“It’s a corno. A goat horn, Joseph. Italian men wear it for good luck. Legend says that it protects against the malocchio. You know, the evil eye. Satan’s work.” Mom narrowed her eyes like she always does when she talks about warding off dark spirits.
Nash looked at Mom like she was an exorcist. Which Mom sort of thinks she is. She’s always talking about how the malocchio comes when people get cocky, causing others to cast jealous, bad luck glances. She talks about it with this doubting grin like she’s way past believing a silly superstition that started in Italy hundreds of years ago, but we all know she buys into it. At least a little.
I looked over at Dad. His bald head beamed from the fluorescent lamp, and he was grinning like he does when he finishes reading one of those classics. “I got a corno from Grandpa Calderaro the year I turned fourteen. I don’t know about warding off dark spirits, but it means you’re on your way. Growing up. Wear it and be proud.”
“Try it on,” Mom said.
“Yeah, put it on, Joseph.” Dad leaned back in his chair proudly, the way the Pope does after Easter mass.
Put it on? No way. I sat there, speechless, looking down at the frosting flower on Mom’s piece of cake. I didn’t know what to say. Boy, was I glad that Nash was a best friend who wouldn’t blab my incriminating moments to others.
“I’ll help you.” Gina picked up the chain and tried to put it around my neck.
I put my hand out. “Stop, Gina.” I stuck the corno back in the box.
“What’s wrong?” Dad looked confused.
“My neck’s hot,” I said, rubbing it, and thinking what a nightmare it would be to get caught wearing this in the locker room. Guys at school would think a goat horn looked even weirder than the smiley face boxers Chuck Beski wore last week. And if they did know about the corno, that probably meant they were Italian, so they’d sure wonder why it was hanging around my Korean neck.
“What, you don’t like it?” Dad asked.
“I didn’t say that.”
“Well you might as well have,” he replied. Almost on cue, the vein near Dad’s forehead started pulsing in a one-stroke pattern like drum rudiments. Bum, bum, bum. Bum, bum, bum. That happens whenever he’s upset. We call it his Mad Meter. Dad has his own window-washing business, and one time this snotty rich lady tried to pay him less than what she owed. That got the Mad Meter pulsing for hours.
I could tell Nash felt funny being caught in a Calderaro clash because he started looking around the kitchen, as if scrubbing the crusted sauce pot suddenly sounded appealing.
Mom noticed the Mad Meter too, so she tried to left turn out of the topic. “Pete, do Irish people have any special jewelry?” she asked.
Nash shrugged. “My mom wears a Saint Brigid’s cross that’s made out of rope, and my sister, Nancy, got a Saint Anthony medal when she graduated from high school.”
“He’s the patron saint for lost things,” Mom said, smiling at Nash. “Italians love him too.”
Nash nodded. “Nancy’s always losing her car keys.”
Sophie picked up the chain and frowned. “I don’t like the corno either, Daddy. We saw a movie in school about how mean people rip the tusks off elephants. My teacher said the people who buy the tusks make everything worse.”
“I think you watch too many movies in school,” Dad snapped. “What happened to books?”
“Down with animal cruelty! From now on, I’m a vegetarian,” Sophie declared.
I looked over at Dad’s forehead. Bum, bum, bum. The Mad Meter synchronized better than our sixth-grade drummers.
Funny thing was, when I looked at the corno, it reminded me of school too. How I had nothing to write for that dumb ancestry essay.
Then Gina joined in the cause. She’s always a me-too kid around Sophie. “Don’t wear that horn, Joseph. Everyone has to stop hurting elephants and goats!” She banged the gift box against the table, nearly knocking into her cake plate.
Gina’s face was so serious I couldn’t control myself. I burst out laughing. Even Nash laughed.
But Dad didn’t. The Mad Meter had stopped, and now he looked sad. “It’s not a real goat horn. See what you’ve started, Joseph? A little gratitude would have been nice.”
“I am thankful, it’s just that I’m not…” I stopped myself. This wasn’t the time or place, as Mom likes to say.
“You’re not what?” Dad asked.
I didn’t answer.
Dad shook his head. Then he put his mug and cake, untouched, in the sink and walked out of the kitchen.
“Mr. Calderaro’s not big on dessert,” Mom said to Nash. As if that explained everything.