“I didn’t know whether to expect a feminist or an old-fashioned girl,” he’d told me once, reminiscing.
“Which was I?” I’d asked.
A crooked smile. “The best of both.”
As I thought of him now, I turned my head away, having brought myself to the brink of tears. Rose and Jean kindly ignored me, but in a way that said, We’re here. The best of both, I thought, mimicking Matt.
My friends—I was starting to include Jean in that group—ordered a bottle of wine and we clinked their wineglasses and my mineral water tumbler to Matt and his good health.
“I’m so glad to be with you both,” Jean said. “I know you’re not asking, but I have to tell you.” She brushed back a faux fern that appeared to be growing out of an armless torso just over her left shoulder. Russo’s seemed to add a little more of Old Rome every month or so, and Jean’s eyes landed on each pink plaster cherub in turn. Any minute I expected criticism of my choice of restaurant, and the news that her hometown of Falmouth had rules against such cheesy artifacts.
“Tell us what?” Rose asked.
Jean looked at me. “Matt wrote me a letter.”
Rose looked uncomfortable, as if she’d asked an embarrassing question and should excuse herself, but Jean apparently sensed it and held her arm. “This is for both of you. If I open my eyes, I can see how much Gloria cares for him, and I realized after reading Matt’s letter how much both of you mean to my brother and well, you know, et cetera, et cetera.”
“Well, you mean a lot to him, too, and we’re all lucky, aren’t we, because Matt is so wonderful. Thank you for sharing that, Jean.”
That was Rose, the gracious lady of Revere, whose ability to rise to any social occasion often stunned me. I stared past Jean’s shoulder at a fountain with water emanating from the mouth of an enormous winged creature, possibly Michael or Gabriel. Matt was not a letter writer. No notes, postcards, or Christmas cards. I had instituted the practice of sending birthday cards to Petey and Alysse. I couldn’t imagine why Jean would make up such a story, however.
Way behind in the conversation, I said, “Matt wrote you a letter?”
Jean nodded. “He didn’t say anything specific, but I know why he wrote it.” She laughed. “He wanted me to stop being huffy—that’s what he used to call me even when I was a little girl. Huffy.” She cleared her throat. “I knew what he meant even then.”
“We all get huffy now and then,” Rose said, looking at me, not quite kicking me under the table, but nudging me with her eyes.
It was my turn to accept Jean’s apology. I wanted to, but I was stuck on the image of Matt writing a letter. Like a will, I asked myself, his last words? I looked at Rose and she read the questions in my eyes. Is Matt going to die? Is this the last scene, where the hero dies after doing one last good deed for those he loves?
“Gloria, this is a good thing,” Rose said to me, locking her eyes on mine. “Matt is getting better as we speak.”
Jean nodded.
The tears came again, filling my eyes. Jean moved her chair closer to me and hugged me. Rose gave us both a wide, beaming smile. I wondered if she was thinking of her dear departed mother-in-law.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
By evening, Jean and I had seen Matt two or three times, separately, for a few minutes each time. Rose made trips back and forth, checking on us and bringing coffee. I knew she was dying to get me alone to discuss the new Jean Mottolo.
“It’s Tuesday. Why don’t you call MC, and maybe we can have a Girls’ Night Out,” I whispered during one of her appearances.
She brightened. “Even Girls’ Night In would be great.”
Dr. Rosen wanted to keep Matt overnight again, assuring me that they would “get it right” and this would be the last time Detective Gennaro would be spending a night away from his fiancée.
I went into Matt’s room to say good night. I’d decided he wasn’t alert enough for a serious conversation, so I hadn’t mentioned anything about microchips, buckyballs—or the bodies in the deadly Rumney Marsh—all day.
Jean hadn’t held back, however, and he was up to date on my newly developed sisterhood with her.
“I guess it’s okay, between you and Jean now?”
“Yes, it is, thanks to some missive you authored. Did you keep a copy?”
He smiled. “You mean on my computer?”
Matt and Rose were among the last holdouts—no computers, no email, no Internet. They still wasted the cost of first-class stamps to pay their bills. Rose’s assistant, Martha, had put the Galigani business files on a PC and it was Martha who accessed the data when needed.