Mrs. Morelli threw a dinner roll at him and hit him in the head. “That's a stupid thing to say to a woman. Sometimes you're just like your father.” She crossed herself and looked penitent. “God rest his soul.”
Everyone at the table crossed themselves except Joe. “God rest his soul,” everyone said.
“And you” Mrs. Morelli said to her mother-?in-?law. “No more with the visions.”
“I can't help I have visions,” Grandma Bella said. “I'm an instrument of God.”
This brought on a lot more crossing and Uncle Mario muttered something that I think included the words devil woman.
Bella turned on Mario. “You watch your step, old man. I'll put the eye on you.”
The table went silent. No one wanted to mess with the eye. The eye was Italian voodoo.
While all this was going on, Mary Elizabeth had put away three glasses of wine. “I love a party,” Mary Elizabeth said, her words slightly slurred, her eyes slightly crossed. She raised her wineglass. “Here's to me!”
We all raised our wineglasses. “To Mary Elizabeth!”
When we were all stuffed with chicken in red sauce and meatballs and macaroni casseroles, Mrs. Morelli brought out the desserts. Plates of Italian cookies from People's bakery, fresh-?filled cannoli from Panorama Musicale, cheeses from Porfirio's, and the birthday cake from Little Italy.
By now it was sweltering in the Morelli dining room. All the windows were open and Mrs. Morelli had brought a fan
in to circulate air. Sweat was running down my breastbone, soaking my shirt. My hair was stuck to my face and my mascara was not living up to its waterproof promise. No one cared about the heat. Everyone but Joe and his mom was shit-?faced, me included.
Candles were lit on the cake, raising the room temperature by another ten degrees. We all sang “Happy Birthday,” Mary Elizabeth blew out the candles, and Mrs. Morelli made the first cut in the cake.
Grandma Bella slammed her hands palms down on the table and tossed her head back. She was having a vision.
Everyone at the table groaned.
“I see death,” Grandma Bella said. “A woman.”
More groaning from around the table.
“I see white carnations.”
“Don't worry about it, honey,” Morelli whispered in my ear. “There are always white carnations.”
“This woman who died,” I asked Grandma Bella. “Is she a blonde?”
Grandma Bella opened her eyes and looked at me. “She has curly brown hair,” Bella said. “Shoulder length.”
My hair. Good thing I was too drunk to care.
“That's the vision,” Bella said. “I'm tired now. I need to lay down.”
Bella always got tired after a vision.
We watched her leave the table and go upstairs.
“Good riddance,” Mary Elizabeth said. “She's such a downer.”
And we all made the sign of the cross and had dessert.
Morelli poured me into his truck and drove me back to his house where he dragged me out of the truck and propped me against the passenger side door. “If you're going to throw up, it'd be good if you could do it out here,” he said. “It's supposed to rain. It'll wash away.”
I thought about that for a moment and decided I wasn't going to throw up. I took a step and went down to one knee. “Oops,” I said. “The curb's in my way.”
Morelli hauled me up, slung me over his shoulder, and carried me into the house and up the stairs. I flopped onto Morelli's bed and put one foot on the floor to stop the whirlies. “Wanna have sex?” I asked.