Italiano Song
Part One
By Missy

SERIES: Italiano Song
PART: 1 of 6
RATING: PG (Adult thematic material)
PAIRING(s): L/L; S/C
DISTRIBUTION: To LW, Kai, Myself and FG so far; any other archives are welcome to ask, but disclaimers must be included, my email left intact. send a URL, and provide full disclaimers as well as credit me fully. Please inform me if you are going to submit my work to any sort of search engine. Please do not submit my work to a search engine that picks out random sets of words and uses them as key words, such as "Google"

Please contact me in order for this story to be placed on an archive, or if you want know of a friend who would enjoy my works, please email me their address and I will mail them the stories, expressly for the purpose of link trading. MiSTiers are welcomed! Please do inform me that you'd like to do the MiSTing, however, and send me a copy of the finished product. I'd also love to archive any MiSTings that are made of my work!
CATEGORY: Romance
FEEDBACK: PLEASE?!
SETTING IN TIMELINE: During "Festival," parts one and two; some alternate material from the established canon for the episodes.
SPOILLER/SUMMARY: What if Laverne's grandmother had taken a shine to Lenny instead of Squiggy during "The Festival"?
NOTES: Basically follows the events and timeline of "The Festival," though using some alternate material.

****

"Whaddya mean, two dollars for a sausage sandwich?"

"You read what it says, mack. I got a supplier to pay off, and it ain't like carnival season lasts all year!"

"Lenoard, my good man, punch this creep in the face."

Lenny's hands were already lost in his back pocket. Triumphantly, he found his wallet, then the four dollars secreted within it. "Sorry, sir. My buddy's real hungry." He paid, received the sandwiches, stuffed Squiggy's into his clenching fist, and smiled mildly as he dragged his best friend away.

"What were you doing?" Squiggy cried out. "You was supposed to clean that guy's clock!"

"Squig," Lenny whined, "did you see how big he was?"

"Not no bigger than you, stretch," Squiggy noted, sarcasm in his tone.

"Ha ha. This's New York. Mister DeFazio told me that they put you in jail for spitting on the street here!"

Squiggy frowned. "Boy, that stinks! There's only two fun things to do on a sidewalk, and they get rid of one of 'em!"

"What's the other one?"

Squiggy's smirk was telling. "Len, ain't I taught you anything?"

"Sure! Gee, Squig, it weren't for you, I'd still be afraid of linoleum!"

"Then how come you ain't spendin' your nights in the company of a nice broad like Fifi Jorgenson?"

"It ain't easy, getting a girl like Fifi!" Lenny protested. "'Sides, you had her after you said you'd comb her mustache."

"Len, my good buddy, you need to learn a little lesson from the lovvve doctor." His dark eyes danced as they followed the jiggly path of a tall brunette in open-toed shoes. Before Lenny could stuff his fist into his mouth in response, Squiggy smacked him in the chest with his sandwich. "Here. Watch my rust," Squiggy straightened his spine, striding over to the girl as she studied the dunk tank.

Normally, Lenny would fixate upon this sight; try to learn something from Squiggy's flirtations. But at the opposite end of the street, a lithesome form on the sidewalk drew all of his attention.

"Hey, Laverne...wanna sandwich?"

"You know what I want, Len?" she replied, tone harsh. "I want you to stop blackmailing Shirl with those pictures!"

"Why? Carmine deserves to know the truth!" Lenny pointed out.

"Well, it ain't like Carmine's Mister Chastity himself," Laverne tartly noted. "Remember Lucile? Besides, you ain't doing it for Shirl, or even Carmine; you're doin' it so you can have somethin' to hold over her!"

Lenny wavered visibly. "Okay..." He fiddled with the camera hanging around his neck until its backing popped open. With a quick yank, he exposed the film to the daylight. "You ain't gonna tell Squig I gave this to you?"

"No!" Laverne grinned as he handed her the film. "Thanks, Len! You're a real pal."

The word 'pal' cut through him more keenly than any switchblade, but he smiled bravely. "You're welcome...." She walked away, flagging down a muscular sailor with a handlebar mustache.

Everyone, it seemed to Lenny, had fallen in love to some degree in the summer heat of New York. Laverne was chasing boys left and right, Shirley was pining for Carmine...when she wasn't chasing the boys Laverne didn't want, and Squiggy was very friendly with his new lady friend. Really friendly, Lenny thought to himself glumly as he walked right by their animated conversation without his friend noticing. Boy, Squiggy was great with the ladies. She was even showing him her native version of the handshake...Lenny wondered why anyone would want to greet a loved one with hands firmly wrapped around the neck, but he was certain it was just a nice custom.

Lenny wished silently that someone would notice him; he had nothing to do, now that his secretive documentation of Shirley's romance had been called to a halt. At least Squiggy still had his role as Laverne's 'boyfriend' to play for her grandmother. Bored and mildly forlorn, he summer heat made him turn to their temporary encampment in the DeFazio brownstone.

He thought it was awfully nice of Laverne's grandmother to feed them on such short notice, even offering a couch for them to sleep on. He and Squiggy had communally made the decision to sleep on the floor of the living room, to avoid cramping the already-close quarters. It had worked out amiably; Frank slept on the couch and Laverne, Mrs. Babbish and Shirley took the woman's spare bedroom.

The marginally cooler and much darker DeFazio apartment welcomed him with silent approval. Lenny found a pitcher of lemonade on ice on the dining room table; without tags to indicate whom it belonged to, he shrugged and decided to take a cool glass with him on an exploration of Grandma DeFazio's home.

Within a few minutes, he decided that there wasn't much interesting about his new entertainment plans. Maybe it was the disparity in their ages or his short attention span, but nothing caught the hot blankness of Lenny's conscious state as interesting or fascinating.

He had decided to sit down at the dining room table and eat his sandwich when the glitter of polished wood caught his eye. Lenny stopped in his tracks and leaned backward, until he recognized the object; a curio cabinet, standing against a wall on carefully crafted legs. He put the half-empty glass of lemonade on the floor and knelt before it - the glowing doors swung open on smoothly-oiled hinges. Anyone could see that this was the heart of Grandma DeFazio's very earthy existence; Lenny had a feeling that she had carried it all the way from the Old Country. No wonder she walks all crooked, he thought to himself. Then he peered into the sunlight-streaked interior, leaving the DeFazio clan's lives laid bare before his wide eyes.

It was a lot of stuff; neatly ordered, carefully maintained stuff, most of which he could not name. Pushing aside what he instantly considered non-interesting, Lenny noticed Frank's army medals. They made Lenny suddenly recall that Mister DeFazio and his father had served together in World War II. Both men had been called home early from Germany, upon the death of Laverne's mother and the desertion of his own, only months before the war had ended. The painful memories faded like the browning certificates and withering pictures that came to light; he sat still at the sight of Laverne's First Communion Photo.

She could make him as quiet as a rock, just with the sight of her. He remembered that face too well; the thin lips that were covered by white-gloved hands, giggles pouring between the fingers. His own First Communion had taken place on the same day. They had taken their commitments so seriously back then, and he had hated her grave look, then as now. Going to church had always made him nervous, so he had tried to shatter the tension by making her laugh - by doing something cheerfully juvenile like hanging upside-down from the thick limbs of the elm in front of St. Mary's and sticking his fingers into the corners of his mouth, turning them gruesomely downward. She rarely laughed after her mother died, he remembered. Even now those laughs were guarded, and when they escaped it was unexpected - like a daisy growing up in a rose bush.

"She is a special bambina, no?"

Wide-eyed, his yanked his arms out of the curio and then flailed them protectively, barely missing a state of the Virgin Mary with his awkward hands. "I didn't mean to open yer stuff, Mrs. DeFazio."

"No, no; it is fine. The family is not impressed with these old treasures any more." She gingerly knelt beside him and withdrew a brass frame. "Laverne's nonno was so handsome that day!"

Through the sheen of the glass frame, Lenny recognized Laverne's grandmother; the shape of her eyes, the set of her chin, and her nose had been carried down through Frank and to the object of his affection. Mrs. DeFazio's stare held a mild sense of defiance; he knew that the tall woman in the funny feathered had and heavy, long coat was not someone to mess with.

The man beside her; shorter, significantly less attractive, with thick eyebrows and a gleam in his eye, lay tentative-seeming hands on her gloves. He had never met Laverne's grandfather, the man having died when Frank was in his early twenties, but Lenny could see the love that had lain between the two DeFazios'.

"That's real neat," Lenny said. He shifted his gaze back to the framed picture of Laverne's first communion. "THIS," he gestured toward the montage of framed photos of Laverne, "is really really neat."

The older woman consumed his faraway expression and unseeing melancholy with sage experience. "She is a pretty one," Mrs. DeFazio said, her tone somewhat cagey. She climbed cautiously to her feet. "You will come now, and have lunch with me in the dining room, no?"

Lenny meant to refuse her; he'd left his sandwich there, right beside the fresh china she'd set out. But he wasn't any good at refusing the elderly. "Okay," he submitted quickly.

The delicious aromas rising from the table drew him the short distance from the hallway to the dressed table. He reached to help her serve, but she insisted on dipping out a thin broth of chicken, carrots, studded with balls of ground meat and spice. She explained that it was called 'Wedding Soup.' As far as Lenny was concerned, it could have been called Toasted Lint Ball Soup; it was delicious. Not as delicious as Turkish taffy and Bosco, but good enough to urge him into finishing three bowls.

"Such a good, strong boy!" Mrs. DeFazio praised while ladling him a fourth; she had finished two herself, plus two slices of warm semolina bread to his four.

"It's real good, Mrs. DeFazio; we don't get grub like this at home."

"You must not eat so well in Milwaukee."

Lenny looked up, the spoon of broth poised in the air. He looked askance before saying, "we eat a lot at the Pizza Bowl. Mister DeFazio's real nice about it."

"I know what Fabrizio does with his money," she allowed her spoon to dip briefly into the clear broth before raising it once more. "He has a good heart."

"Oh yeah." Lenny nodded his head. He noticed that Mrs. DeFazio didn't scold him for talking with his mouth full and liked her more.

"Leonardo..." she said, her tone smooth as she stirred sworls of spinach to the surface of the soup, "you do not go to this Pizza Bowl for the trattoria only."

Lenny's skin turned a light pink, and the spoon slid from between his clenched fingers; his attempt to reveal nothing exposing everything.

"Ahh. It is something more, no? Someone? A lady? Shirley?" She watched his face carefully. "The bambina?"

Lenny tried to rise from the table, ready to make any sort of excuse necessary to avoid what would be another embarrassing and pointless conversation about his useless wants.

"Ahh, the strains of amore on a heart are like a weight," she noted sadly. "Your friend does not know?"

Squiggy! He'd forgotten about that lie. "Nah." He busied himself by staring into the breadbasket, taking another slice.

Her hands met his as they pulled away; he noticed how rough they felt, well-used. Lenny never knew that a woman's hands could feel so much like a workman's. Her eyes pinned him down like an unwilling butterfly to a shadowbox.

"She doesn't love Andrew."

The statement didn't leave further room for a lie. He shook his head, eyes returning to the mellow, salty broth.

"Then she is in love with another?"

Another shake of the head.

"And you love her?"

His ears turned bright red.

"Poor child. You look for my granddaughter, but where is she? Fooling with those boys on Mulberry Street! Silly bambina; always, she runs after the ones with the biggest arms, the widest smile, without a thought for the pain to her heart! You see how she has beaten herself against the walls with hoods? That has not changed since I hugged her goodbye on the day we buried her mother! Why did she think she might fool me, when I know her as well as her pappa does?"

Lenny was alarmed by the woman's rising anger. "Gee, Missus DeFazio, don't be mad! Don't you got a bad heart? Do ya need water? I'll get ya water..."

Her grip on his hands remained firm, so he did not leave the table. "Tell me, why does she not notice a man so tall, with such strong hands?"

"Who?"

She tilted her head, deliberately keeping her eyes locked to his.

"Me?" Lenny shrugged. "She don't want me, Mrs. DeFazio."

"She might, Leonardo. She doesn't know her heart, and she will listen to her grandmother's voice when she sees I like you."

"Boy, that'd be a first!" He scoffed, then felt instant shame at his reaction.

"I yet have ways of making her pay attention."

"Really?" His hope rose to an audible level.

"There is no living woman that knows her heart as I do. With these hands, I pulled her from her mother's body and washed her...I held her as the priest at St. Michaels' baptized her...I nursed her to life when she burned in a fever so high her own mamma had prepared for her funeral." She took a relishing bite of the bright yellow bread. "Now you see that I know all of her, Leonardo. You may trust in me."

Lenny's eyes widened as he listened carefully to her. "You really did all that?"

"Yes."

"Are you magic?"

She laughed. "You are good. You make me laugh, and you are sweet as sugar. That is what she needs, what she is missing, what she has never had."

"But I don't see..."

"I will show you the key to Laverne's heart. But we finish the soup first."

To Part 2