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land a husband?"
    "Of course," she replied, as though everyone knew that was how hard-up Catholic gals got their grooms.
    "Whatever happened to 'thou shalt not steal'?" I asked, scratching my neck uneasily. The good sisters at my Catholic Sunday school had worked hard to instill psychosomatic disorders in us kids at the mere suggestion of committing a sin, so this conversation was making me itchy.
    "It's-a like-a we say in Italia . All is-a permitted in-a war and-a love."
    "All is fair in love and war," I corrected. "We say that in the US too."
    "You see? The whole-a world-a can't be wrong."
    I didn't bother telling her that Italy and the United States were not the "whole-a world-a" because I honestly didn't think that she'd ever heard of any other countries. Instead, I got down to brass tacks. "So, let me get this straight. You want me to steal a lemon from a Catholic altar devoted to Jesus's father that's intended to feed the poor?"
    "You got a problem with-a that?" she asked, now sounding more like De Niro than Brando.
    Before I could reply, someone picked up another line.
    "I found your father, dear," my mother announced. "He's sitting on the toilet."
    To my horror, I heard her handing off the receiver.
    "Happy birthday, Franki," my dad said in an animated voice. "Did you have a nice time last night?"
    I squirmed at the memory of the skin-slougher and at the image of my father talking to me from the john.
    "Bradley didn't pop-a the question," Nonna replied from the kitchen phone.
    "Sorry to hear that you didn't get that proposal," my dad said as though referring to a lost job offer. "Better luck next time, eh?"
    "She'll have-a the luck," Nonna said. "The luck of the lemon."
    "What's she talking about, Franki?" he asked.
    "I'll let Nonna explain, Dad. I've gotta run." Then I remembered the toilet and instantly regretted my choice of terms. "Love you and talk to you soon."
    I pressed end before they could object and held the power button down. I had no intention of talking to anyone else today—not even Bradley. And honestly, if I could've foreseen how these calls were going to go, I would have let that witch keep my stupid phone.
    I slid off the bed and headed for the kitchen. Suddenly, I was craving lemon. And as the old saying goes, when life gives you lemons and your nonna tells you to steal one from a Catholic altar to snag a husband, make lemonade—or better, limoncello.
    And then drink it.
     
    *   *   *
     
    My phone was ringing.
    I opened an eye, and sunlight scorched my brain. I was lying face up on Glenda's antique bearskin rug in front of the fireplace. The back of my head was resting on the top of the bear's, and his right paw was wrapped around a half-empty bottle of limoncello. Now I understood why I felt like I was coming out of hibernation.
    I rolled onto my hands and knees and pulled my cell from the bear's other paw, desperate to stop the noise. The display was dark, so I pressed the power button. Only then did it occur to me that my phone had been turned off.
    The ringing switched to knocking, and I realized that the sound I'd been hearing was my doorbell. I made my way to the door holding my phone in one hand and my head in the other.
    Still using the one eye, I peered out the peephole and saw slicked back brown hair.
    Bradley ? I opened the door.
    But it wasn't Bradley. The man who stood before me looked like a young Nicholas Cage. And even in my semi-drunk state, I could see that his police uniform was made of cheap fabric similar to the kind used for Halloween costumes.
    Glenda!
    Stripper Cop Cage cocked a low brow and pointed a finger intentionally close to my breast. "According to a call that came over my police radio, ma'am," he began in an Elvis impersonator-like voice, "you've been evading arrest."
    "Actually, I haven't," I said clenching my fists at that "ma'am." "I got out of jail just this morning."
    He froze for a moment, and then his shoulders relaxed. "Well, now I'm going to have to