Page 18 of Feared

“Mare!” El Virus picked up Mary’s fork, stabbed a ravioli, and was just about to try to put it in Mary’s mouth when Anthony intercepted the fork.

“Ma, stop, she can feed herself.” Anthony set the fork down on Mary’s plate.

“But Ant, look at her! She looks so tired!”

“She looks fine,” Anthony said, patting Mary’s arm.

Tony-From-Down-The-Block said, “I think she looks good.”

Feet said, “I think she looks good, too.”

“OF COURSE SHE DOES! SHE’S GORGEOUS!”

Mary smiled at her father, but let the others talk, having grown accustomed to everyone discussing her as if she weren’t in the room, deciding what she should and shouldn’t do, what she should and shouldn’t eat, or whether she should or shouldn’t work, exercise, or otherwise exist.

El Virus was saying, “Matty, are youblind? Take a good look at your daughter! Her face is white as a ghost!”

Anthony looked over at his mother. “Mom, she’s not sick, she’s pregnant.”

“Right.” Mary managed another smile, but sometimes pregnant felt like sick, though it would’ve been politically incorrect to say so.

El Virus waved him off, her gelled nails thickly red, like a manicured vulture. “Ant’n’y, you’re a man, you don’t know! I fainted all the time, carryin’ you and your brother. She has to eat for her blood sugar!”

“Her blood sugar is fine.” Anthony sat down as Mary’s father and The Tonys settled into their seats and began passing the steaming platter of ravioli, which trailed an aroma of tomatoes, oregano, and fresh basil. Mary’s mother hovered, waiting for Mary to need something before she sat down, dressed in her flowery housedress, with her arthritic fingers forming a gnarled ball at her waist and her gray hair teased to cover her bald spot.

“Maria, drink some water, you gotta drink.”

“I will, Ma.”

“Drink!”

“Look, see?” Mary raised the water glass and took a sip, like a drinking demonstration, and her mother smiled, leaning over and giving her a kiss on the cheek and a little back rub.

“Love you,cara.”

“Love you, too, Ma.”

“So good you come home.”

“I’m happy to.” Mary kept her smile on, feeling guilty that she didn’t mean it completely. Her mother loved her to the marrow, as did her father and The Tonys, and her family meant everything to her. But she’d had such a horrible day at work, with the firm being sued, the press conference that went sideways, and the fighting between John and Anne, that everything suddenly seemed like too much, on top of her pregnancy.

“Mare, you need to take it easy, you work too hard.” El Virus pulled up a chair next to Mary, her Opium perfume as thick as tomato sauce. Mary tried not to breathe in, newly sensitive to smells, but the scent was her mother-in-law’s trademark, along with her jet-black shag, bedazzled skinny jeans, and white tank top that readWorld’s Best Grandma. It struck Mary that her mother-in-law dressed much younger, while her mother dressed much older, in the stop-time tradition of the DiNunzios.

Mary looked around, seeing the kitchen with new eyes. Everything was from another era; the dented spaghetti pot and coffee percolator had to be fifty years old, and her mother didn’t own a garbage disposal or dishwasher, still doing the dishes by hand and collecting the “slop” in a metal bin in the sink. An old church calendar faded on the walls, with a washed-out Jesus Christ looking heavenward, or maybe rolling his eyes, undoubtedly wondering why her parents had no air conditioner but still used a fan, which whirred away on the kitchen counter, evenly distributing the humidity. The Mass cards tucked behind the switchplate with dried palm were the only thing that ever changed here, growing in number as their relatives and friends passed away. Vita and Matty DiNunzio were getting older, and Mary felt the years closing in, along with everything else.

Tony-From-Down-The-Block tucked his napkin in his T-shirt collar like an adult bib, which Mary happened to know he had on with his adult diapers, so like a one-man Circle of Life. He said, “She should quit work. That’s what I think. She shouldn’t work while she’s pregnant.”

“Si, si, e vero.”Pigeon Tony nodded, his bald head already deeply tanned since he spent so much time outside with his homing pigeons.

Feet pushed up his Mr. Potatohead glasses, clucking. “Mare, you gotta slow down. It’s crazy, it’s too much.”

“SHE LIKES TA WORK. SHE’S GOT A BUSINESS TO RUN.”

Feet frowned, his milky-brown eyes magnified by his bifocals. “But she can’t work right up to the time the baby comes.”

“Sure, I can, I’m fine.” Mary glanced at Anthony, who was looking down at his plate as he ate.

El Virus pointed at Mary’s food. “Mare, eat!”