Ten

People say that Boston was planned by cows, whose random tracks were paved to make streets. This is grossly unfair, as much of the city is laid out in a logical Cartesian grid with alphabetical street names (Boston’s planners having more imagination than those of certain other grid-like cities, who numbered their streets).

However, the cow-path theory of urban planning holds when it comes to the North End. The North End has been here from the beginning, its streets a warren of tight paths better suited to horses than automobiles. The neighborhood fills a rough semicircle that stretches along the waterfront from Christopher Columbus Park to the Charlestown Bridge. The straight border of the semicircle is a green park that was once an elevated highway. Hanover Street cuts through the neighborhood from the waterfront to the park, and Prince Street cuts the other way.

My mother was raised here, in a Honeymooners-style apartment on Prince Street with the rest of her Italian family: the Rizzos. I grew up visiting the North End to see my grandmother, celebrate holidays, and gorge on fried dough and quahogs at the feasts—annual street parties that celebrate the patron saints of Italian towns.

There was no feast on Hanover Street today, just the usual jostling of a busy community. It was three o’clock and even though it wasn’t yet dinnertime, tourists blocked the sidewalks meandering down the Freedom Trail. They’d swing over to North Street to see Paul Revere’s house, then past his statue, and on to the Old North Church. I dodged around them until I reached Cafe Vittoria, the self-proclaimed “Oldest Cafe in the North End.”

The narrow cafe had a granite entryway, a raised white floor, and small chrome tables. A cappuccino bar ran along the one side, and tables ran down the other. One of the tables was tucked up against the window next to the entryway.

Sitting in the window, sipping coffee from a tiny cup, was my cousin Sal. He was alone and had a cashmere greatcoat draped over a chrome chair next to him. Sal saw me, frowned, and beckoned me inside.

Sal dressed like a classy undertaker, in a black suit with a blue striped shirt and a paisley tie. He was big in the way that a silverback gorilla is big—exhibiting an innate largeness that said keep your distance. He had always been bigger than me. He was the firstborn of my generation, sixteen by the time I arrived. He’s been an adult for as long as I can remember.

Sal said nothing. He gestured for me to join him and then motioned to the barista, holding up two fingers and pointing at his biscotti as I pulled up a chair. He watched me sit and said, “I should kick your ass. You move back to the city and you go to the fucking South End with the fucking hippies, instead of to the North End where you got family. How come you never come around here?”

I never come around here because I don’t want to be harangued about how I never come around here.

I said, “And how are things with you?”

“They’re the fucking same.”

“How is Auntie Rosa?”

Sal raised his hand shook his head, “Don’t get me started. She’s like all old people. She’s got nothing to do till she dies except make everybody miserable. How’s your ma?”

“Fine, I guess.”

“You guess? When was the last time you saw her?”

I didn’t want to talk about my mother. I hadn’t seen her in six months, and I didn’t want to get an earful from Sal. I was saved by the barista, who had gotten the message and brought us espresso and biscotti. I bit into a cookie rather than answer the question.

Sal drank his espresso and looked out the window at his world. Two guys in Bruins jackets walked past the window and nodded their hellos to Sal. He nodded back. I wasn’t sure what Sal did for a living. He never talked about his work, and I never asked. But a lot of people treated him with respect.

I said, “There was a dead guy outside my house last night.”

Sal said, “No shit. I guess the South End isn’t as great as you think.”

“I mean right outside my house. On my front stoop.”

“You know the guy?”

“No. But his name was John Tucker. The police think he was my brother.”

Sal grimaced and took a bite of his biscotti, slurped his espresso and said, “That’s bullshit. Did you tell them that your ma had one kid and that was enough for her?”

“Yeah.”

“And what did they say?”

“They said my dad might have been screwing around.”

Sal shook his head. “Right to your fucking face? The cops got no respect.”

I looked out the window and drank my espresso. We were silent for a moment, until I said, “You’re right. Lee disrespected my dad. I never thought of it that way.”

“Nobody thinks that way anymore. Respect. Family. Doing the right fucking thing. Nobody cares about that shit. Speaking of family, did you think I forgot my question? When was the last time you saw your ma?”

“Six months ago. On her birthday.”

Sal pointed at me with his biscotti. “That’s a fucking sin, you know? You gotta see your ma.”

“It’s complicated.”

“It’s not fucking complicated. You go. You see her. You bring her some candy and give her a kiss. What’s so fucking complicated?”

The candy box would have been complicated, but I didn’t say anything.

Sal continued. “You know, she could be dead tomorrow. Then what? Then you spend the rest of your life saying you should have seen her more. You never know when it’s gonna happen. You of all people should know that. Your dad, your wife, even that fucking guy they shot in front of your house. None of them knew it was coming.”

I finished my espresso, noting the brown smear of coffee grounds across the bottom of the cup as I considered the sudden losses in my life. Dad died of an aneurysm and my wife died in a home invasion. Sal was right: neither of them saw it coming, and I always regretted that I wasn’t better to them.

Then this John Tucker got shot …

I looked at Sal. He had finished his espresso as well and was leaning forward to get up to leave. I put my hand out and touched his forearm. I said, “I never said the guy was shot. How did you know he was shot?”

Sal pulled his arm away and stood. He said, “I hear things.”

I remained sitting and said, “And you didn’t mention to me that you heard about this? What else did you hear? This guy was my brother, wasn’t he?”

Sal took a step and loomed over me, pointing a finger into my face. He whispered at me in quiet fury. “What did I tell you? You don’t have a fucking brother. If you had a brother, then someone would have introduced you and said, ‘Hey Tucker, this is your fucking brother.’ You would have bought each other birthday presents and seen each other at Christmas and maybe went to hockey games. But none of that happened, because you don’t have a fucking brother.”

I crossed my arms and said, “Well, we’ll see what his mother says.”

Sal put on his overcoat and said, “Who?”

“Cathy Byrd. John Tucker’s mother. I’m going to see her tomorrow.”

“Yeah, well there’s something you gotta know about Cathy Byrd,” said Sal.

“You know her?”

“Yeah,” said Sal, walking to the door. He opened it and said, “She’s a fucking whore.” He walked out the door and took a left, heading toward the Paul Revere Statue and away from the South End.