For the first time, he really looked at me. It might have been nicer if he didn’t look so confused or upset or irritated, whatever that look was.
“He is dead.”
“Oh,” I said and frowned. I peered around me at all the sad, teary faces. The black clothing. The walk from the church. The cemetery headstones around us. “Oh.”
“Yes, oh.”
“Don’t roll your eyes at me. I’ve never been to a funeral before.” Why was he looking at me like that? “I’m not strange.”
“Your parents…they are of the life, no?”
“The life?”
“Ah,” he exclaimed, “that makes many sense.”
“What does? Oh, come on. Tell me. Please, please, please, pleeeease.” He still didn’t answer me. “Well, you’re no fun.”
He sighed. “It is a funeral. He is dead. It is not supposed to be fun.”
I gazed up at the box. No, not a box, a casket. This funeral was probably exactly why Mammina and Babbo had argued this morning about leaving me behind at the vacation house with the nanny. For once, I was glad Babbo won the argument. And he won without hurting Mammina or making her cry. That was one of the best parts. The second was that even with the sad people and all, I was so happy to be here. I’d made a new friend. My first friend in the last two weeks since our plane landed, which was for-e-ver ago.
“Will you miss him?”
“Who?”
I pointed at the box and ignored the glare from the boy’s mother. She didn’t look like much fun with that serious stare, no matter how pretty she was.
“Your grandfather, silly,” I whispered behind the back of my hand.
“Oui.” He nodded. Did that sound mean yes, then? “Absolument.”
I needed to learn French, I decided. That way, he and I could talk in our own secret language, and almost no one would understand us.
“I miss my dolls back home. Do you miss him like that?”
He barked out a laugh, then schooled his face quickly, though his lips seemed to twitch here and there. He reminded me of mybrother Renzo, who never tried to show more emotion than he had to. Well, except with me. I could make Renzo laugh even on his worst days.
His older brother, probably about Renzo’s age, peeked around their mother and glared at me. There was something in his eyes that sent a chill down my spine. Ghosts looked friendlier, especially with those scars around his mouth. My new friend had a scar too, big and long, around his right eye and down to his chin, but it didn’t make him look mean. I don’t know why, but his older brother just looked half-dead inside and angry about it. I ducked my head and avoided his gaze. At least my new friend had kind eyes. Sad but kind.
“Here.” I tugged my friend’s arm to stop his walking.
Ignoring his mother’s gasp, I handed Gilly over to him, my most prized and beloved friend. He seemed like he needed Gilly more than I did. “You can have her. Maybe she’ll make you feel better.”
My new friend’s eyes weren’t on Gilly, though, but on my hand. His mother had stopped walking, her hands covering her mouth, eyes oddly wide, with fat tears gliding down her smooth cheeks. Those walking with the box had stopped too and even angled around to look back at us. Well, now I just felt all jittery and awkward. So many people were watching us as if I’d done something wrong.
“What’s going on?” I whispered to the boy a little frantically.
Mammina hurried up from the rear of the line of walkers, dragging Renzo with her. Her repeated, soft “scusi” were like a beacon. It didn’t matter that we lived in San Francisco; Mammina never gave up on speaking Italian as much as possible, even if other people didn’t understand. Babbo strutted calmly behind them, his green eyes much like mine, squinted into flat lines. That couldn’t be good. I trembled, hoping I was wrong.
“I just wanted to give you Gilly.”
“You are touching me,” my new friend said, looking at me and my hand as if it were one of those horribly complicated five-hundred-piece puzzles my nanny was always trying to get me to do.
It was then that Mammina swept between us and pulled me behind her black dress with a swish of fabric across my face. Gilly dropped to the wet gravel. I tried to reach for her, but Mammina wouldn’t let me go.
“I am so terribly sorry, Signora De Villier. My daughter can be overzealous at times.” Whatever overzealous meant, it didn’t sound very good when my mother used the same tone she used when trying to calm my father when he was upset. I tried to peek around her to look at my friend, to see if he still looked so confused and sad, but she kept shoving me back.
“You’re in trouble now,” Renzo singsonged beside me. The big oaf. I stuck my tongue out at him, rewarded with plops of rainwater. How many could I catch?
