Gorilla Beach (9 page)

“Great idea.”

“It died.”

Maria said, “So come out tonight. I'll take you to a thing.”

“A party? With Donna Lupo? No thanks.”

“She won't be there. And it's not exactly a party. You'll have fun, though. It's a gathering. Of women. Mature women. In a church basement to play bingo.”

“I'd rather eat sand,” said Bella. “Actually, considering what we've been eating, sand doesn't sound that bad.”

Maria exhaled. “It's not a request. Mama Lupo insists. She's Luigi's mother, the family matriarch. She's going to make a ruling on you and Gia.”

“We haven't done anything wrong.”

“Doesn't matter. Cara Lupo is telling everyone Gia is responsible for embarrassing Fredo—and, by association, the family—at the wedding.”

Bella said, “Gia knows she's innocent. Fredo knows. What difference does it make if his parents don't believe us?”

Maria paused. “How's your job search going?”

“Sucks! I can't find anything. It's like we've been blackballed or … wait, are you saying what I think you're saying?”

“No one in this town is going to hire you until you make peace with the Lupos.”

“FML.”

“Enough with friggin' letters,” said Maria. “I hate that shit. I never know what you're talking about. Just come to the game tonight. This is a rite of passage for Seaside Heights society. I came a few times with Donna. You show up, make a donation. Mama will give you her blessing. By this time tomorrow, you'll have jobs. And I'll talk to Stanley about moving you to a new place that doesn't kill plants.”

What choice did she have? “Okay,” said Bella, and took down the particulars.

The toilet flushed and Gia emerged from the bathroom. “I
could have framed that one. Fredo has no idea what he's missing.”

“Get dressed. We're going to church.”

“Our Lady of the
Perpetual Sorrow?” asked Gia, reading the plaque on the outside of the stone church. “Oh, yeah! This place
rocks
.”

Bella was in her “straight but not narrow” outfit of a black Lycra dress, a ponytail, and “flats,” or two-inch pumps. She took in her cousin's outfit. Jeans short shorts with a black, studded belt. A black, off-the-shoulder T-shirt that read
PASS THE BRACIOLA,
a leopard-print jacket, and midcalf, furry, black boots. “The boots might be a bit much.”

“They're the only shoes I've got that aren't flip-flops or peeptoe heels,” she said. “Toe cleavage isn't Catholic.”

“It's twenty bucks per person. Maria's going to cover us.”

“You mean Our Lady of the Perpetual Booze Breath?”

Laughing, they went through the arched doors. At seven o'clock, it was still light outside. Entering the church was like walking into a cave, the only light coming from candles and the stained-glass windows. Bella inhaled the scents of wax, wood, and lemon Pledge. A regular churchgoer as a kid, Bella had stopped attending as a teenager. While her mom was in surgery, though, she'd gone to the hospital chapel and prayed like she played.

Her prayers were answered. After months of treatment, Marissa was in remission. For now. Her mom had a fifty-fifty chance of a recurrence, which would be a virtual death sentence. If Marissa stayed healthy for five years, she'd be considered “a survivor.”

Gia read Bella's mood. “You're My Lady of the Perpetual Balls. You blew my mind this year. No one's as tough as you.”

Bella looked down at Gia's huge, dark eyes and felt the love pouring out of them. That did it. The tears came. She sank into a
pew and cried. Until this moment, Bella hadn't let herself sob for her mom. Consciously or not, she thought crying meant Mom was dying. If she held her tears inside, everything would be okay. It was a superstitious bargain she'd made with herself.

Blubbering, Bella said, “Our Lady of the Perpetual Mortification.”

“You mean me?” asked Gia.

“No, me! I'm crying in public!”

“It's not public. It's a friggin' church. And you have to let out your feelings, Bells, or you'll get emotionally constipated.”

“I have feelings,” said Bella. “That doesn't mean I need to broadcast them.”

Of course, Bella was upset about her mom! She would love to scream at her dad for being an incredible tool. She'd love to smack down the girls who rejected her at school, the boys who treated her like a stupid slut. But Bella's tendency was to bottle and cork the anger. Gia was Bella's human corkscrew. Everyone agreed Bella was dangerously repressed about her hell year. Marissa pushed Bella to go to Seaside for July. She said, “You need some down-the-Shore-time with Gia. Have fun. Do all the things I was afraid you'd do last summer. Get drunk and hook up with boys. It's unwind or unravel, Bella. You have to unwind.”

Weak as she was, Marissa practically shoved Bella out the door. Yet, this was how she honored her mom's wishes? Crying in church?

“I'm okay,” said Bella, pulling herself together.

“Ready to destroy this place?” asked Gia.

“Biblically.”

“Huh?”

“Forget it.”

They followed a trio of blue-hairs to the basement and found the “games” room. The windowless space was devoted to bingo, with five long tables and dozens of chairs facing a small table in
the front of the room. On that table was a metal cage contraption with a plastic hand crank and little white balls inside.

The girls scanned the crowd. Had to be forty women here. They seemed to fall into one of three distinct categories. The
Godfather
grannies bore a striking resemblance to Mother Teresa. The Real Housewives of Seaside Heights were Donna Lupo–type femooks dressed modestly for church in slacks and silk tops, but with full hair and makeup. Furs and diamonds were not allowed in the house of the Lord, apparently. A dozen or so women looked homeless, nut-ward escapees dragging plastic garbage bags of empty cans and bottles, wearing oversize, pilly sweaters in July.

“Don't they seem a bit old, snotty, and grubby to be playing a game called Bimbo?” asked Gia.

“Bingo,” said Bella.

“I know, right?”

“The game is called bingo, not
bingo
like ‘you nailed it.'”

“You mean this game is called bingo? Like the talking lizard in the Johnny Depp movie?”

“I think that was Ringo,” said Bella. “Or is that the Beatle?”

“Eww. Lizards
and
bugs?” Gia groaned. “I hate this game already.”

Maria was in the back row, waving her arms to get their attention. It was still a shock to see Maria as blond as Donatella Versace.

Gia said, “Hottie!” and clomped in her boots over to Maria for hugs and kisses. The
Godfather
grandmas watched, eyes twitching, clucking their disapproval. Bella followed Gia, smiling and nodding at the ladies of the perpetual stick up their ass. She tried to figure out which of them was Mama Lupo.

The girls sat next to Maria. She said, “Listen, I need to tell you a few important rules of the game.”

Bella turned to the homeless woman on her other side. She smelled like a urine-and-saltwater cocktail. “Okay if I sit here?”

“Touch my bingo card, I'll cut you,” she said, brandishing a plastic fork with only one prong.

Meanwhile, another church regular was petting Gia's back like a cat. “Nice kitty,” said the obviously crazy lady with wild eyes and insane wiry hair. “Where's the nun?! I'm gonna adopt you.”

“She's human, Ruby,” yelled Maria. “Human. It's just a leopard-print jacket.”

“Meow,” the woman cooed, right up in Gia's face.

“Ignore her,” said Maria. “She's released from the ward only once a week for this game.”

“Mooowwll!” said Ruby more emphatically.

“It's kinda hard to ignore her when she's meowing in my face,” said Gia.

One of the RHOSHs clapped her hands right in Ruby's ear. “Back to your seat! Back!” Ruby scurried away. The RHOSH smiled with perfect white teeth, flipped her sleek, straight black hair, and said, “Are you Gia Spumanti? I've heard so much about you.”

The warning siren went off in Bella's head. The woman looked familiar, although she hadn't met her yet. Maria looked worried, too. But Gia didn't register danger. She said, “Hey. You look just like this bitch I met the other night. A real top-shelf skank whore named Cara. Do you know her?”

The RHOSH's face turned white under her mask of blush and mascara. “That top-shelf skank whore happens to be my daughter.”

Making friends wherever she went,
thought Bella of her cuz. Maria put her head in her hands. Her plot to get Gia and Bella off the Lupo enemies' list was not going as planned.

A seriously bent old woman in a black veil came over to their table. Cara Lupo's mother nodded at the geezette, then backed away, bowing at the waist as she retreated.

“Good evening, Mrs. Crumbi,” the old lady said to Maria.

“It's an honor, Mrs. Lupo,” said Maria, jumping to her feet, taking the woman's withered, gnarly hand and kissing her ring.

So this was the big mama. Hardly taller than Gia, she hooked like a human question mark. In ninety degrees with no air-conditioning, Mama Lupo was swaddled in a black shawl, black dress, black tights, and black orthopedic Skechers. Her wrinkles were deep enough to plant corn. Her hair and skin were the same shade of gray. “Are these the girls who humiliated my grandson at your wedding?”

“Mrs. Lupo, this is Giovanna Spumanti and Isabella Rizzoli from Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn. They're dear friends of mine. They feel shame and remorse about any trouble they might've caused. They want to make amends and pay their respects to you tonight.”

The lady nodded, her eyes half-closed and suspicious. “I appreciate that. My Luigi would appreciate it, too.”

Gia said, “My condolences about your husband.”

“My husband, dear?”

“The veil.” Gia gestured to the mourning clothes.

Mama seemed confused. “My husband, Sunny, died thirty years ago. He was gunned down at a tollbooth on the Garden State Parkway. I'm in mourning for Alonzo, my Burmese. He died two years ago, bless his little soul.”

“Cat,” whispered Maria.

“I love cats,” said Gia. “I'm part leopard. Just ask Ruby over there.”

“Which part?” whispered Bella.

“The part that purrs.”

“Have you made a donation?” Mama pointed a crooked finger toward the straw basket next to the metal cage.

Maria said, “We did. All three of us.”

“You girls don't seem like the disrespectful sluts my daughter-in-law said you were,” said Mama.

“We're not,” said Gia. “Disrespectful.”

Mama patted Gia's shoulder and returned to her front-row seat. Gia rubbed where the old woman touched her. “Her hand is ice-cold.”

“Vampire?” asked Bella, excited.

“Maybe zombie.”

“Girls, I gotta tell you the rules quickly before the game starts,” said Maria. “First thing, you have to stay completely silent during the game….”

A priest swept into the room. He wore a floppy black hat, a black cape, a purple silk scarf, a black suit with the traditional white collar, and a few thick chains with heavy gold crucifixes. “Good evening, a-ladies,” said the priest with meataballa Italian accent. Was it fake? Couldn't be. Dude was a priest! “I see we have-a some new a-people tonight. My name eez Father Guido Sarducci. Ciao.”

“Ciao!” chorused the a-ladies.

“His name is Guido?” said Gia, awed.

“Shut
up,
” mouthed Maria.

“Is Guido a name?”

“It's Italian for Joe,” Bella said.

“Joe?
My own father is a Guido?
” Gia shouted.

Forty women shushed.

“We-a get started? I take one a-hundred dollar for the church off-a da top,” said Father Guido, removing five twenties from the collection basket and slipping them into his pants pocket. “Here-a we go. We pass out-a the cards. Take-a the chips. Now-a, my favorite part. The spin! Here-a we-a go.”

He turned the plastic crank, and the numbered balls inside the metal cage bobbed and jumped. After a few turns, he stopped the cage, opened the trapdoor, and removed a single ball. “Ze first-a number eez B6.”

The women checked the cards placed in front of them. Each
card had a grid of boxes, five rows up and five rows across. Inside each box was a number, 1 to 100. On top of each vertical row were letters (
B, I, N, G,
and
O).
Bella checked all the boxes in the vertical row under the letter B for the number six. She didn't have it, but Gia did.

“Put a chip in the square,” whispered Bella.

“Got it,” said Gia.

“Touch my card, I'll fork you,” reminded the bag lady to Bella's left.

Father Guido spun the cage again. “Ze second number eez N28. N28.”

And so the game began. Bella nearly dozed off about three minutes into it. Gia, however, was on the edge of her plastic church chair, rapt with anticipation when Father Guido spun the cage, and bouncing with excitement if she got to put a chip on her card.

Bella was jerked awake when Gia screamed, “Friggin' bimbo! I mean
bingo
! I win!”

A
Godfather
grandma gasped and started fanning herself. Every woman in the room shot daggers at Gia. Maria groaned.

“But you-a can't win,” said Father Guido, shaking his head.

“Wrong! Check my card,” said Gia, rushing her card covered in chips to the front of the room.

Father Guido confirmed Gia's win, the whole time shaking his head. His skin got even paler. Bella wondered if it was against priestly modesty to tan. Meanwhile, Gia did a backflip (ex-cheerleader) for joy.