Chapter 19: A Chair I Set for You

On Friday I found Dino on a ladder in a brownstone in Brooklyn Heights, fitting crown molding.

I had asked Marco where the late job was, and he had texted the address back with no question marks.

The owner let me in and went upstairs.

Dino stood on the third rung with a pencil behind his ear and a strip of walnut against the ceiling.

He saw me in the doorway, and his hands stopped.

"You don't have to say anything," he said.

"I know."

I put my tote bag down on the dust sheet over the floor.

I took out two white plates, two forks and a foil pan, and I set them on an overturned paint bucket.

"What are you doing?"

"It's one o'clock. I'm having lunch."

I peeled back the foil.

It was the lasagna, still warm from the toaster oven, because I had carried it across the river against my stomach.

"Nobody eats until both of us are at the table," I said. "You know the rule."

"This isn't a table."

"It's a bucket. Come down."

He came down slowly, one rung at a time, and stood in front of me with sawdust on his forearms.

I did not touch my fork.

"Say it," I said. "Say the rest of what you think I'm going to do."

He looked at the plates.

"Your father will come to the door."

"He came to the door yesterday with a pan of escarole."

"I know. Marco called me."

"Marco called you?"

"He said you put it on the step." A muscle moved in his jaw. "He said you didn't let your father in."

"I didn't."

"For now."

"Dino."

I made myself hold his eyes.

"Aunt Lucia asked for my mother's table for Uncle Paulie's dinner. I said I'd carry it there myself and carry it home myself."

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