Part 8 (1/2)

The painting sits, covered in a velvet cloth, on a gold easel in the middle of their living room. Mama's made a huge fuss getting everyone ready for Solomon's big surprise. Gusmanov is due in a few minutes, to hang the portrait above the fireplace. It's a Sat.u.r.day and Cheri is bored waiting for her father to come home, listening to Mama tell Cookie to watch out for his car, did she just hear it pulling into the driveway? Her father was only going into work for a few hours this morning, and Mama has made a special lunch.

”It's not a d.a.m.n surprise party,” Cookie says, rolling her eyes. Cheri is just glad her part in this is over.

Every Sat.u.r.day for weeks Mama had been dragging her to her font of inspiration-Cecil's House of Fabric-so Mr. Cecil could paint their portrait. Mr. Cecil was a decorator but had paintings in a Montclair gallery ”and Manhattan,” her mother said proudly. He stank of BO and cologne and invited his favorite clients to the back room-his art studio-to smoke, drink, and eat cheese that looked like it could crawl across the plate on its own.

Cheri hated sitting for hours, frozen in place, on the sofa that smelled of stale tobacco with Mama's arm around her. She hated wearing a dress. Mama's efforts to girl her up stopped in kindergarten when Cheri had taken scissors to the bows on her dresses and then to her hair. She was almost eight now, but Mama burst into tears and said, ”You are crus.h.i.+ng my heart, for this one time, please look like the pretty girl.”

”The eagle has landed,” Cookie says ominously, and Mama sends Cheri to wait in the living room. A minute later, Mama trots into the room, leading her father by the arm. He's still in his white lab coat. Mama s.h.i.+mmies behind the easel and dramatically pulls back the cloth: ”Your family portrait!” Cheri thinks the portrait looks the same as it did last time they saw it: Mama is glamorous in her pink satin dress, her long blond hair in a ”do-up.” Her arm is a little too tightly around Cheri, who looks uncomfortable, posing with a weird, fake smile.

”Is beautiful, yes, Solomon?” Mama stands by Cheri's father, who is staring at the painting. He shakes his head and closes his eyes, clearly disappointed. ”What is wrong?” Mama looks crestfallen. Gusmanov has arrived in the doorway with his tool kit but pauses at the sight of Cici's distress.

Sol pulls Mama aside and speaks quietly. Mama is talking with her hands and her father shakes his head and says, ”Family portrait,” like the words don't make sense. Mama puts her hand to her heart and then glances over at Cheri. ”Go to your room, cara mia,” she says.

Cheri feels the heaviness of her father's disapproval. For what, she's not quite sure, but she suspects that it has to do with her, as it usually does. Once upstairs, she becomes absorbed in her book of Greek mythology, imagining herself as Athena, turning her foe into a spider. When Mama calls her down for lunch, Cheri sees that the table is set for two. Mama's eyes are watery.

”Where is Dad?” Cheri asks.

”He had to go back to the office. He'll be home later.” Mama puts pasta on plates and brings them to the table. They eat in unusual silence.

”I guess he didn't like the painting,” Cheri finally ventures.

”Oh, no, cara. Is the misunderstanding. Cecil will fix everything and your father will be very happy.” The corners of Mama's mouth turn up but her eyes are still turned down.

”Are you okay, Mama?” Mama nods and gives her hand a little pat. It makes her feel unsettled and angry at her father. Why can't her family just be normal?

Two weeks later, the curtain was about to be torn off yet another version of the Matzner family portrait. And just in time for her eighth birthday, Cheri learns she has living relatives. It wasn't as if she thought her parents had sprung fully grown from the head of Zeus, but they had always been silent on the subject of their families. Like all children, Cheri knew only what the grown-ups told her. When she was old enough to understand that everyone had grandparents, she asked where hers were. When ”gone” wasn't the right answer on the family tree Cheri made in second grade, a note from her teacher shamed her mother into further explanation: Belle and Bernard Matzner had died in a car wreck before Cheri was born, and the D'Ameris, back in Italy, had gone to ”a better place,” save for Mama's sister Alida, who ran off and married Christ. A logical child by nature, Cheri had more questions about how you could marry a dead person than she did about the untimely demise of both sides of her family.

But Cheri learns about her mysterious forebears the day Cici marches into the kitchen while Cheri is eating breakfast, criticizes whatever jobs Gusmanov and Cookie are doing at the time, and announces: ”Is time for my daughter to make her roots.” She plunks two airline tickets down on the table in front of Cheri and taps them with a long, polished nail. ”In the premier,” she says, as if traveling in first cla.s.s explains everything.

”Ooof. I tell you this is food for pigs. You will see in Italia no-body eats the crunchy captain cereal. You will not find it at the table of my family. I tell you, Cookie, to toss the pig food.” Cheri cradles her cereal bowl like a convict.

”Family? What family?”

”My sister Genny, you will say Zia Genny, her children-what do you call them, Cookie, the children of my sister?”

”But your family is dead, Mama. You said so.”

”Niece if she's a girl, nephew for a boy,” Cookie says.

”You told me they were all in heaven,” Cheri insists.

”No-no-no. They are in Lago di Como. Is very nice, but heaven? No.”

Cheri glances at Cookie in disbelief. Cookie shrugs: You know your mother.

”So you have family at a lake and I have cousins?”

”What is this cousin? Cookie says it is nice. You have three nice.”

”They're cousins to me, Mama.”

”Nieces like pieces, that's how you say it,” Cookie mutters.

”Does this mean Papa's family is alive too?”

”Porca miseria, no!” Mama laughs so hard she snorts.

Just like that, Cheri's world expanded. She'd always been jealous of kids with big families, like her neighbor Stacey Walthers. Stacey had relatives at every end of the globe. Her house was always br.i.m.m.i.n.g with cousins, brothers, and Rottweilers. Cheri's lack of extended family was another thing that set her apart from most of her friends, along with the fact that she didn't look anything like either her mother or her father. n.o.body ever told her, ”Oh, you have your mother's eyes,” or ”That's your father's chin.” When Cheri got separated from Mama at Saks, a saleslady took care of her while they announced a lost child over the intercom system. When her overdressed mother ran to the sales desk, jewelry a-jangling, the saleslady didn't believe that this grubby little boy belonged to Mama. Incensed, Mama unfurled a wallet full of photographs of her daughter and stormed off, gripping Cheri's hand so tightly it hurt.

Cheri was thrilled to learn her family might consist of someone besides her mother and father. But if her father wasn't coming with them, then something was wrong. Did this have to do with the portrait?

That night, her father comes to the door of her room. He rarely gets home before Cheri's bedtime; Mama has told her that he's working on something that will change medicine. ”Are you still up?” Cheri sits up in bed holding Bippy-a square patchwork pillow with eyes and a tongue she won at a fair. Mama keeps throwing Bippy in the trash because he is schifo, but Cookie always rescues him. She can just make out her father's silhouette in the doorway. ”Dad, why aren't you coming to Italy with us?” Her father makes a throat-clearing noise. Not an ah-hem, but farther back in the throat, two clearings, one-two. At night, when she can't sleep, she can locate her father by that sound.

”Too much work right now,” he says, ”get some sleep.”

Cheri lies back. ”Dad, would you tuck me in?”

He pulls her blanket up under her chin, pats it down awkwardly. He's never tucked her in before so he doesn't know to pull the sheet tight. She closes her eyes and hears his ah-hem, ah-hem going down the hall.

Cheri knows there is more to her father not coming to Italy than work. She overheard him telling Mama, ”You're not only a mother, you're a wife. I came first and I should come first.” They've had this argument before. When her father wanted to take Mama to the Greek islands, she said no-no-no, they couldn't leave Cheri. Cookie had her own children to take care of and Cici couldn't possibly leave her child with a stranger. Cheri loved staying at Cookie's; she liked playing with baby Choo-Choo and was comfortable in Cookie's little house-practically everything in it came from their house anyway, but it all looked cozier at Cookie's. She wanted to tell them that, say that it was okay, please don't fight. But when her father came out of their bedroom and saw her standing there, he seemed mad so she just looked down at the floor.

Cheri doesn't want her father to be mad at her, but if he came to Italy she knows Mama would be different, more anxious to please, more critical of Cheri. The harder Mama worked on bringing everyone together, the more forced it seemed. The rare times Cheri was alone with her father, it was easier. If Mama was out getting her hair done on the weekend and Cheri heard the Good Humor truck down the street, her father would buy her a chocolate eclair ice cream bar. They'd walk back and she'd give him a bite because it was his favorite when he was a kid. But even then, he never seemed comfortable with Cheri-or with any other kids. He always spoke to them in a loud, formal voice, like they were miniature village idiots. Mama was more fun alone, except that she made Cheri sleep in bed with her. Mama would say, ”How about you have the special treat and sleep with Mama tonight, I make the discretion.” But Mama's ”discretion” often became the rule rather than the exception. Would the relatives make her sleep in the same bed with Mama?

Cheri had a million other questions too. ”Will my cousins have black hair like me?” Cheri asked. Mama said, with a touch of pride, that Zia Genny was not so blond. So Cheri imagined her cousins as brunettes, and, as Mama said they probably wouldn't speak English, she studied her Italian/English dictionary extra hard. Mama used to speak to Cheri in Italian all the time. Then one day, she stopped. Cheri asked why and Mama said, ”Your father no like it. It makes him feel bad that we speak and he cannot understand. We speak, just not in front of him. S, cara?”

Cheri's first thought when she sees her cousins standing behind the security gate at the Milan airport is: Normal. Zia Genny and her three older cousins Maria, Donatella, and Lucia are groomed and polite and have mousy brown hair. They try not to stare at Cheri's mismatched eyes, but she catches Lucia checking her out. They have presents-a book of Italian fairy tales and a box of chocolate drops-but n.o.body squeals, ”Oh my, look at you,” like she'd seen with other families. Zia Genny resembles a greyhound; she is thin with close-cropped gray hair and a taut, alert air. She kisses Mama on both cheeks and then Mama drops her suitcase and holds Zia Genny's hands. They both start crying.

In the car, the sisters talk like Zia Genny drives: speeding ahead and then stopping suddenly. They slip back and forth between Italian and English. Between the luggage and the number of people in Zia Genny's matchbox of a car, Cheri winds up in Donatella's lap. n.o.body talks except for Mama and Zia Genny. Zia Genny asks what happened to Mama's tongue, she sounds like a foreigner. ”Screw yourself,” Mama says.

”Screw yourself twice, in the a.s.s,” Zia Genny says. Cheri is used to Mama cursing but didn't expect it from another grown-up.

Many hours later, Cheri finds herself waking up on a cot in an attic room. She can see the sun setting through a lozenge pane of window. She follows the sound of voices and a piano downstairs to a great room that serves as living room, dining room, and, on one side, a kitchen. Maria is practicing on one of the two baby grand pianos that face each other; her fingers move like spiders across the keys. The walls are filled with oil paintings: portraits, still lifes, hunting scenes, a few of the Virgin Mary and Jesus on the cross, His crown of thorns dripping with blood. The great room has high, wood-beamed ceilings. The tall gla.s.s windows look out on snowcapped mountains that soar up from a vast, deep blue lake. Something pungent and garlicky is bubbling on the stove. Zia Genny holds a large rabbit by its ears and skins it with a knife in long, sc.r.a.ping movements. When Cici sees Cheri at the foot of the stairs she leaps in front of Zia Genny, as if to block her daughter's view of something indecent. ”How was your pisolino, cara?” Cici cries out, too cheerfully. Her cousin looks up from the piano and Cheri is embarra.s.sed. Why does her mother treat her like she is a baby, asking about her nap?

Rabbit, it turns out, is delicious. Cheri eats and eats and then has a stomachache all night. The next day, Zia Genny sends the girls to swim at the lake. Her cousins dip their toes and adjust their bathing suits while whispering things Cheri can't understand about the skinny, tan boys who punch each other in the stomach and scrabble up the rocks to see who can dive from the highest point. Not to be bested by boys, Cheri climbs up to the apex and jumps without hesitation, making a huge splash and getting water up her nose because she forgot to hold it shut. The cousins seemed unimpressed and she is pretty sure they are now talking about her because when she returns to where they are sitting, they all shut up.

Maria is eleven and the best bet for a comrade. In mangled English, she asks Cheri if she knows Donny Osmond. Maria provides a second ray of hope when she suggests throwing the knife in their picnic basket against the knot in a tree. Coincidentally, this is one of her favorite games to play with Gusmanov, but when she gets overconfident and proposes that Maria stand in front of the tree to make it more challenging, Donatella announces it's time to go home.

Zia Genny takes Cheri into the library and tells her to wait while she hunts for an Italian grammar book. Cheri peruses the shelves, looking at a few framed photographs of Zia Genny's family and finding one that is clearly Mama and her sisters. Mama looks like a beautiful little doll, not much older than Cheri is now. Behind the girls is a tall, stern man linking arms with a woman wearing a veiled hat and pearls. ”Are those my grandparents?” she asks shyly.

Zia Genny walks over and looks at the picture. ”This was at Chiesa Brunella. Marco D'Ameri is our stepfather and, yes, this is your nonna. She pa.s.sed three years ago next month. May G.o.d rest her soul.” Zia Genny crosses herself.

”And Marco D'Ameri?”

Zia Genny waggles her finger. ”Do not talk about Marco D'Ameri to your mama. They have not spoken in many years and it is best left that way. Va bene, come, let us work on your diction.”

Zia Genny's English is better than Mama's, despite her fifteen years in America, and Genny's a more patient teacher. Cheri sits at the butcher block in the kitchen with her dictionary and workbooks while Zia Genny cooks and Mama uuffs around them, pointing out that n.o.body in America speaks other languages or travels, like Europeans, so why bother? Zia Genny ignores Mama and holds forth, especially since Cheri has proved to be not only an eager student but also a mushroom aficionado.