Kiss of the Wolf Page 7

  He had his hands between his thighs. She crossed around the car behind him. He thought for a second she’d gone on without him.

  She poked her head in his window the way her mother had. “C’mon, sweetie,” she said. She needed to clear her throat. “We’ll make it. C’mon.”

  He opened the door and got out and followed her to the front steps. The grass on their lawn was still shaded, so it was wet. The neighbors two houses down had a blue-and-white Virgin Mary, set in a shell in a rock garden. His mother held the screen door for him, but he let her go in first.

  The blinds were pulled in the living room. It took a little time for his eyes to adjust.

  Nina and Mrs. Monteleone were standing in the hallway off the other side of the room. Mrs. Monteleone had one hand on the sofa back and another on the wall, as if to steady herself. She nodded at them, once.

  She had a TV tray set up in front of the sofa. It had a bowl of polenta on it. There was a pat of butter, unmelted, in the polenta. On the lamp table at one end of the sofa there was a big picture of Tommy Monteleone and his brother, Perry. Tommy was in a blue-plaid jacket and tie, and Perry was in his Navy uniform.

  “Ma, we’re interrupting her lunch here,” Joanie said.

  “No, come in,” Mrs. Monteleone said. She rubbed her temple with the heel of her palm. “You want some coffee? I’m making some coffee.”

  Todd stayed where he was, a few feet from the front door. Nina waved her hand to tell him to come closer.

  “I was just getting some—” Mrs. Monteleone said. She was heading toward the kitchen. She trailed off.

  Nina followed her. “Lucia, don’t fuss,” they heard her say.

  “It’s already made,” Mrs. Monteleone said from the kitchen.

  Joanie sat on the edge of a recliner. She gestured with her head toward a big-backed maroon chair near the window for Todd.

  “C’mon in here,” Nina called.

  When they came into the kitchen, she was setting the table with plates next to the coffee cups. She put a glass tray of cookies in the middle and pulled off the Saran wrap. Mrs. Monteleone was scooping coffee into the coffee maker.

  “Ma, we don’t need anything to eat,” Joanie said. “She shouldn’t fuss.”

  “Just cookies,” Nina said. “Sit.”

  They sat. Nina put milk and sugar on the table. She set two cookies on Todd’s plate.

  “You want some polenta?” Mrs. Monteleone asked.

  “We’re fine,” Joanie said.

  Mrs. Monteleone was gesturing at Todd.

  “Todd,” Nina told her.

  “Todd,” Mrs. Monteleone said. “Some chicken? I got chicken in there.”

  “No, thanks,” he said. “I got cookies.”

  She sat at the table, her hands in her lap. The coffee was brewing.

  They looked at her. It was like they had to.

  “You’re sweet, coming over here,” she said. She looked at each of them.

  Nobody was doing anything or saying anything. Todd lifted one of the cookies on his plate.

  “Tommy,” Mrs. Monteleone wailed. She covered her eyes and started crying.

  Todd froze. His mother looked like she was lifting something very heavy.

  Nina patted Mrs. Monteleone on the side of the head. She cried herself out after a minute.

  She wiped her eyes and got the coffee.

  She went around the table pouring it. Todd was still holding his cookie. He put it down.

  His mother was rubbing her hands together like she was soaping them up. “We wanted to say how … sorry we were,” she said. He felt like he was going to fly apart.

  Mrs. Monteleone sniffed and put the coffeepot back on the counter. Nina was looking at Todd and Joanie.

  Mrs. Monteleone sat back down. Todd could hear a radio, on quietly in another part of the house.

  “Do they have any more news?” Nina said.

  Mrs. Monteleone shook her head.

  “How’s Tommy Senior? He okay?” Nina asked.

  Mrs. Monteleone shook her head again. Todd recognized the face: when you don’t want to move because you’re afraid you’ll throw up.

  “How could they do that?” she cried. “How could they just leave him there on the road?”

  Nina patted her arm and then squeezed it. Todd and his mother stared straight ahead in agony. Todd was looking at refrigerator magnets.

  Nina stirred Mrs. Monteleone’s coffee for her. They listened to the sound of the spoon in the cup.

  They heard a car in the driveway and then a car door slam. They all sat there, everything on hold until this new person arrived.

  “Ho,” Bruno called from the front door. “Anybody home?”

  Nina got up to let him in.

  He came into the kitchen carrying a grocery bag. He looked upset. “I got some cake,” he said to Mrs. Monteleone. “Dominic’s was closed, don’t ask me why. I went to Stop and Shop. All they had was Sara Lee.”

  Todd had no idea what Bruno was doing there. He was emptying the bag: more coffee, a plastic half gallon of spring water, a Sara Lee pound cake. While he put everything away Mrs. Monteleone got up and took some money out of a flour tin in the cabinet and held it out to him.

  “Get outta here with that,” he said.

  “Take the money,” she said. “How much was it?”

  “Free,” Bruno said. “Special sale.” She tried to stuff it in his shirt pocket. He took it out of her hand and put it back in the flour tin in the cabinet.

  She sat down at that, and sighed.

  “How’d you know what she needed?” Nina asked.

  “I was over here before,” he said. “She said she needed to go out for a few things, I told her I’d do it.” He crumpled up the grocery bag with a big noise.

  Mr. Monteleone appeared in the hallway. He was wearing an old blue robe and his eyes were impossibly red.

  “Hi, Tommy,” Nina finally said. “You want some coffee?”

  He was wearing black socks and no slippers. He looked over at Todd and then at the sink. He cinched his terrycloth belt and left.

  Bruno uncrumpled the bag like he’d done something wrong. Todd and his mother looked at each other.

  “He want some coffee?” Nina asked Mrs. Monteleone.

  Mrs. Monteleone shook her head.

  Bruno went into the dining room and brought a chair back into the kitchen. He poured himself a cup of coffee and then pulled the chair up to the table.

  “Where’s the other car?” Nina asked. “If Tommy’s here?”

  “It’s in the shop,” Mrs. Monteleone said.

  The doorbell rang.

  “Now who the hell is this?” Bruno said.

  “I didn’t even hear a car,” Nina said. She got up and went to the door. Todd kept his eyes on Mrs. Monteleone, who sat there as if all this was going on in another place.

  Nina came back into the hall. “It’s the florist,” she said. “They won’t let me sign for it.”

  Mrs. Monteleone got up and followed her to the front door.

  Bruno spooned two sugars into his cup and stirred it by twirling the cup in his hand.

  He was quiet. Todd had never seen him this way.

  “What’re you doing here?” Joanie said in a low voice.

  “What’m I doing here? What’re you doing here?” Bruno said. “I didn’t know you knew Tommy.”

  Joanie shrugged.

  “What’d you, just come over with your mother?” he asked.

  She nodded. He seemed satisfied with that. He looked at Todd, and Todd thought for a second he was going to ask, You have anything to do with killing him?

  He went back to his coffee. “So how’d you know him?” Joanie asked.

  Bruno shrugged. “We were friends. We did some business.”

  “Business? What kind of business?”

  “What’re you, a cop?” Bruno said. “Business.”

  Nina came back into the kitchen with Mrs. Monteleone.

  “What’d they se
nd?” Bruno asked. “Flowers?”

  Nina looked at him. “It’s a florist,” she said. “Flowers.”

  They sat back down. Nina got up to warm up her coffee. It looked like Mrs. Monteleone was going to cry again.

  “Ma,” Todd said, “can I go outside?”

  Bruno slurped his coffee and looked at him over the edge of the cup.

  “Yeah, you go out,” Joanie said. “We’re only gonna stay a little longer. Mrs. Monteleone’s got things to do.”

  He stood up. He didn’t know whether to say good-bye or not. Mrs. Monteleone smiled at him.

  He went out the way he came in, the front door. He didn’t want to have to look at the Virgin Mary, so he walked down the driveway to the backyard. He’d never seen it before.

  It was small and fenced in. The next-door neighbor had a yappy little dog that barked at him nonstop as soon as he came around the corner. It clawed at the fence to get at him.

  There was one maple tree in the middle of the yard. He sat underneath it. Its roots went so far under the ground they were lifting the blacktop on the driveway ten feet from the trunk.

  There was nothing to do. The grass was worn away to dirt at the places where the roots went in. The dog was still barking and scratching at the fence. He put three fingers down to the dirt and brought them up to his mouth.

  The back door opened and Bruno and Joanie came out. They walked over to where Todd was sitting. They both had their hands in their pockets and Bruno was jingling change.

  The dog was still barking. It was throwing itself against the fence, making the whole thing shake.

  “Nice animal,” Bruno said, squinting over at it. “They bring a lot to a family, don’t they?”

  He picked up a stick and threw it over the fence. The dog was quiet, probably checking it out.

  “Don’t forget, the old man’s retired now,” he said. “They got nothing. Big Tommy, his idea of savings was whatever was left in the wallet.”

  Joanie looked back at the house. “Maybe we could help out,” she said. “You know, lend them a little bit.”

  “You?” Bruno said. “Since when do you have a pot to piss in?”

  Joanie looked down at the grass and then over at Todd. “What happened to you?” she asked. “What’ve you got on your mouth?”

  Todd rubbed it with the back of his hand. “It’s dirt,” he said.

  The dog started up again. They listened to it bark.

  “So what do you think?” Joanie said.

  “What do I think?” Bruno said. He was looking off toward the house. “I think I wanna know what happened.”

  Todd looked at his mother. She had her eyes on Bruno. She shrugged like someone was holding her shoulders. “Maybe the police …” she said.

  “The police,” Bruno said. “Please.”

  “Well,” she said. “Wasn’t he just—?”

  “Whaddaya telling me?” Bruno said. “He’s hit by a car wandering around in the dark on Route One-ten?” He exaggerated the pronunciation of the number. He was mad enough that Todd and his mother had to look away.

  “This is Tommy Monteleone, now,” he said. “This is not a guy who goes on nature hikes. He lives in a rented room on Nichols Avenue. Nature’s when a bug gets in the screen.”

  Todd’s mother put her eyes somewhere else. Todd pulled at the tongue of his Nike. The dog was still barking.

  “Shut up,” Bruno shouted. Joanie and Todd jumped.

  The dog was quiet.

  “Todd, get up,” his mother said. “We gotta go.” He could see how shook up she was.

  The dog started barking again, hysterically.

  “That son of a bitch,” Bruno said, looking over at the fence.

  “Todd, come on,” his mother said. He was up but he was standing around, and she grabbed his shirt sleeve, pinching a bicep. He yanked it free.

  “Fine,” she said. “You stay here. I’ll drive the car up onto the grass to pick you up.” She went back into the house, probably to say good-bye and get Nina. He was left standing there with the barking dog and Bruno.

  He could feel himself close to crying and fought it. “Bruno,” he said.

  Bruno looked at him. “What’re you, gonna whine about this?” he said. “What was she, mean to you? Don’t whine to me. Those people in the house: they got problems.”

  Bruno walked off. Todd stood there alone, with the barking dog.

  What he remembered all through the ride home was the pitiful way he sounded when he said “Bruno.” He understood he wasn’t thinking about Mrs. Monteleone, or her husband with his blue bathrobe, or the picture of Tommy. He was thinking about the pitiful way he sounded, and the way Bruno looked at him after he said it.

  Back in his room, he bridged individual playing cards around the sleeping Audrey. Audrey was on her back with her legs folded in the air. Her head was stretched straight out upside down, and her cheeks hung down from gravity, exposing her incisors. She looked like a sleeping mad dog.

  He was using only face cards, leaning them on her side by side, one by one, trying to surround her before she woke up or moved. He had his Ad Altare Dei booklet out and was deciding whether or not he would remind his mother. The meeting Wednesday night was at seven.

  The booklet was opened to the first page. He’d filled it out when he’d gotten it.

  Ad Altare Dei

  Record book of Todd Muhlberg

  221 Indian Hill Road

  Milford, CT 06498

  Our Lady of Grace Church

  $1.75

  He still owed the parish the $1.75.

  His mother was in the spare room, next to his, talking to herself.

  “What was he doing out there?” she said. “What was he doing out there without a car that time of night?”

  He’d never told Brendan whether he’d give him a ride or not. He could call from up here if his mother ever went downstairs. They’d gotten him a phone for his eleventh birthday. His father had been against it.

  Going for the Ad Altare Dei had been his idea. His mother and grandmother had gone along. Could he drop out of something like that? Could he just not show up?

  His mother whacked something wooden in the next room. He heard her get up and go downstairs.

  He listened to her bang cabinets in the kitchen. Audrey stirred, and some of the cards collapsed. He kept flipping through the booklet.

  Reference Material

  Listed below are a few books which will help you prepare for this program:

  1.Old Testament and New Testament—Confraternity edition.

  2.Second Vatican Council:

  Decree on the Church

  Decree on Liturgy

  Decree on the Church in the Modern World

  3.Rite for Holy Anointing—Liturgical Press.

  (One dollar.)

  4.Come to Me—Book Two (the Sacraments and the Mass) Rev. Benedict Ehman and Rev. Albert Shamon

  (Five dollars.)

  He stopped reading.

  He lay back on the floor, looking up at the ceiling. Sandro had finished it with an overlapping swirl pattern, like a series of waves.

  He had to call. He had to call the rectory if he was not going to show up. He couldn’t just stay away.

  Tears came into his eyes at how complicated everything was. You just feel sorry for yourself, he thought. That’s all you do.

  He sat up again. He had to let them know if he wasn’t going. He stood up and padded downstairs in his bare feet. He crossed to the kitchen and opened the cabinet nearest the phone and pulled out the Milford directory.

  His mother was sitting at the kitchen table with her back to him. She didn’t turn around.

  It didn’t look like she was making dinner. A colander and a pot were out on the counter, but that was it.

  He climbed back up the stairs. His legs were tired. When he came back into the room, Audrey rolled onto her side and looked up, collapsing all the cards. She laid her head down again and closed her eyes.

  He li
stened for noise downstairs and then dialed the number in the book for the rectory. Maybe he’d get Henry, Father’s assistant, instead of Father Cleary.

  He got Father Cleary.

  “What’s up?” Father Cleary wanted to know. “You ready for the big night Wednesday?”

  “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about,” Todd said. “I don’t think I can go.” His forehead and underarms cooled.

  “Why not?” Father Cleary asked. “What’re you, sick?”

  “No,” Todd said. He grimaced at having blown that excuse.

  “So what is it?” Father asked after Todd didn’t say anything else.

  “I don’t know,” Todd said.

  “You don’t know,” Father said.

  Todd didn’t answer. Father didn’t say anything. He could hear a little buzzing on the line.

  “I don’t know if it’s right for me. I don’t know if I should be doing this,” Todd said.

  “Oh, come on,” Father said, surprising him. “You had months to think about this. Now you don’t know if it’s right for you?”

  “I guess I shoulda called earlier,” Todd said. He was so dying to get off the phone he did knee bends where he stood, swinging his free hand around.

  “Just give it a shot,” Father said. He sounded irritated.

  Todd tried to figure out what to say next.

  “You don’t know if you’re gonna like it till you give it a try,” Father said.

  Todd did a knee bend all the way to the floor. He put his free hand on top of his head.

  “You do one or two, you decide you don’t like it, you can quit with my blessing,” Father said. “All right?”

  “All right,” Todd said. He closed his eyes. It was just like the sacrilege about Communion. “All right.”

  “Wednesday night. Seven o’clock,” Father said. “See you then.” He hung up.

  Todd turned the receiver around in his hands and put the earpiece against his forehead. He hung up. He could have said it was a mortal sin on his soul he was worried about, and that he’d confess it later, and then later he could have made up something.

  He wandered into the upstairs bathroom and sat on the toilet in despair. The phone rang. On the second ring, his mother got it downstairs.

  Back in his bedroom, he stood next to his extension, waiting, afraid to pick it up. The click would give him away. But he had to know if it was Father Cleary. He eased up the receiver.