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We’s All In For Anchovies by Meridith Leo-Rowett © Meridith Leo-Rowett 2009 As a kid I grew up hearin stories. Just like any odda kid had. The difference wuz in my famly your “friends” were ya brothas. An ya “partners”… well we didn’t talk too much bout them. We grew up on Jamaica Ave. Not nothin changed much. I grew up the youngest of two and nothin seemed outta sorts far as I knew. I realized things wa off lata on. They kept me outta da loop fa reasons ya know unbeknownst to me. But whateva. Every day Frankie got dressed up in that stupid suit. He waited fa them to leave before he put in on. He stood in da mirror starin at himself cursin the hurtful uniform that “made his chest look skimpy.” As a kid I just loved da fact that he could get out. Do his own thing, ya know. It ain’t easy around here to step off da stoop. One day when Frankie left fa work at da local ria I got my chance to make it big. I was sittin there waitin for something to happen when there she came. Badda bing. Man, she was good. Lena was a new girl on da block and I was way hot fa her. She stopped at da stoop and made it furtha into our place. As I skillfully got past the ridiculous shrine of Mary and the others and then off da couch that squeaked no matta which way you moved I realized there wuz only one place fa us to go. Like a kid I jumped from his bed to mine ta show er how I owned both. She looked ova our room more thoroughly on his side than mine. Jealousness ya know filled my veins until it all came to me. Pshhh me jealous? Of what? Whateva. She wanted to meet him she says. She liked his style. Ya know, da way he made my bed n stuff. I just liked it when she wuz in it. I’d caress her skin, look into her eyes and promise her none a dis wouldn all matta in time. It's 1978 and she says to me: “He’s different.” “Yo, he’s my brotha. Don’t say that.” “He is.” “Do you care?” Frankie’s all naked when I walk in. His pizzeria delivery uniform is on the ground and he’s lookin out the window. He hates it all and what it’s made him into. “Come on I really wanna meet your brother. Frankie is it?” “Yeah, but ya know he works a lot. And it’s in da East Village. Ain’t nobody go down there less they pickin up their partner. Ya know?” I looked down cause I knew where dis wuz goin and I didn like it. Bein out there wuzzin easy but fa Frankie it made it all worse. I knew what wuz up. From da moment Frankie and me stopped takin baths together he stopped talkin native it wuz all ova. We neva said nothin. Keepin it quiet was betta than exposin it n Frankie was betta with playin formal than me. Livry boyz is good at dat. “If you really want me you want me to know all about you,” Lena said. “Aright, well we’s all in for anchovies?” “Sure,” she said. An we wuz on our way. Frankie was da hottest Sicani round our way. Everybody wannid him an he always got what he want. He’d try ta talk me inta takin ova deliveries but I neva got the nerve he had. Ladies loved him and men adored him. No contest. Frankie took one step closa to the bay window and stared inna the distance without flinchin. I knew he was wonderin what it would be like to touch God. He wondered if they’d let him in. He was scared but couldn take bein on the outside anymore. He looked back at me and that’s the last time I ever really saw my brother. I hate myself now. I hate how I neva really opened it all up to the person I’d shared a womb with. I guess I could just give it up to the same old same old: life sucks. My brother eventually did die in 1983 of AIDS. It was the greatest loss I could’ve ever been dealt. Frankie and I had lots of unfinished business. I loved him. He was famly and I never had the chance to tell him. I lost my chance since that day by the bay. I often look at the numerous pictures my wife Lena had taken of us all together. I stare for hours at the face of Frankie tryin to understand how the times had made him so unhappy and silent. How somehow we never said what was needed to say. Even now it’s all in my head. Not once have I spoken of his so-called unforgiveable loves that are unorthodox for our culture. How I curse life at times for bein unforgiving to the unknown. No matta what, when it came down to it we’s all in for anchovies.
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