“Buy you a frankfurter, brother?”

Danny had never called him “brother” before. It had always been “little brother.” It changed everything, made Joe feel a foot taller, and yet part of him immediately wished they could go back to how it had been.

“Sure.”

They walked up West Broadway to Sol’s Dining Car at the corner of C Street. Sol had just recently added the frankfurter to his menu. He’d refused to do so during the war because the meat sounded too German and he had, like most restaurants during the war, taken great pains to change the name of frankfurters to “Liberty Sausages” on his menu board. But now the Germans were beaten, and there were no hard feelings about it in South Boston, and most of the diners in the city were trying hard to catch up with this new fad that Joe & Nemo’s had helped popularize in the city, even if, at the time, it had called their patriotism into question.

Danny bought two for each of them and they sat atop the stone picnic bench out in front of the diner and ate them with bottles of root beer as cars navigated horses and horses navigated cars out on West Broadway and the air smelled of the coming summer.

“You heard,” Danny said.

Joe nodded. “You married Nora.”

“Sure did.” He bit into his frankfurter and raised his eyebrows and laughed suddenly before he chewed. “Wish you could have been there.”

“Yeah?”

“We both did.”

“Yeah.”

“But the folks would never have allowed it.”

“I know.”

“You do?”

Joe shrugged. “They’ll get over it.”

Danny shook his head. “No they won’t, brother. No they won’t.”

Joe felt like crying, but he smiled instead and swallowed some meat and took a sip of root beer. “They will. You’ll see.”

Danny placed his hand softly to the side of Joe’s face. Joe didn’t know what to do, because this had never happened. You slugged each other on the shoulder. You jabbed each other in the ribs. You didn’t do this. Danny looked down at him with soft eyes.

“You’re on your own in that house for a while, brother.”

“Can I come visit?” Joe heard his own voice crack, and he looked down at his frankfurter and was pleased to see no tears fell on it. “You and Nora?”

“Of course. But that’ll put you in the doghouse with the folks if you get caught.”

“Been in the doghouse before,” Joe said. “Plenty. Might start barking soon.”

Danny laughed at that, a bark unto itself. “You’re a great kid, Joe.”

Joe nodded and felt the heat in his face. “How come you’re leaving me, then?”

Danny tipped his chin up with his finger. “I’m not leaving you. What’d I say? You can come by anytime.”

“Sure.”

“Joe, Joe, I’m fucking serious. You’re my brother. I didn’t leave the family. The family left me. Because of Nora.”

“Dad and Con’ said you’re a Bolshevik.”

“What? To you?”

Joe shook his head. “I heard them talking one night.” He smiled. “I hear everything in there. It’s an old house. They said you went native. They said you were a wop-lover and a nigger-lover and you lost your way. They were really drunk.”