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“Frankie, for fuck’s sake. Answer your phone.” Jack’s voice carries through the shop, echoing from deep under the hood of a late nineties town car.
I’m leaning my elbows on the ancient metal shop desk, sorting through a goddamn mountain of paperwork as though the answer to the meaning of the universe is on one of those purchase orders. The even more ancient desk chair creaks under my weight.
“Frankie!” Jack times his shout to the momentary pause before the bass of the song booming through the speakers kicks up to eardrum-splitting.
“Fuck, man, you want me to find that slip or what?” I yell back.
I’ve got a one-track mind, and I mean that literally.
You want my attention, you get it. All of it.
You want diagnostics run on a fuel pump, the best cup of coffee you ever had, a night of mind-melting orgasms courtesy of my tongue, or even a lost purchase order found—I can do every one of those things exceptionally well. But only one damned thing at a time.
Finding that piece of paper Jack lost in this mess on the desk will take every shred of patience I have left.
And to be honest, I didn’t even hear my phone. I can’t believe he can hear anything over the hair band he has blaring.
I curse under my breath and try to find the slip of paper that my buddy insists is here—somewhere.
If Jack’s parents weren’t going through some shit, I would have gotten my ass out from behind the desk and back under one of the dozen cars we have waiting for work, telling him to find the goddamn paperwork himself. But Jack’s my oldest friend, this is his shop, and without his mom here to keep the books, he’s in way over his head.
“Come on, man. Did you find it?” Jack demands.
I want to tell him to find his own needle in this haystack, but instead, I just hold up a hand and flip him the bird while I shove aside papers of all shapes and sizes.
One problem at a time.
I grab my phone and swipe the screen, and I see not one, not two, but three different messages, all from the same sender.
Mom: Frankie, sweetheart, it’s your mother. Can you take a quick break and meet me at Latterature? It’s urgent but not life-threatening. Love, Ma
Mom: Franco, honey. It’s almost lunch. Do your mother a favor and run down to the bookstore. I won’t keep you long. It’s very, very important. Love you, sweetheart. Ma
Mom: Son, please, now I’m getting worried. You work five minutes away. Are you coming? Love, your mother Lucia
Three separate text messages composed in full sentences. Each one addressed to me. Each one signed by my mother.
No matter how many times I’ve explained that she doesn’t have to sign her texts, it’s a habit she’ll never break. And just like when we were kids, Ma escalates the urgency of her texts by switching from Ma to your mother. And worse, her full name.
“J!” I yell over the music, rolling back on the wheelie chair that normally belongs to Carol, Jack’s mom. “I got to run out. You want me to bring back lunch?”
Jack isn’t listening or didn’t hear me, so I head over to the hood of the town car and press the off button on that damn Hello Kitty speaker.
“Yo!” I shout in the sudden silence. “I’m running to Latterature. You want somethin’?”
Jack shakes his head and rolls his eyes. “My mom made me lunch today, man. I’m sorted.”
Even though the marriage stuff going down with his parents is rough, I have to give him shit about it. “What, she pack you a Lunchable and a little note?” I tease.
Jack kicks a work boot at my leg, but intentionally misses. “Fuck off.” Then he sighs. “She’s staying with me this week. She insists on packing me lunches and making dinners. It’s her way of thanking me for letting her crash at my place.”
I clap a hand on the hood of the car and nod. “All right, man. So, you’re set with your ham sando with the crusts cut off. You want a coffee or something while I’m out?”
“Nah.” Jack sniffs and gives me half a grin. “Ma packed my camping thermos. She thinks I spend too much money eating out.”
I snort-laugh and almost give him shit for that. Almost.
Yeah, we may be grown men in our late thirties, but if Ma makes it, we eat it. Ma says it, we pay attention.
Hell, I’m about to leave work, thanks to three text messages from my ma, so I don’t have much room to give him a hard time about being a mama’s boy.
“All right,” I say instead and nod. “I’ll be back.”
I take the love of my life, my Harley-Davidson Road King, through town, waving and nodding at the many people I know along the two-mile drive between the shop and downtown Star Falls.
When I finally reach Main Street, I drive all the way to the farthest end of the strip of quaint storefronts and park right outside the bookstore café.
It isn’t even noon yet, so I don’t bother stopping by The Body Shop, the tattoo parlor next door. It’s Tuesday, which means my little sister, Grace, will be opening the shop, but not until one—and that’s if she is on time. Gracie is unpredictable, stubborn, and—more than anything—loves her sleep.
As I pull open the door to Latterature, I’m braced for the string of Christmas bells that normally go off like a wind chime caught in a tornado. But today—nothing. No warning bells, no chimes. No customers.
“Ma?” I call out into
the store.
It’s unusually quiet in the place, and I don’t just mean the lack of welcome bells. Given the fact that my ma practically called a three-alarm fire trying to get me over here, I’m not seeing any sign that she’s actually in the store.
I wander past the cash register and note a couple people browsing the stacks.
“Hey, Bob.” I nod at Bob Horton, who’s got his reading glasses at the end of his nose. He’s leaning back in a vintage—and by that, I mean old as shit—plush rocking chair, looking over some figures on a clipboard.
“Frankie.” He greets me but doesn’t bother looking up from his notes. Bob’s always been a little off, but he owns the local electronics store. One of the last in a twenty-mile radius that’s not owned by a big corporate retailer.
“Workin’ or playin’, Bob?” I give the old man a half smile and scan the aisles for my mother.
Bob grunts in response.
I’m used to Bob being a man of very few words, and awkward ones when he does talk, so I give him a nod and keep on moving.
The vibe in Latterature is a cross between an elderly aunt’s attic and somebody’s grandma’s kitchen. I can smell the familiar scents of freshly ground coffee, vintage books, and old upholstery as I walk past bookshelves and head toward the back kitchen.
Finally, the familiar scent of hair spray and perfume greets me. Evidence that Ma was here recently, along with her friends.
“Franco. Where have you been? I’ve been worried sick.”
I turn around and look down at Lucia Bianchi. Matriarch of our family and overall force to be reckoned with.
She’s short but curvy, and despite turning fifty-nine this past spring, Ma’s hair is drugstore auburn, sprayed to within an inch of its life, and perfectly styled around her smiling face.
“Come here.” She holds out her manicured hands, her nails perfectly colored and bedazzled with some sparkly looking things on the ends. She pulls my face close and kisses my cheek, then loops her hand through my arm and lowers her voice. “I wish you’d gotten here sooner. What took you so long? My God, son, I was about to get in the
car and make sure you weren’t crushed under one of those cars or something worse.”
“Morbid, Ma, but thanks for the concern.” I look around us, but my mom’s crew of best friends is nowhere to be found, which is unusual.
Lucia was a stay-at-home mom who never went to work even after we grew up, but by God, she made knowing the ins and outs of her kids’ lives more than just her job. It was her passion.
Now that Vito, Benny, Gracie, and I are all in our thirties, Ma makes everyone’s business her job. And unless she’s with my father, she’s never far from her crew of best lady friends.
“What’s with the urgency? You made it sound like—”
Ma shushes me a little too vigorously and points a red nail toward the lounger where Bob is rocking back and forth. She gives me the universal mom-eyes, half wide and then settling into a frustrated glare, as she huffs, “Come back into the kitchen.”
“In the kitchen? Ma, come on, I got to get back to work.”
My mother ignores me and takes hold of my arm. All five foot nothing of her pedals off toward the back of the store, dragging me with her.
I would stop and argue the point, but when Lucia Bianchi gets her mind set on something, there is only one person who can stop her and that’s my father, Mario.
We push through the door with an ancient, paint-chipped sign that would read Employees Only if all the letters were still there, but which now reads, “E p l ees On .”
As soon as we’re in the back, Ma starts talking a million miles a second. “Did you see Bob out there? Franco, you’ve got to get rid of him.” My mother’s gesturing wildly, her nails like tiny daggers already dripping with Bob Horton’s blood.
“Come on, Ma. What’s the problem with Bob? He’s harmless.” As I peer around the room, the rest of Mom’s crew rushes toward me, and then I get it.
The gang is all here after all.
They’re all just hiding from Bob.
Carol, Jack’s mom, who’s currently living with him and making him sandwiches and coffee, starts first. She’s wearing a low-cut fuchsia top that reveals an expanse of cleavage the likes of which I never want to see on anyone’s mom.
She touches my forearm before she starts to speak. “Franco, the man’s odd. You know he’s odd, and his nephew’s odd. The lot of those Hortons are strange. Always have been.” As if she remembers that I have history with his niece, she pats my arm. “Not that sweet Celeste, though. Good thing she married and ditched the Horton last name.
I’m just about to roll my eyes and set the ladies straight, when Sassy, who’s never been called by her given name of Shirley, slaps a hand against my arm. “Listen to your mother, Frankie.”
Sassy waits tables at the only Italian restaurant in town, owned by none other than my cocky, asshole younger brother Benny.
She’s like a second mother to us kids, which is why she feels comfortable laying hands on me, especially in front of my own mother.
Hell, all the women in my mom’s lady gang are like mothers to me. Although to be fair, Ma is more mother than any one man needs.
“Thank you, Sassy,” my mother says, sounding exasperated. “You know what a pain in the ass that man is. Plus, he’s…” Ma taps the tips of her long nails together while she thinks of just the right insult.
“He’s got sociopath vibes,” a voice calls from just behind Sassy.
“Bev’s right.” Sassy moves aside and nudges forward the quietest—which by no definition of the word means quiet—friend of my mother’s. Sassy nods vigorously. “You tell him, Bev.”
“Ladies, please.” I hold up a hand and hold back an impatient sigh before Bev can launch into a spiel about her assessment of Bob’s mental state. “You all have known Bob Horton for freakin’ ever, and he’s…” I have to bite back the words. “All right, he’s a little off, but so what? Has he done anything? I just saw him out front, and he seemed harmless enough.”
A little grumpy, but if he had the first idea that his anti-fan club was hiding out in the bookstore’s café kitchen, I’d have been a grumpy asshole too.
“This isn’t about us, Franco.” Ma clutches the trio of gold charms that hangs around her neck—an Italian horn, a simple cross, and an engraved heart, a gift from my father for their 25th wedding anniversary. She glares at me and steps away from her three best friends. “This is about Chloe. We can’t let that lecherous creep take the girl for the little she’s got. She’s been through so much already.”
“Chloe?” I draw in a long, calming breath and check the time on my phone. “Ma, who the hell is Chloe and what’s Bob done to her?”
“Well, nothing yet, but that’s why you’re here.” My mother, on her three-inch heels,
marches through the kitchen toward the commercial refrigerator at the back of the room. “Chloe, come meet my son.”
Oh, for fuck’s sake.
There’s another one of them.
Chloe must be the relative who has come up here to take over Latterature since Ann, the previous owner, passed.
Now it’s starting to make sense.
My mom’s gang just added a plus-one, and I’m being called in to rescue the old lady from what, I have no clue. But I am hoping we’re getting close to the point.
“Ma, what could Bob possibly be—” But the words die in my throat.
I squint and blink, expecting my vision to clear at any moment and for a clone of Ann—short, round, and heavily age-spotted—to appear before my eyes.
But that doesn’t happen.
What does happen is Sassy, Bev, Carol, and Ma form this mom-circle around me.
I can feel the weight of their meddling looks as Ma coaxes a woman who looks younger than me using a voice better suited to soothing stray puppies and lost kittens at the rescue where she volunteers with Bev.
“Chloe,” Ma says, drawing out her name as though it’s something precious, “this is my son Franco Bianchi. Franco, this is Chloe Harkin.”
The woman in front of me is dressed the opposite of the older women huddled in the kitchen. ...
