bottle of Canoe last week, special for the prom. He never wore cologne, but he'd put some on to keep her happy. He had enough on his mind—he didn't need his mother getting into another snit and crying in her bedroom on his prom night.

Frank looked for a waste basket for his paper towel, but the attendant took it from him and tossed it in a basket in the corner where he was standing and no one else could get to it. He waved his hand over his selection of offerings like a genie out of the bottle—colognes, breath mints, hair tonics. It was a smorgasbord for old guys. Guys like Mr. Trombetta and Mr. Nunziato and his father.

Frank just wanted to get out of there, but the tip bowl bothered him. He didn't want to leave a tip, but he figured he should. It was what you were supposed to do. And the guy was black. He didn't want the man to think he was a racist. He looked at the money in the bowl. A dollar was definitely too much, but was a quarter enough? He had some change in his pocket and he also had a twenty dollar bill in his wallet, which his father had given him before he left the house that night with grave instructions: “Treat that girl like your sister.” His sister Carol, holding Rosary Bead Barbie, stared at him poker-faced from the porch as got in the Cadillac and backed out of the driveway, her dead-straight bangs covering her brows and masking whatever she was thinking.

Frank also had the hundred-dollar bill Mr. Nunziato had given him tucked in the back of his wallet with his Social Security card. “Show your girl a good time,” Mr. Nunziato had said when he'd given it to Frank. So what did that mean? He had twenty bucks to treat Annette like his sister, but a hundred to go wild, Rat Pack-style.

Greg Wilenski pounded through the bathroom door and sailed in like a clipper ship, his white dinner jacket as big as a sail.

“Nice tux, Grimaldi.”

“Yeah, fuck you too, Wilenski.”

They were both grumpy and sarcastic, but Frank thought nothing of it. Grumpy and sarcastic was the standard attitude for guys at St. A's, and since there were girls on the premises, the men's' room would be the only place where unfettered grumpy and sarcastic would be appropriate. And given those restrictions, guys would probably be grumpier and more sarcastic tonight. Frank wondered what the attendant would make of this, but it was hard to tell because his blandly pleasant expression hadn't changed since Frank first came in and Frank had a feeling it wouldn't.

Frank dug out the change in his pocket and inspected the coins in his palm. He had three quarters, three nickels, and a dime. He picked out a quarter and put it in the tip bowl. He glanced at Wilenski standing at a urinal. Wilenski was looking over his shoulder, looking at the bowl. Frank put another quarter in. He didn't want anyone to think he was a cheap-prick racist.

“Thank you, sir,” the attendant said as Frank pushed through the door. He could hear the band playing in the ballroom. He was having second thoughts about putting that second quarter in the bowl. Well, too late now.

The soles of his black leather shoes slid on the plush blue carpeting. He walked carefully, not wanting to slip and look ridiculous. Some couples were just arriving. Girls in gowns and fancy hairdos, corsages pinned to their shoulders or strapped to their wrists. All of them giddy and grinning. Most of the guys looked awkward and out of place, like gorillas in people clothes. Only the guys who had steady girlfriends looked vaguely human. They knew how to behave around girls.

Mr. Pomeroy, Frank's math teacher, stood by the front doors, observing the couples as they came in. He was one of the faculty chaperones for the night, and he wore a dark green-and-black plaid tuxedo jacket with a maroon tie, his pipe clenched in his teeth. He had suffered no repercussions from the starter's pistol incident and had returned to teach his classes the very next day. Larry Vitale's parents had complained to Monsignor Fitzgerald, but he passed it off as an extreme but acceptable technique used to motivate extremely unmotivated students, like their son. Vitale's parents bought that load, and for all Frank knew, Pomeroy was still packing heat. Unbelievable.

Pomeroy caught Frank's eye, flashed his Jolly Roger grin. “Where's your date, Grimaldi?”

“Inside.” Frank nodded toward the ballroom.

“Are you in the running?”

“Excuse me?” Frank didn't know what he was talking about.

“The award.”

“What award?”

“Follow me, my boy.” Pomeroy walked to a deserted end of the hallway where the empty coat-check room was located. It was late spring and no one was wearing a coat. Pomeroy cocked a lascivious eyebrow as he opened the half door and let himself in. On the floor in a corner was a paper grocery bag, the top folded closed. Pomeroy picked it up and opened the top. He crooked his bony finger and pointed inside the bag, inviting Frank to take a look.

Frank was wary. What the hell was this? Starter pistols weren't enough? Had he graduated to bombs?

Frank peeked in. In the dim light it took him a second to figure out what he was looking at. Six cans of dog food bound together with pink ribbon like a six pack. Bows and plastic flowers decorated the can tops.

“The Alpo Award,” Pomeroy said, keeping his voice down. “It's a school tradition. The student who brings the ugliest girl to the prom wins the award. You're not in the running, are you, Grimaldi?” He wiggled his eyebrows.

Frank shook his head. “I'm afraid I'm not, Mr. Pomeroy.”

Get me the fuck out of here, he thought.

“Oh, that's what all the boys say.” Pomeroy chuckled, his teeth clacking against the pipe stem. “But I'll be the judge of that.” He closed the bag and put it back in the shadows on the floor.

I go to a school run by fucking mental patients, Frank thought.

But then the possibility that he might win clogged his gut like an anxiety cantaloupe. Annette wasn't a dog, not by a long shot, but she, like every other girl here, looked different. The updos, the bizarre makeup, the Josephine Bonaparte dresses. Why did they do all that? This wasn't the version of them that guys salivated over. It was their everyday look that got guys motors running. Not this Barbie dress-up crap.

He walked to the ballroom and scanned the crowd for Annette. Blue and white streamers—the school colors—looped from wall to wall, and each round table had a centerpiece of roses and spider mums. The band, older guys in their twenties in candy-colored satin military jackets—a weak allusion to the famous close-up monochrome photographs of the individual Beatles, each one a different color—played an equally weak version of “Proud Mary.” Guitar, bass, sax, keyboards, and drums. The singer/guitar player had an okay voice and cool mutton-chop sideburns, but his bouncing Adam's apple was too distracting. It looked like he had a gerbil caught in his throat.

On the dance floor a few couples danced—or in the case of the St. A's guys, tried to dance. The girls were much better. According to Annette, that was because girls watched “American Bandstand” and “Where the Action Is” on TV and imitated those dancers. Gdowski was particularly bad, throwing his arms out with spastic jabs and thrusts, hardly moving his feet except for an occasional heavy grape-stomping step that came without warning and had nothing to do with the rhythm of the music. He looked like an arthritic Neanderthal having a seizure. Frank was glad Annette had insisted that they practice before the prom. He didn't want to be good enough to be noticed, but he didn't want to look pathetic either.

He spotted Annette standing by their table, talking to one of her girlfriends. She was wearing a mint green, empire-waist, floor-length gown that hid her legs and somehow reduced her normally ample bazooms to just ordinary ones. Her Nancy Sinatra flip was gone, too. Instead she had a mass of Medusa curls dangling over the back of her neck, the front lacquered across her forehead instead of falling in her eyes the sexy way it usually did. Her lips were a shimmery pale pink, and her eye shadow was aqua blue. If they turned off the lights, he was afraid her makeup would glow in the dark. He really wished she'd just left her hair loose.

As soon as she spotted him coming toward her, she bounced on her toes and waved for him to come quick. “Come on. We're all here,” she gushed. “We're gonna take some pictures.”

Frank sighed inside. The “we” she referred to were all her friends and their St. A's dates, guys he didn't know that well and/or didn't particularly like. Dennis Collins, a.k.a, the Invisible Man, a.k.a., the King of the 2:45s, because his claim to fame was that in his four years at St. A's he hadn't participated in a single school activity, club, or team—unless you counted jug. Robbie Ruselli, eager as a cocker spaniel and dumb as a post, who laughed at anything anyone said whether they meant it to be funny or not. Gdowski, who was dating Annette's best friend, Jennifer. And worst of all, class clown and chucklehead-in-chief, Larry Vitale, whose date was Marsha Cravens, generally considered the sluttiest girl at Mother of Peace who, according to Annette, was on the pill and bragged that she had gone all the way with three guys so far. Larry was hoping to be number four, no doubt.

“Okay,” Annette said. “Everybody sit down and squeeze in tight.” She scurried around the table like a border collie rounding up sheep, but she shoo-ed people away from the center seats, saving them for herself and Frank.

Annette took her seat, and Marsha poured herself into the one next to Frank's. She wore a low-cut gown and unlike most the girls here, she had cleavage and didn't mind showing it off. She also wore her hair down, which in her case, made her seem ready for action. The other girls were so done up they looked untouchable. Like the porcelain dolls on the shelf over Annette's bed.

As Frank was about to take his seat, Larry Vitale came up behind him and whispered in his ear. “Don't worry,” he said. “I have rubbers. I bought the big box.”

Frank just nodded, non-committal, but he was glad Vitale had thought ahead. Just in case he got lucky.

Frank took his seat and Annette immediately grabbed his hand, lacing her fingers through his. Each place setting had a cut-glass cup of fruit cocktail. Frank hated fruit cocktail.

A girl Frank didn't know stood on the other side of the table, peering through an Instamatic camera. “Okay, I can't see everybody. Squeeze together.” She flapped her hand sideways.

Annette got half her butt onto Frank's chair while Marsha, who he'd just met, threw her arm over his shoulder and pressed her tits into him. She smelled of tangerines. She tilted her head toward his, and he felt a strand of her hair on his cheek. Annette glared at her and moved closer to Frank, gripping his hand tighter. All of a sudden Frank had an incredible boner.

“Okay, say
cheese!
” Instamatic Girl said.

The girls said “Cheese!”

The guys muttered, “Cheese.”

Vitale said, “Fuckin' cheese!”

The camera flashed.

Everybody laughed. Except Frank.

What the fuck am I doing here? he thought.

“One more,” Instamatic Girl said.

“Cheese!” they all said.

The camera flashed.

The girls laughed, and Ruselli laughed harder.

Frank saw neon floaters. And smelled Marsha's tangerine perfume, his boner hard as wood.

Why am I here? he thought. I don't even like these people.

“You okay?” Annette said.

“Yeah,” he said. “I'm fine.” Did she know he had an incredible hard-on, and it wasn't exactly for her?

“You look mad.”

“I'm not mad.”

“Oh.” She pouted.

“I'm not mad,” he insisted. “I just don't… smile that much. I think it's a medical condition.”

“What?”

“I'm just kidding.”

“Why? We're supposed to be having a good time.” Her brow was crinkled.

“I am having a good time,” he said. It was a lie, but he wanted to keep her happy. He didn't want her to turn moody on him. That rubber had to get used tonight. Graduation was two and a half weeks away. He had made a vow to himself. If he didn't get laid before graduation, he would forever think of himself as a pussy.

Vitale leaned across Marsha to talk to Frank and Annette. “Okay, so here's the plan.”

Gdowski and his date who were on the other side of Annette, leaned in for a huddle. Marsha's tits where squished against Frank's arm.

“I got the keys to my uncle's place in Belmar,” Vitale said. “He said it's okay if we go there after the prom.”

“Did you get any booze, Larry?” Marsha's snotty attitude implying that she wasn't going anywhere unless there was alcohol.

“No sweat. My uncle's practically an alcoholic. He's always got plenty to drink at his place.”

Annette looked worried. “But he'll know if we drink all his stuff.”

“No he won't. He's a drunk. He'll think he drank it.” Vitale opened his mouth wide and let loose with his jackass laugh, and Ruselli immediately echoed him. As if having an uncle who was an alcoholic was funny.