Chapter 5: The Front Door

On Saturday night I rang the front doorbell of the house I had lived in for twenty-two years.

I had never used it before.

The kitchen door was where I belonged, with the trash and the grocery bags.

The guard who opened the front door stared at my dress, a green one from the secondhand shop on Elm, bought with my first two nights of tips.

"Miss Livia," he said. "Should I announce you?"

"Please."

He cleared his throat and opened the dining room doors.

"Livia Gallardi."

Forty people turned around.

Every capo and every wife sat along the long table, and at the head stood my father with a champagne glass raised.

My sister was beside him in a white dress with a ring on her hand and a young man's arm around her waist.

He was the heir from across the river, a man of about thirty-five in a gray suit.

He was checking his watch.

My father's glass stayed in the air.

"Your apron is in the kitchen," he said.

"I'm not here to serve, Dad. I'm a guest."

"Livia." My mother half rose from her seat. "Not tonight."

"I'm only here for dinner, Mom."

I walked down the table and found the only empty chair, the one next to Valerio Carraro.

A place card stood in front of it, with my name on it in my mother's handwriting.

Valerio pulled the chair out without looking at me and sat back down.

The room started breathing again, a little.

My father laughed too loudly and finished his toast.

"To my daughter Bianca," he said, "and to the union of two great Families."

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