Party Foul - Abby Knox Page 0,13
to afford one of those, but maybe one of the small walk-ups. As it was, the only thing available to him in this, his childhood neighborhood, was dingy basement apartments.
The way his grandmother kept him fed, and refused to charge rent, he almost had saved enough for a decent walk-up.
“You know, Billy’s mom has an apartment above their garage, too, if you’re looking for your own space.”
“And how would that be different than living here? She’d still feed me and I’d still feel the need to keep an eye on her.”
“Well, babe, you can’t say you were born into a place where people don’t care about each other,” YaYa said. “Speaking of, I don’t suppose you wanna come to the cancer benefit tomorrow at Holy Rosary?”
“I work tomorrow night at Crow Bar, remember?”
She waved her hand. “I wish you’d quit that place. Ah, there’s no talking sense into you. Anyway, it’s an open house until six. You should have plenty of time.”
“I’ll try,” he said, dumping their empty paper plates into the trash.
Her eyes glinted. “Maybe you’ll meet a nice girl at Holy Rosary.”
He chose to ignore that comment as he continued cleaning up. “Thanks for breakfast. You’re too nice to me.”
“Somebody’s gotta be. You ain’t nice enough to yourself. This is what I’m saying. Those boys at Crow Bar are holding you back. Move on with your life; the place is a dump.”
Levi hoisted his backpack onto his shoulder and grabbed his keys. “I am moving on with my life. I’m on my way to class, in case you didn’t notice. And anyway, is that any way to talk about the place where Pop proposed to you?”
“It used to be a nice place. It used to be you could take a date there. Go to Spinelli’s for dinner, Crow Bar for dancing, a drink, play some darts, see your friends. It’s not like that anymore.”
“It is exactly still like that.”
“You got a bad element there now.”
“Pop was a dockworker just like the rest,” Levi reminded her.
She eyed him. “Some of them ain’t great. You got gangsters hanging around the docks, messing with the Union. The Union used to be a family-centered organization. Helped people. Now they’re just interested in power and collecting dues. And for what? They ain’t helping pay for medical debt, I can tell you that.”
A knot of anxiety walloped his stomach. He couldn’t hide anything when she looked at him like that. “What do you know about gangsters hanging around the docks?”
“I know the Marks’ daughter disappeared, and the police did virtually nothing about it. Nobody’s passing around ribbons or being interviewed in the news when someone from Dockside disappears. It ain’t right.”
“I know it ain’t right. But what are you gonna do about it?”
That was the wrong thing to say to his YaYa. It was exactly the kind of thing that got her blood pressure up.
“I don’t know, but maybe I should look into it,” she said.
Levi set down his backpack and held up both hands in the air. “You don’t want to go digging around, trust me.”
She was on a roll. “I bet that Girardi is involved.”
“YaYa, you don’t know what you’re talking about. You heard what happened to that reporter from the Dispatch who started sniffing around the docks, asking questions.”
“The Union ain’t what it used to be when your Pop was coming up, that’s for sure,” she said.
Levi bit his lip and said, “It ain’t the Dockworkers Union what’s behind the disappearance of the Marks girl.”
His grandmother eyed him suspiciously. He’d said too much.
“Levi, if you know something, you need to tell the authorities and then you need to go talk to Father O’Brien if you’re in some kind of trouble.”
He shook his head and picked up his backpack. “I don’t know nothing! I don’t talk to those guys, I just keep the peace and that’s it. Besides, I haven’t gone to confession since I turned myself in.”
“It might do you good.”
“YaYa, come on.”
“Consider it my Christmas present.”
This made him laugh. If that was all it took to please the older woman, he would do it weekly. There was no area of his life she didn’t want to push him.
“Well I can’t convince you to get away from Crow Bar, but I’m begging you. Hurry up and get your HVAC certification from school, quit that place, move out of this neighborhood, and find you a nice girl. I just want you to be happy, honey.”
“I know, YaYa. I gotta go.”
She opened her