Home for the Holidays (3 page)

“He
is
an animal—no offense,” Nicky's father said. “He never did anything the easy way his whole life. Isn't he almost old enough to retire?”

“Two more years, he'll have his twenty,” Grandma Tutti said. “Then he can start doing something else.”

“When will he be here?” Nicky asked.

“On the twenty-third,” his father said. “Just in time for Christmas.”

“We'll all be together,” Grandma Tutti said. “We can go to Mass. So I need to find out where's the church.”

“Sure, Ma,” Nicky's father said. “But what church?”

“Who knows?” Grandma Tutti said. “But you don't think
I'm gonna stay out here in the woods with no church, do you? I'll go where you go.”

“Uh, great,” Nicky's father said. “I'll make the arrangements with Clarence. Would you like to go this Sunday?”

“I'd like to go
now,”
Grandma Tutti said. “Or don't you have Friday-night mass in the country? Not that you'd go on a Friday.”

Nicky's father said, “I'll talk to Clarence now.”

An hour later, in the backseat of the big Navigator, Tutti felt a little more at ease. At
least they
have
a church
, she thought, staring out the window as the countryside went by.
All these trees! No buildings! Where are all the people?
It was no wonder her Nicky had seemed lost when she had taken him to St. Peter's, in Bensonhurst. Who could even find another Catholic out there in the woods?

“Hey, Charlie!” she called into the front seat. “If you see one of those markets my daughter-in-law was talking about, you'll stop—right? I might buy a sausage or something.”

“Yes, ma'am,” Clarence said. “You bet I will.” Tutti sat back in her seat. Maybe being in Carrington was going to be okay after all.

3

W
ithin days the Borelli household was transformed. Grandma Tutti attended services at St. Monica's. She found an Italian deli that sold meats and cheeses and bread. Every morning Clarence drove her to church and took her shopping. Every afternoon she entertained guests while she cooked dinner or baked fresh bread or cakes and pastries.

Sometimes the guests were friends she'd made at church or at the deli. One afternoon three very old Italian ladies came for cookies and coffee. The next afternoon Grandma Tutti made cannoli for Father David, the young priest from St. Monica's.

Sometimes the guests were Nicky's mother's friends. Mrs. Feingold and Mrs. Carpenter, two of his mother's golf pals from the country club, stopped by one afternoon
to meet Grandma Tutti—as if they were going to see some exotic animal at the zoo. The next afternoon two of her friends from the Carrington Prep PTA dropped by.

Tutti charmed them all. She told stories about her childhood, about Bath Avenue, about her late husband. She shared recipes and cooking tips and gave advice. Father David had a bad back; she told him to spread Vicks VapoRub on it and then lie down on a hot, damp towel. Mrs. Carpenter had sinus infections; Grandma Tutti told her to go to church every day and light a candle. Marian Galloway, Nicky's mother's best friend, who lived in the large Cape Cod next door, was recently widowed and dating again; Grandma Tutti told her, “I'm sorry for your loss. Learn to cook and you will find a new husband.” She invited Marian to come around the following afternoon and watch her cook baked ziti.

Nicky's friends came around more often, too. Noah and Chad both asked if they could stay for dinner. They'd eaten Nicky's mother's cooking plenty of times. They liked Grandma Tutti's better.

Even Nicky's father was home for dinner most nights. He was still busy with his law practice, and with his plans to turn the old Fairport brewery building into housing for the poor—with Peter Van Allen's help.

But there was a problem. The Fairport deal had to be done by the first day of the new year. Van Allen said he might have trouble raising enough money by then. “I
have
the money, of course,” he said. “But it's tied up in other
projects.” Nicky's father was going to have to invest some of his own money to finish the deal by January 1.

“Isn't that risky?” Nicky's mother asked. “I thought we weren't investing any of our money.”

“I know,” Nicky's father said. “But it's Peter Van Allen. It's not like we're going into business with some crook. It couldn't be safer.”

But despite the difficulties, he managed to finish his work and get to the table almost every night in time for Grandma Tutti's braciole, or her steak
pizzaiola
, or her chicken parm.

Some nights, he'd find Nicky or his wife or both up to their elbows in red sauce as they helped Grandma Tutti put the finishing touches on the evening meal. Sometimes Marian Galloway would come, too. She and Nicky's mother would have a glass of wine and watch Grandma Tutti bake bread, make ricotta cheesecake or stuff a chicken with bread crumbs.

After dinner, Nicky's father would ask Clarence to build a fire. The four Borellis would sit in the living room—a room that, until then, had been used only for entertaining company—and just talk. Nicky's father found a CD compilation called
Christmas for Italians.
Every night for the next two days, they sat in front of the fire and listened to Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and Tony Bennett sing “Silver Bells,” “Winter Wonderland” and “Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!”

Then, just days before Christmas, it
did
snow. Nicky
went downstairs early one morning to find that Car-rington
was
a winter wonderland. He whooped and hollered and made his mother bust out his snow gear. With his parka, ski pants and heavy boots on, Nicky went out into his backyard and spent the next two hours making a snowman and throwing snowballs at it. Then he turned on the jets in the hot tub, put on his bathing suit and timed how long it took to melt a snowball in hot water.

After lunch, Nicky had Clarence drive him and his friends Chad and Jordan to Glen Forks, a woody park where the boys sometimes went for a hike or a picnic.

That day, it was filled with kids on sleds, flying down the hiking trails, crashing into trees or each other, laughing and red cheeked with the cold and the excitement.

“Let's try going down the big hill,” Nicky said, but no one would. “Come on!” he begged. “Halfway?” No one would.
When Tommy gets here
, he thought,
I bet he'll do it with me.

Nicky and his friends spent the rest of the day carving trails in the snow and seeing who could go the farthest or the fastest or the longest time standing up.

Nicky went home exhausted. He couldn't
wait
for Tommy to come.

Uncle Frankie arrived, full of noise and packages and hugs, two days before Christmas. He sat with the Borellis in front of the fire that night, Grandma Tutti at his side, Nicky smiling up at him, Nicky's father and mother laughing at
his stories. Nicky's father poured glasses of sweet dessert wine for Nicky's mother and Frankie.

“Look at this,” Frankie said. “Fancy wine. A fire in the fireplace. Snow all around. It's like Christmas in the Sears catalog or something. Almost like a real family,
Amerigan
style!”

“I'm glad you're here,” Nicky's father said. “I hate to think of all the Christmases you weren't.”

“Ah, it's water under the bridge,” Frankie said. “Let's let bygones be bygones. Hey, what's a bygone? Nicky?”

“I'm not sure. Something that's gone by already?”

“So, old acquaintance should be forgot, right? No, that's New Year's Eve.”

“I think so,” Nicky said.

“Whatever. I'm at home with my brother and his family, and it's the holidays,” Frankie said, and raised his glass.
“Salute!
To your health!”

Nicky's father and mother raised their wineglasses. Grandma Tutti said, “If only your father was here!” and took out her handkerchief.

“Are you kidding? He'd run for his life back to Brooklyn!” Frankie said. “Can you imagine the old man here in Caramel Town?”

“He'd hate it,” Nicky's father said. “All these trees! All this snow! Where's he gonna get a
Racing Form?
Where's he gonna buy his vino? Who's gonna get him some grappa?”

“He'd be proud of you, though,” Frankie said. “This is some house. He'd want to know how many families you got living here. How many square feet is it?”

“Just over five thousand,” Nicky's father said.

“Is that the house or the lot?”

“That's the house.”

“Jeez,” Frankie said. “I don't think I've ever been in a place this big. Except professionally. You remember that wiseguy Eddie Beets? He was a boss with the Marinello organization. He had a house on Long Island. We found bags and bags of heroin in the walls of his study. I said, ‘Hey, Eddie, what's this?’ He said, ‘It looks like insulation. Ask the contractor.’”

“Well, I paid for mine the old-fashioned way,” Nicky's father said. “I earned it, working my fingers to the bone like our old man did.”

“Please! You're a lawyer,” Frankie said. “And a very good one, I guess. I'm proud to be your little brother.”

“Listen to that,” Grandma Tutti said. “Isn't that nice? If only your father—”

“Look what I did,” Frankie said. “She's going again. Stop, Ma!”

Grandma Tutti had been getting ready for days. The following morning, she began cooking the traditional Christmas Eve meal—the Feast of the Seven Fishes.

Before sunrise she was in the kitchen, cutting, chopping, cleaning, boiling, frying, steaming and roasting her way through a mountain of groceries. Nicky and his mother spent almost the whole day helping.

On the menu were seven kinds of fish, made into seven different traditional Italian dishes. There would be
shrimp
oreganata
, fried calamari, linguine with clams, baked mussels, lobster Diavolo and more.

On the guest list were half a dozen of the Borellis' closest friends, including their next-door neighbor Marian Galloway, her daughter Amy, Tutti's new friend Father David—and Peter Van Allen and his wife, Gloria. The Van Aliens were not friends, exactly, and Nicky certainly wasn't looking forward to seeing their son, Dirk. But Nicky's father needed Mr. Van Allen's money for the old Fairport brewery building. Inviting them seemed like a good way to butter him up. There wasn't a person alive who could resist Grandma Tutti's cooking. That and a few glasses of holiday wine, and Mr. Van Allen would be putty in Nicky's father's hands.

Clarence had built a huge fire in the living room. A catering service had sent over two waiters—dressed in matching black and white outfits, with festive red vests— to serve drinks and appetizers and help with dinner. Nicky's mother had decorated the house with wreaths and mistletoe and candles.

The guests stood in the living room with cocktails, listening politely while Father David more or less repeated Sunday's sermon. Then Uncle Frankie came into the room and everything changed. He shook hands with everybody, greeting them as if they were old friends. He said to Peter Van Allen, who had arrived with his wife but without his son, “Hey, Petey, how you doin'?” He slapped Father David on the back and said, “Hiya, Father. How's things with the Big Guy? I'm only kidding!”

Amy clinked glasses with Nicky and they sipped their eggnog. “Merry Christmas, Nicholas,” she said, and flipped her blond hair. “I like your uncle. He's funny.”

“He's great,” Nicky said, then whispered, “How come Dirk's not here? Is he grounded or something?”

“Yeah, right,” Amy said. “Like he's ever been grounded for
anything.
I think he had tickets to a hockey game.”

That's a relief
, Nicky wanted to say—but didn't. He didn't know the details, but he'd heard that Amy and Dirk were sort of boyfriend-girlfriend. He couldn't imagine how a nice girl like Amy … But it was none of his business.

When it was time for dinner, Nicky was disappointed to find he was seated far away from his uncle Frankie, and far away from Amy, too. He wasn't sure it was an accident. Amy was seated next to Mrs. Van Allen, which made sense—that boyfriend-girlfriend thing must be true—and Frankie was seated next to Marian Galloway. They seemed to be getting along well.
Very
well. Nicky's mother saw him looking at them, and she winked as if they were sharing a secret.

Dinner was served. Grandma Tutti had cooked a meal fit for royalty. One dish after another came from the kitchen, until the guests were filled to bursting.

“What a meal!” said Marian Galloway.

“Almost sinful!” said Father David.

“It's the most amazing dinner I have ever been served in a private home,” said Peter Van Allen. “Borelli, I gotta hand it to you—and to you, Elizabeth.”

“Thank you, but I take no credit,” Nicky's mother said. “It's all my mother-in-law. She's the chef!”

“Three cheers for your mother-in-law, then,” Mr. Van Allen said. “Here's to you, Tutti!”

Everyone at the table raised a glass. Grandma Tutti was, suddenly, silent. She looked into her plate.

“And three cheers for you, Borelli,” Mr. Van Allen continued. “Thank you for inviting us here on this special occasion.”

“Oh, it's nothing,” Nicky's father said. “We're just flattered to have you join us tonight at our humble table.”