The Witch of Little Italy (11 page)

“But what if I hurt you? Or worse, what if I make you hurt me? And then you won’t be able to forgive yourself, and then…”

“Elly, I’m never going to leave you. Period,” Anthony interrupted.

“How do I know that? How can I know for sure? How can
you
know for sure?”

“Because I already stayed. I already did it. I’ve waited. I’ve lived through you leaving and then coming back and not remembering me. I’ve lived through that
traumatic
Christmas when you kissed me and then left me cold,” he laughed.

“That’s not funny, said Elly, breaking away from him and swinging alone. “I didn’t want to leave that night either. Carmen made me.”

“Come here,” he said, his arms open. “Swing with me.”

Elly climbed on his lap, facing him, slipping her legs by his sides. He covered her smallish hands with his large ones.

Anthony began to swing slowly, their bodies moving back and forth, the force of the air pressing them together. He stopped and took her face in his hands, the streetlights washing the park in artificial light glowing against her green eyes. He pulled her face to his and kissed her. His warm mouth reminded her of the ache she felt for him all those years ago. The rightness. The kiss that softly expresses wanting to be as close as two people can be. Not like Cooper’s kisses. The kisses that violently established ownership and left her mouth bruised and invaded. Elly felt that blackness begin to fill up with something else. Something real and familiar.
Feels like I’m home
 …

*   *   *

Back on 170th Street there was a rush to get Sunday dinner on the table and Anthony was sent out for loaves of bread. Elly, lost in the fuss, found herself alone. She wandered through the building, through the front hall that narrowed and then became the back hall. Up the staircase that split the apartment building into an A side and B side. She put her hands on Uncle George’s closed door and tried to remember more of him than just a muttering, smelly old man. But mostly, Elly listened closely for the crying but didn’t hear it. She heard something entirely different but somehow more unnerving. She heard the mystery child laughing. Muffled giggles now paired with echoes of tiny feet running up and down the stairs and in and out of closed doors.

At dinner, in between courses of steaming pasta, meatballs made with friselles (pepper biscuits), and tender asparagus quickly sautéed in olive oil and tossed with salt, there was a lively discussion about the mystery voice.

“Laughing now? The kid isn’t crying anymore, it’s laughing?” asked Mimi.

“Yeah. And it’s just as creepy as it is curious,” she said to Mimi at the table.

“Maybe it’s Zelda,” Fee yelled.

“No, we’ve already decided it isn’t Zelda,” said Mimi.

“How can you be sure?” asked Anthony.

“I guess I can’t be sure,” said Elly, stuffing another mouthful of pasta in her mouth. She’d never had a meal that tasted so—right. It was made with a special ingredient, or so the aunts had said. Strawberry leaves sautéed with olive oil, garlic, and other greens and mixed with chicken stock. Then tossed with the homemade pasta.

“Have you seen it? Is it a boy or a girl?” asked Mimi.

“No, I haven’t seen it. And I can’t tell the gender by the voice,” said Elly. Then she threw her napkin on the table in frustration. “And see, this is crazy. You’re all supposed to be telling me it’s in my head.”

Itsy scribbled quickly, showing Elly her words. They exchanged smiles.

“What did she say?” asked Anthony.

“
It’s in your head.
See, at least one of you is sane.”

Itsy nodded and grunted out in raspy agreement with herself.

“This pasta is
so
good, Mimi! What’s it for again?” asked Elly, reaching for the large ceramic bowl in the middle of the table. It always seemed full, she noticed. As if five people hadn’t already eaten their fair share.

“Strawberry leaves,” said Mimi. “It’s good for the baby, that’s all you have to know.” And it was
all
Elly wanted to know—because someone caring about her, cooking for her, keeping her safe … these feelings were magical enough. She didn’t need to know any recipes. Not just yet.

9

Elly and Liz

That night, when all the pots and pans were cleaned and put away, Mimi brought Elly a fine white nightgown with delicate cutwork around the squared neckline.

“Mama made them for all of us. Fee and Itsy made this one for you last night.”

“Last night?” asked Elly, taking the lovely yet sturdy garment from her grandmother’s rough hands. “But it’s so beautiful.”

“What is it? A sheet with a few fancies, not much. But a girl feels like a girl in one. So wear it and have a good sleep, okay?”

Mimi was out of the room so fast Elly said goodnight to the door.

She wasn’t tired. She wandered around the room, her mother’s room, and traced its features with her fingers. The dresser, the blue paisley wallpaper, the molding.

In the nightgown, with her hair piled high and her body scrubbed, Elly felt like she should be a ghost wandering around in old Scottish ruins. A shadow at Stonehenge. A barefoot priestess lost in the mist, carrying a secret.

The winter window grew moss as Elly fell asleep. A pebble woke her. And then a handful of pebbles. She sat up and cupped her hands together to see out of the window.

“Liz?” She opened the window. “What are you doing here?”

“Want to go for a walk in the winter wonderland?”

Elly yanked on her boots and put on the coat she’d borrowed from Anthony. She climbed out the window.

“You’re a big girl, I’m sure no one would object to you leaving out through the front door. Sheesh!”

“You don’t know my people.” Elly dusted cold snow from the windowsill off her neck and shivered. For a moment she wanted to take down her hair and grab her hat. She fought the urge. “Where are we going?” she asked.

“Let’s visit Georgie,” Liz suggested.

“Who’s that? Someone else I can’t remember?”

“You don’t remember your uncle? Shame!”

Elly knew she knew this girl. She didn’t really know how or why, but she knew the glimmer in her eye, the spontaneous fun. It was contagious. “Uncle George is dead.”

“I know that, silly! Let’s go to the cemetery.”

It seemed the
perfect
thing to do on a cold and snowy night in the middle of a dangerous city.

Liz knew back roads and alleyways. Elly ran next to her new, old friend. Her feet sure on the ground. Soon they were at the gates of Shady Rest next to the Botanical Gardens. “It’s so beautiful here, isn’t it?”

It was. The landscape, already quiet from its burden of heavy stones, was even more subdued from the blanket of soft white. “Come this way. Your family plot is over here.”

“How do you know so much about my family when I don’t know anything?”

“I can’t account for your memory loss,” Liz joked, throwing a snowball at Elly.

“I guess not. I remembered you, though.”

Liz ran to her and gave her a hug. “Ooh! I knew you would. What did you remember?”

“You giving Anthony rabbit ears, down by the beach.”

“Far Rockaway?” asked Liz.

“I guess so. Mimi said she took me there that summer,” said Elly.

“Yeah. We all went. It was a great week. Tons of fun.”

“Anthony says he has pictures, too. That might help.”

Liz stiffened. “Pictures?”

“Yeah, why, you not photogenic or something?”

“No, not really. Anyway … come on! Let’s say hi to George.”

They stood outside a gated plot under a large tree. Two stones were larger than the rest.

Margaret Green Amore

Beloved Mother and Wife

Born 1895–Died May 8th 1945

Vincent Louis Amore

Beloved Husband and Father

Born 1894–Died May 8th 1945

“The same day?” Elly recalled Anthony calling it
The Day the Amores Died
. And then Mimi made mention of “That Day” as well
. For a Yalie I sure can be obtuse,
thought Elly.

“Yeah, they all died on the same day, more or less.”

“All?”

“Your great-aunt Bunny, her daughter Zelda Grace. You don’t know the story?”

“No.”

“Crazy. It’s like mythology around these parts.
The Day the Amores Died.
Bunny and Zelda are around here somewhere. Wanna say hi to them, too?”

“All of them?” Elly felt very sad all of a sudden. “I think I want to go back, Liz. I’m cold.”

“Sure. Of course. Let’s just say hi to good old George, okay?” Liz went through the gate and dusted off a smaller stone. It read
:

George Amore: Always a Child at Heart

“Boy, did he love you, Elly.”

“Really?”

“Yes. I hope if you remember anything, you remember playing with George.”

Fee. Fi. Fo. Fummy …

“But he was an old man when I was little.”

Liz laughed. “Your Uncle George was never an old man!”

Elly smiled, and then shivered.

“Let’s get out of here. You’re cold. What was I thinking taking a full-of-life person to a full-of-death place? Your Mimi would have my head.”

Did I tell her I was pregnant?
Elly wondered.

*   *   *

Elly reentered the building using the front door, unlocking it with a hidden key Liz revealed between some crumbled foundation mortar.

“See ya later!” Liz called out as she ran down the snowy street.

Standing in the hall Elly decided to try and remember Uncle George. Not the old, senile, grumbly person she recalled from more recent visits, but the playmate Liz assured her existed during that long, forgotten summer. She padded into the main hallway and then up the stairs. Halfway up she could clearly see the second floor doors. Her Uncle George’s apartment, 2B, was to her left, Anthony’s, 2A, to her right. A whisper of a giggle came from the right. Elly gripped the banister and closed her eyes, a delicious bubble of laughter rising inside her own chest.
“Fee fi fo fummy, I smell a girl and girls are YUMMY!”
Elly let out a little squeal and ran up the remaining steps, but when she turned around, no one was chasing her. She was dizzy as she knocked on door 2A. She heard a muffled “Wait a minute” and locks being undone. And there he was, Anthony, his hair tousled, his face transformed by the happy surprise.

“Come on in, pretty lady. I’ve been waiting for you to find me since we were ten.”

“Don’t get any big ideas.”

“Well, why are you here if it ain’t for my kisses?” There was laughter in Anthony’s easy voice.

“I think I’m remembering things,” she whispered.

“What kind of things?” Anthony took on a serious tone and helped her into his apartment.

“Did Uncle George play with us when we were kids?”

“Oh yeah, all the time.” He scratched his fingers through his thick hair and smiled, remembering, too.

“Can you tell me?”

“It’d be my pleasure. Oh, and I found the pictures.”

Elly went inside the dark apartment. It smelled like him, but when he turned on a table lamp in the living room, Elly remembered his mother.

“She was beautiful. You took such good care of her,” she said, wandering the apartment, re-seeing it again. Exactly the same floor plan as Mimi’s in 1A, yet worlds apart. Smart, low Danish Modern furniture, potted plants, floor to ceiling bookshelves. Anthony’s mother had a bohemian flair.

“You remember.”

“Yes. I seem to remember things easier if they have nothing to do with me.”

“Here, look through these.” Anthony handed her a cigar box filled with Polaroid pictures. “We took them, so they aren’t great.”

Images of elbows and too-close half smiles. An ice cream truck, the beach. “Oh look! This is Uncle George, isn’t it!” It was a picture of an old man, but not old like in Elly’s recent memory. “He was handsome for an old guy. You know, I swear I felt him chasing me up the stairs before.”

“Really? That’s a little spooky,” said Anthony.

“No, it wasn’t spooky at all. It was
fun
. Did he chase us?”

“Yeah, he chased us all the time. You mostly. Boy, he loved you. He used to pretend he was a giant and chase you around the building yelling Fee, fi…”

“… fo fummy. I smell a girl and girls are yummy. I’ll eat that girl and fill my tummy,” finished Elly, laughing with delight.

Anthony grabbed her and held her tight. “You remember.”

“Some things. But not everything. There’s so much darkness still there.”

“Don’t worry, Elly, give it time. It’ll come back to you.”

“Anthony?”

“What is it?” he asked, his head nestled against her neck.

“What if there’s a reason I can’t remember? What if it’s better left forgotten?”

“Nothing is better that way, believe me, Elly. And whatever it is, bad or good, I’ll be here for you.”

Elly pulled away from him and leaned her forehead against the window, looking out at the city lights. “Why are you so nice to me?”

“Because I love you, Elly Amore. And you love me. You just haven’t remembered it yet.”

10

Itsy

I saw her leave the building. Out through the window just like her mother used to. But she’s different. Not like Carmen. She reminds me of Mama, she always has. I’m tired and can’t seem to get a bit of sleep anymore. Fee snores so loud. I try to pretend the sound is the creaking of a ship at sea. It used to work. It doesn’t anymore. My mind is just so full.

The boys were born first. Three in a row. Mama was scared she’d never have a girl. Papa, too. Then came Bunny, then Fee, and Mimi eighteen months later. They called Fee and Mimi Irish twins. Mama and Papa figured God was done with them. Three boys and three girls seemed a fair amount of children, and all healthy, too. Then came me and George. Twins. I came first and no one knew little George was in there. He waited a whole two days to show up. The cord came with his feet and everything was jumbled. He didn’t get enough air, the midwife said. Not enough air makes you a kid forever. Isn’t that funny? Childhood is all about air. Running with hair blowing out behind, puffs of hot air making fake smoke coming out of your mouth on the first colder days of autumn. But Georgie didn’t get enough and spent his whole life a child. It was wonderful, sometimes, and sometimes not so much. But he was mine, George was.