The heavy bottom of a Guinness glass made a hollow sound on the living room table through it was filled with honey tasting liquid. A hot tea, made sweet with scoops of honey from a jar that was always on the counter at Sasha's place.

Sasha plopped down next to me, dressed casually in a mint colored cotton nightgown. He was the only other person in my life whom I knew liked to wear nightgowns, though he wasn't doing it out of any personal feeling. He didn't need the nightgown. It just felt good on his skin. I knew Ganya liked to give him nightgowns because of this, usually at Christmas. It was familiar to me and filled me with a small unrest, because Frankie liked to do the same thing for me, though not only at Christmas.

My eyes stayed on the hot honey tea as Sasha's arms wrapped around me from behind. Stayed on the bold Guinness letters as he pulled me close, rested his chin on my shoulder. Cuddled me.

He said no words, just breathed deeply and I felt these long breaths on my back. We stayed like this for a long time, like old times. It was what he did when we had been homeless together. No matter where we were that night, he'd hug me tightly like this before falling asleep. We needed love, so we loved each other as best friends and there was nothing wrong with that.

Now, eight or nine years later, we still needed love. We'd been scared tonight, so we needed familiar comforts. I was glad for him, because without him I had nobody. I'd have no chance of intimacy such as this. And I needed that warmth, his slow breaths.

"I'm going to sleep in the living room tonight. On the floor. You have the couch, it's okay. I know what you're thinking. I know you well enough," he said finally. "I'm going to bring in the blankets and pillows, make your bed on the couch. Then I'll sleep right over there. If you wake up and you need me, wake me up. I'll be close all the time, though. So don't worry."

"Okay," I said softly, feeling safer than I had in days in his arms.

He swallowed and made this small noise with his nose in it, a strange thing he did sometimes. It was the most comforting little noise, reminded me that he was truly here and it could be no one else. His arms squeezed around my middle and remained tight, securing me to his body.

There was a beeping noise somewhere in the townhouse and it was keeping me from falling asleep. It sounded like a smoke alarm that needed a battery replaced. Maybe it was upstairs, because it was faint.

Gently, I pulled my covers down to my stomach and sat up, trying to make the least amount of noise as possible. As promised, over on the floor beyond the coffee table was Sasha. He was asleep, still, and his breathing was telling me it was too dry in here with the heat on. He'd always been sensitive to such things, his sinus cavities stuffy even in the barest of spring.

I decided, watching him, that I'd go get a bowl of water to put on top of the heater to make the air more moist and therefore sparing his nose. It was the most I could do. I couldn't sleep anyway, with the smoke alarm being the least of my worries.

Getting up, I swept the empty Guinness glass into my hand and went off to the kitchen. Taking care to have soft steps, the skirt of the nightgown of Sasha's I was wearing gently swayed with my movements. The smoke alarm upstairs beeped again, making me jump. It had a way of being quiet just long enough to make me think it wouldn't beep again then beeping with a jolt to my system. Maybe since I was up, I could replace the thing for them as a show of gratitude, if I could find batteries without waking them both up.

Before putting the glass in the sink, my foot bumped against Sasha's purse under the table. I remembered how he dropped our purses there when we'd arrived, careless except to make sure I was okay. Next to his purse was mine, black clashing with his maroon. I paused, staring at it. My thoughts wandered.

Lost in them, I made my way into the slender kitchen, separated by a doorway from the dining room. Inside, I slipped the glass into the sink noiselessly and leaned against the metal sink in thought.

Images of Eddie's face flashed in my brain, making my bladder muscles squeeze involuntarily. The fear was still fresh, never faltering. The idea that he could be at my apartment right now, maybe tearing through things, maybe looking for me out there... It made my breath hitch and an involuntary whine come from my throat for a few seconds before my hand went over my mouth to stop it.

With wide eyes, I realized I was now standing next to our purses, my black one right next to my foot. Silently, I crouched down and took up the straps into my hand. I slung it over my shoulder, and quickly raced back to the kitchen. Inside, I close the door. It was like a jail cell in here, though safe feeling. The door was the only way out or in, only with a window but this was easy to observe.

In the darkness but for the moon, everything took on the same color. There was a slight blue pallor on everything, like the night with Eddie but dissimilar. This still encouraged my heart to beat hard. I bumped into the sink counter lost in my thoughts again, but the pain of the edge on my hip brought me back to reality. The bone pain was nearly the same achy numb one as Eddie's gun had caused. My purse slipped down my shoulder, and my hands started going through it without my consent.

Before I knew it, my hand was on the beige rotary phone on the counter and a white business card was in my other hand. Unsteadily, my finger turned the rotary seven times, and the phone extended to my ear with a plastic sound, too hard in the darkness. When it started to ring, I jumped but only once.

It had to be an ungoldly hour, but he answered anyway. Almost as if he were expecting my call. And I suppose he had been.

"Pronto?" Luciano greeting warmly. More warm that I thought possible from him. Like a grandfather would, I thought.

"Pronto..." I answered quietly.

"Oh, yes."

An awkward silence followed as he realized who was talking to him. Perhaps hesitance. Finally, he cleared his throat. It made me grip the phone more.

"How are you this evening?" he asked professionally.

"Not well..." I sighed and turned, leaning on the counter with my behind.

"I'm sorry to hear that. Well, I need to speak to you."

I nodded, though he couldn't see. "I know you do."

"I know what happened the other night."

"I know you do."

"He can not act that way. He is a barbarian. Has anyone ever told you that? He does not adhere to our practices. He is a loose wire, or what is that phrase."

"A loose cannon."

"Yes, a 'loose cannon'. He is messing everything. But I will not talk about it. That is not why I must speak to you."

Messing everything? What had he been about to say? The image of Ganya staring at me sternly about what I knew appeared in my head, the reminder that just down the hall he was asleep in his bed. Our practices. What was Luciano talking about? Our. Ganya talking about him in the car floated through my ears, about how he was part of one of the most powerful families-

"I heard from Caselotti what was going on. We go way back, he and I. We were in the war together. Palermo. Do you know Palermo? Anyway. It does not matter. Our families are close because of this. Our children grew up together. I consider his sons my nephews. I consider Frankie my nephew."

Frankie. He was tickling my ears. Just the mention of his name caused a flood of good feelings in my heart like a warm honey fluid. Semi-relief. "Yes," I said slowly.

"He talks to me about him a lot, Frank, about Frankie. He was so worried about him when Frankie was growing up. He wasn't like his other sons. He was a bit more...what is the word..." I could hear him snapping his fingers on the other side of the line. "He was more..dainty? Dainty? Fancy. Something. He would often argue with his wife about this when we were out. But I'm saying things that do not matter. Anyway..."

My entire being had gone silent at his words. This history. I had no idea. Guilt washed over me about the whole situation with Luciano. He'd been this close to them? To Frankie? Then what...why had he treated me this way? Memories of him bandaging up my finger, his face. His need to help me, his gentleness despite what I was making him out to be. I was seeing it in an entirely new light, and I was ashamed. Had he helped me because I was Frankie's...but had he known? He was so close to Frankie's father...so maybe...

"I'm sorry," I said in the quiet.

"Hm?" He asked, interrupted suddenly.

"I'm sorry."

"What are you saying that for?"

"You've been so kind to me, and I've been..."

"No, I know you were scared. Of course a young lady is scared of an old man. Especially after what I did to you. I need to apologize for that. I was drunk. My wife... But that is no excuse."

I swallowed and nodded again though he couldn't see.

"Now, for the reason why I must talk to you."

I swallowed and nodded again in anticipation, worry.

"I must talk to you, because Frank had told me some things. Eddie...has said some troubling things. My son plays Poker with him sometimes. And this time. He could not shut up, my son. He said Eddie roughed up a woman, and we do not do that. We do not deal with the women and the children. They are innocents. Do you understand? So I talked to my son about it. I asked him more, because roughing up a woman is atypical for Eddie and for anyone. Then he mentioned the club, and mentioned something about Marilyn Monroe. He was not too clear about it, because he's never been to the Majesty, but I knew. I knew exactly who he was talking about and I could not wait. We'd heard about Antony earlier in the day, and my mind. You would not believe."

But I could believe. I was living it. I could not speak.

"I heard from Frank some time ago about you and Frankie. About how you were searching for a doctor. A special doctor, a rare doctor. Frank was so desperate, he asked me about it, about my colleagues. Did I know anyone. But I do not know anyone."

My heart. It was jolting in my chest, as if somebody were rubbing electric shock paddles and forcing them into my chest over and over. My brain was short circuiting.

"What do yo mean-" I began, but I did not get to finish.

"When I heard about what Eddie did and what Antony did, I could no longer wait on the issue. I had been asking and calling people, looking around, as a favor to Frank. But now. I can not wait. He wants to send you both to Hawaii, in hiding he said."

Hiding.

He continued, all business. "I think it is a good idea. But you need this surgery first. The law. He wants to give you new papers, work with the police, the court, everybody. Witness protection, that is what he said. Hiding. Do you know what I mean?"

My breath was getting uncontrollable. I could not speak. It was too much to take in.

"This surgery. But I do not know about it. The most I have done is the circumcision for the Jewish, one time descended the testes for a young man. But I must help you. I must do this surgery for you. You need the surgery to secure new papers. You must get out of here, out of New York. Are you listening?"

I must do this surgery for you.

My breath caught as I gasped in silence, my hand going over my mouth. I could not answer him. It took everything I had not to drop the phone on the floor from my shaking hand, to not fall on the floor from my shaking knees.