Free Dinner at Fiorello’s by Rick R. Reed

forehead and clumsily got to his feet.
    He smiled down at the girls and said, “You ready to go outside? And then we have our supper, no?”
    He was sure the dogs understood every word. To prove his point, they both moved over to the area opposite from the door, where their leashes and harnesses hung from hooks on the wall. Vito took them down and suited Gabby and Connie up.
    They tugged at his hand, eager to get outside, to do their business and see what new smells awaited them. He remembered a certain little dark-haired boy saying they were reading their “pee-mail” and shut the memory quickly from his mind.
    Outside, the girls led him straightaway to the spot near a streetlight where they often peed. Both squatted, and Vito indulged them by saying, as he always did, “ Brave raggaze ,” or “good girls.”
    They trotted on, stopping here and there to sniff. Tonight he had brought home some ground veal, left over from that day’s special—meatball subs. He couldn’t wait to watch the girls enjoy the meat, although it would be gone so quickly, he would wonder, as he always did, if they even tasted it.
    Later, after the dogs had eaten their feast, everyone was in a mellow mood. Vito was curled up on the couch with the latest Lee Child thriller he was attempting to get through on his chest, and the dogs lay at his feet, Connie snoring loudly. “Sawing logs again,” he whispered. Sometimes the dog snored so loudly at night she woke him, but the evenness of her breathing, fortunately, almost always worked to lull him back to sleep.
    He couldn’t concentrate on the book. Times like these, he thought, shutting the book after dog-earing the page where he left off, were the hardest—when it was quiet, when his hands and mind were unoccupied. It was part of the reason he loved working in a busy kitchen. There was always something to do and scarcely a free moment to think. There was always another order. That busyness was a blessing.
    He told himself, as he had a thousand times before, he shouldn’t do it, but he got up carefully off the couch, placing his feet so he didn’t awaken his girls, and headed for the bedroom that wasn’t his. “Why do you do this to yourself?” he wondered aloud.
    He crept into the bedroom softly, almost as though he were afraid he might wake its occupant, but the moonlight streaming in through the single window bore witness to an empty room. The silver light showed, in a kind of black-and-white reality, a twin bed, neatly made up with a Sesame Street comforter. Atop the bed was a stuffed rabbit, one ear up, one down, its synthetic fur worn down in spots, demonstrating that it was much loved. Above the bed was a poster, a framed blowup of the cover from one of the Harry Potter books. Opposite the bed, a bookcase, filled partially with Golden books and paperbacks of Harry Potter. There was also a collection of all The Wizard of Oz books. Interspersed with the books were toys: a fire truck, a baseball and glove, a battered Candy Land board game, and more stuffed animals.
    Vito sat down on the bed, which creaked under his weight. He put his head in his hands and wept. The visitation to this room was one he tried to avoid, because this was always what happened when he broached the doorway. He lost control. He could never keep the tears at bay.
    He cried until his throat felt raw, sore, and his eyes burned. He lifted his head and tried unsuccessfully not to allow himself to remember sitting on this same bed, reading a chapter from one of the books in the room to a little boy with serious eyes, who would always urge him to read just a little more, just a little more, until Vito would tell him that enough was enough, kiss his forehead, and tuck him in tightly. “Buona notte e sogni d’oro,” Vito whispered every night after the kiss, and he would ruffle the little boy’s hair. Good night and golden dreams….
    Would Vito ever have them again?
    Wearily, he got up from the bed, feeling as