Chapter 8: Thursday Lunch

Domenico's POV

On Thursdays the men who run Bellandi Linen eat lunch at the long table in the warehouse office.

On Thursdays I try very hard to say nothing frightening.

It is harder than it sounds.

This Thursday a delivery truck had been four days late to a restaurant on Halsted.

The truck driver stood at the end of the table with his cap in both hands.

He was a big man and he had been sweating since the door.

I did not want to be at this table.

I wanted to be on Harlem Avenue, looking at a bakery window, and I had no explanation for it that I could say aloud.

"Sit down," I said. "Please."

He stayed standing, so I tried again.

"I would hate for your truck to be late," I said.

That was the whole sentence.

I meant that the restaurant on Halsted needed its tablecloths.

I also meant that the driver's mother was in the hospital, and that I had been worried.

The truck driver looked at the men around the table, and then back at me.

"It won't happen again, Mr. Bellandi," he said.

"I am not angry," I said.

"No sir," he said.

"I was only mentioning it," I said.

"Yes, sir. Of course, sir," he said.

"Please eat something," I said.

He went pale.

Then he sat down on the floor.

He had meant to sit on a chair, and he had not been able to reach it.

The man with the gold tooth said, "He's fainted."

"Get him water," I said.

Two of them carried him out to the loading dock and propped him against a pallet.

The man with the gold tooth came back, sat, and lowered his voice to me.

"Boss, I'll say this for you. Four days late, and he fainted on the first sentence."

"I only said I would hate for it to be late."

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