3. Sisters in order of most to least annoying （Today）

THREE

#1 Lea

"It's for the best. I'd be a shitty stripper anyway."

Sitting at Rochelle's battered kitchen table in the Bronx, I took a shot of the very worst tequila on the market as if to punctuate the story of Most Embarrassing Doctor's Appointment Ever.

The next afternoon, I'd headed straight uptown as I promised, intent on helping my family as promised. Unfortunately, the idea of all that was a little too much for me to handle, so I'd taken a four-block detour for some lunch and liquid courage at Rochelle's apartment.

Okay, so I was avoiding. Not the packing. That I could handle. But the disapproving faces of my siblings after I skipped Mass, definitely.

I coughed. Oh, that stuff burned. "Anyway, yeah. I won't be working at Diamonds anytime soon."

Rochelle sighed, almost as if she was more disappointed by the news than I was. "I don't know about that Dr. Hunt, but Dr. Palmer is really good. Maybe you should ask for him instead."

I shook my head. "No way I'm stepping foot in that place again. It's a sign, Chelle. And I doubt I'd get approved for the financing option anyway. The pamphlet said it was for people with over six fifty credit scores. I'd be surprised if I have a number at all."

"Kyle might advance you the money. He did for me, and not every club owner is willing to help their dancers like that, you know. It's a good deal."

Undoubtedly, it was. Rochelle had taken up the Diamonds owner's offer last year and, according to her, had earned back the money three months after she returned to work.

But I just shook my head. And it had nothing to do with the way the asshole doctor had called me perfect right before insulting me. Nothing at all. "These titties just aren't ready for icon status yet. That's all you, baby."

My cousin grinned, then shook her head with regret as she painted another clear coat of polish onto her nails, which were green with neon pink flowers this week. "It would have finally gotten fun working over there."

Rochelle and I had come up together in the same little dance studio in Belmont. We were Mrs. Suarez's top pupils and the only ones who had tried to make a real go of it in the city. Rochelle was even better than me, good enough to get into LaGuardia High School, the famous performing arts school in Manhattan. She hadn't, however, had patience with the grind of auditions. She started working at Diamonds to pay her bills about two years ago and hadn't been quiet about wanting me to join her.

Last summer, I'd finally agreed to meet her boss. But the day before the audition, I got the part in Chicago.

That too had felt like a sign.

"I might as well just keep trying to convince Tom to give me more shifts while I look for something else," I said. "I am getting better, you know. Yesterday, I was finally able to make a Long Island iced tea without looking up the recipe."

Rochelle delivered her patented side-eye. "Did they actually drink it?"

I giggled. "No comment."

The customer had, in fact, sent it back. But still, I had made it.

Instead of shaming me for my difficulty remembering things like that, Rochelle just chuckled with me and went back to painting her nails. That was one of a thousand reasons why we were friends.

"I might know of something else," she said.

I perked. "What's that?"

Nothing would be better than going home with good news for once. My siblings already all thought I was an idiot and a loser. If I at least had a job, maybe they'd cancel the plans and let me keep Nonna's house instead of renting it out.

"Kyle runs a bunch of other sorts of private clubs around the city," Rochelle said. "I serve drinks there during weeknights when it's slow at Diamonds."

"What do you mean, private clubs?" I wondered. "Like men's clubs?"

She started painting her other hand. "No, more underground. Apartments or basement, maybe. Sometimes a boat or maybe a warehouse. Anyplace rich men can drink and gamble."

I recoiled a bit. "Why don't they just go to Atlantic City?"

Rochelle gave me a look. The one that told me not to be so damn naive. "They don't want all that noise. Just some pretty girls while they play their little games. It's all very old-school."

"You mean like Goodfellas?"

Growing up in Belmont, I'd heard plenty about those sorts. Nonna still recounted the days when she and my grandfather had to tithe to the church and the local bosses when they were first getting started. Matthew had loads of stories from his days breaking up gambling and trafficking rings as a prosecutor in Brooklyn. Even Michael, my brother-in-law, was briefly involved with the Albanian mob when he was younger.

At least shaking it at a strip joint was legal. Even if my boobs were too small.

Rochelle, however, just snorted. "This ain't The Sopranos. It's just a bunch of old guys wanting to get away from their wives for the night, play some games, and look at girls without crappy music pounding in their brains. Easiest money I've ever made, I'm telling you."

I frowned. "So, it's topless?"

"Sometimes," Rochelle admitted.

I just stared at her.

"Okay, most of the time. But it's look, don't touch. Not unless you want. You could give a lap dance or two, but always your choice. Mostly, you just serve drinks and flirt."

I hugged my arms around my chest, considering. It wasn't that I was shy. As a dancer, I'd spent most of my life on display. Once, I'd done a production where we wore nothing but thongs, white body paint, and pasties. A body was just a body. I'd never felt the urge to hide mine.

But I'd never performed explicitly to be looked at…that way.

I could see the appeal. Granted, I'd never given an official lap dance, but grinding on some dude in the club wasn't that different, and I was damn good at that, bad knee or not.

"And Carmine still doesn't care?" I prodded, wondering again about Rochelle's long-time boyfriend. "About you showing the goods to other men?"

"Well, considering he's the doorman at Diamonds, no. If anything, we're both making more money now that he helps Kyle find locations. Plus, other men can look, but he's the only one I go home with. He knows that. I make sure he knows that."

I tipped my head, considering. Honestly, I had just as many dudes drooling over me at Opal. One less piece of clothing was the main difference, and Rochelle's gig sounded a lot more lucrative than being a two-bit bartender. Maybe I should get real about my actual skill sets and put them to use.

Time, after all, was running out.

"Well, I always wanted to do Gypsy." I shrugged. Something felt wrong about it, but I couldn't say what. "I'll think about it."

"Just let me know."

"All right, babe," I said. "One more for the road."

Before Chelle could stop me, I poured another shot and tipped it down my throat, relishing the burn, then the tingling in my head and eventual relaxation that would make bearing my family's disapproval that much easier.

"Good luck with the move. And with Lea," Chelle called as I grabbed my purse and headed out.

Outside, a cold wind was blowing through Belmont. The remnants of last week's mostly melted snow flurries made icy puddles around the curbs. It was the dregs of winter—the weeks after the merriment of the holidays had worn off, and now people were just buttoned up against frigid breezes and somber skies.

The streets around Belmont were relatively empty for a Friday evening. As I approached the little brown house on Hughes Avenue, the familiar scents of tomato sauce and car exhaust cut through the deserted park across the street. Next to our house, Victor Manuel's voice crooned through Mrs. Hernandez's kitchen window while clashing Pavarotti wails floated from one of the nearby Italian restaurants on 187th.

It wasn't anything fancy, and maybe just a shadow of the community and warmth Belmont exuded during warmer months. But it was still home.

For one more night, anyway.

I crept up the crooked front stoop, and the front door swung open before I even took out my key.

"My God, what took you so long?" Lea demanded without even saying hello. "We've been here for hours. And you missed Mass." She sniffed. "Joni, are you drunk? You stink like tequila."

"I work at a bar, Lea. I always smell like liquor." It wasn't a lie. I just wasn't answering her question.

Unfortunately, Lea could always smell a rat. Fortunately, she was too stressed to trap it with her typical tongue-lashing.

"Come on," she said, then yanked me into the house and up the stairs, where I could hear the rest of my family working to clear out the rest of the house.

"Out of the way!"

Lea and I stepped aside while Matthew and Michael carried an old mahogany bureau out the door toward the moving truck parked at the curb. They were followed by Xavier holding a nightstand.

"Why couldn't Matthew or Frankie pay for movers again?" I wondered as I watched them pass. "They both own the world now. They couldn't have spared a little to help our grandmother?"

Within the last year, both my brother Matthew and my older sister Frankie had married very wealthy partners.

"Probably because they don't think they're too good for hard work like some people," Lea said as we continued up the creaky old stairs.

"I don't buy it. Frankie's not the crank in the family, Lea," I said.

She turned around as if to argue more, then seemed to decide this particular fight wasn't worth it and shrugged. "They tried, but Nonna said no. Honestly, I think she just wants us all here one last night. Come on, you and I are taking care of your room. And you're not getting out of it this time."

"Toss or keep?" Lea asked as we sat in my room—or what would be my room for exactly one more night—shoving things into boxes.

There wasn't much. For a good chunk of my life, I'd split my time between dance companies, a few half-hearted attempts at school, and splitting a room with my sister Marie. It didn't leave much time for hoarding.

That was good since, for the time being, it was all going to sit in Nonna's storage unit until I found a place of my own. The only things staying out for sure were a few changes of clothes, toiletries, my iPad, and my earring collection.

Can't forget the earrings.

I looked up to where Lea was holding up my copy of Milady Standard Cosmetology and made a face. "Toss."

Lea turned the textbook over to examine the front. "You sure? It was so expensive, and you were only a few credits short?—"

"Toss it," I ordered again. Just the idea of going back to cosmetology school made me want to jump out the window. "I literally burned someone's hair in a final exam. The Leslie Beauty Academy does not, under any circumstances, want me to return to their program. Give it to the Salvation Army for some other sucker to enjoy."

Lea gave me her patented "Joni's being an ass" expression but put the book into the box designated for charity and went back to the other items scattered across the little desk in the corner.

"Can I ask you a question?" she asked a few minutes later, after packing all of my stage makeup into a big plastic kaboodle.

I looked up from sorting sweaters. It wasn't really Lea's style to ask my permission to speak. "Sure…"

"What's the plan for tomorrow? I keep asking if you have a place, but you won't answer my texts."

I turned away as my cheeks heated.

How could I explain this to the sister who always seemed to have everything figured out? A full twelve years older than me, Lea had pretty much raised me and my other sisters as much as Nonna did. To hear her tell it, she changed most of my diapers, taught me to walk and talk, and even took me to checkups and dentist appointments. As siblings, we should have been equals, but when she looked at me like that, it was obvious that her experience would always outweigh mine.

Out of all the Zola kids, Lea was the perfect one. Nonna's "good girl." The one whose life had most closely mirrored our grandparents, especially once she and Mike took on the auto shop after Nonno died. They created their own brood of four mini Zola-Scarrones, took Nonna to church, made ziti every Sunday, and did everything that was expected of them while the rest of us flew the coop.

It went without saying that she should be done with me by now. But here I was, just as immature as ever.

And just as desperate to make her think otherwise.

Behind me, Lea sighed. "You haven't found a place, have you?"

I turned back from my closet. "No, but I will, I promise. I'm working on it, really."

Lea emptied another desk drawer of mostly pencil stubs, used hair ties, and other random crap into a trash bag. "Jo, you've been saying that for months. You're out of time."

"I know that. Don't you think I know that? I just need another few days. I have a few leads on some jobs, and?—"

"Leads?" Lea shook her head, looking blown away. "That's all you have after four months? Some more leads?"

"Hey, any more boxes need to go down?"

We both turned as Frankie and Kate walked into the room, Kate with free hands, Frankie carrying a plate of amaretti, freshly baked by the way their sweet, almondy scent drifted through the room. A delicious and totally premeditated ambush.

"We're almost done," Lea said stiffly as Frankie set the cookies on the desk and then lowered her five-month-pregnant self into my chair.

"When's your flight?" I wondered as I snagged a cookie and popped it in my mouth.

"Four tomorrow." Frankie looked between all of us. "And that's it for a while. I'm not supposed to travel after six months."

She and Lea traded knowing looks. There had been a rash of babies in the family lately. First, Lea had baby Lupe last year, and then Frankie got pregnant again within a month of Matthew's wife, Nina. Everyone was settled and/or nesting like freaking ducks in a pond. Everyone but me.

"So, what is this, the Spanish Inquisition greased with cookies?" I joked as I grabbed another amaretto, ignoring the fact that I was the only one taking advantage of them. "I think the Spanish had better outfits, you know."

My sisters exchanged guilty glances around the room.

"Don't do that." Frankie's gentle voice broke through the awkwardness. "Don't mask your nerves with insults, Jo."

"Since Marie's not here, someone has to take them," I shot back.

I'd never admit it to anyone, but I missed my mousy wallflower almost twin like crazy. Despite being born only ten months apart, we were complete opposites and fought like cats and dogs. But home wasn't really home without the person I'd shared a room with for most of my life.

"Where are the kids, anyway?" I asked Lea as I considered a third cookie. Were I still auditioning, I would have limited myself to one, but these days, did it really matter? "Usually, they sound like a herd of elephants by now."

"The boys took the kids back to my house," Lea said. "They knew we needed to talk. All of us."

"So you said. What is this, an intervention?" I joked. To hell with it, I was going to have that cookie.

Every woman around the room clasped their hands in identical prayer-like positions while they stared at me with identical expressions of frustration, pity, and…dread. No one laughed. No one even argued. The room grew quiet.

And my family was never quiet.

"Wait," I said, cookie halfway to my mouth. "This…is…an intervention? For friggin' what?"

As a dancer, I'd been freakishly intense about keeping my body clean. Even though that career had ended almost four months ago, I wasn't much different. I liked to go out with friends, sure. And the occasional random dude. Fine. But I hardly drank, almost never touched drugs beyond alcohol, and basically treated my body like a temple. Compared to other twenty-four-year-olds in this city, I was a saint.

What addiction were they intervening? Nonna's baking?

"Did you find a place?" Frankie wondered at last.

I didn't answer, but Lea did it for me.

"She doesn't have anywhere to go," she said. "Still."

"Joni, seriously?" Kate put in. "You told me last week you had some leads."

Had I told her that? I wondered. Sometimes, I could barely remember conversations from yesterday.

"Honestly," Lea continued. "How can you leave something as basic as where you sleep to the last minute? It's crazy!"

"You know what's really crazy?" I demanded. "That I have five siblings, two of them with rich-ass partners, and none of them can give me any help. Not even a couch to sleep on."

I glared around the room, full of accusation.

Frankie, whose husband was one of the "rich-ass" ones, shook her head in that quiet, sweet way while she set a hand atop her pregnant belly. "I'm sorry, babe, but you know the townhouse is under construction until after the baby is born. The whole place will be covered in dust and workers."

A glance at Kate told me she wasn't willing to put me up either. "My studio barely has room for my bed, let alone an extra mattress. I really wish it could be different."

I turned to Lea, who was already shaking her head. "Mike would kill me. Our house is too cramped as it is with four kids. He already spends half his nights on the couch when Lupe can't sleep."

I flopped back in my chair. This couldn't be happening. It was almost like they planned it this way.

"Look," Frankie offered as she pulled at her ponytail. "Xavier and I can totally give you a deposit?—"

"It's fine. I don't need it."

"Don't be a stubborn donkey." Lea dumped my old high school notebooks into a trash bag. "But I don't think she would get approved for a lease anyway."

I stared at my feet. Hating that she was right. Who was going to give a lease to a part-time bartender barely scraping minimum wage?

Really, it was the questions no one was asking that bothered me most. Why couldn't I get my shit together? Why couldn't I manage something as basic as rent or a job that required more than a few nights a week? Responsibilities, bank accounts, all the things adults were supposed to handle?

I tried. I really did. But every time I approached the mountain of things I was supposed to do every day, every week, every month, they all seemed so impossible. The world felt heavy and exhausting and fucking unbearable.

So, I'd ignore them for another day in favor of scrolling on my phone or sending memes to my friends. And the mountain grew. And grew. And grew.

Fuck.

I grabbed another cookie. Right now, they were the only things that seemed to help.

Unfortunately, when I looked around the room again, my problems were still reflected in the expressions that said the same thing: poor, sad, stupid Joni.

Just like they had my entire life.

I swallowed the cookie and scowled. "I said I can take care of myself, and I will."

"Oh, please." Lea's sarcasm cut through the room. "When have you ever had to do anything for yourself? Every single one of us took turns making your lunches and tying your shoes until you were more than old enough to do all of it. You have never had to lift a finger. You have no clue what it's like to take care of anyone else, much less yourself, for once."

"Lea!" Frankie hissed. "That is not helping."

"Well, it's the truth. And she needs a reality check. That's why we're all here, isn't it?"

"Don't hate on me just because you chose a life of perpetual housekeeping and four snot-nosed brats," I snapped at her.

"Don't you be a brat just because your life is empty while the rest of us have gotten our shit together," Lea retorted. "Grow the hell up and learn to think of more than just yourself."

"Lea!" Frankie tried again, to absolutely no avail.

"Christ," Kate muttered.

"I think of things plenty," I bit out, if only to stop my voice from shaking. "Who brings Nonna boxes of her favorite nougat from Gino's on Mother's Day, huh? And who takes her to her doctor's appointments? Or does her nails and helps her do her hair in the mornings and watches old movies with her whenever she wants?"

"You do, civetta."

We all turned to find Nonna entering the room, her face lined with sadness.

My grandmother had been a beauty in her youth—a dead ringer for Sophia Loren. Now, there wasn't much of a difference beyond some fine lines, the fact that her black hair was now dyed that way, and the way age had rendered her a bit more petite. At seventy-eight, she still had a whole life to live. Starting tomorrow.

I would have been happy for her if it weren't costing me everything.

"It's true," she said as her Italian accent, normally softened by more than sixty years in New York, thickened with emotion. "You can be a very kind girl when you want. Joni isn't always the baby. Not anymore."

"Just sometimes, then?" Lea and I traded glares, though her tone was admittedly less, well, bitchy.

"Better than nothing," I cut back. "And unlike you, I have a job."

"Hey," Frankie said sharply. "Raising children is most definitely a job, Jo."

I swallowed. Okay, that was a low blow. Especially in this crowd. Frankie had raised her daughter alone for four whole years. And it was no secret that Lea had to give up her own career to take care of her brood. And then there was everything she, Matthew, and Nonna had done for the rest of us.

But that was different. I didn't know how, but it was.

"Well, I got a promotion at Opal, didn't I?" I rattled on. "Tom has been teaching me how to mix drinks. I'm a bartender now, not just a shot girl or on the platforms."

"But it's been months since then," Kate pointed out. "And you still only work two shifts a week. Tom can't give you any more?"

I pressed my mouth into a thin line. I wasn't going to tell them about how many times Tom had refused that particular request, claiming my skills were not up to the chaos that took over Opal on the weekends. Or how many other bars had refused to hire me, given my lack of experience. Or how many other interviews for hostessing or waiting tables I had just plain skipped because I couldn't bear being told I was inadequate one more time.

"What else do you do with your time?" Lea wondered. "‘Physical therapy'? ‘Working out'?" She mimed bunny ears with each phrase that made me want to smack her.

"I have been doing physical therapy," I protested, but even I knew that was B.S.

When my union benefits lapsed, I hadn't been able to see a physical therapist for more than a few weeks after my surgery this summer. So, on my days off, instead of coming home to help or finding another job like I knew I should, I'd go to my old dance studio to continue with the exercises in the hope that maybe, just maybe, things would heal on their own.

It was the same every time. I'd get through a warm-up. Do a few simple routines. Feel good, if a little out of practice. That was to be expected.

Then I'd try something harder, like a fouetté or a jump.

And land right on my ass, knee throbbing, gritting through the pain.

Anterior cruciate ligament tear. That's what the doctors called the event that killed my dream in exactly one and a half seconds.

"Okay, okay, okay," Frankie said. "No one's keeping track. But there's still just the harsh reality that you have to move out, Jo. Nonna leaves tomorrow, and the new renters are moving in on Monday. Time's up."

"What if I just stayed here?" I blurted out. "Can't we just call the renters and cancel? I'd take care of the place better than strangers anyway."

Literally, everyone around the room snorted in unison. It was like being surrounded by a bunch of snarky horses.

"What?" I pressed. "I would! It's all paid off, isn't it? Honestly, Nonna, why can't I just stay here and take care of the house for you?"

Nonna just walked through the room and patted my cheek like she might a delusional child's. "I'm sorry, baby. It's done."

"Besides," Lea said with another Joni-is-an-idiot sigh. "Nonna has to pay rent in Rome too. What, do you think our seventy-eight-year-old grandmother should get a job waiting tables instead of you?"

"I didn't say that," I said. "Just that?—"

"Are you really so selfish that you would rather cost her good income so you can keep freeloading forever?" Lea's voice was harsh, but not completely unfair. She knew it, and I knew it.

And so did everyone else, which is why they didn't argue with her either.

I opened my mouth, then shut it, trying and failing to keep my face from flushing bright red.

No. I wasn't selfish.

And I wasn't a freeloader.

I was just…scared. Not that I would ever admit that to anyone, but it was the truth. There was only one thing I had ever been good at, but that wasn't an option anymore.

All I had had after that was my family. Was this place.

And now I wouldn't have that either.

I looked at the bed where I'd only sleep for one more night, at the scattered boxes filled with old dance costumes, jewelry, and random bits and bobs, at my sisters, all watching me with equal parts fear and pity. My eyes pricked with tears.

"But—who—what—" I swallowed. "Where am I supposed to go?"

There was another shared glance around the room. Clearly, they'd been prepared for this moment. The one where I broke like an egg.

Lea reached into her jeans pocket and pulled out a set of keys. "Mike and I talked. You can use the breakroom in the garage until you find a place to land. Frankie's giving you the first and last—but you need to make rent, Jo. No exceptions."

She handed me the keys, and I stared at them, dumbfounded. "You want me to live above the auto shop? It doesn't even have a shower!"

"It's better than a shelter, don't you think?" Kate offered.

I looked between them and the keys. "But that place smells like motor oil and bad coffee and cigarettes, and I'll be woken up every morning by the greasy dudes who know exactly five words, and?—"

"And it's a free roof over your head," Lea cut in sharply. "You can shower at my house down the block. That's the best we got."

"Maybe she could come to London with us…" Frankie started, clearly feeling sorry for me.

"That's just coddling her," Lea argued back. "We discussed this."

"Yes," Nonna agreed, though she was looking at me. "Lea is right. We decided."

Even Nonna was in on this shitty little ‘reality check'?

My mind raced as I tried to come up with another solution. Anything besides a grimy shop room drenched in grease and my family's pity.

Maybe I could stay with a friend? Except none of my friends had extra space—they were either dancers living four to a studio or kids from high school who already had husbands and babies too. Rochelle would give me her couch, but Carmine would kick me out within a day or two.

Sleep at the bar? Doubtful. Tom did that himself half the week, and the only accommodation in his packed office was a cot in the corner.

Fuck. Fuck.

I felt a hand land on mine and looked up at Nonna, peering at me with a mixture of sadness and resignation.

"Joni, I'm sorry. I wish I didn't have to do this, but it's time for you to grow up. Time for la civetta to leave the nest."

My chin trembled, eyes pricking with unshed tears.

"Fine," I said, trying to keep my voice steady as I pushed back from the table, causing the chair leg to screech loudly on the wood floor. "I'll just fly the coop, then."

"Joni, wait," Frankie called as I stormed out of the room. "We can help you look?—"

"Don't bother," I called, already yanking on my jacket and throwing my purse over one shoulder. "You just made it clear that from this point forward, I'm on my own. I'll figure it out myself."