Gangster (45 page)

    The explosion rocked the alley, sending the red Fiat hurtling into the air and landing back down with a flaming thud. The glass from the trattoria shattered and cascaded out onto the street. We were about twenty feet from shore and I closed my eyes to the heat of the blast. I dropped the gun into the bottom of the boat and sat silently next to Don Frederico.

    Gennaro will take you to the airport, he finally said to me as we neared the shore. You should have more than enough time. Then he pointed toward a dark blue Mercedes that was waiting for us. Your suitcase is in the trunk. The tickets are on the backseat. Flight seven-eighteen, scheduled to depart at noon.

    I will miss you, I said.

    We will live in each other's memories. Don Frederico gave me a warm embrace. Both happy and sad ones.

    I rubbed my hands across my face, my shirt wet from the rain and the sea, my fingers smelling of dried blood. I turned away from the old man and looked out at the passing Neapolitan scenery, at a place and a people I had come to love in such a short time. I would see neither of them ever again.

     *     *     *

I WAS NOW well prepared to be a career criminal. I had the proper training and a natural feel for the business. I had a respect for the old-liners like Angelo and Don Frederico. I had been a witness to both murder and betrayal and had my appetite whetted for acts of revenge.

    I just didn't have the stomach for any of it.

    I didn't want my life to be a lonely and sinister one, where even the closest of friends could overnight turn into an enemy who needed to be eliminated. If I went the way Angelo had paved, I would earn millions, but would never be allowed to taste the happiness and enjoyment such wealth often brings. I would rule over a dark world, a place where treachery and deceit would be at my side and never know the simple pleasures of an ordinary life.

    It was during that nine-hour flight back to New York that I decided I wanted to live my days far removed from the evil realm of the criminal. I had to walk away from both the life and from Angelo. I didn't know how he would react, or if I could muster the courage to confront him and tell him how I felt. I was good enough to be a gangster, that I knew. I just didn't know if I was tough enough to tell Angelo that I didn't want to be one.

    I tried to sleep but was too restless. I didn't touch any of the food. I stared out the small window at the wide ocean that passed under the wings and vowed not to be swayed by Angelo's forceful personality, and to have the conviction to follow my decision to its natural end. I knew he would give me time to recover from all that had happened in Italy. But I also knew that each day that I allowed to pass would ensnare me deeper into his web and make my escape a much more difficult one.

    In the midst of my thoughts, I remembered back to when I was eleven and sick with a severe respiratory infection. My fever capped out at 105 degrees and no number of blankets could keep me warm. It was on one of those nights that Angelo came into my room, tossed an electric blanket on top of a mountain of quilts and laid down next to me. He rubbed a cool towel against my forehead and rested a hot water bottle on my chest. He whispered the words to an old Italian ballad, Parle me d'amore, Mariu, in my ear until I had fallen asleep. He stayed by my side until the fever broke.

    That was the Angelo few were ever allowed to see. The Angelo I would never fear and always love. The Angelo I needed to find in order to tell him what was in my heart. I sat back and shut my eyes, waiting out the slow descent into JFK and the return to what I had once embraced as a normal life.

     *     *     *

ANGELO SAT ON the edge of a garden chair and let his fishing line hang loose off his left hand, the early-morning sun warming his face and neck. I stood behind him with my back against a wooden mast, the small boat floating free in the middle of Long Island Sound. I had been home for three weeks and this was our first time alone together. The anxiety and unease I felt after Nico's death and my abrupt departure from Italy had not yet vanished. In less than a month I was set to enter college, at a university within walking distance of the bar. I was eager for that day to arrive, seeing it as my first big step toward distancing myself from the criminal world. Angelo viewed my decision to attend college with indifference. He would have preferred not to have to wait another four years before I could begin working full-time by his side. But he also knew that a crime boss with a combination of street knowledge and a degree could prove to be a most lethal weapon to have at his disposal. And so, he stayed silent on the matter.

    During those weeks, I kept my own company, choosing to take long walks after my evening meal, turning down frequent requests to go to movies, ball games or the theater. I was in a transition period and sought my comfort in the silent moments such a time afforded. Angelo kept his distance, allowing me as much free ground as I needed. I could feel his eyes on me whenever I walked through the bar. Occasionally, we would look at each other and nod, quick furtive glances meant to convey understanding and concern. He knew Nico's death bothered me and that my time in Italy had changed me, but not entirely in the ways he had hoped. I was heading down a new path and needed to navigate my way through its waters alone. A boy's teenage years can be difficult ones. Mine were made more so, weighted down as I was with the additional burden of attempting to free myself from the addiction of the gangster life.

    He stood in the middle of my room, a few feet from my desk, hands in his pockets, hidden by the shadows. As usual, I saw him long before I heard him, looked up, then checked the clock next to my lamp. Everything okay? I asked, my eyes eager for more sleep, tired from hours spent reading and watching television.

    Good as it's ever going to be, Angelo said.

    It's almost two, I said. Not even Ida would want to be walked this late.

    I put some clothes on your bureau. Wash up and put them on. I'll be waiting outside in the car.

    Where are we going? I asked, as he turned to leave the room.

    I thought we'd pick up something for dinner, he said.

     *     *     *

I DIDN'T KNOW you liked to fish. I looked out at the emptiness of Long Island Sound. You never mentioned it before.

    I've never done it before. What little I've done so far, I hate.

    So why are we out here? This boat's packed with new fishing poles, gear and enough worms to last a year.

    We need time to talk, Angelo said, dropping the fishing line at his feet. And the little I know about fishing is that it's quiet.

    Talk about what? I was suddenly defensive.

    About you, Angelo said. And about what happened to you and Nico in Naples.

    You know everything there is to know.

    But you don't. Or at least you're not sure. And I don't want that to boil up inside you like it seems to be doing.

    There isn't anything I need to know, I said with a shrug.

    You need to learn how to live with what happened.

    I reached into a packed cooler and pulled out a can of Coke and a quart of milk. I handed Angelo the milk and sat on the wood planks, popping open the soda.

    It was me he wanted dead, Angelo said. Not you.

    I couldn't kill him, I answered. Even knowing what they said he tried to do, I still couldn't do it.

    That's because you didn't believe the hit on me was for real. And you still don't.

    How do you survive it? I asked suddenly, leaning closer to him. How do you go through every day alone, knowing there's nobody you can talk to, nobody you can really ever trust. How do you do that and not go crazy?

    I don't think about it. Angelo looked off into the distance. Not any of it.

    And what do you think about if not that?

    I think about Isabella, he said. It was the first time I had ever heard him mention her by name. She's alive to me, even after all these years. She keeps me happy, inside, in places where no one can see.

    If she had lived... I started. He had opened the door and I was eager to enter and ask as many questions about her as he would allow. But now that I had the opportunity, I wasn't sure what I wanted to ask. As always, however, Angelo knew.

    I would have been a better man if she had lived, Angelo said, a soft break to his voice, but not as good a gangster.

    How long did it take for you to work that out? I asked.

    I'm still working it out. She's the only piece of me that's alive. Nobody else sees it. Nobody else knows it But I see it and I feel it. Every day I can touch that part of her that's in me. Some days she's clearer than others. You've been around me long enough to tell when my days are dark.

    I nodded and glanced past him at the waves hitting the side of the boat. Did it help taking care of the ones who shot her?

    No, he said, shaking his head. You feel good that they're dead, but they're just triggers without faces. And it's not killing you're looking for. It's keeping alive what you once had in your arms.

    Do you ever see her? Isabella? I don't mean like a ghost. I mean as if she were real, as if she were still alive?

    Lots of times. In different places. I'll catch a glimpse of a face crossing the street or a head turning my way at the track. Sometimes I'll even see her on a TV show, walking in the background. And each one of those women looks just like what Isabella would have looked like if she were still alive. To my eyes, anyway.

    I'm sorry, I said, my hand on top of his as it gripped a railing.

    You have a difficult decision to make, Angelo told me, clenching his other hand over mine. Take all the time you need to find your balance and your place. Get through college, if that's important to you. In time, you'll come to me and tell me what it is you want to do.

    I already know, I said.

    He looked up at the sun, wiped his brow with a silk handkerchief and ignored my last statement. I think it's time we took this boat back to shore.

    I said that I already know what I want to do, I repeated. And maybe it's time for you to hear it.

    Angelo took a long drink from the milk container and nodded. Tell me, then, he said.

    I love you for all that you've done for me. The words came out slowly, buffered by the passing wind. All that you've taught me.

    Angelo tossed the quart of milk against the side of the boat and stood, his dark eyes glaring into mine. Tell me, he said, in a voice crammed with danger.

    I want out, I finally managed, sweat running down my back, my hands holding on to the mast for support. I can't be what you want me to be. I don't want to look over my shoulder the rest of my life, waiting for a bullet that I know will eventually come. I don't want to run a crew, not knowing who I can trust or who's planning to move against me. And I don't want to end up an old man sitting in a boat, without anyone in the world I could call a friend.

    I thought you were my friend, Angelo said, the words filled with venom.

    I am, I said. But I'll always be more than that, too.

    Not if you leave, he spit. It's your choice, what you do with your life. But remember, with choice there's also risk. You've been protected by me all these years. You turn your back on me now, you go out there alone. And that's something you've never tasted before.

    I have no idea what it's going to be like for me in the real world, I said. But I do know what it'll be like for me in your world. And I don't want any part of that.

    Then you don't want any part of me. For the first time in my life he looked at me with hate in his eyes, and it staggered me. Once we get to shore, it ends between us.

    I was suddenly overcome with an urge to cry, realizing how cruel and hurtful my words must have sounded. I won't ever betray you.

    You just did, Angelo said.

    I'm choosing to lead my own life. I could hear the defiance coming back to my voice. That's all I've done.

    And I'll allow you to do it, Angelo said. That will be your punishment. You'll be set free and left alone. The world you've known since you were a child will disappear just as easily as it appeared.

    I didn't mean for it to end this way, I told him.

    But it did, he said, then turned his back to me.

    Neither one of us spoke during the five-mile ride back to shore. I knew what happened that morning would never be forgotten by either one of us. He had allowed me entry into a part of his life he had kept sealed all these years and I had returned the kindness by crushing his greatest desire. After this day, neither one of us could ever fully trust the other again. I knew that many years would pass before I would see him, if I ever did, yet I wondered if he would really stay out of my life.

    The most dangerous gangster is the one willing to kill what he loves the most, and there was none as dangerous as Angelo. He had no other choice. It was the only way he knew how to live.

     *     *     *

YOU MAY NOT know him as well as you think, I told Mary. You may not even realize all that he's capable of doing. All of it in the name of love.

    Mary let go of the IV pole and came over to me. You're wrong about that, Gabe. There isn't anything he did that I don't know about. Especially when it came to you.

    What right do you have to know anything about me?

     All the right in the world. It was the one thing Angelo could never deny me.

    Why? I asked.

    One of the reasons I came here was to see you, and not just to tell my story but to listen to yours. There's still more that needs to be told and I need to hear that from you. Then, when that's done, I'll leave you with the end of mine.

    I hope it's worth it, I told her, forcing myself to stay calm.

    It will be, Mary said. That I promise.

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