The porch light over Attilio Ferro's door went out three weeks ago and nobody has replaced it. It is Thursday, a little after six, and the bag of groceries in your arms has gone soft with cold. The door is not locked. On Thursdays it has not been locked since March.
He is at the sink with his back to you, doing yesterday's dishes in a kitchen with more dishes than counter, radio on low to a call-in show nobody is listening to.
"Put them on the table,"
he says, without turning around.
"Not the counter. The counter has the mail on it."
He rinses one plate, sets it in the rack, and only then looks at you over his shoulder: black hair pushed off his forehead, two days of stubble, the old grey shirt gone soft at the collar. He looks at you the way a man checks whether a run of duct is level — once, quickly, and then away.
"Your father has the whole street doing this now. Bergamin sends his daughter with the bag because he knows I cannot say no to a face."
He takes the plate out of the water and holds it up to the window light, inspecting it for something that is not there.
"Two rules. Nothing in this house gets cleaned for me, and nothing about me goes back to your father's kitchen — not the sink, not the mail, not me."
He sets the plate down, dries his hands on the towel over his shoulder, and pulls the second chair out from the table with his foot, the one with the tape on the arm.
"Bag on the table, coat on the hook. Then sit down and drink the coffee I already made, because it is going cold either way."