He put his hands on a made guy, and it’s going to be trouble.
“The fuck out of here,” Peter says. He’s sitting at a table in the Central Diner, trying to enjoy his eggs.
“I’m telling you,” Frankie V says, “the guy is a finook.”
“Sal Antonucci a fag,” Paulie says. “Come on.”
“You don’t believe me, okay,” Frankie says. “But he punched me. He punched a made guy and I want something done about it.”
“He was out of line,” Peter says. “No question. But we got bigger problems right now.”
“Like what?”
“Like what?” Peter asks. “How about a bunch of fuckin’ Mau Maus going off the plantation? I know you know about this, Frankie, I saw you at the funerals.”
“So what?” Frankie says. “You’re going to give Sal a pass for hitting me because you’re afraid he’ll go sulk again, you lose your best hitter?”
“Hey, Frankie, you want to go do Marvin Jones, be my guest,” Peter says.
That shuts Frankie up.
After he leaves, Paulie asks, “What do you think? About Sal being a fag?”
“No fucking way.”
“I dunno,” Paulie says. “Remember how broken up he was about Tony?”
“The guy was his cellmate.”
“What I’m saying.”
“You know what I think about Sal being a fag?” Peter asks. “Never to be repeated? I think I don’t care. After the ditsoon are done popping Colt forty-fives over Marvin’s grave, then maybe I’ll care. Until then, Sal can suck all the cock he wants.”
He asks Sal to come in for a sit-down, though.
That afternoon, at American Vending, Peter says, “Fuck, every guy I know wants to smack Frankie V, that mouth of his. I can’t stand the fucking guy. But you shouldn’t have hit him, Sal.”
“I know,” Sal says. “This temper of mine. You gonna tax me for it, tax me. I’ll pay.”
“He’s within his rights to want something.”
“I know.”
“Look, apologize to him,” Peter says, “send his fat wife something nice—I dunno, a leg of lamb—I’m willing to forget the whole thing.”
“Yeah?” Sal asks, waiting for the next Gucci to drop. Peter is an elephant, he doesn’t forget shit.
“I’d like you to do something for me, though,” Peter says.
There it is. “What’s that, Peter?”
“This fuckin’ shine, Marvin . . .”
Danny’s shot clangs off the rim.
“You never change, Ryan,” Marvin says, scooping up the rebound on the bounce. “You sucked then, you suck now.”
He turns, shoots and swishes.
“There’s something to be said for consistency,” Danny says. He grabs the ball beneath the basket and takes an easy layup off the board. “And I thought you didn’t remember me.”
Even in the cold, Danny’s sweating under the gray hooded sweatshirt. He passes Marvin the ball.
“I don’t,” Marvin says. “I’m just busting chops.”
He takes a jumper.
Swish.
“I ever tell you about my mama, Ryan?” Marvin asks as Danny takes the ball. “That woman got up every damn day at dawn, went out to clean other people’s houses, mop their floors, scrub their toilets. We kids didn’t have a lot, but we never went hungry.”
Danny tucks the ball under his arm and listens, grateful for a breather.
“You know who my daddy was?” Marvin asks. “Harold Jones.”
“The singer?”
“Yeah, that Harold Jones,” Marvin says.
He launches into a soul tune that Danny’s heard on the radio a few thousand times. Hell, he and Terri used to screw to it.
“One-hit wonder,” Marvin says. “You gonna stand there sucking air, or are you going to shoot?”
Danny shoots.
Clang.
“So what was he like?” Danny asks.
“Damned if I know,” says Marvin. “‘Papa was a rolling stone.’ My point in telling you all this is that my mama doesn’t clean toilets no more. She doesn’t mop floors. Other people clean her toilets. In the house I bought her.”
“Okay.”
“What about you?” Marvin asks, chasing down Danny’s rebound. “Your mama and daddy.”
Marvin spins and shoots.
It goes in.
“My old man is your basic Irish stereotype,” Danny says, chasing down the ball. “A bitter alcoholic. It was my mother who was the no-show.”