Even though I’m dreading telling my parents about Dante, I sit them down that same night, as soon as we’re done eating. I would have liked Serwa to be there too, but she was tired and went to bed early.
“Mama, Tata,” I say, “I have something to tell you.”
My mother looks expectant. My father is frowning—he doesn’t like surprises.
I take a deep breath. “I met someone. We’ve been dating a couple of months now.”
Mama smiles. She looks pleased, like she already expected this. “It’s Jules, isn’t it?” she says. “I saw his mother at brunch last week, and she said—”
“It’s not Jules,” I interrupt.
“Oh.” Her smile fades, but not all the way. She thinks it must be some other boy from Young Ambassadors, or a friend of Emily’s.
“His name is Dante Gallo,” I say. “He’s from here. From Chicago.”
“Who is he?” my father asks at once.
“He’s, well, uh . . . his family works in construction. And the restaurant business . . .” I say. I’m trying to list the least-offensive of their professions.
My father isn’t fooled for a minute.
“Is that who you’ve been sneaking out to see?” he barks.
“Yafeu, why are you—” Mama says.
“Don’t think Wilson hasn’t told me,” my father says, not taking his eyes off me. “He drops you off at the library, and you call him six hours later. You disappear from dinners and parties . . .”
“I didn’t realize I was under surveillance,” I say coldly.
“Sneaking out?” Mama says, frowning. “I really don’t see—”
“What are you hiding?” my father demands. “Who is this man you’re seeing?”
I’m sweating and my stomach is rolling over and over. I hate this. But I’m not going to cry or throw up—not this time. I have to stay calm. I have to explain.
“He’s a good man,” I say firmly. “I care about him . . . very much. I didn’t want to tell you about him because I knew what you’d think.”
“What?” my father says with deadly calm. “What would I think?”
“His family has . . . a criminal history.”
My father swears in Twi.
My mother is staring at me, wide-eyed.
“You can’t be serious, Simone . . .”
“I am. I’m very serious.”
“You’ve become infatuated with some . . . some malfaiteur?”
“He’s not like that,” I say.
I didn’t want to lie anymore, but I don’t know how to explain what Dante is, actually. He’s strong, he’s bold, he’s intelligent, he’s passionate . . . I hate to hear him described in the awful terms my parents are using. But at the same time, I can’t exactly claim that he’s innocent, that he’s never broken the law . . .
“I want you to meet him,” I say, in the firmest tone I can muster.
“Out of the question!” my father scoffs.
“Wait, Yafeu,” my mother says. “Maybe we should—”
“Absolutely not!” he says. Turning to me, he orders, “You’re not going to see this man again. You’ll block him on your phone, you’ll give his name and description to the staff, and from this moment on—”
“No!” I cry.
My parents fall silent, staring at me in shock.
I don’t think I’ve ever told them ‘no’ before. I’ve definitely never shouted.
Heart racing, I say, “I’m not going to stop seeing him. Not before you’ve even met him. You can’t say anything about him now when he’s a stranger. You don’t know him like I do . . .”
My father looks like he wants to shout something back at me, but Mama puts her hand on his arm, steadying him. After a moment, he takes a breath and says, “Fine, Simone. You’ll invite him here for dinner.”
Even Mama looks surprised at that.
“Dinner?” I say.
“Yes,” he presses his lips together in a thin line. “We’ll meet this man who’s insinuated himself into my daughter’s heart. And we’ll see exactly what sort of person he is.”
Blood is thundering in my ears. I can’t believe he’s agreeing. It seems like a trick. Like the other shoe is about to drop.
But my father doesn’t say anything else. He waits for my response.
“Thank you,” I say quietly. “I’ll invite him tomorrow night.”
“Good,” Tata says. “I can’t wait.”
The dinner is a disaster.
From the moment my father opens the door, I know that’s how it’s going to be.
He’s put on one of his best suits—the navy Brioni. This isn’t as a gesture of welcome or respect. He wants to appear as intimidating as possible.
He greets Dante coldly. My father can be horribly stern when he wants to be.
The problem is that Dante is equally stern in return. He’s wearing a button-up shirt and a pair of slacks. His hair is nicely combed, and his dress shoes are polished. But he doesn’t look refined like Tata. With the sleeves of his shirt rolled up, his meaty forearms are displayed, dusted with dark hair and thick with veins and muscle. His massive hand closes around my father’s, and it looks like a brutal hand, with its swollen knuckles and the gold family ring Dante wears on his pinky.
By contrast, my father’s hands are slim, refined, manicured. My father’s watch and cuff links look like the jewelry of a gentleman.
Dante looks like he hasn’t shaved, even though I know that he has. It’s just the darkness of his facial hair that marks his cheeks in a perpetual five o’clock shadow.
When he greets my mother and sister, I know he’s using his most gentle tone, but it comes out like a grunt. They’re not used to his voice. Mama actually jumps a little. They don’t know how to differentiate between his softer tone and his truly terrifying growl. To them, he sounds rude and uncouth in everything he says, even when he tries to compliment them.
“You have a beautiful home,” he tells Mama.
That sounds wrong, too, like he’s never been in a nice house before. When I know that the Gallo mansion is lovely and venerable in its own way. Much more than this rented place.
I’m already sick with dread and the dinner’s barely begun.
We all sit down around the formal dining table.
Tata is at the head. Mama’s at the foot. Serwa sits on one side, Dante and me on the other. At least we’re right next to each other.
One of the housemaids brings out the soup.
It’s gazpacho, with a sheen of olive oil glimmering on its surface. Dante eyes the chilled soup warily.
He picks up his spoon. It looks comically small in his huge hand. My father, mother, and sister are all staring at him like he’s an animal in a zoo. I’m so angry at them that I want to cry. I know they don’t mean it, but it hurts me to see their stiff expressions, the veneer of politeness with distaste underneath.
Dante can feel it, too. He’s trying to be calm. Trying to be warm to them. But it’s impossible under the bright lights, the tense scrutiny, the silence that blankets the table. Every clink of our spoons is magnified in the formal dining space.
Dante takes a few polite bites of the soup, before laying down his spoon. It’s too much to try to eat with so many people watching you.
“The soup doesn’t agree with you?” my father says with chilly politeness. “I can order something else from the kitchen. What do you like to eat?”
He says it like he thinks Dante lives on a diet of pizza and french fries. Like normal human food is beyond Dante’s appreciation.
“The soup is excellent,” Dante growls. He picks up his spoon again and takes five or six hasty bites. In his hurry, a little of the red soup splashes on the snow-white tablecloth. Dante flushes and tries to dab the spot with his napkin, making it worse.
“Oh, don’t bother about that,” Mama says.
She means it kindly, but it sounds condescending, like Dante is a Great Dane sitting at the table, from which nothing better could be expected.
I can’t eat a bite. The soup smells awful to me, like it has iron filings in it. I’m holding back tears.
“So, Dante,” my father says, as calm and deliberate as ever. “What do you do for a living?”
“My family owns several businesses,” Dante replies. To his credit, his voice is as calm as Tata’s, and he has no trouble meeting my father’s eyes.
“What sort of businesses?”
“Construction. Real estate. Fine-dining.”
“Indeed,” my father says. “Also several laundromats and a strip club, isn’t that right?”
I see a muscle jump in Dante’s jaw. My father is making it clear that he’s done his research on the Gallo family.
“Yes,” Dante says. “That’s right.”
“Your family has a long history in Chicago, don’t they?”
“Yes.”
“That house on Meyer Avenue is simply . . . charming. Your family must have had it a hundred years.”
“Since 1902,” Dante says stiffly.
My father lays down his spoon and folds his slim, shapely hands on the table in front of him.
“What I’m wondering,” he says, “is why you think that I would ever allow my daughter to align herself with the Italian mafia?”
A frigid silence falls over the table. We all seem frozen in place, my mother stiff and wide-eyed in her chair, Serwa holding her spoon up to her mouth but not taking a sip of her soup, me digging my nails into my palm so hard I might be drawing blood. My father staring at Dante, and Dante staring right back at him.
“All families have their secrets,” Dante says, his harsh voice in direct opposition to my father’s cultured tones. “You, for instance, growing up in Accra . . . I doubt you’d have to look far to find a relative who had cut someone’s throat for a few Cedi.”
My father doesn’t flinch, but I see the outrage in his eyes. I don’t know if Dante is aware how accurate that statement was. My father had two uncles who worked for a local gangster. One day they offered his sisters positions as housemaids in the wealthy part of the city. The girls packed their bags, planning to come home on the weekends. But they never came back—my father never saw them again.
Tata’s hand twitches on the tabletop. I think he’s about to respond, but Dante isn’t finished yet.
“That’s normal in Africa, I guess,” Dante growls. “What about after you came to London? That’s where the real money is. Hedge funds, mergers and acquisitions, large-scale real estate transactions . . . the Outfit is good with money. Very good. But we’ve got nothing on international financiers . . . that’s crime on a whole other scale.”
My father makes a tsking sound, his top lip drawn up in a sneer.
“I’m sure you’d like that to be true,” he says. “My hands may be black, but yours are bloody. Those hands will never touch my daughter. Not after tonight.”
Dante’s eyes get so dark that they’re darker even than my father’s—no iris at all, only black pupil.
I’m afraid that’s he’s going to tell Tata that he’s already touched me. In every way possible. I’m not Daddy’s pure little princess anymore. Not even close.
But Dante would never betray me like that.
Instead, he says, “That’s not your decision.”
“Yes, it is,” Tata says. “I am Simone’s father. She will obey me.”
Dante looks over at me. It’s the first time our eyes have met since this awful dinner began. And it’s the first time I see a crack in Dante’s armor. He walked in here like a dark knight, stern and unyielding. And now in his eyes, I see the first hint of vulnerability. A question: is my father speaking the truth?
My mouth is too dry to speak. My tongue darts out to moisten my cracked lips, but it’s not enough. I can’t form any words.
That muscle jumps in Dante’s jaw again. His brows lower in disappointment. He turns to my mother.
“Thank you for your hospitality,” he says.
And with that, he stands up and walks out of the room.
I should jump up.
I should chase after him.
Instead, I vomit directly into my soup bowl. All over the untouched gazpacho.
