"A pimple ball?" "They were white rubber balls with little raised dots. A pimple ball. We'd play for hours, with a half ball." "Why half?" "After the ball was dead, we didn't throw it away. We were too poor to throw it away. We cut it in half." Her father ran his fingers over the wall's soft bricks and came away with soot on his fingerpads that surprisingly, he didn't seem to mind. "We'd mark the wall with chalk for a single, a double, a triple."
"Sounds like fun." "It was." Her father resumed their walk. "Played with the kids from the block. Mimmy. Squirrel. Lips. Tommy G." Vicki looked over again, and her father was smiling. "Nicknames," he explained, needlessly. "Your friends." "Right. We didn't play on Lincoln as much, because of the traffic." They turned onto Cater and walked two doors down, where he slowed his pace in front of a row house. An African-American man stood on a metal ladder, hanging new red shutters on the windows. Her father stopped in front of the house. "My buddy Lips lived here. Leon DiGiacomo. We used to shoot craps in front of this house."
"That's illegal."
"Tell me about it. I got picked up once, by the cops."
"You?"
"Yes, me." Her father sounded almost proud. "They picked us all up for, what they'd call"-he thought a minute, his head cocked-"‘gambling on the highway,' that was it. Must've been an old ordinance. They took us into the station and they made us buy tickets to the thrill show."
"What's a thrill show?"
"Like a circus. The PAL put it on, I think. Motorcycles and dancing bears." Her father laughed, and so did Vicki, surprised. She had never heard him talk about his childhood, and now she couldn't shut him up. He was walking again, pointing across the narrow street to the other side. "And we used to play knuckles in the street, right there."
"Knuckles?"
"A card game. And over there we played Pig and Dog. Basketball. We nailed a trash can to the telephone pole for a hoop." He mused as they walked, the sun shining on his head and shoulders. "I played outside all the time. We all did."
"Sounds like you have some happy memories, after all."
"Nah." Her father stiffened, suddenly. "You can't go home again, Victoria."
"I know people say that, but I disagree. I think you never really leave."
"What?"
"I'm Devon, Dad. I'm Devon, wherever I go. Some people are pure South Philly, and a New Yorker is always a New Yorker." Vicki never thought out loud in front of her father, but didn't stop. It was time to stop editing herself, even with him. "Think about it, Dad. There's Jersey girls and Valley girls. Chicagoans and San Franciscans, Texans and Bostonians. Steel magnolias and Southern gentlemen. And Reheema is so West Philly, when you meet her, you'll see it. She's great."
Her father was frowning, but maybe the sun was in his eyes again. Maybe the sun was always in his eyes, even indoors. Someday he would realize they had therapy for that, but Vicki wasn't going to be the one to tell him.
They reached the garden, where her mother was talking with Reheema. More neighbors were hard at work, weeding the pepper beds, restaking the tomato plants, and cutting cosmos for their dinner tables. Vicki introduced Reheema to her father, who shook her hand stiffly.
"So this is the community garden," he said, eyeing the lot. "Very pretty." His gaze fell on the unfinished left side, in the shade. "What are you going to plant there?"
Vicki cringed. It never failed, his always seeing the negative. She'd bring home four A's and a B, and he'd ask, Why the B?
"We're not planting anything there," Reheema answered. "We voted to make a place for the little kids. Put in one of those nice wooden playground sets and some wood chips underneath, so they don't get hurt if they fall."
"When are you going to install it?"
"When we get the money. Those wooden sets, they cost like two grand. The neighborhood's tapped out, after the dirt and the railroad ties, but we'll get it." Reheema nodded. "You know, this garden wouldn't have come about without your daughter, Mr. Allegretti. I was just telling your wife, Vicki's the one who got the crack dealers out of here."
"Please," Vicki said, reddening, but Reheema ignored her.
"Vicki saved this block, this whole neighborhood. She should get all the credit."
Her mother smiled, tightly. "We were so worried about her, we didn't appreciate the good she was doing. Maybe we were too worried."
"No, you shoulda been worried!" Reheema laughed. "If she were my daughter, I woulda been worried sick! You wouldn't believe the trouble we got ourselves into, the newspapers only had half the story. She's a real badass, your daughter!"
Hoo boy.
"She gets it from me," her mother said, her smile relaxing, and Vicki laughed, surprised.
But her father didn't reply and kept looking at the garden. Reheema seemed to run out of steam, uncharacteristically speechless. The moment was so awkward that Vicki stepped in to fill the silence.
"Thanks for the tour," she said. "We should probably get going. Congratulations on the garden."
"Thanks, take care."
"Yes, congratulations," her mother said, hugging Reheema briefly. Then she looped an arm around Vicki and they walked onto the sidewalk.
Her father didn't join them but lingered at the entrance to the garden.
"Dear?" her mother asked, and Vicki turned.
"In a minute," her father said quietly, then looked at Reheema. "I'd like to help you with the playground."
"I don't understand," Reheema said, and neither did Vicki.
"I'd like to send you a check, for the playground. I'll make it out for three thousand dollars, to cover the cost of the playset and the mulch. If you need more, you'll let me know."
"You don't have to do that, Mr. Allegretti," Reheema said, with a puzzled smile. "You don't have any responsibility for the garden. You don't even live here."
"I did once, and Victoria's right, part of me always will."
Whoa! Vicki thought, astounded. She would have hugged him but she wasn't sure he'd taken his Pravachol.
"Well. Okay." Reheema broke into a grin. "Mr. Allegretti, thank you so much, from the whole neighborhood."
"You're welcome," her father said, turning to Vicki with a new smile. "Come on, Devon. I'm taking my girls out to dinner."
"You got it," Vicki said, happily surprised, and the three of them turned to walk up Cater Street.
"That was a wonderful gesture, Victor," her mother whispered, taking her father's hand, and he gave her a quick kiss on the cheek.
Vicki felt her spirits lift, walking behind the two of them. Maybe Dan had been right that night in the hospital. Maybe she just had to accept her father the way he was. And think out loud at every opportunity. Like now:
"Dad, I can't get over it. You said I was right. In front of witnesses."
Her father turned, smiling. "I won't make a habit of it."
"I hope not." Then Vicki got an idea. "Hey, now that we're all in the love mood, can we go to an Olive Garden for dinner?"
"No," her parents answered, in unison.
And Vicki laughed.
AUTHOR'S NOTE AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I don't know what other authors do for fun, but I eat saturated fats, ride Buddy the Pony, and watch trials at the federal courthouse, where, in my ex-life, I worked as a lawyer. Not long ago I wandered into a courtroom and found myself watching a jury trial for crack-cocaine trafficking against members of one of the most violent gangs in Philadelphia history. I had seen only five minutes of the testimony before ideas and characters started to flow, and I knew I had a novel. In fact, the next morning I woke up with the first line of Devil's Corner. That has never happened before, and I'm hoping it happens again. Every year for the next ten years.