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  Suprema dropped the rock, and it hit the stage platform with a loud thunk. Abby was certain it was about to crash on through to the ground. She then picked up a set of barbells, hoisted them into the air, tossed them lightly, and then caught them again. The audience cheered, except that same heckling voice that shouted, “Oh, come on, there’s no way it’s real.”

  Ruth gripped Abby’s wrist all the tighter.

  “You want to give it a try then? Or, I suppose, you would like me to lift you?” Suprema asked of the heckler, setting the barbell aside.

  Ruth cringed. “Bad move.”

  Worried, Abby glanced at her, but didn’t know what to say. She turned her attention back to Suprema, hoping that nothing was about to go wrong. Acknowledgment must have quieted the heckler, because no answer came.

  “I thought not.” She went back to the barbell and lifted it once again with one arm, then the other. Finally, she held it between both hands and, as Abby had seen her do at the athletic show, broke the metal rod holding the weights together in half.

  The audience broke into thunderous applause. Abby jumped to her feet to give a standing ovation. Just as she was exiting, Suprema caught her eye and blew her a kiss. A shiver ran the length of Abby’s body. A simple, but quite splendid, shiver.

  AFTER THE SHOW, RUTH TOOK Abby by the hand and led her behind the tent. She marveled at how Ruth seemed drawn to Constance like iron to a magnet. They needed to be near each other. Abby did not feel that way, not even when Suprema came into view. She didn’t gravitate toward her as though some desperate need to be whole could only be filled when she was near, and that didn’t seem wrong. The lack of obsessive need made her attraction seem all the more right. When she saw her, she felt freer, more herself, more able to fly—something she had been missing for much longer than she had realized.

  When she saw Suprema, she grinned broadly, then rushed forward to give her a hug. Suprema seemed taken aback. She hesitated for the briefest of moments, but before Abby could pull away, wondering if she had gone too far, she melted into Abby’s arms, wrapping her own strong ones around her.

  Abby could hear Suprema’s heart and she rested her head against her. The difference in their heights was exacerbated by the brilliant red pumps Suprema wore. Suprema’s heartbeat was quick and a little erratic, and Abby wondered if a high from performing or their current closeness was to blame. She couldn’t hear her own heartbeats, but she could feel the heady, slightly dizzying sensation they were giving her.

  “You were marvelous,” she whispered, pulling back and taking Suprema’s hands in hers. She was not ready to let go just yet, but was well aware of how public and exposed they were.

  Suprema scoffed, shaking her head.

  “Don’t start,” Abby replied, sensing the self-deprecation. “You were.”

  Thomas rushed toward them from the side of the tent.

  “Abby Amaro!” he called out three times before she realized that he was calling her name. The other girls snickered, but Abby didn’t mind. Practically panting, he came toward the group. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere.”

  “What is it, Thomas?” Abby asked, as a sense of apprehension rose.

  “You’ve been so desperate for mail, I just figured …” he trailed off, holding out a letter.

  Abby gripped the letter in both hands. None of them breathed. They knew how much a letter from home meant to Abby. “There’s no return address,” she whispered, still afraid to open it. Warning lights were beginning to flash in her mind. What if the letter were from Frank? What if he had tracked her down?

  “I’m sure it’s from your brother,” Ruth said with more urging than confidence in her voice.

  Her hands trembling, Abby slid her index finger under the back flap and took out the pale pink perfumed stationery. This was certainly not from Frank, but it was unlikely to be from Natale either, and she doubted that her sisters would have a luxury like this paper. She unfolded it to find the name Mrs. M. Holland, along with the return address that had been missing from the envelope, embossed at the top of the page and neat, but elaborate, handwriting beneath.

  Abigail,

  Your letter startled me. I have not heard from a single one of you since that unpleasant business with my sister and I assumed that would remain the case in perpetuity. I am quite surprised, but pleased to have heard from you and doubly so to hear that you will be visiting my own home city this week. After a great deal of consideration, I have decided that I would, in fact, like to meet with you.

  Now, we cannot meet at our new townhouse. Matthew has quite the nervous disposition about what the neighbors may think of us based on our choice of guests. Perhaps you would enjoy meeting at the aquarium. It seems like a nice and neutral place for the setting aside of grievances if there ever was any. This is not to say that I hold anything against you, dearest Abigail. It is simply my hope that you feel similarly towards me.

  The best day for me to meet with you is Sunday afternoon when Matthew will be lunching with his mother. I shall wear my purple hat. You once mentioned that you were fond of it. Perhaps I shall give it to you. I rarely have cause to wear something as ostentatious any more.

  My best regards,

  Therese Holland

  “Therese?” Abby muttered to herself, a bit put off by the stilted tone of her aunt’s letter and the fact that she had altered the pronunciation of her first name. It was odd, but she was happy to have received a reply.

  “What is it?” Suprema asked; her eyes showed concern. Abby wondered if her own expression betrayed her confusion.

  “It’s no—” Abby began to say, but then stopped herself. It was indeed something. She just wasn’t sure what. “My aunt would like to meet with me is all, and I’m not sure that I want to.”

  Ah.” Suprema nodded and slipped her hand into Abby’s. Her expression still showed concern, but, as Abby said nothing more on the matter, she seemed unwilling to press it.

  Constance clapped her hands. “We should get dinner!”

  Ruth nodded. “And another dress for Abby, but after dinner. I want to see how the food tent reacts to her.”

  Abby glanced up at Suprema who looked back at her, her eyebrows raised with concern. “I’m going to be okay,” Abby tried to say with her eyes, but Suprema’s expression didn’t change. A hurt was hidden there that Abby sensed had nothing to do with her.

  Chapter Fifteen

  A BOUQUET OF ROSES LAY outside Della’s trailer when Abby arrived there that evening. They seemed to be casually discarded as opposed to carefully placed the way Thomas would have delivered them. That should have been a sign of things to come, but Abby was far too distracted by the day’s emotions, both good and bad, to notice. She simply picked up the roses and walked inside.

  Thanks to the lot’s smell, all the trailer’s windows had been kept closed; the slightest opening anywhere was stuffed full of scrap fabric. It gave the place a heavy, humid atmosphere. Abby sighed and set the roses on the table. It was too hot to stay in the trailer. “Someone sent you roses,” she said, turning to go.

  “They’re not mine,” Della said gruffly, climbing, barely dressed, out of the sleeping compartment and pulling the curtains tightly closed behind her.

  “Someone sent you roses?” a groggy male voice echoed from her compartment. Abby stopped in her tracks.

  “Again, they’re not mine,” Della repeated, this time to the sleeping compartment, sounding even more annoyed.

  “Della, who do you—?”

  “Is there someone here?” the male voice asked. “Are you trying to pull something freaky on me, Adelaide?”

  Abby raised her eyebrows at Della, trying to say without words that she was not comfortable with this turn of events.

  “Is this what you burlesque carnival girls get up to?”

  “Della, get rid of him,” Abby hissed.

  “I’ll get rid of who I want to,” Della hissed back. Still, she threw open the curtains and snarled at the man there, who
was dressed in nothing but his undergarments. He grinned up at her, but Della’s rage was a sight to behold. If Abby hadn’t known better, she would have sworn that every blonde hair on her head stood up and became a snake poised to attack. “Get out!” she bellowed. The man did not have to be told twice.

  Della shut the door tight and latched it, then threw herself into a chair with a pronounced sigh. “All right, he’s gone then.”

  “I’m sorry, if I had known—”

  “Not necessary. Gave me an excuse to be rid of him. He was a bit of a square. Gave me these though.” She plucked the large faux-pearl starburst earrings from her ears and set them down on the table next to the roses. Abby wasn’t sure that was wise. They would probably be lost under a pile of fabric before long, never to be seen again. “‘Sides, you’re just riled ‘cause it wasn’t your brother. You sure these roses didn’t have a note?”

  Abby shook her head. She saw a man’s suit jacket sleeve dangling out of Della’s sleeping compartment. “Della, he forgot his jacket.” She reached in to pick it up and stopped, seeing a slip of paper with very recognizable handwriting, Natale’s handwriting.

  “Maybe they’re from your Amazon lady lover.”

  The sarcastic way she emphasized the word Amazon made Abby’s blood boil. She grabbed the paper and spun around. “Don’t you talk about her like that!”

  “So it is true?” Abby was sure that if Della were a wild animal, she would have been baring her teeth. “You’re seeing the Queen of the Jungle?”

  “She has a name.”

  “Yeah, and do you know it?”

  “Yes. S—”

  “Don’t you say Suprema. That’s her bullshit stage name. It’s no more her real name than mine is Miss Adelaide.”

  “Suprema is what she called herself to me, and if she wants something different, she can tell me herself.” With great care and deference, Abby took the roses from the table and cradled them in her arms. She knew they couldn’t be from Suprema. When would she have ordered them? Still, it was nice to pretend. They were a lovely dark red, almost the color of a glass of merlot—one of Abby’s favorite colors. She took a deep breath, trying to hold on to the fragrance.

  Della wrenched the roses from her arms with such force that Abby reeled backward.

  “What are you doing?” Abby called out. “What’s gotten into you?”

  “They’re mine, you idiot!” she said, putting them back on the table. “I was just pulling your chain, but you look like you’re in love with that bitch.”

  Abby felt as though she had been slapped. She frowned, still clutching the note in her left hand.

  “Are you?” Della asked, her eyes narrowing into an inscrutable expression.

  Though she herself wasn’t sure of the answer, defensive anger rushed her forward. “So what if I was?”

  “I don’t have a problem with her being a girl if that’s what you’re getting snippy about,” Della said, sounding rather snippy herself. “I just think you’re diving headlong into another batch of trouble. Natale asked me to look after you. You don’t even know her!”

  “I don’t need you to protect me, Della. And besides, how is what I do any of Natale’s business? He hasn’t bothered to contact me, even though he knew how desperate I was to know everyone was okay. Not a single word. He won’t even answer the phone, but he’s writing love letters to you?” She hurled the note from her hands and onto the table.

  The trailer was too hot for an argument. Both of them knew that, but they couldn’t help themselves. Once the fight had begun, there was no stopping it. Della clenched her hands. “God, Abby, listen to yourself. You ran away with us to escape all this mucked-up love nonsense, and believe me, it is all mucked up, Abby. Deep down, I think you know that as much as I do. Nate’s told me a bit about your family, and—”

  “What’s he been telling you about us?” Abby grabbed the letter and stopped cold. She could plainly see the date at the top right-hand corner. The letter was almost two weeks old, but then she saw another word. The salutation. The name was not Della, but Abby. Her tone as cold as ice, she asked, “What the hell is this?”

  Della looked horror-struck, but did not say a word.

  “This letter is for me?”

  “I can explain,” Della began. Abby was not in the mood to be placated. She wanted to rip Della’s throat out, and not doing that was taking all of her energy.

  “What is the matter with you? I know you don’t want me here. Why not let Natale come and get me so I can go home?”

  “You sure you want to go home now that you’ve got your woman?”

  “Do not bring her into this!”

  “Cut the gas, Abby, and listen to me for once!” Della began to pace. She tugged at her hair, looking frantic and desperate. “You wanna get all wrapped up in some kind of business that’ll get you put away the second you step off this carnival lot, that isn’t my business. Hell, I thought your awful personality was because you were some prude, but now I see the truth. You’re sick in the head.”

  Her eyes stung. Della’s words were too much. “Just because I don’t have a different boyfriend in every town—you know, I have no idea what Natale sees in you. He can do so much better than some little tramp.”

  Della threw the bouquet of roses as hard as she could at Abby. “You have no idea what you’re talking about! You think you know me?! No one could know me less than you!”

  Abby was stunned. She wasn’t the only one crying. Tears were falling from Della’s carefully lined eyes. She had wanted to hurt Della back, but seeing the reaction was too much for Abby. She tried to take a step toward her, but Della swatted her away. “Della, I—”

  “No,” she said, taking a step back. “I need you to cut out of here. I need you to go.”

  “Go where?”

  “I don’t care. Just get out of my trailer. It’s not like you’ve been a very productive seamstress anyway.”

  Abby didn’t know how to respond. She stared at Della, who kept turning her face to hide the now-streaming tears. “Della, I’m sorry for whatever I—”

  “I said, get out!” Her scream echoed in the tiny aluminum trailer. It sounded as if, in her anger and hurt, Della had split herself into hundreds of Dellas all bent on Abby’s destruction. Abby ran out the door.

  She hurried through the carnival lot, unsure where to go. She started in one direction, then another, then changed her mind again and found herself getting nowhere. She glanced back at Della’s trailer, but she had switched off the lights already. There was no going back there tonight. Maybe in the morning, but not tonight.

  Taking a deep breath, she started toward Suprema’s trailer. Her heart started pounding at the thought of seeing her again. Della’s words echoed through her mind. But she hadn’t meant for any of this to happen. She was supposed to wait, patiently, until her brother came. She wasn’t supposed to feel attraction for anyone. She wasn’t supposed to want to stay. This life wasn’t for her. She needed to go home and clear her head. If she could get her place back at the Music Institute, or even just her job at the diner, she could be the person she expected herself to be, the person everyone expected her to be. She didn’t need a new romance. Romance only brought trouble and heartache.

  ~February, 1953~

  PAPA SITS IN THE CORNER of the church social hall. He does not greet a single soul that approaches. He stares, but he does not see. Nonna stands behind him with a nervous hand on her son’s shoulder. She looks as worried as Abby feels, but Abby tries not to show her concern as she leans against the door and watches the funeral reception come to an end. Her eyes are on her father as people file by and shake his hand. She doesn’t hear their words, but she knows what they are saying: “I am so sorry for your loss.” She’s heard that too many times today, herself. It’s one of the few things about the entire day that isn’t a blur.

  “Has he said anything?” Natale asks, walking up behind her.

  Abby shakes her head. “Not a word. He doesn’t
even nod.”

  Natale sighs. “Have you seen Za Teresa? She was supposed to come take care of the little ones—”

  Again, Abby shakes her head. “I’ll go look after them. You call her. Maybe there’s snow, and she couldn’t get out.”

  Natale looks skeptical, but Abby doesn’t want to think about it. She slips into the coatroom where her younger siblings have been squirrelled away. They don’t know what is happening. None of them. Maybe Leon, who holds baby Annette and stares defiantly at the others, but Abby can’t imagine even he fully grasps that their mother is gone. Not yet.

  “Hey guys, who’s hungry?” she asks, wobbly on her feet. They frown up at her, all except baby Annette who fusses and grabs hold of Leon’s finger. He scowls. “Come on. Everybody out there means well.”

  “That bitch!” Natale’s scream echoes down the corridor and into the room. Abby looks out the door, eyes wide. Her brother is not usually one for such language.

  She takes a deep breath and rushes to the phone nook. He is standing there, still holding the receiver, while an unknown woman’s voice on the other end of the line says, “Sir, your party has been disconnected; would you like me to try again?”

  “Natale?”

  “She’s not coming. She’s worried her fiancé will be scared off by her family. Apparently he has money. And apparently that’s more important.” He slams the receiver down as the operator once again tries to remind him of her presence on the line.

  Abby touches his arm and shakes her head. “We don’t need her anyway. We’ve got each other, right?”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Abby,

  I don’t know what to say. Normally, I’m better with words than this. I’ve written about a hundred letters in the past week to the most far-flung people in our family, and none of those letters were even half as hard to write as this one.

  Abby, Nonna has passed.

  There I wrote it. It’s out there. You now know.

  You should have been here, Abby. It is mean of me to put it that way, but I won’t mince my words right now. You should have been here. Facing this alone was much harder than I expected it to be. Papa is as he’s been, worse even. The kids are hurting. Carla won’t leave her room. Annette walks around asking where Nonna’s gone, and I don’t know what to tell her. She was a baby when Mama died. She doesn’t understand any of this. Leon’s getting into fights, and Joseph is so quiet sometimes I wonder if he’s forgotten how to speak.