Dark Heart (Dark Heart 1)

I know it’s dangerous. I can’t make the kinds of promises that other people could. And I have secrets. Not intentional ones, but lies of omission—like about the kinds of things I’m doing to keep Tony Diamond and the people above him from shaking down my dad. We can’t go back to that. Not if we’re going to be able to afford Mom’s maintenance chemo pills.

Dad’s been in debt to the Arnoldis for about ten years, since the store flooded and Roberto, one of his customers, loaned him some money. I don’t know exactly what happened, but I can guess it involves a bottle—either plastic or glass. Dad fell behind on his repayment plan, so Roberto would stop by sometimes and try to make him pay up. One day when I was fifteen, I was feeling pissed off. I stepped in front of him when he came toward the door and told him not to come by anymore.

I said something like, “Quit kicking someone who’s already down.”

At the time I didn’t really know who Roberto Arnoldi was. When I told Leo and Alesso, they figured I’d probably wind up sleeping with the fishes, but the opposite happened. Roberto just stopped coming. A year or so later, Tony started stopping by. I told him to fuck off, too, and that’s how I got into this shit with him.

Elise can never, ever know. Of everybody in my life, she’s the one who really believes I’m a good person. And when I’m with her, I feel good. Like I could be good—good enough to justify continuing. And I have to justify it, because I can’t stop. Even though I know I’ve got nothing to offer her.

When she told me about Columbia today, I couldn’t bring myself to tell her I got a scholarship offer there, too. I don’t think I’ll ever make it there. Someone’s got to watch out for my mom and Soren—and keep Tony off our backs.

I tell myself I’m okay with temporary. She’ll move out of her parents’ place and start college, and she’ll find someone better for her. And until then…

I’m on the train, holding the new book I checked out from the library—A Storm of Swords, by George R.R. Martin—when the full weight of all this shit hits me. I really am in love with her. And she said she loves me.

It feels so fucking good…but I feel off the rest of the ride back to Brooklyn.

I grab a bag of donut holes on my walk from the station, and find the shoe store quiet when I arrive. For a second, I stop just inside the door. It looks the same, feels the same, smells the same—leather and dust. I find my father behind the counter; he can’t stand up, so I organize shelves and dust for two hours till he can, and then we walk to the house in silence.

My little brother Soren has cooked dinner—spaghetti with my Tati’s special sauce. My mom’s quiet at the table, maybe upset.

Dad pours himself a glass of sambuca and beckons me into his room. He’s had his own room for years now, right beside mine. Mom sleeps in the master—if you can call it that—and my brother in what really is a closet under the stairs.

When we step into Dad’s room, he leans against his dresser and just looks at me. Up and down, and up and down, and then his face crumples like he might cry. “Luca,” he says, heavy, “there’s something that I’ve gotta tell you…”

He looks mournful, maybe even sorry. His brown eyes are watery. His bushy brows are drawn down. It takes work to keep a cringe off my face. But it doesn’t matter. A second later, he totters toward his bed and face-plants on the mattress.

A minute later, I hear him snoring. “Good talk.”

I wait another minute, but he doesn’t stir. Do I want him to?

I think, as I look down at him, about the conversation I overheard at the wedding reception. Someone warning him—in Italian—about whatever he’s been doing. Probably something to do with his fix.

Part of me still wants to ask him about it, to confront him about his presence at the reception to begin with, but I don’t see the point. It’s an easy guess: for some reason or another, Roberto Arnoldi expected him there, so he went. Even though Roberto has treated my dad like shit.

Before that, he was a longtime customer. I think he was Dad’s friend.

In the kitchen, Mom is slicing homemade cheesecake onto painted clay plates. I make her sit down, then drizzle Hershey’s syrup over the three slices. Mom and Soren and I eat together on the couch, scraping every smidgen off the plates with our forks, watching American Idol.

“Too bad neither one of you is good at singing,” she says.