One by One. Nicholas Bush

am I their focus, both of them fall eerily quiet at this, and then one changes the subject. No matter how odd the things they say to me are, or will ever be, I always avoid acting in any way that might seem remotely disrespectful. I know they don’t freak out over things the way my parents do, but I don’t want them to ever have a problem with me. I never initiate a conversation on the topic of their spirit meetings and I never go to one, but Francesco and Greta will continue to reference this mysterious topic to me in an indirect manner. Eventually they bring it up almost daily. Over time, the bombardment of strange spiritual activity in the home becomes so thick that I am convinced these people are into some sort of satanism or witchcraft. I do my very best to ignore this and stay focused on being polite and getting high.

      Soon after moving into the Russo residence, during parties Giovanni and I host with a small group of people, I discover his infatuation with his Ouija board. Once everyone has become sufficiently wasted or high and all other forms of entertainment have been exhausted for the evening, he always pulls out the board. Too tired or inebriated or too curious to refuse, our guests usually give in.

      One evening, Giovanni and a friend of ours burst out of his room with Adriana following closely behind. They are headed outside and ask Greta for binoculars. I follow them all to the back deck, with no idea what’s going on. The three of them stare up at the sky, so I look too, but the sky looks the same to me as it always does. Greta is calmly standing behind them, smoking a cigarette, and Francesco is wiping a dish dry with a cloth while peering at us through the window over the kitchen sink. I ask why we are all out here, what we are looking for, and Giovanni simply replies that the stars are about to move. I know better than to laugh at him; after all, the group is outside with binoculars and a laser pointer and the adults are showing genuine interest. Something must be going on. When I look up again, sure enough, one of the stationary stars seems to slowly begin to move around.

      Giovanni hands me the binoculars, “Look.” He shines the laser pointer in a stationary position and tells me to lock onto the end of the beam with my line of sight. When I find the beam through the binoculars, I see a craft with three blinking lights high in the sky. It silently glides on a linear course to the end of the beam and then makes two right-angle turns before continuing to travel on its original course, now at an impossibly high velocity. This takes just a second to unfold, but time pauses while I watch. I can’t believe my eyes. I have never been so intrigued—it’s beyond measure. I consider myself tough from all I’ve been through and yet I am trying to avoid being frightened by what I’ve just seen. Was that an alien spaceship? What was that?

      I give the binoculars back to Giovanni and nonchalantly say, “Cool,” and then I walk back into the house, silently trying to process what just happened.

      Much to Giovanni’s dismay, never once do I actively participate or even play along when he pulls out the Ouija board. He also doesn’t like that I won’t actively discuss UFOs with him. He often asks me what I think about having seen a UFO. I’ll say, “That was crazy,” but I know he wants me to express more interest or emotion. On my end, I do think it was crazy, but I don’t know what to make of it or what to do with that feeling. Instead of expanding my mind, I prefer to escape. I just want to party and have fun. That is what life is about, right? Not trying to make sense of the universe. Why care about something that seems to have no purpose or explanation? In the back of my mind are the lingering questions of why the Russos are involved in these otherworldly activities and what their endgame is. Something feels off, or bad, about all this, but is it really, and should that matter to me? Can I put it aside?

      My chosen path is to do nothing. I continue to regard the references and invitations by Giovanni’s parents to partake in their spiritual practice as nothing short of stupid, even though Giovanni has taken the time to elaborate on the subject and reveal that he has taken part in some of his parents’ séances and has seen greater things than I could even imagine. I express my doubts concerning a personal investment of any kind into such ridiculous spiritual activity by remaining silent on the subject, simply not replying to their inquiries when provoked to do so. Only when I acknowledge the legitimacy of the inexplicable cause of the events that have taken place concerning the Russos’ involvement in my life, or the UFO we saw together, do they relent on the topic. What I take away from all these events is that these people live by some sort of combination of La Cosa Nostra code and guidance from spirits conjured up during séances hosted in their living room.

      It’s not that I don’t believe Giovanni when he says that he has recently seen a spirit appear in human form walking right into the room out of a solid wall . . . but what am I supposed to do with that? I grew up roaming city streets after school, looking for a friend or classmate to stay with, bouncing from house to house ever since I can remember. I have no desire to seek help or direction from God, the universe, spirits, UFOs, or anything of the sort. I’ve made it this far on my own without any of those being there for me.

      One evening I ask them point-blank at the dinner table in a sort of jovial tone, “So, are you guys in the mafia?” All I receive in response is a glare from Francesco that lasts for what seems like forever. He puts his fork on his plate while he glares, and Greta, Adriana, and Giovanni just sort of stop eating and look at the floor. This is when I realize just how secretive these people are. In fact, whenever I press them for any direct information about themselves and the shadiness that defines them (although I don’t phrase it like this), I am always met with an evasive or vague response. It becomes clear that they are so dead serious about maintaining whatever path of life it is they’ve chosen that they won’t even let me in on it, even though I’m becoming more and more like an adopted son.

      The only information I ever get comes from Francesco directly, as he loves preaching about how life is meant to be lived. The gist of it is to basically play society’s game well enough to stay off the radar, but to live under the authority of a code that is to be followed in order to gain respect, be feared even, and get what you want . . . money, power, sex, drugs, a house, a car—anything. I feign interest when he says these things, and then simply turn a blind eye and figure that as long as I am loyal to them, I can continue to enjoy the ride.