Chapter 2 - THE DIALECT HIS MOTHER USED
Every smart part of me told me to lower my eyes.
Apologize.
Walk away.
Keep the job.
Keep breathing.
Instead, I heard my mother’s voice.
Not from a memory I invited.
From the kitchen of the apartment where I grew up.
Her hands dusted with flour.
A pot of tomato sauce simmering.
Her correcting my pronunciation because, according to her, Americans murdered Sicilian vowels with enthusiasm.
Never let somebody insult you in a language they think you don’t understand.
She had said that once.
I had been twelve.
So I looked directly at Salvo Romano and answered in the same old Palermo dialect.
“If you’re going to call me stupid, at least do it accurately.”
The younger associate stopped smiling.
Anthony Moretti’s face went blank.
Salvo did not move.
I continued.
“I tripped because your carpet has a loose thread near the table leg.”
I pointed toward it.
“And if your eighty-dollar appetizer came with enough manners to match the price, perhaps you’d insult people after confirming they cannot understand you.”
Somewhere near the fireplace, a glass touched a table too loudly.
Salvo stared at me.
His expression had changed.
Not anger.
Something stranger.
Recognition.
Then he spoke again in Sicilian.
Slower.
“Where did you learn that?”
“Home.”
“From who?”
“My mother.”
His eyes narrowed.
“What part of Sicily?”
I hesitated.
“Palermo.”
“Palermo is not a neighborhood.”
“I know.”
“Where?”
“Kalsa.”
Anthony’s head turned sharply.
There.
I saw it.
Salvo saw it too.
He looked at Anthony.
Then back at me.
“What was your mother’s name?”
My heartbeat changed.
“That has nothing to do with the wine.”
“No.”
His voice went quieter.
“It doesn’t.”
My manager, Anthony Moretti—not related to Salvo’s consigliere despite the same surname, a coincidence New York produced more often than outsiders believed—finally rushed toward the table.
“Mr. Romano, Mia is very sorry.”
Mia.
My name.
Salvo repeated it.
“Mia what?”
Anthony looked at me.
I did not answer immediately.
That made Salvo’s security men notice.
“Mia Caruso.”
The silver-haired consigliere stopped breathing.
Not figuratively.
His chest simply paused.
Salvo looked at him.
“Gianni?”
So that was his name.
Gianni Marino.
One of the men whose photograph I had seen in newspaper stories about union disputes and waterfront investigations.
Gianni whispered:
“Caruso?”
I looked between them.
“What?”
Salvo stood.
The entire room changed.
Not because he moved quickly.
Because everyone else adjusted around him.
He was tall.
Taller than he looked sitting.
“Your mother.”
His voice had lost all trace of mockery.
“First name.”
I felt the old defensive wall rise.
“Why?”
“Because I asked.”
I almost laughed.
“Then no.”
Anthony nearly fainted.
Salvo stared.
I held his gaze even though my knees had become unreliable.
Finally, he nodded once.
“That was badly phrased.”
The entire private dining room looked more shocked by his correction than by my Sicilian.
He tried again.
“May I know your mother’s name?”
That was different.
“Lucia.”
Gianni sat down.
Hard.
Salvo looked at him.
“You know her.”
Gianni stared at me.
“Lucia Caruso had a daughter?”
My mouth went dry.
“Has.”
Silence.
“My mother is alive.”
At least I hoped she was.
No one corrected me.
That made everything worse.
Salvo asked:
“When did you last see her?”
I felt something cold move through my stomach.
“Seven years ago.”
His expression changed.
“She disappeared?”
“Yes.”
“How old were you?”
“Twenty.”
“What happened?”
“My mother left for work.”
“Never came home.”
“Police decided she’d left voluntarily.”
“Did you believe that?”
“No.”
The answer came too fast.
Because I had never believed it.
Lucia Caruso did not abandon grocery lists half written.
She did not leave her passport in a kitchen drawer.
She did not vanish without the blue rosary she had carried since Sicily.
She did not leave me.
I knew that.
Nobody else cared.
Until now.
Gianni whispered:
“Jesus Christ.”
I looked at him.
“What do you know?”
Salvo turned.
“Gianni.”
The warning was gentle.
That angered me more.
“No.”
Both men looked at me.
“You asked me questions.”
I placed the empty Barolo bottle on the table.
“Now I’m asking.”
Gianni’s tired eyes moved toward the other guests.
Salvo understood.
He looked at Anthony, my manager.
“Close this section.”
Anthony blinked.
“What?”
“Everyone not at my table moves to the main room.”
The senator in the corner suddenly found his dessert extremely interesting.
Anthony started moving guests.
I said:
“I’m working.”
Salvo looked at me.
“Not anymore tonight.”
My pulse jumped.
“Are you firing me?”
“No.”
“You don’t employ me.”
“Correct.”
His mouth shifted almost imperceptibly.
“You’re still not carrying another bottle while your hands are shaking.”
I hated that he noticed.
I hated more that he was right.
Ten minutes later, the smoked-glass doors closed.
Only Salvo.
Gianni.
Two trusted men.
Me.
My manager hovering outside.
Salvo removed the ruined shoe and handed it to one of his men.
Then looked at me.
“For the record.”
“What?”
“I should not have spoken about you that way.”
The apology was so unexpected I almost missed it.
“You insult every waitress after spilled wine?”
“No.”
“Just me?”
His jaw tightened.
“I was angry.”
“That’s not an excuse.”
“No.”
That mattered.
Not enough.
But mattered.
Then Gianni spoke.
“Your mother worked for Salvo’s father.”
I stared.
“What?”
“Not the way you think.”
“How do you know what I think?”
Fair point.
Gianni continued.
“Lucia translated.”
“For what?”
“Meetings.”
“Letters.”
“Old-country contacts.”
My mother?
The woman who cleaned medical offices and made wedding cakes on weekends?
“No.”
“She was a medical receptionist.”
“In America.”
Gianni nodded.
“Before that?”
I said nothing.
Because I knew almost nothing about her life before New York.
Only Sicily.
A widowed aunt.
A boat.
A crowded apartment.
Stories with important pieces missing.
Salvo sat.
“My father trusted very few people.”
“He trusted Lucia.”
“Why?”
“She spoke Sicilian, Italian, English, and French.”
I stared.
French?
My mother had never told me.
Gianni continued:
“She could listen to three men lie in three languages and remember which version contradicted the others.”
That sounded like her.
Painfully.
“What happened seven years ago?”
Silence.
Salvo looked at Gianni.
The older man answered.
“She called me.”
My heartbeat stopped.
“When?”
“The night she disappeared.”
Everything inside me went quiet.
“What did she say?”
“She said she found something.”
“What?”
“She wouldn’t tell me by phone.”
“Then?”
“She asked to meet.”
“Did you?”
Gianni looked ashamed.
“No.”
My hands curled.
“Why?”
“I was dealing with something else.”
I laughed.
One broken sound.
“Something else.”
“Mia—”
“No.”
Seven years of police indifference suddenly had a face.
“You knew she was afraid.”
“Yes.”
“You knew she had worked around dangerous men.”
“Yes.”
“And you didn’t go.”
Gianni looked down.
“No.”
Salvo did not defend him.
Good.
I asked:
“Did your father know?”
Salvo’s face changed.
“My father was dying.”
“When did he die?”
“Six months later.”
“And you?”
“I was twenty-six.”
Not yet boss, maybe.
Still inside the family.
“Did you know my mother existed?”
“Yes.”
“Did you know she disappeared?”
A pause.
“No.”
I believed him.
Not because he deserved trust.
Because the surprise in his face had been too clean.
Then Gianni reached inside his suit.
One of Salvo’s security men shifted.
Gianni pulled out no weapon.
A photograph.
Old.
Creased.
He placed it on the table.
My mother.
Younger.
Maybe thirty.
Standing outside a restaurant in Palermo beside four people.
One was Gianni.
One was a younger man who looked unmistakably like Salvo.
Not Salvo himself.
His father.
And beside Lucia stood a woman I had never seen.
Dark hair.
Long face.
A small scar near her eyebrow.
Salvo stared at that woman.
His face went white.
“Where did you get this?”
Gianni whispered:
“Lucia gave it to me.”
“When?”
“Seven years ago.”
Salvo picked up the photograph.
His hand actually shook.
I looked at the unknown woman.
“Who is she?”
Nobody answered.
“Who?”
Salvo finally looked at me.
“My mother.”
I froze.
Salvo Romano’s mother had died when he was nine.
Everyone knew that much.
Car accident in Sicily.
Family tragedy.
Old gossip.
But the photograph was dated on the back.
I turned it over.
My breath stopped.
The date was twelve years after Salvo’s mother supposedly died.
I looked at him.
Then Gianni.
“No.”
Salvo’s voice became almost inaudible.
“My mother was alive.”
May you like
Gianni closed his eyes.
“And Lucia knew.”
