(no subject)
Title: Truth
Characters: Silver, Giovanni, Pearl, Green
POV: Silver
Notes: Finally you getta see how his friends react.
“Excuse me. Where is your father?”
I look away from Green just as she serves. The ping-pong ball whines just by my ear when I turn around.
Oh great. Another one. Another middle-aged Italian man in an Italian suit with an Italian accent- excuse me, Sicilian, can’t have anyone thinking that Sicily’s a part of Italy, hah, hah, hah… Perhaps I’m a little bit irritated, but I shove my head sideways, towards the parlor. “Living room with a bunch of people. Can’t miss it.” I turn my back to him, grab another ping-pong ball, and deliberately hit it so hard it doesn’t even hit the table.
“Geez, why do you have to do that?” she sniffs. It’s the last ball in the slot, so we both crawl around the room looking for the other balls. I’m reaching under the couch for one when someone trips over me.
“Ow!”
The man smiles at me and says in slow, annunciated English, “He-LLO. WHERE is your-“
“LIVING ROOM!”
As he heads off to the meeting, Green gives me a funny look from under an armchair.
“You know… I’ve been meaning to ask. Are you sure this is a good day for me to come over? Your house is a bit full by now… Are all these people really your uncles?” she asks dubiously.
Yes. My uncles. And definitely not the heads and officers of minor and major crime families operating within an ethnic community. “Hah…” I force myself to laugh a bit. “Yeah. Just uncles visiting from around the country. They only like get together once every three years or so, and it’s a big thing so they’re all wearing suits and coming in with bodyguards. Your serve.”
The ball bounces across the table a few times before I score. “Point for me- hey!”
Green smugly flips a number for both of us as the ball flies by my head again. “Me too.”
“That’s something my mother would do,” I say absentmindedly.
She stops and looks at me. “Don’t ever say that ever again.”
We leave it like that and she scores three more points.
“They’re coming out for lunch, I think.” Green and I are outside on the patio and about to tuck into grilled cheese when the entire crowd comes out.
“Maybe we should move,” Green suggests, and I begin to nod, when all of a sudden, two huge suited men flicker into existence behind me.
“Wah-“
“Young Sir. Your father requests that you keep within the perimeter described by the frontal portion of your garden.” They stop and stare.
It takes me a while before I remember how bodyguards are. “Er- confirmed. Yes. We’ll stay here. Thanks.”
They both nod and melt back.
I turn back to Green and she’s staring with her lip tucked up. “Really. Those are your uncles? I thought they were FBI agents… And why do they call you ‘young sir?’”
“It’s… It’s a term of endearment, really, for… A… Younger family member. It’s really Yongsre. It’s… A local dialect, really. You won’t find it in any Italian dictionaries.”
“…Hey.”
“No, really, it means ‘little-‘”
“Whatever.” She gives me a look but goes back to her sandwich. “You know, I think your entire family’s planning something… Please just tell me. Does it have anything to do with… Your father’s… Business?”
“I told you! He’s only doing it part-time now! The rest of the time he’s a consultant for companies!”
“Part-time!” she snorts.
“Yes!”
We glare at each other for a while.
“Are you defending him?”
“No! I’m just telling you as it is!” I say crossly.
She curls her hair around her finger. “I don’t know. I mean, you’re like family to me. But now that you’re living with your parents, it’s just weird… And like all your uncles are here… I mean, we’ve spent like, years fighting him and now I’m sitting in his garden chair on his patio, eating his food-“
“-no, actually Ma’m made the sandwiches for us…”
“-Drinking his lemonade, looking at finches on his wife’s fairy princess bird feeder-“
“-Actually, the bird feeder’s his…”
“-Eating the cute girly tea cookies his wife baked-“
“No, that’s his cooking too…”
This stops her for a moment. “I’ll never get this image out of my mind. But point is…” She grabs a napkin and wipes the sauce off her mouth. “It’s just weird, sitting here and-“
“-Using his used napkin!” I exclaim and tug the napkin out of her hand.
She quickly grabs my napkin and wipes her mouth again. “Eew.”
I sigh. “It’s hard for me too. I mean, he’s my father, but I know what he does. I know he does… Less legal stuff, and he kills people that get in his way. But I don’t know…”
She suddenly looks down at herself in disgust. “My gosh. I’ve been… This whole time I’ve been thinking about how weird it is for me, but it’s you that has to go through all this… Here, hug!”
Behind us, a throat clears, and I quickly jump back but calm down when I realize it’s just Father. His eyes crinkle up at the edges when he smiles and he pats my shoulder warmly.
“Son! How are you and your friend doing?” he asks kindly. I notice that he’s layered his Sicilian accent on extra thick.
“Good, Dad! The cookies are really good. Aren’t they, Green?”
He looks like such a complete sweetheart she grudgingly relents. “Hello Mr. Giovanni! The cookies are really good… You have a lot of brothers, Mr. Giovanni.”
He looks at her in surprise. “What do you mean? I’m an only child!”
.