The Patron Saint of Ugly Read online

  “What’s going on?” I asked.

  Mom stopped and looked at me. “It’s Betty’s birthday, honey. I invited them for cake and coffee this afternoon. Just cake and coffee.”

  “But Mom!”

  “I know.” She offered an adult admission I couldn’t rebut. “Honey, she’s my only real friend.”

  The compromise was that I would get to stay in my room with a box of Froot Loops. Plus I got to write Happy Birthday, Betty on the cake, though it looked more like Holly Barfly, Bebby, which was still nicer than the message I wanted to leave: Vaffanculo, Ray-Ray!

  I was rinsing frosting from my fingers when Dad came up from the basement. “I’m heading to the pharmacy for cigars.”

  As he shrugged on his coat Mom said, “Take Garnet with you.”

  Dad looked at her, then me, and he hesitated only a second before saying, “Get your coat.”

  I seldom rode in the car alone with Dad. Usually Nicky called shotgun and I ended up in the back ramming my knees into his seat. That day, though Dad and I didn’t utter one syllable, I relished that up-front drive.

  The bell over the pharmacy door sounded as we entered. Mr. Flannigan was in the rear dusting the display case that held sundry last-minute gifts: aftershave and cotton handkerchiefs, costume earrings and brooches, an assortment of rosaries.

  He called to my father, “White Owls and your Play—” He switched gears when he saw me. “Howdy there, Garnet. How about a cherry Coke?”

  I looked up at Dad, who said, “Sure. And coffee for me.”

  Dad sat on the stool Nicky had swiveled on the day we celebrated the bells. I sat beside him, though it felt, frankly, weird.

  Mr. Flannigan made his way to the soda fountain, slid a box of White Owls onto the counter, and served us our drinks. He and Dad started yammering about the Cuban Missile Crisis, which had been at the forefront of every adult conversation for the past six weeks. The Cuba on my left elbow had been at the forefront of my attention for the past six weeks too, since it had been itching like the dickens. I still wasn’t sure if it was La Strega or someone else playing tricks on my skin, but I glided off my stool to peruse the ointments lining the back shelves that might offer relief. I also drooled over the penny candy, spun the comic-book rack, scanned the rows of greeting cards and the display case of baubles Mr. Flannigan had been dusting. Amid all the trinkets I saw something that stopped my breath: a heart-shaped charm on a bracelet, exactly like the one Mr. Giordano had given Donata last spring when my class made its confirmation. It was really too much; first the holy day he had carried his broken-legged daughter into church, and then the bracelet with a silver charm inscribed with my heart’s desire: I love you. All the girls tittered, especially when Donata added, “He’s going to buy me a charm every year until he walks me down the aisle on my wedding day.” As I stood in Flannigan’s I wondered what charm Mr. Giordano would buy Donata next: a horse, a four-leaf clover, a ballerina. It lifted my spirits to think that the bracelet had been a last-minute purchase while Mr. Giordano picked up shaving cream or Preparation H.

  Just then the back of the display case slid open and Mr. Flannigan smiled across the crowded shelves at me. “See something you like?”

  “That bracelet,” I whispered.

  “It’s a nice one.” He picked it up, walked out from behind the case, and slid it into my palm. “The heart opens up too.”

  I wedged my dirty thumbnail between the two halves and easily pried it open to reveal the slots where two tiny photos could go, or perhaps a piece of hair. I closed it and studied the back, imagining an improbable inscription.

  “What’s that?” Dad asked, now standing beside me.

  I wasn’t even thinking when I handed it over. He held it close to his face. “It’s a beaut.”

  This was my chance. “Mr. Giordano just gave one to Donata. Lots of fathers do. Give their daughters charm bracelets.”

  “That so?”

  “Want me to ring it up?” Mr. Flannigan asked. “Free engraving included.”

  For a minute it looked as if my father was seriously considering it. “Maybe later. We need to get going. Don’t want to miss the big party.”

  I lagged behind as Dad pushed outside clutching a brown shopping bag.

  The drive home was wordless and not because I was pouting. I was bubbling inside because Dad had left the little door open. Maybe later, he had said, words I polished on the ride back, since Christmas was coming, that season of miraculous births and of so many things.

  When we got home Dad dashed to the basement with the bag that held the spoils we all knew about: his stinky White Owls and a splayed-blond-bombshells men’s magazine.

  Hours later the phone rang. Mom answered and I eavesdropped. Apparently Uncle Dom’s car wouldn’t start. God does answer prayers, I thought, until Mom said, “Angelo can come and get you, Betty. No! It’s no trouble!”

  “Traitor.” I scuffed outside fuming at Mom and at Grandma Iris, who had foisted upon us a stupid car that would ferry my tormentors to my home. And then I had an idea. I slunk down the steps and approached the car as if it were a timid dog. “It’s okay,” I cooed, hand stretched toward the grille. I had watched my father lift the hood countless times to check fluid levels and belts. I thought I could easily open it and pull out some gizmo that would keep the machine from starting. I reached my fingers under the hood and tugged. Nothing. I pulled again and the car jiggled, but still the hood would not lift. “Open up!” More furious yanking. The car stared at me, all that chrome smirking, so I kicked the bumper. I was about to slink away when I remembered the car’s secret.

  The first day Dad drove us all over to Nonna’s and Grandpa’s to show off this car, Nonna had circled it, saying, “Guarda la macchina!,” as she’d done with the Mercedes convertible. She clapped her hands on Dad’s face and smiled. “I make-a the portafortuna.” She looked at Nicky and me. “Come. I need-a you help.”

  Nicky and I followed Nonna upstairs to Dad’s old bedroom, which she had converted into an anti-malocchio chamber. His chest of drawers was stuffed with skeins of red yarn, boxes of saint medals, dried rue branches, jars of I-don’t-even-want-to-know.

  She filled her apron with a jumble of ingredients and sat at the card table to cut a three-inch square of red fabric. In the center, as she muttered a litany of prayers, she sprinkled grains of rice, a dash of salt, a tiny gold horn, a Saint Christopher medal, and two drops of yellow liquid from an old iodine bottle. She gathered the four corners and twisted them together, making a pouch. “You hold-a,” she said to me. She twined red thread around the top of the pouch, counting all the while. After she tied it off, she kissed the bundle and held it to our lips for a final consecration.

  Again we followed as Nonna carried the portafortuna downstairs and outside to the car. Nicky opened the passenger door so Nonna could scoot inside.

  “Open the glove-a box,” she said.

  Nicky obeyed and Nonna shoved the lucky pouch as far back as she could. She rearranged several maps and a single mitten over it and made the sign of the cross before closing the compartment. “At’s-a good. Now you are-a protect from the fender-bend or the run-out-of-gas.” So far, the talisman had worked.

  All of that could change, however, and I yanked open the passenger door, popped open the glove box, and pulled out road maps, the still-single mitten, gasoline receipts, and that detailed logbook Dad kept about the car’s repairs. And then I found it, the red bundle, a bit dusty but still wrapped tightly with Nonna’s loving care. I rammed it into my pocket, stuffed the detritus back inside, and hightailed it to my room just as Dad emerged from the basement. “I’m going to get them!”

  “Don’t start. Don’t start. Don’t start,” I chanted.

  Of course the car started right up. I felt the lumpy portafortuna in my pocket. “A lot of good you do.”

  Forty minutes later Dad still hadn’t returned. I heard Mom open the front door. “Wonder what’s keeping him?” I hoped against hope that
my macchina-tampering had finally kicked in.

  But eventually he arrived with his brother’s family. I dove into the closet with my Froot Loops but could still hear every word when they entered the living room, Uncle Dom blabbering, “If Marina were my wife . . .”

  Apparently Aunt Betty had Nicky in her big-bosomed headlock. “Where’s your sister?”

  Mom answered for him. “She’s not feeling well, so she’s going to stay in her room.”

  A pause, then Aunt Betty said the thing that made me love her even more. “I don’t blame her, Marina. If I could quarantine Ray-Ray for the next thirty years I would. That boy, I swear.”

  That boy had probably spent the day hurling cats off the train trestle into the Ohio River.

  Soon I heard the fam-i-ly singing “Happy Birthday” followed by a cheer as Aunt Betty blew out candles. Silverware clattered on dishes, then Ray-Ray’s clodhoppers pummeled down the hall toward Nicky’s room. “Come on,” he called. I listened for my brother’s acquiescent footfalls also heading toward his room, but instead I heard the front door creak open and then closed.

  “Where’re you going? Wait up!” Soon Ray-Ray was clomping down the front steps too.

  I kept waiting for Mom to announce, Okay, now. Time for you to shove off. But she didn’t, and she didn’t, even as the afternoon light began to fade.

  I heard kids cavorting outside, so I burst from my closet and knelt on my bed to look out the window at the litter of children circling Mr. Julietto, our candy man, who paraded around the hill passing out goodies he pulled from a World War I military satchel. One time I was in Flannigan’s as he rattled off his list—Mary Janes, root-beer barrels, candy peanuts—and I watched Mrs. Flannigan dumping whole boxes full into his sack. Candy Man was like a migrating bird; he disappeared into his home around Thanksgiving, when arctic weather slid in.

  That November day, he must have sensed an early winter, because it seemed he was doling out all of his remaining treats. As I peeked through my blinds and watched him, I really did feel ill; obviously, God was punishing me for fibbing and perhaps because of the stolen portafortuna. I started plotting while buttoning up two sweaters. I would have to tiptoe past the party, but I heard Betty laugh in the way she did only when she was tanked, so I knew the scotch and schnapps were blurring everyone’s vision.

  I’ve heard stories about mothers lifting cars to rescue babies, the superhuman adrenaline surge that allows mere mortals to perform heroic feats when faced with a catastrophe. I was faced with a disaster—missing out on Candy Man—and I cracked open my door, tiptoed down the hall, zipped by the kitchen, and eased outside undetected. I followed the trail of candy wrappers and pushed myself to the forefront of the children.

  “Garney!” Mr. Julietto said. “I wondered where you were, honeydew.”

  There are times when port-wine stains evoke sympathy, which is sometimes welcome, sometimes not. That day I embraced it, because along with his pity came the biggest fistful of confections Candy Man could pull from his satchel. As I pushed back through the kids, someone whined, “How come she always gets so much?”

  “Because she’s a saint.” Dee Dee Evangelista sighed, visions of a Betsy Wetsy miracle swirling around her head.

  “’Cause she’s so ugly,” Tony Panatela said, the barb stinging less with the loot in my paws.

  I headed to my favorite spot for savoring penny candy: Snakebite Woods, a cemetery for BB-gunned squirrels and birds and the hideout of the Four Stooges.

  Streetlights buzzed on up and down the street as I circled around and around and down the backside of the hill, but before diving between the trees, I leaned forward and listened for any sign of the Stooges: cackling and snorting, loogie-hawking.

  Though the coast seemed clear—the Stooges hopefully in the village getting their skulls cracked by Dino’s baseball bat—I avoided the downhill path that led to their ground-level box fort, which I had seen during previous expeditions. Instead I darted onto the upward path that crested a rise and snaked down the other side. Twigs snapped under my feet as I aimed for the four-trunked sycamore, its bark peeling off, revealing naked white skin. I contorted myself into the center of the trunks, my own kind of box fort, and dumped an entire mini-box of Mexican jumping beans into my mouth while looking up at the lacy crosshatch of branches already stripped of leaves.

  I peeled off the waxy Necco Wafer wrapper and before shoving the first chalky disc in my mouth I chanted, “The Body of Christ.” I ate one after another until the package was empty.

  The Sugar Daddy took real effort, and as I warmed the taffy in my mouth, I peeled off more strips of sycamore bark and rubbed my hand against the smooth, cool trunk. My mind reeled back in time as I imagined the Adena mound builders who’d once lived here. Perhaps the ground the tree stood on was one of their mounds, and underneath it rested the skeleton of an honored chief wrapped in deerskin or fox fur or whatever they used to preserve their dead.

  My Sugar Daddy finished, I angled out of the tree, squatted down by its base, and picked up a sharp stick to scratch at the earth. I scraped away layers of matted leaves, the smell of mushrooms drifting up. I dug, hoping to find a yellowed human tooth or a pottery shard, some connection to Sweetwater’s original residents. I unearthed acorn caps and worms and pumice stones, of course, but no artifacts, so I unwrapped gumballs and rammed one after another in my mouth. The blending flavors of sour apple, cherry, grape, and dirt congealed into a gritty wad the size of a nectarine. Soon my jaw became sore so I spit the glob into the freshly dug hole, sprinkled in all my candy wrappers and the sucker stick, and started covering it over. Maybe in a thousand years some Judy Jetson girl would unearth them, flatten all those wrappers, and read Necco Wafers and Jumping Beans, words that would have no meaning to her, and she would wonder what message the long-dead person who had buried this treasure had hoped to convey.

  It was a sad cache, and because I could, I reached in my pocket and pulled out the portafortuna. I tugged at the thread and unwound it, going around thirteen times. The square sprang open in my palm, revealing the salt and the rice, the holy medal and gold horn. I sprinkled the contents into the hole, laid the red square on top, and was scooping dirt over it when somewhere in the woods a voice wailed, “Stop!” My hand stilled and I feared that somehow Nonna had discovered me undoing her good magic. I tilted my ear up and heard a sharp crack and then a muffled cry.

  “Quit!” a thin voice pleaded, a voice decidedly not Nonna’s.

  I fell back on my bum but then jumped up and started running toward that word lingering in the air because I knew that voice intimately. Then everything was quiet except for the wind in the trees. I froze, willing my eardrums to pick up any hint of sound, and I heard it: not voices, but bodies jostling. I knew exactly where it was coming from and tiptoed toward the Stooges’ box fort with the four trees serving as corner posts. The goons had filched lumber and nails from various construction sites, but the trees’ asymmetrical growth cycles left wide gaps between the planks.

  A sound like sheets flapping on a clothesline came from inside the fort. I crouched low and tiptoed toward the widest gap between the slats, wondering what torture the Stooges had cooked up now.

  I held my breath and peered in, though I didn’t think I’d be able to make out much since the sun was nearly gone. Nearly. At first all I could see were stripes of dim blue light filtering in from the opposite wall. Then movement below, a triangle of something white and as smooth as the skin of a sycamore that had shed its bark. And it was skin, a shoulder. Not one of the Stooges’, but Ray-Ray’s bare shoulder blade, though he was mostly facing away from me as he knelt and hovered over whoever it was he was wrestling with, a figure almost completely hidden by Ray-Ray. I wondered what game this was and then, when I saw the other boy’s bony knees, his pants tangled around his ankles, wondered if it was a game at all. A tinny voice inside my head started chanting, No-no-no-no, because I didn’t want the other boy to be who I already knew it was. Ray-Ray gri
pped a handful of the boy’s golden hair and yanked his head back. “Be still!” The boy tried to wrench free, twist his head out from under Ray-Ray, and I saw his porcelain cheek streaked with dirt, a petrified look in his eyes, a look that I’ve tried to gouge out of my brain ever since.

  A hot wave rushed over me, under me, through me. I ran away, branches whipping my face, scratching my skin, as I careened forward and found myself crouched before that four-trunked sycamore, a tree sturdy enough to lean on while my head flopped forward and I puked onto the grave I had so recently dug. I vomited up all of Mr. Julietto’s candy, the jumping beans, the Necco Wafers, innocent delights I had just indulged in so fully but that I would never be able to enjoy again.

  Then my body started shuddering as the ground rumbled beneath my feet. I don’t think I imagined water leaking out of a fissure in the dirt. I heard what sounded like percolating coffee from inside the earth and I started to run.

  I burst out of Snakebite Woods just as something exploded at the top of the hill. Whatever it was, I wanted it to blow us all to smithereens: Me, Mom, Dad, Nicky, and most of all, Ray-Ray. I raced up the hill feeling mist on my face, not rain exactly, not snow or ice. It was dark by then and I tripped and stumbled more than once. The neighbors’ porch lights pinged on all along our street as I scrabbled up the middle of the road, seeing the image of my brother’s petrified face, that look in his eyes, and Ray-Ray. Something surged from the pit of my gut and shot from my fingers, eye sockets, mouth until every streetlight on the hill began humming and sputtering. They surged as I ran under them and one after another they exploded, sparks and glass shattering on the now-wet road, crunching under my sneakers. Porch lights popped like gunshots, neighbors rushing outside: “Hey! What’s going on?” I charged upward, around and around, panting, lungs burning as I left a trail of darkness in my frenzied wake. I scrambled up our cement steps, skinning my shin on one sharp edge before banging through the front door, not caring about our own crackling porch light, or the table lamp, or the overhead hall light, all sizzling and then snapping us into darkness.