Chapter 94: Chapter Ninety-Four
The next few days passed rather quietly in the Donati household. Frankie made three more attempts to sneak into Gloria’s room, each of which was met with stern threats from his father. One night she thought Frank Senior might finally put his threat to getting a switch to use when he stormed outside after catching Frankie at her door. Yet after several minutes, he’d come back in, warned Frankie he always had a belt handy and slammed the bedroom door. Frankie had snickered out in the hallway until giving up and going back to their new form of communication: handwritten letters, slipped through the wall.
Frankie would also hold secret counsel with Accardi each night during which time he would suck down half a pack of cigarettes. Gloria noticed the only time Frankie smoked was when talking to the Don, almost as if it were a habit picked up from the mafia boss and talking to him was enough to trigger a craving. Each night when she’d ask for an update, he would always write the same thing: Nothing new, Vixen. A valuable lead that turned out to be nothing but smoke. Picture tonight???
Gloria discovered the old Polaroid camera sitting atop Stephen’s desk with a bow the night after the barbecue. She’d taken a picture all right: one of her middle finger. He still loved it and said he would tape it to the back of his laptop so anyone on the other side would know better than to interrupt whatever he was working on.
Other than those moments, the time spent with the Donatis was a study in boring domesticity. Gloria helped Mrs. Donati with the laundry, keeping up the house, cooking everyone’s meals and gossiping on the back porch with the neighborhood ladies who seemed to have developed an infatuation with the new Donati recruit. Nora came by nearly every day. She was eager to help with the wedding preparations. As she and her on-again-off-again girlfriend, Bea, would probably never be settled enough for a wedding of their own, she took it upon herself to plan the most extravagant backyard party that could be produced in less than a week’s time.
While the girls were girls, the men of the house were busy being just that: men. She watched with fascination as Frankie worked on his father’s old 90-something Ford Explorer. Especially when he did so shirtless with a rag stuffed in his back pocket that weighed his jeans down enough to show the band of his boxers. She had no idea he could work on cars, but then again, that was the appeal of Frankie Donati, wasn’t it? There was no limit to his secret knowledge. In fact, one day when he was having a hard time loosening a bolt under the car, she’d discovered through a string of profanities he unleashed that the man could speak Arabic.
Other than the car, Frankie would help with other odds and ends around the house. He worked on the front door, which sat crooked in its frame until two hours of work from him had it propped straight and the doorbell working. He landscaped the yard, spending an entire day working around the perimeter of the house to ensure it was in peak condition: mowed, weed-whacked, new mulch, new spotlights to illuminate the sidewalk. She was shocked he hadn’t pulled up a ladder to repaint the entire house. Instead, he’d only pulled the ladder out to clean the gutters. By the time Thursday rolled around, the house had increased in value by $10,000. Not a single picture frame hung anything but straight, no tile was missing from the floors and every door in the home opened and shut without a protest.
One night after dinner, when she’d asked why he was working so diligently around the house, he’d merely responded with a shrug and a wink before responding, “I’m a hardworking man, Vixen. I get stir-crazy when I don’t have something to do with my hands.” Then he’d leaned in, caging her against the wall by the stairs and whispered into her ear, “I’d prefer to use my hands for other things but my parent’s rules are strict and I can’t seem to get these damn floors to quiet the hell up.”
Someday she would ask Frankie what it was about walls that he loved so much. The control? The extra support so he could use his hands elsewhere? The fact that there was always one nearby? Perhaps she wouldn’t ask… because then he might stop… and she didn’t want him to stop. What she wanted to stop was her knees from shaking as she walked back toward the kitchen where Frankie’s mother was waiting.
Gloria had just gone down to the garage to give Frankie a sandwich she’d made him for lunch. Luckily for them, his father had just gone up to use the bathroom, giving Frankie exactly four and a half minutes to shove her against the wall and work her into a fever pitch with his lips, his tongue, his teeth and his fingers. Those fingers were working inside her when the stairs alerted them to Frank Senior’s approach.
Frankie groaned. “You’ll need to do something with me soon, Vixen, or I’ll end up fucking you with an audience,” he warned as he dropped her legs and gave her exactly fifteen seconds to appear as though she wasn’t five seconds away from an orgasm before Frank Senior walked in.
Frankie shoved a piece of sandwich into her mouth and nodded to his dad with his own mouth full. “Heyo, Pops.”
Frank Senior looked between them and gave a grunt before turning his back and relieving her embarrassment. Frank Senior wouldn’t say anything, but Marge may. As Gloria grew closer to the kitchen, she heard a second voice who would most definitely say something. Gloria fluffed her hair and pressed her knuckles to her cheeks as she strode into the kitchen.
“Thank you for doing that, dear,” Marge said from the kitchen sink.
“No problem,” Gloria said, ignoring Nora’s knowing look.
“Sure did take you a long time to deliver a sandwich,” Nora observed.
“How would you know?” Gloria quipped, glaring at the woman.
Nora popped a chip into her mouth and smirked. “I walked in as you were heading down the stairs.”
“Well, I was just talking,” Gloria said, putting her apron back on to help prep dinner.
“I have no doubt you were flapping your lips,” Nora said.
Gloria flung a wet rag, and Nora dodged it with ease.
“Girls,” Marge said, her mother-voice in full effect. “Leave her alone, Nora. It’s hard to say no to a Donati. I know when me and Frank met…” Marge glanced up at the ceiling and sighed.
Gloria wrinkled her nose. It was weird hearing his mom talk about her Frank.
Thinking the same, Nora set the bag of chips down. “Don’t, Mrs. Donati.”
“I remember when we first got together, he had this thing for pushing me against walls…”
“Please!” Gloria screamed, startling both women. Marge placed a hand to her heart in shock. Gloria cleared her throat. “I mean…” She coughed into her hand. “Sorry, I just mean, please, pass the salt?”
Nora burst out laughing, nearly falling off her stool, while Gloria wished she had Superman’s heat vision.
“What are you even doing here?” Gloria hissed, taking the salt she didn’t actually need from Marge’s timid hand.
Nora pulled herself back up straight and collected herself. “Mrs. Donati asked me to come over so we could talk dresses.”
“Dresses?” Gloria asked, starting to make a mix for the beef stew they would eat that night.
“Wedding dresses, Gloria,” Nora said, giving her a poignant look.
“Oh, oh yes,” Gloria said, nodding furiously.
“Jeez, must have been a hell of a sandwich,” Nora said with a chuckle.
Gloria felt the weight of the ceramic bowl in her hand and wondered what kind of brain damage she could inflict with it if she were to smash it on Nora’s head.
“We’re thinking tomorrow is the last day we could get one. Just in case there needs to be some last minute alterations,” Marge explained, giving Nora her own look of warning: the same look she witnessed the mother give her son multiple times a day.
“Yep, wedding is only three days away and we still have stuff to do,” Nora said.
“Really? Like what?” Gloria asked, chopping up the meat.
“Girl, you clearly never dreamed of your wedding if you still don’t know what all needs to be done.”
Gloria scoffed. “What would be the point of that? My wedding was ironed out when I was two. The only choice I’d be given is if I should start walking with my left foot or right.”
The kitchen grew silent. After a moment, Gloria looked up to find the women giving each other a look filled with pity and sadness.
“Well…” Marge said, shaking her discomfort off. “Jenny needs to know the cake flavor by tomorrow morning. There’s also getting the backyard set up and the rehearsal dinner.”
“And the bachelorette party,” Nora said, nodding slowly with a cheek-splitting grin.