Isabella for Real Page 4

  “You still want to be our friend, right?” interrupted Oakleigh.

  “Best friend,” said Anisha.

  Emory put her arm around my shoulders. “Don’t worry, Isabella. We’ll keep your secret.”

  Explore.

  Create.

  Imagine.

  Stretch.

  Be yourself.

  Four out of five wasn’t bad . . . was it?

  11:52 a.m.

  Scene 15/TAKE 1

  Under the Dashboard of the Buick

  I’m taking on the peculiar aroma of rubber mats mixed with cookie dough air freshener. All pretty awful when combined with how I already smell from stinky gym socks. I lift my head past the steering wheel and the view is uglier than I expected. And I’m not talking garbage cans or Nonni’s shriveled tomato plants.

  Frankie—not the cat—is knocking on our back door. Worse, way worse. If Frankie starts blabbing stuff he shouldn’t be blabbing about, things could go “boom” even quicker than I thought.

  Road trip is over.

  Bye-bye, Buick.

  11:55 a.m.

  Scene 16/TAKE 1

  On the Move

  FYI, the row of bushes I climbed over through two backyards behind three garages is very, very prickly. (As in OUCH!)

  11:56 a.m.

  Scene 17/TAKE 1

  Aunt Minnie and Auntie Ella’s House

  Fingers part the curtains, and Auntie Ella’s face peeks from the kitchen-door window. Her eyes widen and she smiles, sliding the deadbolt.

  “Minnie! Look who is at our door here!”

  I’m surprised either of them heard me knocking. Springsteen is wailing at a hundred decibels.

  “Get in here, my sweetheart—fancy school girl—big star! What are you doing out there? Quick! Before those peeping Toms with cameras the size of bazookas come after you! They were click-click-clicking me when I took out the recycling, and I wasn’t even wearing lipstick! It’s Barnum and Bailey out there, only without elephants, although that one fella walking around in the gray sweatsuit comes close.

  “Madon, look at your hair—going this way, that way. A brush or comb it needs, no? What’s it doing outside? Snowflaking? In the middle of October? Or is Mrs. Findlay shaking her dust mop out the window again? MINNIE! TURN DOWN BRUCE! I KNOW THE MAN IS BORN TO RUN, BUT GIVE HIM A REST ALREADY! And you, Isabella, I’m kissing. Mmmmmwah. Mmmmwah. Ooo! Your cheeks are icebergs!”

  11:57 a.m.

  Scene 18/TAKE 1

  I kiss Auntie Ella on both cheeks.

  We’re a two-cheek-kissing family. Anything less starts a family feud, and I’m already in enough trouble.

  “Ooo! Ice cube lips, too.” Auntie Ella fingers the sleeve of my T-shirt. “No wonder you’re a Poopsicle! Wearing such a skimpy thing outside in this weather. You got nothing better? Or cleaner?” She sniffs. “You smell like furnisher wax, dirty socks, and Paulie Colandra’s tires. What’sa matter? Washing machine not working over at your house?”

  She grabs a long zebra-print sweater from the back of a kitchen chair and guides my arm through one sleeve.

  “Warm up, bambina. And stop making with a frown face. We’ll hide you from them pupserapsies, right, Minnie?”

  “Paparazzi,” says Aunt Minnie, shuffling in from the dining room, ballet flats on her feet.

  “Pap? Pup? Pip? Who cares? However”—Ella reaches into the pocket of the zebra sweater and pulls out her phone—“you can give your old aunt one or two good pictures, right?” she says holding it close to my face. “Smile, Isabella. Show me some of that personality.”

  “Ella!” shouts Aunt Minnie as the light flashes.

  “What?” she says with a shrug. “I’m not going to sell them to the rag sheets. Unless some big money is involved, of course.” She gives a wink and stuffs the phone into the pouch of her leopard hoodie. “Isabella, what are you wearing on your legs there? Pajamas? Minnie, lunchtime and the kid is still wearing pajamas!”

  “PJ pants,” I tell her.

  “Sweetie, you gotta talk into this good one,” Ella says, pointing to her right ear. “I like the colors going on in that plaid. Magenta is what you call it. A pretty blue in there too.”

  Minnie frowns. “Turquoise, maybe aquamarine. It is not blue.”

  “Such a color expert,” Ella says with a wave. Minnie turns her back and Ella sticks out her tongue. She looks at me and winks. “Maybe I’ll get me a pair of those pink and blue PJs.”

  Minnie shakes her head. Her eyebrows furrow and her mouth shifts sideways as she takes slow baby-steps across the yellow and gray checked linoleum, nylon knee-highs rolled down around her ankles. Her bright pink tights are streaked with brown paint from the knees up, and she smells of turpentine, linseed oil, and garlic. She probably chopped more than a couple cloves for the sauce bubbling on the stove.

  I sniff. “Something smells good.”

  “Of course it smells good,” Ella says, walking over to the front burner. “Minnie’s got everything in her Saturday gravy pot. Meatballs, sausage, spareribs, neck bones. The whole pig is in there swimming with the last of the summer tomatoes and basil from the garden.”

  Auntie Ella picks up the wooden spoon resting on the counter and gives the sauce a stir, then lowers the flame until it barely burns a light blue.

  “You stay for rigatoni, Isabella,” orders Minnie, one hand on her hip, the other pointing to the big stainless steel pot.

  I notice the orange smudge across her chin. If it were on her sister, I’d say Auntie Ella was self-tanning again, but on Aunt Minnie I know the smudge is paint.

  Every summer, way before I was born, the two of them visited Cousin Carmela on the family farm in Tuscany so Aunt Minnie could paint plein air. (Aunt Minnie told me that means painting outdoors.) Her arthritis is so bad now, she can no longer make the trip. Now instead of Italian landscapes, she paints portraits in the big room upstairs she calls her studio. It faces the backyard and has the best light in the house. Not the same as Italy, but Aunt Minnie says New Jersey light is all she’s got.

  She gave me the last landscape painting from her final trip to Italy. A scene of my great-great-grandparents’ farm in Pienza: green hills, swaying lavender, red poppies, tall deep green cypress trees, and way in the background, a white farmhouse. Her papa’s. My Great-Great-­Grandfather Giuseppe. Uncle Babe hung the painting over my bed. (It only took him three nails and one big hole in the plaster.) Mom even picked out a bedspread to match the purple flowers.

  “Painting today, Aunt Minnie?” I say as we kiss.

  “Little bit. Keeping my old fingers moving.”

  She smiles. So does Auntie Ella. That’s when you can really see they are twins. When my aunts were younger, they looked identical. I’ve seen pictures in Nonni’s photo albums, and you almost couldn’t tell them apart. It’s easy now because Minnie wears big white cat-eye glasses and her hair is red, like the hydrant down the street, while Ella’s is the color of a Creamsicle. Neither has Nonni’s cotton-candy beehive. Their hair is short, spiked, and gelled. Today, except for a fringe of short red bangs, most of Minnie’s hair is under her favorite purple do-rag that she wears when she paints.

  “Minnie. Look at our Isabella. Ammonia she’s going to get, no?”

  “New-moan-ya.” Minnie rolls her eyes and claps her hands in prayer. “The woman refuses to listen to me.”

  Ella shrugs and hitches both thumbs inside the waistband of her bright green spandex biker shorts and gives them a hike. As she lifts her pants, spots on the leopard hoodie she’s wearing start to jiggle. My grandmother is usually the designated checker when it comes to my aunt’s undergarments. (As in: is Ella wearing any.) Pretty sure Grandma missed something important this morning.

  My stomach growls.

  “Minnie! The kid is hungry! Make this string bean something to eat.”

  “Of course I’ll make something. What do you want, cara mia? I’ve got everything.”

  I move aside for Minnie to pull the refrigerator
handle and peek over her shoulder as she opens the door.

  Minnie slides her glasses down her nose, and squints. “Let’s see what’s in here. Bolognese from yesterday . . . veal involtini still good from Tuesday . . .”

  Ella pokes me. “Eh. Pass on that. The veal is just okay.”

  “It’s delicious, Isabella.”

  Ella whispers, “Oops. Thought that was her deaf side.”

  Minnie moves the containers from one shelf to the other. “I also have some eggplant.”

  “Minnie makes better than Constanza. Ravioli, too.” Ella lowers her voice as if their older sister was able to hear two houses away. “Minnie’s ravies are little pillows. Your great-grandmother’s dough is tough, chewy—too much rolling and kneading. Of course, that’s why her arms are in such good shape. Not as good as mine, though.” Ella makes a muscle the size of a tangerine. “That’s ’cause I do weightlifting. One pound. Each arm.”

  Minnie juts her chin toward the counter. “Look what’s cooling on that rack next to the sink: crostata di fichi e pere —fig and pear tart. Carmela’s recipe.”

  Ella nudges me in the ribs. “Remember when your Aunt KiKi was in that crazy Search for Liars, Lovers—whatever they called that show—and she asked the head writer to make her character have a craving for Carmela’s crostata?”

  “That show was garbage,” says Minnie. “My pastry was the only good thing that happened on the program.”

  “I definitely want a slice of that,” I say, already tasting the baked pears and Aunt Minnie’s delicious crust.

  “As much as you want. Take two. Three. You’re a toothpick. Eat.” Minnie pulls out the lunchmeat drawer. “Isabella, a sandwich maybe? Salami? Beautiful imported prosciutto de Parma? Or how about mortadella?”

  Ella pokes me again with her elbow. “You know what your grandfather calls that, don’t you?” she says with a laugh. “Bologna with Q-Tips.”

  “I’m so hungry I could eat a Q-Tip.” I pat my stomach and smile. Grandpop would say coming over here was hitting the Daily Double: time to think and eat.

  12:08 p.m.

  Scene 19/TAKE 1

  Ella grabs my arm and heads for the dining room. “Isabella, come while Minnie makes.”

  “Ella! Wait!” says Minnie before we reach the doorway. “Isabella, tie your aunt’s shoelaces on those tugboats she calls sneakers before she trips and every bone in her body crumbles like a pignoli cookie.”

  “I can bend over and tie my own sneakers,” Ella insists.

  “I know you can bend over,” says Minnie. “But nobody can get you back up.”

  I crouch and give Auntie Ella’s purple laces a double tie while she tells me about bone density and her daily calcium intake: two cups of broccoli, one of kale.

  “I’m what you call ax-toes untolerant. Can’t drink milk no more. Doctor says eat green veggies like my younger Babe. These old bones are in good shape now, even though broccoli makes me gassy. Minnie, don’t forget olives!” she yells over her shoulder, leading the way into the dining room. She stops and whispers, “I like to suck on the salty black ones. I just have to remember not to swallow the pits.”

  Except for the bay window that faces Vincent’s house next door, Aunt Minnie’s paintings cover every inch of the four walls, floor to ceiling. I’ve never been to my great-great-grandfather’s farm, but every time I’m in this room I feel like I’m standing in one of those fields in Italy. Aunt KiKi says it’s amahzzing how Aunt Minnie can create a tree with only a few brushstrokes. Mom says a person can almost feel the Mediterranean breeze. I think she’s right.

  Directly across from the window is the sideboard that once belonged to my Great-Great-Grandmother Lucia back in Italy. Sitting on the marble top, front to back, end to end, are dozens of family photographs, like my grandparents’ wedding portrait. (Grandpop’s mustache was black and his sideburns were long and bushy.) There are pictures of Vincent blowing out his birthday candles when he was five, me sitting in a highchair with a bowl of spaghetti on my head, and one faded three-by-five of Uncle Babe in his plaid sport coat, back when he wasn’t bald.

  I like the photographs of Mom and her sisters at the Jersey Shore taken when they were little girls dressed in matching bathing suits, sitting on the sand under a striped umbrella, and another where the three of them are lined up in front of a cotton candy stand alongside my great-grandmother. (Aunt KiKi calls that snapshot “an example of the unsettling influence the Boardwalk had on Nonni’s choice of coiffure.”)

  And way in the back where nobody can see, but I know it’s there, is the only photograph I’ve ever seen of my parents. (Actually, it’s three quarters of a photograph. Aunt Minnie cut part of my father’s face out of the picture. But what’s left looks handsome.)

  “Come,” Ella says, still leading me by the hand. “We’re having a pic-a-nic.”

  “Pick-nick!” shouts Aunt Minnie from the kitchen.

  12:13 p.m.

  Scene 20/TAKE 1

  Aunt Minnie and Auntie Ella’s Living Room

  “Older by two minutes,” Ella mutters as she props a square pillow behind her back and squirms back and forth, getting comfortable on the beige couch. “A hundred and twenty seconds makes somebody so smart? Sit, my sweetheart.”

  She pats the cushion as I take a quick peek out the window. I glance right, then left, look up the street as far as I can see, but there’s no sign of Frankie or Vincent. The hot dog guy is still doing big business, though.

  Ella gives the seat cushion another pat. “On my good side, so I can hear what you’re saying. Otherwise all I see are lips moving—same as watching television with the sound off.”

  The living room smells of peppermint candies and Murphy Oil Soap, not counting Auntie Ella’s Dolce & Gabbana. What she forgot with underwear, she made up in perfume. I was expecting the aroma of stale cigarette smoke, because even though Auntie Ella promised Mom she would quit we don’t think she did. Either Auntie Ella has been forgetting where she hides her smokes, or Aunt Minnie opened the windows yesterday and aired out the room. That, however, would be unlikely, as the whole house is hermetically sealed the minute the temperature drops to sixty degrees.

  The only room in the house where a window is unlocked and lifts up without a crowbar is one of the four in Aunt Minnie’s studio. Grandma opens it a couple of times a week so she doesn’t walk in one day and find Aunt Minnie passed out from turpentine fumes.

  “Minnie! Hurry up in there,” Ella calls, turning her head toward the kitchen when she hears my stomach growl again. “We have a hungry girl! And warm up some of that eggplant left over from Wednesday!” Ella smiles. “Never get in trouble eating eggplant, right, Isabella?”

  I nod and smile even though that is so not true.

  Not true at all.

  Seven Weeks Ago, Second Week of School

  Founders Dining Hall, Fortier Academy

  Sixth Grade Lunch

  “Isabella, would you please pass the ketchup?” Emory asked, nodding to the bottle in the middle of our table next to a jar of mustard and stack of napkins.

  “Sure. Hey, did you know back in 1933, one of these didn’t even cost ten cents?”

  “Huh?” She took the bottle from my hand and turned it upside down over her hot dog. “How do you know about that?”

  “Uhhhhhhh . . .”

  “1933?” she said, hitting the bottom with the heel of her palm.

  (Uh-oh. I almost slipped into Isabella for real.) I hunched my shoulders and shrugged. “Read it somewhere, I guess. I’m sort of good on . . . insignificant details.”

  “Well then promise me you’ll be my study partner when history exams roll around. I hear through the grapevine Madame Bertrand loves to pack her tests with stuff just like that.”

  “Isabella can help you after she helps me,” said Oakleigh, biting into the end of the bun.

  (Me, a tutor? Who knew?)

  “Uh . . . maybe we should eat!” I said, changing the conversation.

  “W
hat have you got in there?” Anisha asked as I opened the brown bag.

  “Lunch. My Nonni packed my lunch again.”

  “What’s a nonni? You mean nanny?”

  “Of course she means nanny, don’t you, Isabella?” said Emory.

  “I haven’t had a nanny since I was eight,” Oakleigh said through a bite of hot dog, mustard smeared across her chin.

  Emory swirled the end of a long french fry into the puddle of ketchup on her plate. “Isabella, are you talking about the woman who drives you to school every day in that cool vintage car? I thought you told us the other day she was your mom’s personal assistant?”

  “Her name is Rosie, right?” Oakleigh said, reaching for a napkin.

  (I started thinking I might have to take notes. I had forgotten the little fib I’d told them about Aunt Rosalie.)

  “Um. Yes. Rosie. That’s right. She drives, cooks, and I guess what you call . . . nannies.”

  “She’s a personal assistant, nanny, chauffeur, and a chef too?” Anisha asked, looking confused.

  “Well . . . kind of. . . She sort of . . .”

  “Multitasks?” said Oakleigh, wiping mustard off her chin.

  “Exactly,” I said with a long exhale. “Rosie multitasks . . . Let’s eat!” I said in a second try at changing the topic.

  I pulled the container from the soggy paper bag and Anisha leaned closer to my chair. “Is what’s in there a favorite of . . . the Contessa?” she whispered.

  “Well . . . uh . . . let’s just say, I wouldn’t be wrong if I told you that.”

  (Which was actually totally true. Aunt KiKi loved Nonni’s eggplant.)

  It was more than a week into school and I had given up trying to convince them I wasn’t the daughter of a countess. The more I said I wasn’t, the more all three believed I was. Yes, I knew this could turn into a big, ugly, soot-covered snowball growing bigger and bigger as it rolled down the drive at Fortier, but for right then, it just seemed like one harmless little fib.