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They don’t do this often anymore, have a drink without any of the other guys around. Nowadays there’s just always someone there, Sil constantly busy, The Bing bursting with patrons every hour of the night. It's almost a strange feeling, sitting here without Tony and the usual crew. They've gotten good at revolving around him these past few years, they all have. Good enough to almost forget there was a time before him.
They're sitting on the balcony overlooking the poles where a few girls are languidly entertaining a small straggle of daytime patrons. Even at this time, Sil likes to keep an eye out for the room. There's been too many incidents on his watch these past years, too many inconveniences to his business. It hasn't been getting any easier, their thing.
Sil offers him his pack of cigarettes. Paulie declines. Sil lights one for himself and drops the pack on the table. They sit in comfortable silence for a while.
"It's good. You bein' back."
One thing about Sil, he doesn’t lie about these kinds of things. All sorts of people have told Paulie a lot of shit since he got out of the can. Black suits he's never seen before, grinning and patting his back and kissing his cheeks and going on about how fuckin’ great it is to see him back. He doesn’t believe a fucking word. He’s been in this thing long enough to know that most of the fat fucks are lying off their asses. Silvio's excluded from his general suspicion only because Paulie knows he doesn’t have his eyes out for his position. Never did. Just like himself, Sil has a natural respect for the order of things.
"Fuckin' great to be back, Sil. Fuckin‘ violation of human rights in there. The shit that goes for food in there, madonn'. Even Ginny Sack would lose a few pounds just looking at that fucking tragedy."
Sil chuckles and takes a drag off his cigarette.
"And here I thought for you the can would feel like bein' on vacation.”, he jokes. "Can’t have been so different from what you got at home. Single cell? Must have been a dream come true.”
“Oh! Watch it, Sil.”
Grinning mischievously, Silvio takes another drag from his cigarette, glances over the balcony. Maybe checking out one of the girls or watching the bar. Then he seems to remember something, and something in his demeanor changes. His smile falls.
„Actually, Paulie." He hesitates. "Speaking of dreaming. I uh. I’ve actually been waiting to talk to you about something.”
That gets Paulie's attention.
"What with that face you're making, it can't be any good. What, I have to worry? T say anything?"
Silvio shakes his head.
"What is it, then?"
“I know we made the oath. No talking about it. But I’ve been thinking. About the day on the boat.”
Just with that, it's all back. Tony's boat. The Stugots. Executing the rat bastard on the lower deck. His pleas that wouldn't save his life. Keep my eyes, he said. Every joke dies on Paulie's lips on instant.
"Oh! You bring this up now?"
He can't believe it. Fresh out the can, and this guy wants to remind him of Salvatore Bonpensiero.
Sil’s not looking at him, sort of awkwardly staring at the crumbs of ash silently dropping from his cigarette into the ashtray. Jesus Christ, the fucking timing on this guy.
Paulie drops his voice without really knowing why. Two years he’s been keeping his end of that promise.
“Come on, Sil. Been a great night so far. Why start now? No sense in digging up old shit.”
“I know.” Sil won’t look at him.
“Then let’s not talk about it, then!”
He can see from the deep fucking frown on Sil’s face that he’s not happy with that. Paulie can see that he’s contemplating saying something. The guy may not say a lot, but most of the time his eyes do the talking. It’s irritating and it’s definitely the reason why Sil could never be boss. Way too honest for his own good.
Sil looks up at him, fidgeting with his cigarette.
“You ever dream about him?”
“Do I what?"
It’s an absurd question. Anybody else ask him that, he’d think they were trying to fuck with him. Insult his pride. But Sil ain’t the type to joke about that sort of stuff, not about something like this. Not when Paulie can clearly remember how bad he took it.
“It’s a regular fucking question, Paul.” Silvio says, the slightest bit annoyed. He takes his time with the cigarette. Paulie waits. There’s always more with Sil, eventually. You have to let the guy talk.
“I mean, Tony says he does. Think he may have brought it up with that therapist lady.”
“T? He talks about Pussy in his therapy?”
So much for never talking to anybody about it. He’d like to spit out to make a point, but this is Silvio’s place, and he’s got manners. Doesn’t mean he has to agree with any of it, though.
Silvio waves off his concern.
“T knows what he's doing. But about the dreams, I, uh. I fuckin’ do.” He pauses. “Or did. I don’t know. Happened a few times now. It’s making me nervous.”
Should make you nervous, because that ain’t fucking normal, Paulie thinks, but for once he says nothing.
Maybe because he still remembers the look on Sil's face out on the boat that day.
Terrible fucking day it was, he’ll give him that. The type where the sun doesn't come out the whole day, and Tony in a foul fucking mood because of his bad stomach. They worked in a feverish haze, freezing from the thrashing sea air in their backs while slowly working up a sweat in their winter coats. Nobody wanted to look at the huge body on the deck where they'd dragged him. He was still warm. Ten minutes earlier, and he would have looked out at the waves with them. The fat fuck loved the ocean. Nobody dared to reach out and close his eyes while they rolled him up in tarp.
"Never”, Paulie says, enunciating clearly to drive the point home. “I never even think about him.”
Sil leans back in his chair, looking grim.
It didn’t feel good, but it had to happen. The moment that Puss slipped from their grasp and into the sea as if swallowed by some huge, hungry fucking mouth. He was gone faster than their eyes could follow. Too fast even to say a quick prayer to send him off, even if he wanted to, which of course he didn’t, with the guy being a fucking rat.
It was real silent on the boat after they were done. T all green in the face from his food poisoning, Sil bent over the railing like he was dead set on joining Puss in there at the next swell of grey-green saltwater. Looking at him, Paulie swallowed an ugly joke. Seasick, the poor kid, from the swaying. Happened to the best of them, what with Sil's other physical sensibilities and all. Tony was no better, sitting on the floor, feverish eyes glazed over. The man was sick, could you blame him.
Sil’s gold-ringed fingers are fidgeting with the latch of the cigarette pack. He's upset; it’s not his style. You’d really have to bother him. Then again, this thing here has had time to marinate. Paulie doesn’t know how long he’s been dragging this around. You think you know a guy.
“Went home after. Couldn't fucking sleep even a minute. Next day, gave Gabriella the fucking story. All the time I can’t help thinking that it’s not fucking right. And Christ, don't get me started on Angie. I get nervous just seein’ her around.”
“You talk to Tony about this?”
“Whaddaya think? He don’t wanna hear it.”
“Oh! So what makes you think I fuckin’ do?”
He means it half as a joke, but Silvio shoots him a look, and Paulie shuts up.
He can feel there's more. Sil's stalling, not really looking at him, like what he's about to say is too hard to put into any kind of words. It takes him a while before he comes out with it.
"Listen, Paul." He says it carefully. "Don't you ever let ‘em put a wire on you."
"Oh! Fuck's with you today?”
Paulie thinks he’s never seen him look so serious before.
"I'm not joking around here, Paul. You get touched, get yourself caught in something you can’t handle by yourself, you call me first. You call, and we’ll fix it."
There’s something here that he doesn’t say, but he doesn’t need to, because Paulie understands already. Silvio loved the fat fuck Bonpensiero like a brother, they all did. It gets to a point where you can’t stand the thought of losing another. Not like this, not when you’ve had to clean the blood off your own hands and still feel like a human being after.
He grasps for something to say, if only to let off some of the tension that suddenly fills the room like smoke, when he realizes how Silvio is looking at him. Just as serious as always, but there’s a different dimension to it, too. Like he’s scared. Just out here in the open. Paulie feels a rush of something for him then.
"Alright", he says, mostly to keep the peace. „Alright, God forbid."
Sil nods grimly. "Fucking right, God forbid."
They’re silent for a while again, just sitting with the weight of it. Paulie wants to say more, about Sal maybe, and about how much he knows Silvio loved him, and maybe something about the stupid Santa costume, because that always used to get a laugh out of Sil. But the moment passes faster than he thinks, and Silvio stubs out the cigarette and the tension fizzles out with it.
Silvio gets up with a groan that betrays his age, the burnt-up cigarette left smoldering in the ashtray. Claps him on the shoulder with one of his big hands. Leaves it for a moment, then nods in the direction of the bar.
“Sorry for bringin' that up. How 'bout another drink? Celebrate you bein’ out the can some more?”
Paulie sits for a second. Lets himself think about Sal again in what feels like years. The unease it puts in his stomach is nothing new. Their best friend, wrapped in plastic, still warm to the touch.
Maybe Silvio's right about this. It's good to have a friend in your corner. To know it, too. What else is there to do about it, anyway?
“Sure, Sil", he says to him. "Don’t mind if I do."