Hope's Angel (34 page)

David grinned and handed him the keys.

***

When they reached home David said good-night and drove away in his
pickup to spend the night in the church rectory once more. Greg parked the
station wagon in the pickup’s space. No lights were on in the flat upstairs;
Gianna had left a note explaining where they all were, and Papa and Mamma had
apparently gone to bed.

Gianna left the backseat and headed for the stairs, while Connie and
Greg remained in the front seat.

“It’ll be okay,” Connie said when Greg peered up at the dark windows
with a worried look on his face. “You can sleep in Angie’s room. Gianna and I
share a room. She’ll vouch for us behaving ourselves.”

Greg didn’t look convinced. “Are you going to put a sign in the
bathroom or something? I don’t want your mother screaming when she realizes
there’s a strange guy in her house.”

“You’re not that strange.” Connie gave him a teasing grin, then leaned
forward to press her lips to his. “Thanks for making the trip. That was fun.”
She kissed him again, savoring the feel of his mouth on hers.

He pulled back to look at her with a frown. “Quite a difference from my
house, huh?”

Connie shook her head. “Don’t do that, Greg. You’re not responsible for
what happened at your house.”

He glanced down at her hands in her lap, then enclosed them in his and
looked up at her. His gray eyes held hers in a steady, solemn gaze. “My father
has been an abusive drunk for my whole life, Connie. I live at home because when
I’m there, he’s less likely to take it out on my mother.”

Connie couldn’t imagine that. “He hits her?”

“He hit us all. I got the least of it because I was a sickly kid, and
maybe that’s why I’m more willing than anyone else to stick around. My brothers
live far away for a reason.”

“They don’t worry about what he might do to her?”

“They blame her for not doing anything to protect us as kids. She
should have left him a long time ago. But she never  would. She never will.”

“Why not?”

“She would never give up that house.”

Connie was appalled. “She stays with him for the house? You’re kidding!
Why? She has a career! She comes from a wealthy family!”

“She doesn’t come from a wealthy family. And she’s never made much
money as a social worker. Not enough to maintain that house or that lifestyle.”

“But she went to Mount Holyoke!”

“She worked her way through college. She had a couple scholarships, and
she was smart. She played the Mayflower descendent card and got herself
introduced into higher society by the friends she made there. That’s how she
met my father.”

Connie took a moment to absorb all he was saying, her mind going back
to the conversation in the kitchen. “She told me her parents didn’t approve of
her Portuguese boyfriend, and that they sent her to Mount Holyoke to get her away
from him. She said that was why she could understand your attraction to me.”
She looked into Greg’s eyes. “That wasn’t true?”

Greg winced, almost imperceptibly but enough for her to notice. He let
out a short, disbelieving laugh as he looked away. “Jesus, isn’t alcohol amazing?”

Connie watched him, not sure what he meant.

“What the hell,” he said with a sigh. His eyes came back to meet hers.
“She was pregnant when my father married her. She said the baby was his. He had
reason to believe it, apparently.”

“But it wasn’t?”

“Glenn didn’t get his brown eyes from my father, and he certainly
didn’t get them from my mother. Yeah, she had a Portuguese boyfriend—when she
was a senior in college.”

Connie blinked in surprise.

“When my dad realized Glenn wasn’t his, he was too embarrassed to do
anything about it, but he told her he wouldn’t support him. He made her go to
graduate school and get her master’s in social work so she could get a job.”
Greg gave her a bitter smile. “It gets better and better all the time, doesn’t
it?”

Connie shrugged. “That’s them, Greg, not you.”

“I just want you to understand, Connie. So you’ll see why I’m not
concerned about us fitting in. They’re not who they pretend to be.”

“What’s going to happen if you go home?” Connie searched his face.
“What’s he going to do to you?”

“Nothing. He doesn’t go after someone who can fight back.”

“And if she’s hurt? How will you deal with that?”

Greg looked away. “I do what I can when I’m there, but in the end, it’s
her choice. She’s the social worker. She knows what the resources are, and she
refuses to use them.”

Connie squeezed his fingers in hers. “If she had left him, you might
not live here now, you know. We wouldn’t be together.”

Greg’s eyes came back to meet hers. “I wouldn’t blame you for bailing.”

Connie gave him a sad smile. “Why would I bail? Because you try to take
care of your mother? Because your father’s a jerk, but you try to preserve his
dignity?” She put her hands up to his cheeks and stared into his worried eyes. “Please
don’t go home tonight. I promise you, it’ll be okay with my parents.”

“Okay.” He gave her a weary smile. “Just do me a favor, and put that sign
in the bathroom.”

Chapter
Twenty-two

January, 1969

“Do you know how many U.S. troops are in Vietnam? Five hundred forty
thousand!” Marilyn leaned across the cafeteria table toward Connie. “The march
against the war is at four o’clock, in front of the Admin building.”

Connie poked at the oyster crackers floating in her bowl of chili. She
had attended one of the demonstrations the week before, but this time she
couldn’t stay. “Greg needs to leave early today. He’s taking his mom to an AA
meeting.”

“She can’t drive herself?”

“She wrecked her car last week.”

Marilyn shook her head. “I don’t know why you stick with this guy. When
are you meeting Mr. Beautiful?”

Connie grimaced; she preferred not to think about her upcoming talk
with Paul. “After supper.”

“What does Gregory think of that?”

“He’s not crazy about it, but he understands.”

Marilyn smiled as she stirred her chili. “You two are so cute. So
upfront about everything. So honorable.”

Connie frowned at her friend’s mocking tone. “You think I should sneak
around behind his back?”

“I just remember when you thought he was a pain in the ass. Now you’re
ready to marry him.”

“Just like you predicted.”

Marilyn’s smile became a self-satisfied grin.“Yup. Just like I
predicted.”

During the drive home Greg never mentioned her planned meeting with
Paul. They talked about their new classes, their plans for the weekend, and the
predicted snowstorm that might make travel difficult the next morning. He
dropped her off in front of the store and drove away; his mother’s meeting
started at six and he needed to get her there on time or she would use being
late as an excuse not to go.

Dinner with Connie’s family wasn’t as quiet as usual. Gianna was now
working at the elementary school, filling in for the librarian who was on
maternity leave, and she was bubbling with stories she needed to share about
her day. Angie was loving the debate club she had joined at the high school,
and they had had their first meeting of the semester after classes that
afternoon. Mamma had received a letter from her oldest sister in Italy, telling
her that the sister’s second boy—Mamma’s nephew—was emigrating to the United States.
Only Connie and her father had little to say as they ate and listened to the chatter
all around them.

She had asked Paul to meet her at seven at the public library for lack
of a better place. She arrived in the small lot behind the brick building with
butterflies in her stomach. His car was already parked there, and he was
sitting inside, staring off into space. She walked up to his side window and gently
knocked on the glass.

He turned and rolled down the window but did not smile as he looked up
at her through his dark lashes. “Can we go somewhere with coffee?” he asked. “I
got home late.”

“Sure.” She walked around to the passenger side of his car and slid
onto the seat beside him. Being so close to him felt awkward, and she kept her eyes
straight ahead. “Where do you want to go?”

Paul leaned forward and started the car without answering, then backed
out of the space and turned down the alley toward Main Street. His silence
seemed to use up all the air in the car.

He turned into the public lot beside Sofretti’s pastry shop on Main
Street, parked with the Ford’s hood against the building, and stepped out of
the car without a word. Connie sighed to herself, then pushed her door open and
followed him to the sidewalk and up to the glass front door of the little shop.
He was wearing his usual tight-legged blue jeans and Red Sox jacket, and his luxurious
black curls lay long and soft against the back of his collar. She wanted to
reach out and touch them, to make him turn and smile at her, but that wasn’t the
plan. Quite the contrary.

He opened the door to Sofretti’s, and she expected him to walk in and
leave her to her own devices, but instead he stepped back and held the door for
her. She smiled nervously at him, but he did not smile back, his expression as
disinterested as if he were holding the door for a stranger.

Her resolve began to crack. What was she doing there? What did she hope
to accomplish? Didn’t she realize that she couldn’t be this close to Paul and
still hold onto rational thought unencumbered by pure emotion?

Small, round, two-person tables sat in the alcoves to either side of
the door, and a young couple, holding hands, looking all dreamy in love,
occupied one of the tables to the right. Connie took a table to the left and
sat down to wait near the front window while Paul went to the counter to order
his coffee. She watched him stand at the counter and pick out some cookies, and
she thought about how incredibly good-looking he was and how much she enjoyed
his company. When the girl behind the counter gave him a flirtatious smile,
Connie felt herself bristle, and a sudden sadness washed over her at the
thought that he wasn’t hers to bristle over. She forced herself to look
elsewhere, and when he came to sit in the chair across from hers, she was reading
the blackboard on the wall: olive bread and ciabatta were only made on weekends.

He put a small white box of cookies between them on the little table
and took a sesame one, gesturing to her to help herself. He then devoted his
attention to sipping his coffee and eating his cookie.

Doubt over what she was doing paralyzed her. She watched his face, and
her heart ached when he refused to meet her eyes.

Finally he looked up. “You said you wanted to talk, so talk.” He stared
past her to whatever was visible through the window behind her.

Connie swallowed back the lump rising in her throat. “I’m… I… I want us
to still be friends, Paul. I want to be able to see you on the street or in
front of your nonna’s house and not feel like I need to hide.”

His eyes shifted to meet hers, and a small thrill ran through her. She
wondered if he realized how overwhelming his gaze could be.

“Whatever you want, Con.” He spoke without feeling, as though he were
bored. “You don’t have to hide from me.”

“I don’t want this bitterness, Paul.”

“What bitterness?” His brow furrowed, and a small sneer teased at his
upper lip as he stared at her. “All I’ve ever done is what you wanted, Connie.
Whether it was to touch you, to not touch you, to give you space, to come when
you call. You tell me what I’ve done wrong.”

He glanced down at her hands resting on the table, then back up at her
face. “No ring? I thought you were engaged.”

“I never said that.” She fixed her eyes on his. “I said he asked me to
marry him. I never said I had accepted. You assumed that and took off.”

“I took off.” He nodded ever so slightly, his expression hard. “So,
that wasn’t him I saw you with on Christmas Eve, going into your nonna’s
house?”

“You mean when your sister called Gianna a whore?”

He looked away from her again, the irritation on his face softening.
“I’m sorry about that. Annie’s mouth outruns her brain.”

“And I’m sorry for how things happened between us.” Connie drew a deep
breath; the tightness in her chest threatened to cut off her air. “I’m still learning,
Paul. I know that sounds stupid, but I’m not real experienced at this. I’ve
done dumb things. Very dumb things.” She stared into his face, hoping he would
look at her again. “I never meant to hurt you. That’s the last thing I would
ever want to do. But I’ve learned things, too. Like it’s not always best to go
for what’s easy.”

Paul’s brow furrowed as his eyes shifted to meet hers once more. “What the
hell does that mean?”

She stared into his blue gaze. “What kind of a future would we have
together, Paul? We’re too much alike. We have the same background. The same experiences.
We know all the same people. You need somebody from outside the neighborhood,
somebody who can take you places you’ve never been—in your head, I’m talking
about. I’ve learned a lot in the last six months alone, Paul. Things that have
changed my life forever.“

“From him.” Bitterness dripped from his voice.

“No, not just from him. But I’ve learned about people and history and
places and things I’ve been blind to because I’ve lived in my tiny little
isolated world up until now. You need to find somebody fantastic from somewhere
else, and you will. I know you will. I could introduce you to a cute Jewish
girl from Brattleboro.” Connie gave him a smile meant to convey encouragement.
Yet as she pictured him with other girls, her heart began to ache.

Paul’s eyes transmitted his disinterest. “That won’t be necessary. I’ll
be going places sooner than you think.”

Connie’s heart thumped hard against her ribs; she knew what he was
going to say before he said it.

“I got my draft notice last week.”

She put her hand to her mouth to cover its quivering as she stared at
his face. “Oh, my God.” Tears welled in her eyes and spilled down her cheeks,
and she didn’t try to stop them.

“So, you see, you’re free and clear.” His eyes had turned cold as he
stared back. “No chance meetings on the street. No uncomfortable sightings.
It’s all for the best.”

Connie reached across the table and closed her fingers around his wrist,
grasping it before he could pull away. “Don’t say that. That’s terrible. My
God, Paul, that’s the last thing I would ever want.”  Uncontrollable fear
swelled within her as she looked at him, and she tightened her hold on his
wrist as if, by sheer willpower, she could keep him from going. “Maybe you’ll
flunk the physical,” she said in desperation. “Can’t you get a deferment for
your apprenticeship? Pretend you’re gay. I’ve heard guys say you can get out of
it if they think you’re gay.”

Paul let out a hearty laugh, the first she’d heard from him in weeks,
and the sound tore at her heart worse than if he had told her to go to hell.

“I’m serious, Paul. Poke your arm full of holes like a junky. Do
something!”

Hel brought his free hand to rest on top of hers where she gripped his
wrist. “Hey. Take it easy. It’s okay.”

“No, it’s not okay! Aren’t you scared?”

He closed his hand around her fingers, and the light in his eyes faded
away. “I’m scared shitless.”

She stared into his eyes, so overwhelmed with love for him she could
barely breathe.

“This doesn’t change anything,” he said, frowning at her.

“It changes everything.” Hot tears flowed down her cheeks as she leaned
closer to him.

Paul abruptly pulled his hands free of hers. “No, it doesn’t,” he said
angrily. “I don’t want your pity.”

“I don’t pity you, Paul. I love you.”

A look of distaste came over his face, an angry sneer that curled his
upper lip. “How can you say that to me now?”

“Because I do love you! And I want the best for you!”

She couldn’t hold the building pressure anymore. The sobs rolled out of
her, choking off her voice, distorting her features beyond her control. She
turned away from him to cover her face with her hands, and he rose to his feet
and came around to stand in front of her. His hands came under her arms, and he
pulled her to her feet and into his embrace. She wrapped her arms around his
torso, warm and firm beneath his bulky jacket, and pressed her face against the
soft skin on his neck as she closed her eyes and cried. Her tears wet his neck
and cheek as he held her tightly to him, and her awareness of him—the smell of
his skin and his muscular frame and the strength in his arms—made her sob even
harder.

“Whether we were together or not, I’d still have to go, Con.” His
breath fell warmly onto her skin as he spoke. “This way, it’s better for you.
And, maybe, for me, too. I won’t miss you like I would if I knew you were here
waiting for me.”

“But if I could give you hope—something to come back to…” Her sobs cut
off her words, and she pressed her face into his neck once more and tightened
her hold on him.

“I’d worry more about you. I’d feel  guilty expecting you to wait, like
I was cheating you out of life. I’d probably put myself in more danger because
I’d be distracted and depressed.” Paul gently pushed her from him, holding her at
arm’s length as she shuddered through her waning sobs. “We need to leave, Con.”
He turned and picked up the napkin beside his coffee cup and handed it to her.

“Will I see you again before you go?” she asked between hiccups of
sobs.

“No. I’m not having any stupid-ass party. And I can’t go through this
again.” He picked up his glass coffee cup and walked over to the dirty dish
bucket while she dabbed at her eyes and cheeks with the napkin. The couple on
the other side had left at some point, but the girl behind the counter was
watching them with a stricken look on her face.