Eddie Joyce - Small Mercies

She smiled and her eyes expanded merrily, taking Michael back a few decades. He reached a warm hand up to her hip, an old man reminding his wife that he can still be stirred in that way and that she can still do the stirring.

“Come back to bed with me, my Irish girl.”

But she didn’t. She rose out of his grasp, said she was running late, and winked at him before leaving the room. From the stairs, she shouted back up at him.

“Maybe later.”

“Tease.”

There will be nothing later. He knows that. He can still be stirred on occasion. She can still be stirred on occasion. But aligning those occasions so they coincide? A tricky business made trickier by his unwillingness to employ pharmacological aid and her unwillingness to be cajoled into something in which she’s mostly lost interest. This used to bother him — the diminishment, near extinction, of their sex life — but it doesn’t anymore.

The fact that it doesn’t bother him is what bothers him now.

He has a mild hangover and his usual remedy, more shut-eye, is unavailable, so he gets out of bed and goes to the bathroom to fetch a handful of Advil. His right shoulder is achy and both his ankles click as he walks. He curses his teenage self, cavalier and invincible, for pinballing around football fields without regard for either of their bodies: that young, pristine one or this old, dilapidated one. He takes a long, satisfying piss and washes his hands. He splashes some water on his face.

He is startled when he looks in the mirror. Most days, he barely notices his reflection. He shaves in the shower, uses the mirror only to make sure he doesn’t look like a buffoon: no shaving cream hanging from an earlobe, no gush of blood from a nick, no patches of hair the razor didn’t find. But some days, he looks up and his father stares back at him. Today, he sees Enzo. A question sits on his lips, unspoken.

“Not today, Dad.”

His father’s face remains impassive, patient.

“Not today, Dad. Please, I just want to enjoy today. Take the sheets in, have a few beers.”

His father waits.

“I wanted a different life. Okay. Simple.”

His father shrugs.

Michael raises his right hand, extends his index finger, watches its doppelgänger extend to meet its maker. He pushes on the mirror once, raises the finger to his reflection again, presenting his evidence.

“This. I was tired of this.”

His father smiles.

* * *

Michael is woken by a finger jabbing his shoulder. He knows this jab well. It is not a rough gesture, not particularly insistent. It is simple, purposeful. It carries a message.

I have let you sleep as long as possible.

He opens his eyes, pivots to a sitting position. He senses the shadow of his father hustling out of the still-dark room, embarrassed that he must rouse his son in this fashion. Michael looks at the window, sees the hint of daylight creeping around the shade. It is not yet six o’clock. He yawns and stands.

His parents are waiting for him in the kitchen, already dressed, breakfast behind them. His father sips coffee while his mother cooks him peppers and eggs. He finds them like this every morning, as though they were living according to some clock he cannot see, cannot fathom. His mother slides a plate in front of him, kisses the top of his head.

“ Grazie, ” he says, then, “thank you.”

His parents look at him, unsure why he keeps saying everything twice, first in Italian, then in English. Michael’s not a big talker, in either language. Neither are his parents. Their English is still choppy, experimental, despite their twenty years in this country. And they know that long conversations in Italian make their son uncomfortable. Silence reigns, and in that silence lives a heavy, expectant love.

It has always been this way. From an early age, Michael could sense the oppressive neediness of his parents’ love. He was their universe, the polestar of their existences, the only outlet for their hopes and dreams. Just the three of them. No cousins, no aunts or uncles. No neighbors dropping over for coffee. Once a year, a distant relative of his father’s, Umberto, would drive down from Buffalo to drop off a dozen jugs of homemade wine, receive a few bundles of Enzo’s dried salami and sausage. He would spend a few nights and even though Umberto wasn’t particularly warm, Michael relished those visits. If nothing else, Umberto distracted his parents for a while, let Michael escape the glare of their incessant affection.

He finishes his breakfast, takes some coffee to go. He kisses his mother good-bye, has to hurry to catch up to his father. Enzo is shockingly impatient in the mornings, as though they were running late, even though they almost always finish their prep work an hour before the first customer of the day arrives. They drive to the store in silence. When they enter, the smell — the slick, acrid scent of blood and bone — always shocks Michael. He thought he would eventually stop noticing it, but he hasn’t. Others love it. They tell his father, make a great show of sniffing the air when they walk in. Michael doesn’t understand why he hates it so; he wonders whether florists ever get sick of the scent of fresh flowers.

They go about their business. Periodically, Enzo peeks over Michael’s shoulder and notices an error. You are moving too fast, not watching your knife. You are slicing the bacon too thin. You need to find the joints on the chicken thigh before you start hacking into it. Now the bacon is too thick. Michael nods, mutters curses in English under his breath.

As usual, they finish well before the store opens, but Enzo cannot sit still. He fiddles in the display case, straightens boxes of pasta, sweeps up the floor for the third time. Michael sits and reads the paper, ignoring Enzo’s beseeching looks. If there were something else to do, he would do it. He is not lazy. But fussing about and making work is craziness. So Enzo sweeps while Michael reads and the silence grows tense.

The tension dissipates as soon as the first customer shows up. The day speeds up, the store fills with other voices. A few speak Italian, but it’s mostly English. The conversation is light, expedient. The Verrazano Bridge, only a few months away from being completed, is a frequently discussed topic. Some people say it will be a good thing: it will bring more people to the Island! Others think it will be bad, very bad: it will bring more people to the Island! Most people agree that it’s beautiful. Also, of course, wonderful that it was named after an Italian.

“Michael,” one woman asks, “you just graduated from high school. What do you think?”

He thinks, If I hear one more person talking about the fucking Verrazano Bridge, I am going to walk to the middle of it and jump off.

“Could be a good thing. I don’t know. Maybe not.”

The woman nods as though he’s said something profound.

“Smart boy,” she says to Enzo, who looks at Michael with intense pride. Michael looks at the clock. It’s not even noon.

He makes some deliveries: Seaside Boulevard, Old Town Road, Garretson Avenue. Enzo won’t let him drive — he knows how but doesn’t have his license yet — so he has to use the store’s busted old bike, even though it’s ninety-two degrees and the air is thick. By the time he gets to the houses, he’s dripping with sweat and he can smell himself through his clothes. He knows the women he delivers to: Mrs. Scotto, Mrs. Villa, old lady Meehan. Mrs. Villa is young, maybe five years older than he, and pretty. She invites him in for a glass of water, tells him to call her Lisa. He stares at her cleavage while she complains about her mother-in-law. He takes his time finishing the water.

On the way back to the store, he stops at Nunzio’s for two slices and a Coke. He eats the slices in a rush and then sits at the counter, sipping the Coke, wishing the minutes away. When he gets back, Enzo looks irritated even though the store is empty. He hands Michael a paper plate with his lunch: sliced salami on a roll. He inhales that, slaps his hands together to remove the crumbs. If this was the job — Lisa Villa’s tits, pizza, salami — he would be happy. If he could somehow get his salami between Lisa Villa’s tits, he’d be really happy. He needs a few bawdy thoughts to get him through the day.