Nono's Gift Edward McDermott            Originally published in Issue XVIII of Vulgata, February, 2008

"Come, Nino, we go for ride in the pickup truck and let your Momma have a rest."

That's how I remember him best, as a small gruff old man with a cigarette dangling in his mouth and a pickup truck that smelt of cement, brick dust and forming timbers. He would boost me up into the high cab and strap me in carefully.

I was his favorite grandchild. Perhaps I was the right age when he retired, old enough to go with him but not too old to accept these trips as great adventures. Maybe it was because I was his daughter's only child and he spoiled me to show her his love.

I was his favorite grandson that summer when my mother grew huge in the belly and quickly cross, then tearfully sorry. My father worked hard in an office each day. He left very early in the morning, so it fell to Nonno to rescue me from a house that had to be too quiet for an active boy. I do not remember ever having a grandmother.

He would drive up in his truck like an errant knight. His pickup had a secret name, and would only run well for one that knew that name according to Nonno. For all others it would sputter, and kick and jerk like a wild horse. I remember it as spotted gray with darker rust markings along its bottom.

The bed of the truck was sometimes empty, sometimes filled with tools, or bags. Nonno never allowed me to climb into the bed. That was reserved for tools and peasants. I was his Nino, so I rode in magnificent splendor in the cab, usually on a couple of old phone books so I could see over the hood.

Nonno kept his construction helmet on the cab seat. I sometimes tried to wear it. The lip of the hat always came down to rest on my nose. "When you are big enough, little Nino, I will take you to the top of the world and show you all the city under your feet. It is a sight for a man."

On warm sunny days he might drive to the park to play cards with old men, while drinking from a paper bag, as I conquered the swing then wore away the grass with running. Other times we watched bocchi, and then he would bring out a worn soccer ball and taught me to play both the ball and the man.

Best were the times we rode to make a delivery. "Nino, you must be a good boy, for today we have to make a delivery. OK?"

I would nod, and he would tousle my hair and smile with half his mouth, the other always held his dangling cigarette. Then he would say "Bene."

"What will you become, Nino?" he would ask me.

One day I would say policeman; another day I would say fireman. Nonno would nod his head sagely. "If that is what you want more than anything else, including ice-cream, then it is good. Do you want it that much?"

I cannot remember what language Nonno spoke. I know that if I switched between Italian and English in the middle of a sentence, he would follow me with a wise nod. To my parents I had to speak Italian. At school I spoke English. Only with Nonno could I speak whatever language I chose.

One day in August Nonno stopped at the house. He insisted that I come with him. He already had the load in the back, covered with a tarpaulin. He boosted me up into the high cab and strapped me in carefully, but he didn't put on his own seat belt.

"Nonno, Nonno, you should put on your seat belt."

"Not now, my little Nino," he said, shifting into reverse.

We drove to a construction site. My Nonno stopped by the gate where the man with the lists stood guard. I knew that man must be an Anglo because he didn't understand the insults the construction workers threw at him with smiling faces. He smiled back, too stupid to know he was a peasant, despite his construction hat.

Inside the barricades men strode around, all wearing the same armor of honor, heavy work boots, dirty jeans, plaid shirts over gray tee shirts, and topped with bright yellow construction helmets. They wore leather belts about their waists with tools or heavy hooks, moving with insolent bravado, shouting obscene insults at each other with good-hearted humor.

I saw other Anglos who stayed in the tin house near the entrance. They strode around with drawings under their arms and pointed with long slender fingers and clean fingernails. I pestered my Nonno. "Who are those men? I want to be like that. I want to be like them. Who are they?"

"They are engineers, and, if you study very hard in school, you may go to University and become an engineer, just like your father who became a lawyer. Do you want it more than ice-cream?"

"I don't want to be a lawyer. I want to be an engineer and run the building site. I want to make great buildings."

My Nonno laughed and rubbed my head. "I am the one who made great buildings. I carried the building up on my back, one load at a time. Now be quiet. God gave you two ears and one mouth so you could learn by listening."

While Nonno stopped to talk with a worker, I watched the concrete trucks with their gigantic mixers turning slowly as they poured a stream of gray sludge down the spillway into an enormous bucket that the crane then lifted into the sky.

The men came and unloaded the back of the pickup truck. Nonno didn't help them. Instead he coughed up thick dark phlegm, and had to rest against the truck after the fit.

"Are you all right, Nonno?"

"No. My Nino, but today we shall go to the top of the world. Come with me. Remember, you must stay close."

He opened the cab door, undid my seat-belt, lifted me out of the pickup and slapped an oversized hard hat on my head. He had to set me down, so I walked close by him, my tiny hand in his horny grip. My running shoes squished in the mud beside his steel tipped work boots as we walked through the construction to the elevator.

A straight shaft ran through the web of iron and concrete. The gate of rough wood closed us in, but I could see between the slats as we flew into the sky. We rocketed up to the highest point in the building, faster than a roller coaster.

When we stepped out on the top floor, only the cabs on the cranes rose above us. In one corner, men were pouring concrete over iron bars from an immense bucket. On another corner I could see a welding torch challenging the brightness of the sun. Above us, as I looked up, I saw only the blue sky. My helmet fell off. Nonno picked it up and gave me a gentle cuff on the ear for my carelessness.

As we stepped away from the elevator, several men who worked up on the high steel rushed over to us. They knew Nonno, and they all crowded around to welcome him home, giving him rough slaps on the back and calling him obscene names in loving tones. In the midst of all those legs I felt small and afraid, even with Nonno's hand holding me firmly by the shoulder.

Eventually the rough men slowed in their questions and Nonno shoved me forward.

"This is my Nino," he said, formally, "my daughter's son." I gave a short bow, one hand holding the construction hat in place, and solemnly shook hands with the workers who laughed and slapped me on the shoulders.

"He is a big boy, and strong looking too, but does he have his grandfather's head for the heights? Put a belt on him and I'll take him up to the high steel," one said.

The worker had to wind the belt around my waist twice before it was snug enough. Then he hooked a safety line to me. "Come little one," he said, "come and see the world from the top of the steel."

I looked at my Nonno. "Go. Antonio will keep you safe. I will rest here."

Antonio showed me how to attach the heavy hook on the safety line properly, but my hands lacked the strength. He laughed. "One day you will, little one. Now come with me to the edge and see the city. Look over there. Can you see the lake? Up here the air has a different taste. Are you afraid?"

"No," I said, but I stepped carefully and held tight to the wire barricade that marked the edge.

"It is good to fear the edge, but not to let that fear control you. Your grandfather taught me that, many years ago. Step closer now and look down. I have you. You will never fall. From here you can see your own backyard."

I looked across the world. From here the city was a forest of green trees. Only the largest buildings thrust through the canopy. Their roofs were filled with junk, odd boxes and pipes, with no particular order. Down below the cars looked smaller than my toys, and the people a scurrying mass. I took in a deep breath of air, and relaxed, unclenched my hands from the wire. In some place in my chest I felt as if I had come home for the first time. I looked at Antonio and smiled.

"Now we go even higher? Up there."

I nodded, still a bit shy of this vibrant lessor god who strode above the world each day.

He cradled me in front. I climbed the steel to the top of the column, to the highest point and stood with him. There, on a space barely wider than my shoes I looked around at the city. Antonio laughed with the joy of life and I laughed with him.

"Look at the world as God does," Antonio said. "From here, no man looks down on you. Only the saints and angels have a better view."

When we descended to where Nonno waited, I found him sitting on an upended lunch box, a cigarette in his mouth.

"Did you like it, my Nino?"

"Yes."

Antonio laughed. "He has the heart of an eagle. If we had higher steel, he would be climbing still."

Nonno smiled, pride in his eyes, pride that made me swell with joy.

"Can we come again?" I asked. "Can we bring Poppa and show it to him? One day I will work up here like you did."

"Do you want that more than ice-cream?"

"More, Much more. Can Antonio take me high up again?"

"Hush. You ask too many questions. Remember this. No man can purchase what you have found today, not with all the money in the world. Now we go home."

That was the last time I saw my Nonno alive. At the funeral home, I crossed myself and said ten Ave Marias over the strange figure in the casket. They had made the face wrong. It was harsh and cold, with pursed lips that neither smiled nor smoked. The dark brown stains had been mostly scrubbed from his fingers. Still Momma insisted that this was Nonno, and I had to believe her, no matter how much it hurt. None of my screams, or tears, or promises or threats had brought him back.

So I sat on a hard chair in a new suit with a starched collar that chaffed, while strangers spoke in hushed tones to my parents. Alone in a full room, I tried to hide a tear, for Nonno would have had no time for a boy that cried. Only babies and girls cry, he said.

Someone squatted beside me.

"The little eagle."

I turned to see Antonio wearing his wedding and funeral suit, his construction boots replaced with black Italian loafers that pinched. Only his hands remained unchanged, hard, rough and warm as he hugged me to him.

"There, there, little eagle. Now he is in heaven which is even better than working on the high steel."

"One day," I said. "One day I will climb up there again."

"Yes, and your grandfather will see you and smile."