“It’s a Greek custom,” Leo explains, his voice softer. “The first son is named for the paternal grandfather. The first daughter for the paternal grandmother.” He nods toward the knitting corner. “Hence, Leo, myself. And Maria.” He gestures with his chin toward his sister, who’s laughing with a cousin by the dessert table and then his grandmother.
“That’s a beautiful tradition,” I say.
“It keeps the names alive,” Michalis says. “Keeps the family connected.”
“So your parents moved to America, too?”
“Later, yes. In the seventies. After we open the restaurant.” He leans back in his chair. “When we first come here, my parents stay in Greece. They are older, they do not want to leave. But then my father, he get sick. Heart problems. And the hospital inour village—ach—not good. So I bring them here. We sponsor them, we get them green cards, and they come live with us for few years. Then they get citizenship.”
“How does that work? The citizenship?”
“You live here for five years with green card, you take test, you become citizen. My whole family do this. Is not easy—the test is in English, you have to know American history, the government—but we all study together and we all pass.” He says this with clear pride and a wide, gentle smile. “Now we are American. But we are still Greek. You can be both, you see.”
I flip through more pages of the album, smiling at each one. There’s little Leo on a red tricycle, grinning at the camera with his wild hair. Leo and Maria sitting on their grandmother’s lap, both of them holding cookies. Leo in a school photo, maybe six or seven, wearing a button-up shirt that’s too big for him, his expression serious. Maria in a white communion dress, all ribbons and lace.
There’s a report card with “Leonidas Michalis Roussos” written at the top in careful teacher handwriting. A drawing Leo made of what appears to be a boat. A pressed flower taped to a page with “From Maria, age 4” written underneath in Irene’s handwriting.
I think about how much love went into this. How much care. Every photo carefully placed, every moment preserved. I’ve never seen a baby album of mine. I don’t think my parents ever kept one.
I stop at a color photo. A younger Michalis and Irene, beaming, stand in front of a storefront with a new sign: ROUSSOS. A little Leo, hair still defiantly upright, and a tiny Maria in a frilly dress stand proudly in front of them.
“Did you always know you wanted to open a restaurant?” I ask.
Michalis reaches over and plucks a golden, syrup-soaked pastry from a nearby platter. It looks like a twisted, fried doughnut. He takes a bite, dusting his beard with powdered sugar. “Mmm.Loukoumades. Here, try.” He pushes the platter toward me before answering. “Not a restaurant specifically,” he says, chewing thoughtfully. “But I always knew I wanted to work for myself. Ever since I was a small boy, I did not do well with authority. I did not like people telling me what to do—except my parents, of course, because they would hit me.” He says this casually, like it’s just a fact of life. “But bosses?Ach.I hated bosses. So I always knew—I wanted my own business. And America, this was perfect place for that.”
Leo snorts and leans over to me. “That’s where Maria gets it from.”
Michalis laughs, slapping the table. “Yes! She is exactly like me, that one. Very stubborn. Very—how you say—headstrong. She does not like when I tell her what to do at the restaurant, but too bad. Is my restaurant.”
“Why wouldn’t owning your own business work in Greece?” I ask.
He sets down his dessert and leans forward, his expression becoming more serious. “In Greece, in the sixties especially, if you want to open business, you needed connections. You needed to know the right people, pay the right bribes. And even then, the bureaucracy—panagia mou—so much paperwork, so many rules, so many people with their hand out wanting money. And if you were from a small village like us? Forget it. Nobody take you serious.”
He shakes his head.
“Here, in America, is different. You want to open business? You save money, you get loan from bank, you file paperwork, you open. Is that simple. Noteasy—very hard work—but simple.Nobody care where you come from or who your family is. You work hard, you can make it happen.”
He picks up his dessert again, taking another bite.
“When I come here, I work with my cousin in a restaurant. Greek diner in Queens. And I realize—eh, I like this. I like to cook. I like to feed people. And Irene, she love to cook, too, and she’s always been good with people. So we start saving. Every week, we put money away. Took us years to save enough to open Roussos. Years of working two, sometimes three jobs at a time. But we do it. And you know what I love about America? Here, you can own anything you want if you are willing to work for it, if you are willing to bleed a little.”
“He loves America,” Leo says, his tone fondly teasing. “He’ll give you the speech.”
“It is not a speech, it is the truth!” Michalis insists, turning to me with passionate earnestness. “Here, you can own a business, a home, get an education. The education here!” His eyes light up. “The public library!Free!My children, they went to college, they got degrees.” He gestures toward Leo. “In Greece, if you are poor, you go to school until you are fourteen, maybe fifteen, then you work. That is it. Here? My son, he go to university, and now heworksat university.Columbia University.You understand? My son, whose father could not read until he was twelve years old, is now professor at one of the best universities in America.”
His voice cracks slightly. “I will always be grateful to this country. It gave my family a foundation to build on. But…” He taps his chest, over his heart. “You never forget the soil you come from. The smell of the air in your village, the sound of your language in the street. That is your…your compass. It tells you who you are. America gave us the future. But Greece?” He smiles, a little sadly, a little proudly. “Greece gave us our bones. You need both to stand tall.”
Michalis looks at me, his eyes warm. “You understand what I am saying?”
I nod, not trusting my voice.
He closes the album gently, as if putting a cherished child to bed. “Good. Now,” he says, the solemnity melting into a twinkle. “You have had enough of my stories,koukla. You need some karidopita. Leo, go get her cake.”
“I need to save some room for actual dinner first,” I tell Leo, laughing, as his dad pushes the plate of syrup-drenched cakes toward me. I look at Michalis. “I promise, I’ll have a full tour of the dessert table after.”
Michalis chuckles, a rich, approving sound. “You have a deal.”
Just then, a blur of floral fabric and a plastic firefighter helmet barrels into the room. Emma slides to a stop in her duck boots and, without ceremony, climbs onto Michalis’s lap. She surveys the table of desserts with the gravity of a military general.
