James that she was odd this time, mercurial and withdrawn, even from the children, although as soon as he’d said it he realized she had been that way for some time. Once he’d found her sitting on the floor, just looking at her good china. He couldn’t believe that was normal.
“Women have these strange fancies when they’re expecting, Tom,” James had said, shaking his big handsome head and smiling, and they had left it at that. James had never been the kind of brother to whom Tommy could confess that he feared his wife’s strange fancy was for some guinea with big forearms from the old neighborhood.
He could not believe that she missed that portion of her life. She rarely went to see her father, sending Maggie instead, and he had not found this peculiar. He remembered going for the first time to her parents’ home, those two old people, this one lovely, lonely child, and thinking that she was out of the world there, as though she lived in one of those little crystal balls with falling snow inside. He had been amazed that she had even learned to dance, had learned the melody to “Moonlight Serenade,” until later, when he had gone to Celeste’s house and seen Connie’s connection to a normal life. He had always felt a touch of pride at having taken her away from all that, the heavy silent mother with the V cut into one front tooth from biting off thread at the sewing machine, the father who took all his affection outdoors and massaged it into the ground around his beloved plants. Once he had found her, pregnant with their second child, planting tomato plants in the backyard, before one of his sisters-in-law had made a comment about how well Italians did such things, and he had seen tears fall down upon her dirty hands. “I miss my father,” she had said, although the old man was only twenty minutes away by car. “Go over and see him,” Tom had replied, but she just shook her head. “You don’t understand,” she had said, sobbing. “Sometimes people are near but they might as well be on the moon.” He thought he understood now what she had been saying then.
“How’s everything else?” he finally said to his brother to break the silence.
“Come into the business, Tom,” Mark said, looking up at him.
“Oh Jesus, not this again.”
“Maybe I’ve been going about it the wrong way. I know your wife is pissed that I’ve been bothering you—”
“Says who?” Tommy said.
“She told Gail to tell me to lay off.”
“Go on,” Tommy said.
“But I need your help. Things are changing. There’s a lot to be done.” Mark stared at his hands. “I’ve been going over the books, Tommy. They’re not good. The old man moved a lot of money around in strange ways. I don’t think we’re as solid as he always pretended. Some of the construction companies aren’t making money. He mortgaged two of the apartment buildings for that new equipment we got a couple years ago. It’s going to take some doing to make things right.”
“What do you mean, to make them right?”
“I think the business is in trouble, Tom. I need your help.”
“Jesus,” Tommy said.
“Jack and Joe are all right, but they’re not so smart. I say do something and they do it. But I need a real partner.”
“You’re exaggerating,” Tommy said. “You just want someone to argue with until Pop comes back.”
“I need your help. I need someone to work with. It’d be good.”
“I have a job,” Tommy said, wiping his mouth. “I have a family, I have a house, I have a job.”
“The cement company can run itself. Besides, he told me he’s thinking of selling it off.”
Tommy smiled sourly. “Oh yeah?” he said.
“I figured you knew.”
“He’d go that far?” Tommy said.
“He says it’s never been a big moneymaker.”
“He’s full of shit, Mark,” Tommy said. “The other day at the hospital he told me he was going to have me fired so that I wouldn’t be able to make my mortgage payments and would have to move into that house he bought. He was going to have me fired so that I’d have to work with you to keep food in my kids’ mouths. He’s got a little chessboard in his head and he’s been able to move every piece on the goddamn board except two of them. The last two. Me and my wife. And he won’t rest until the game is over,