Page 11 of Working for the Mob

“What happened?” Her eyebrows narrowed in a look too similar to our mother’s.

I made sure Art wasn’t listening. He was behind the counter looking over some paperwork. But he was being exceptionally still.

“We … uh. We had a row,” I said, and Lucy gasped. That never happened. I never disagreed with Mom and Dad––they were our parents! It was my duty to do what they wanted me to do. Until last night.

“I bet Mom and Dad freaked. Mom can be such a kaiser,” Lucy said, and I let out a breathless laugh. “What caused the row?”

I closed my eyes to keep it together. Last night still burned like a bee sting. It wasn’t every day you left your parents.

“You know how I’ve been … getting on in years. Most women my age have been married for a decade already.” Lucy nodded. She was just a couple years younger than me. “Mom and Dad were getting worried that I wouldn’t be able to find someone to marry. So they set up an appointment …”

“No!” Lucy gasped.

“... to see the matchmaker.”

Art scoffed from behind the counter, but I ignored him. I didn’t ask him to listen in, and I certainly didn’t want him to.

Lucy let out a squeak of disappointment. People only saw the matchmaker when they ran out of all other options.

There was no need for me to tell Lucy which matchmaker they brought me to. Only one lady ran the Manhattan marriage ring, Madame Rousseau.

She ruled over the matchmaking world with her fake furs, painted face, and satin slippers. And no one dared to cross her for fear they may end up as an old spinster.

My parents already thought of me as an old spinster and decided that I needed to find a man before I got any older. If I was lucky, I could find one on their second wife and hope whatever ill fate that met their first wife didn’t find me as well.

“So what happened?”

I still wasn’t sure.

“Mom went all out. She had my hair done, she did my nails, we picked out the perfect dress. And we even brought Dad.” Which showed how important it was to my parents that we made a good impression on Madame Rousseau. “I was sitting there between them, and the matchmaker kept asking things like, ‘Does she play the piano? Does she cook? Can she sew? How is she with kids?’ and I started thinking that I didn’t want to be pigeonholed toheridea of a wife. She just narrowed down the future of my entire life into one laundry list. I didn’t want to do any of those things. Why would I limit myself when there are so many great things out there for me to do?

“And I told her. I said I wasn’t going to just stay home, take care of the kids, and wait on my husband. And she was condemning every woman she sealed that fate to.”

If women wanted to stay at home with their kids, I fully supported their right to do so. I know it isn’t an easy job. However, that life wasn’t for me. I deserved to choose what I wanted to do.

“I bet she didn’t like that.”

“Without thinking, I basically insulted her whole livelihood. It didn’t help that I may have called her out on her ginger wig either.”

“No!”

I could still picture her now, with her painted face contorted in rage, yelling that I was going to die penniless and alone. And she had the power to ensure that happened. She could block any match that I found myself.

“Mom and Dad were furious. They said that I embarrassed them and complained that they didn’t know what they would do with me.”

But it went beyond that. This was the first time I could remember that I disappointed them. It was a new feeling. One I was still getting used to.

“So I left. Last night, when I called, I planned to leave Mom and Dad. For good. I grabbed my savings and I jumped on the first train this morning.”

Savings I had socked away for the last eight years. Courtesy of the allowance from my father. I had been waiting for the right opportunity to come along to let me move out from my parents’ house and start on my own. And now it could be gone.

Lucy reached across the table and took my hand. At least she knew what it was like to disappoint Mom and Dad. Although it never seemed to bother her.

We looked up at another knock on the window, and a uniformed man walked in without waiting. He had thinning hair, a potbelly, and droopy eyes, which together made him look like a sleepy cherub.

“George,” Art said, and nodded to him.

“Mr. Necci.” The officer nodded back. I think he was trying to smile, but he looked more like he had a bad toothache.

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