Big Mimmo
The bleeding fireball sun was starting its descent over the rooftops as Francesca’s father, Dominic Scalino, aka Big Mimmo, drove into his driveway. He noticed a coyote on the nearby hillside, sly and feigning nonchalance while being on the hunt. Coyotes were becoming more and more of a nuisance in the neighborhood, and at odd times of the day, too. They kept down the rodent population, so they had half an excuse to live. Their mating screams startling, waking him up in the middle of the night were one thing. But now to judge by the handbills on the telephone poles, cats were going missing, toy dogs disappeared, and people were growing militant. If a coyote entered his property, Mimmo’d have to do something about it.
He walked into his house through the garage. The big dog thudded over to him, expecting a head rub, which he deserved and which he got, along with an insanely desirable liver treat for good measure. Who would win a battle between this dog and a coyote, Mimmo wondered. Problem was, when a fight broke out with a coyote, it was a good chance there was never a single coyote, and that they schemed to be chased by the dog—all the way into the pack of coyotes gathered in ambush. It’s a violent world here in the suburbs.
He was taking care of his daughter’s dog because she and Tommy went out of town for a few days, in the name of stabilizing their shaky relationship. Dickens was a very good dog, a chocolate brown pit bull mix with a sweet disposition, and the dog felt at home here in this house with a man who was evidently in possession of a limitless supply of liver treats.
Big Mimmo had returned from his doctor’s appointment, which had not gone well, as could have been predicted. The man didn’t trust the medical profession in general, but he figured he had to take a little bit seriously the results of the latest series of distressing tests, or at least pretend to.
“If you want to hang around in the world for a while, you need to start making some serious changes in your life,” the doc had said. “Lose thirty pounds. Give up the damn cigars. One glass of red wine a day, tops. You’re not a young man anymore, Dominic.”
“You’re not telling me to walk a half hour every day, like you usually do.”
“Because I give up, why waste my breath, but you should definitely do that, too.”
Big Mimmo, who had been gratuitously, rudely reminded he was not a young man anymore, opened up a fine bottle of so-called Super Tuscan Tignanello, and poured some into a goblet. It needed some air but it tasted wonderful accompanied by a chunk of Parmigiano he slivered off the wheel of Reggiano on the kitchen counter. Then he clipped the end of a Dominican gran robusto and lit it. Living alone, he could smoke in his house anytime he liked. Not as before, before his wife went into assisted living, which was required, given her needs and maladies. Way back when she put her foot down about smoking in the house, and that was an argument he was never going to win. Things had changed, largely not for the better. He took the wine and the cigar outside and sat in an Adirondack chair and settled in to watch what was left of the fading sun’s show.
Dickens sidled up to him for another pat and with any luck another cube of freeze-dried liver. The man didn’t have any doggie treats at hand outside, but he did have some of the tantalizing cheese, and he slipped the dog a piece. To judge by his eagerness, that had to taste better than freeze-dried liver.
He liked to talk to the dog, who seemed to understand him perfectly. “We’re both misunderstood species, daverro.” The dog signaled agreeableness as he relaxed on his haunches and appeared content to be looking out in the same direction as Big Mimmo, each of them claiming territory, the whole sky, for his own. He poured himself a second glass. The wine was coming around even if, according to his grim reaper of a doc, he wasn’t anymore.
He heard the front door open, and Dickens scampered happily in that direction. What was Mikey, his son, doing, coming over? He only came over when he needed some money or a shoulder to cry on. But Big Mimmo was wrong.
“Papá,” Francesca said, opening the glass door to the patio, while the dog seemed thrilled he had her again. “I’m back.”
“I can see that, tesoro. Tommy with you?”
She and Dickens had a bond that was obvious. Tommy? He was not with her.
“You two were going away to spend quality time together? Never understood that, quality time, like is there any other kind?”
“What are you drinking?”
He showed her the label on the bottle and she went back inside for a glass and poured herself one.
“Come va? You gonna tell me what’s up, carissima?” It was a week after the gala, a lot had happened that night. None of it pleasant to her mind. First Mackey, second the fight between her and the cop. Ex-detective, she would have corrected him.
She sipped and sipped again. “Nothing went according to plan. We couldn’t decide whether to break up or get serious.”
“I know what you mean, I remember...”
“So, Papá, we decided to do both.”
He wasn’t following his daughter, who was smarter than he was, which he was smart enough to understand.
“What I mean is, we’re going to get married…”
She flashed a new diamond on her finger. “Tommy wants to make an honest woman out of me. Somebody had to.”
At first he thought she was joking. She wasn’t.
“Your mama would have been happy.”
She let his remark linger, because her mother was not going to register that development, or any other developments.
“How did the doctor go?”
“Aces, Francesca, carissima, aces. I put a bet in, I’m going to outlive the guy.”
“That’s great. You happy for me, Papá?”
“I been happy for you since the day you were born.”
“Think I’m doing the right thing?”
What could he say? He took her hand in his.
She knew, as he did, Tommy was no Anthony. Anthony himself was no longer Anthony. He had been transformed into an image, a towering memory, an unattainable ideal. This was not fair to Tommy. It wasn’t even fair to Anthony. But the dead always get the last word.
“But life, life is for the living, tesoro.”
“You always say that. I don’t know what it means.”
“Va bene, okay. You will when you need to.”