“Berger’s asking where to eat near the hotel,” he says. Casual. Too casual. “I’ll send him somewhere.”
He types for three seconds. Sets the phone face down. Meets my eyes for half a beat. The restaurant is fifteen minutes from the hotel. The team is scattered across Newark. The probability of someone walking through that door is low but not zero.
Nonna touches my arm. “Isaiah. More bread.”
“I’m fine, thank you.”
“You’re not fine. You barely ate.” She pushes the basket with the same three-inch precision she used earlier, and I take a piece because I am not going to argue with this woman tonight or, I suspect, ever.
Nonna leans toward me near the end of the meal. Her hand finds my wrist. Her voice is low, pitched just for me, and her eyes are the same eyes that studied me across Avi’s kitchen two weeks ago.
“You are patient,” she says. Two words. She pats my wrist once and turns back to her water.
The sidewalk outside is February in New Jersey. A different cold than Atlanta. Sharper. The kind that finds the gap at your collar. The family left first. Ma kissed Teo on both cheeks and then kissed me on both cheeks before I could prepare for it. Gina squeezed my arm. Jackie gave me a nod that felt less like a goodbye than a ratification. Nicole said “the eggplant was undersalted” to no one in particular as she walked out, and I respected that.
Nonna held my hand at the door. Both of hers around one of mine. She looked at me the way she looked at me at Avi’s house.Steady. Then she let go and walked out with her cane and her daughter’s arm and her coat buttoned to the throat.
Teo and I stand three feet apart on a sidewalk in Newark. We are not touching. The three-foot gap, representing perception versus reality, is what we always navigate.
“Your family is a lot,” I say.
“I know.”
“Jackie is going to run a background check on me.”
“She already did. In December.”
I look at him. He looks at me. The grin is there but it’s the quiet one, the one from his apartment when the lights are low and he thinks I’m not paying attention. The one that means something he hasn’t said with words yet.
“Thank you,” I say. “For managing all of that.”
“That’s what you do for your people,” he says. Simple. Not a confession. Just a fact, stated the way he states all his facts, plainly, with the full weight of meaning underneath.
I carry it back to the hotel. Along with the cold at my collar and the warmth of his mother’s hands on my face and the weight of five women who knew my name before I sat down and decided I was worth feeding.
Marchetti Sisters Chat #2
Gina
she called him wonderful, Matteo
Teo
I know
Jackie
she doesn’t call anyone wonderful
Nicole
she called Papa wonderful. and the priest. that’s the list
Gina
that is the COMPLETE list. and now Isaiah is on it
Jackie
