Sitting across the table from Willy, sipping tea, my eyes darted in time to a jumpy electrical thought process that ended at the oven, and only the oven. By the end of that long Saturday holed up inside Windy City Gym, it was clear that my single option was to go to the bakery alone. I had involved Willy too deeply already, which was why I didn’t tell him what I’d seen on the mini-camera tape. If I had, he would have insisted on coming along to help me, and I couldn’t bear the thought of something happening to him-the only person I had left.
My plan was to sneak out of the gym before daybreak on Sunday morning.
It wouldn’t occur to me until much later that I’d missed my date with Max.
Maybe he waited outside the Davis Theater Sunday afternoon checking his watch or maybe he went inside alone and counted from
My own world was so focused on the great iron oven that served as the flaming core of Rispoli amp; Sons that the idea of Max seemed remote and out of reach, like a luxury I couldn’t afford but wanted nonetheless. I understood that I now had no time for him, but my heart disagreed-it thumped disjointedly in time to his name-with the difference between logic and desire equaling me thinking of him numbly.
The majority of my brain function was devoted to Vulcan.
Early Sunday, while it was dark outside, I shimmied down from the Crow’s Nest. Harry whined insistently as I tried to leave, showing signs of his usual, assertive self, so I wrapped him around my neck and brought him along. He hadn’t coughed up blood in twenty-four hours and was on his feet, but wobbly. He padded softly behind me across the gym and when I whispered “Stay” outside Willy’s apartment, he did. I crept inside and found the keys to the Lincoln on a brass hook, and as I lifted them, a soft buzzing rose behind me. Willy was snoring on the couch, glasses on his forehead, one hand on his chest and the other dangling loosely with a length of steel pipe on the floor at his fingertips. I knew how tough he was-I’d seen him spar with guys decades younger and teach them hard lessons to the nose and jaw-and knew the steel pipe was a sign that he meant business. If anyone came after me on Willy’s turf, he’d deal with them South Side Chicago style. His readiness to beat a thug sideways in my defense warmed my heart and steadied my nerve.
I found the Lincoln parked in the alley behind the gym.
I put Harry on the backseat and buckled him in.
I turned the key, the engine hummed, and I lost that nerve instantly.
The bakery had always been alive to me, with its fresh tastes and familiar warm smells, its singsong soundtrack of spoken Italian, and the rightness of my family in that place. We owned it, and it owned us. When I thought of my grandparents, I thought of the kitchen’s powdery white flour and sweet yellow dough, the brass cash register, neon sign in the window, and sparkling cases filled with pastries. The musical
What I thought of now was how the bakery would be locked and deserted.
It would be silent, dark, and dusty.
Emptiness can be the most terrifying thing in the world.
I made an impulsive right turn and sped along desolate streets toward the Loop. The sun was rising over the lake, its pink glow reflecting on canyons of glass and steel, while lines of streetlights popped off behind me, one following another. There was a time not so long ago when I would beg my father to take me along on early morning deliveries of doughnuts and croissants. Even in the summertime, it was cool outside at six a.m. as we drove through the city with the delivery truck windows rolled down. The Loop (named for the elevated trains that loop around it) is the busiest area of Chicago during the week, with literally millions of people coming and going to work. Sidewalks are filled with fast-moving pedestrians while impatient cars creep behind jumpy taxis that dart around crawling buses. Commuter trains rumble past in a long, elevated oval, drawbridges clang up and down, airplanes roar overhead leaving white smoky lines, and car horns and construction noise and people shouting and sirens blipping are the orchestra of the city that does not slacken until late at night.
Early in the morning, it’s such a different place that it’s almost a different planet.
Cabbies, bleary-eyed from working all night or beginning at dawn, drive lazily along deserted boulevards. Maintenance men hose cigarette butts off high-rise sidewalks, Chicago Transit Authority workers in crisp uniforms amble toward subway and El stations, and the random go-getter, yoga-stretched and dressed for success hours before his coworkers, power-walks down empty sidewalks. This was the Loop I crept through in the Lincoln, unwilling or unable to face the tomblike atmosphere of the bakery, needing something safe and familiar to fortify my soul before I took the leap.
Blocks later, I hung a hard left onto Jackson Boulevard.
There was the old diner and its retro lampposts, Route 66 sign, and curved counter just inside the picture window.
The sign for Lou Mitchell’s glows in pinkish-orange neon, and announces humbly that it serves the world’s finest coffee.
I parked on Jackson, made sure Harry was comfortable, and entered the place that was already half full before most Chicagoans had even opened an eye. The old water purifier burbled by the entrance like always, the smell of crisp bacon and Greek toast filled the air like always, the background thrummed with morning conversation like always-these small, reassuring things connected me to my family. I sat at the counter and ordered coffee. The waitress paused when she set down the steaming mug, looking at her watch and then back at me. The coffee reached my nostrils hot and acidic, and I sipped its strength. As I did, I noticed the waitress’s gaze drift and her eyebrows raise. Without moving my head, I glanced sideways at a Chicago police officer in blue, also in mid-sip, taking the waitress’s cue to inspect me. His face remained blank as his eyes moved over me-the thick, gray walrus mustache twitching thoughtfully under his nose was the only giveaway that he was concerned. I realized what he was seeing was not pretty-a sixteen-year-old girl alone at six in the morning after more than twenty-four hours in the Crow’s Nest with no shower following a world-class ass-kicking, wearing ancient sweats, a face full of bruises, and a nose that, just by its disproportionate size, hinted at trouble. Trying to look casual in that situation was impossible-every fidget made me feel guilty of something, which made me behave guiltily, which made me fidget even more. I was scared to look at him, but realized that he was punching a cell phone.
He murmured into it while staring at me.
Suddenly, I felt as if the entire diner were staring at me.
Turning on my stool, the entire place looked like it was stuffed with cops.
Nerves tingled sickly in my stomach as I glanced around the room. Every table and booth held one or two burly guys with close-cropped hair, or a pair of tough-looking women with no-nonsense expressions. All of them wore casual clothing meant to disguise their copness, which only broadcast it instead. I was sure they were looking at me, or just looking away from me, or trying to act as if they weren’t looking at me at all. Maybe Detective Smelt had been tailing me all along and these were her people. Maybe they were just waiting for the right time to pounce.
I sipped coffee, trying to calm down, but then listened to my gut.
It said to forget calming down and wise up.
It told me that unless I did something quick, I’d be leaving the diner in handcuffs.
The officer leaned toward me and smoothed his mustache, about to say something, but I jumped to my feet and hurried to the restroom. I entered the last stall, locked the door, and began biting my thumbnail-there were no windows to climb out of, and I doubted that sprinting for the exit would result in anything other than being tackled by cops. I felt like all four walls were pushing in at me, and that my fate rested just outside the door. I held my head in my hands and stared at linoleum, searching for a solution.
There it was, on the floor between my feet.
I picked up a book of matches, despite my parents’ warning never to play with fire.
Except that I wasn’t playing-I was deadly serious.
I counted to three, then left the stall and began working quickly, yanking paper towels from one dispenser and the other until both sinks were full. I wet half of them and stuffed them into the bottom of a garbage can. Then I packed the dry paper towels tightly on top, praying that the wet ones would extinguish the others if need be.
I struck a match and smelled sulfur.
It flamed and I realized what a stupid and dangerous thing I was doing.
