Around 1:45 PM on a spring afternoon in Paterson, New Jersey, the anxious whine of a siren passing close by his window woke Furio Giunta in his new apartment for the first time.

"Vaffanculo," he muttered, and turned over.

For a few slow seconds he was completely disoriented before it came back to him that he was no longer in Napoli, but in a foreign country in a sparse apartment in an aggressively charmless neighbourhood – all thanks to his puttana of a cousin, Annalisa. The ocean here was grey and filled with trash. The worst of it was he had no idea of how long he would have to stay here. He supposed he should be grateful that Tony Soprano had forgiven him for leaving with no explanation and let him come back to work for him, but the truth was the choice had never been his. He was even unhappier in the States this time around – oddly enough, since now with the death of his father he had less ties binding him to his homeland.

With a sigh, Furio made himself get up and set about fixing his morning espresso. On his way to what passed for the kitchen, he glanced into the empty bedroom and automatically crossed himself. With one day's notice that his life was about to be upheaved, he'd had to settle for the first available apartment that was close enough to Tony Soprano and his associates – an apartment that was, as it turned out, too big for just him by himself. There were two bedrooms, and now one lay empty. Furio was not a religious man, although he had been at one point, but he was superstitious. In living memory, he'd never forgotten one piece of his nonna's wisdom and still lived by it as best he could – those sayings that hinted killing people was bad luck he'd had to ignore – but for almost every situation that came up in his life, Furio had developed rules for what must and must not be done. For these reasons – his logic and dizzying self-control – he had become one of the most dangerous hit men on his side of the Atlantic.

As an impatient driver outside beeped his horn, his nonna's voice came back to him, almost so clear Furio wondered if he was hearing things:

"When you keep an empty room in a new house, the ones you love back home will soon be gone."

Furio was only troubled as he shaved and prepared for the day. He tried not to think about the empty room too much. Worrying made him less efficient.

That afternoon, at around 4:10 PM, a bus pulled into Madison, New Jersey from Brooklyn. Frankie waited for everybody else to get off before she collected up her bags. She wasn't in any great hurry. Later that day she would drop by the job Sheila had found for her. She could stay at Adrian Santos' this night in Paterson, and possibly the next one, if she hadn't found a room by then.

Her cell phone was ringing as she stepped off the bus.

"Hi Ma."

"Francesca? Did you get there okay?"

"Yeah, Ma, I'm fine. I'm in Madison now."

"You're sure you're okay? You sound strained."

"Mamma…" Frankie sighed. "I just banged my knee on the side, that's why. Don't worry yourself into an early grave."

"Oh, okay. No need to get snippy." A moment's pause. "But really, Francesca, I don't see why you feel the need…"

"Ma! Don't get started again!"

"All right, all right. But if you wanna live 'on your own' I don't see why you can't just move two streets over. Mrs. Marcolina's son just moved out and she gotta whole…"

"I'm sick of the city, Ma. I thought I explained this already."

"Oh excuse me! You don't think your father got 'sick of the city' when he was workin' 12 hours a day cleanin' streets? You didn't see him just waltzin' off…"

"Ma? Ma, I gotta go, I'm crossin' the street. I'll call you later, okay?"

"Okay, Francesca. I love you."

"Love you too, Ma."

When he came home that evening, at around 7:12 PM, Furio's white shirt was spattered with blood, dried to a dark red-black. There was a cut down his forearm, long but relatively shallow, where Jack LoSanto had gotten arrogant and tried to defend himself with a jackknife. Big mistake, Furio mused as he unbuttoned the shirt and tossed it into a corner. Jack had signed his own warrant for a slow, agonizing death, rather than the clean, quick one Furio had had in mind for him.

As he walked to the bathroom to take a shower before putting in an hour or two at Vesuvio, he caught a glimpse of the empty bedroom. For a second he thought he saw a body curled up beneath the covers. A second later it was gone. Furio frowned and muttered a prayer to himself. He liked knowing what he was seeing at all times. This fucking room was bothering him so much he thought it would drive him completely insane if he didn't do something about it soon.

And so it was that at 7:19 on a Tuesday evening, Furio Giunta decided to rent out the extra room. At 7:21 he was on the phone with a real estate lady, and by 7:25 he'd designed a decent advertisement for the room. At 7:37 that evening, he was walking out the door to Vesuvio, lighting up a cigarette. When he arrived at the restaurant, he stuck the advertisement on a nearby phone pole and went inside, feeling like a great burden had been lifted from his soul.

At around 9:04 PM, Frankie and her old friend Adrian were walking down the street in Paterson, reminiscing on old times. Adrian was Frankie's former best friend's ex-boyfriend, and although she and Liza never talked anymore, she still considered Adrian a nice guy. Adrian was recounting things from senior prom that Frankie had long ago forgotten – or tried to forget, as it turned out. She stopped and lit a cigarette halfway down the block, and noticed the nice-looking Italian restaurant across the sidewalk. It smelled really good.

"You hungry?" she asked Adrian.

"What, you wanna go in there?" he asked. "It's a mob hangout, somebody's probably gettin' whacked in there as we speak."

"No, dummy, it's too expensive anyway," she laughed. "I was just wonderin' if you wanted me to cook something when we get back to your place."

Adrian said yes he would, and Frankie took another drag on her cigarette and looked around. There was a paper stuck on a billboard nearby that looked new. She checked it out, and moments later Adrian heard a happy cry.

"It's a room!"

Furio had just inadvertently gotten some ash in the mozzarella, and was trying to cover it up when his cell phone rang.

"Stronzo mozzarella," he hissed. He had no hands free and let it ring. He was relieved afterwards to find it had not been the number of anyone from Tony Soprano's crowd. He figured it was a wrong one.

"Well, they ain't pickin' up," said Frankie.

"Try again tomorrow."

"I'll leave a message."

"We could go check out the building," said Frankie later, "except there's no address on there. Ain't that weird? No home number either. No name!"

"I'm hungry," muttered Adrian.

When Furio got home that night, he was inordinately exhausted. He blamed it on jet lag, didn't bother to check his messages, and fell asleep instantly.

When he woke up at 10:36 AM on Wednesday morning, he was still disoriented but his surroundings clicked into place sooner. He sighed and rose to make his morning espresso. On his way he glanced triumphantly at the room that would, with any luck, soon not be empty. Flipping open his cell phone, he saw he had a new voice message.

"Hi, my name is Frankie and I saw the ad for your room outside Vesuvio. And, uh, well, I'm interested. I'd come pay you a visit but there's no address." Here she laughed a little, nervously. "Anyway, give me a call back at…"

Furio did, and this time it was she who did not pick up. He left a message. He wondered if she would talk a lot. Her Brooklyn drawl was not the easiest thing to understand, especially to someone whose grasp on the English language was uneven at best. But she had a nice voice, he thought. The espresso was not working out, and he decided to go to Satriale's instead.

Frankie woke up at 11 that morning with a slight headache. Feeling dishevelled, she slouched into the kitchen where Adrian greeted her with a Bloody Mary and the news that her phone had rung several times. She had a few new voice messages:

"Francesca? You said you'd call me back but you never did! Anyway I just wanted to know if you're okay and if you wanna come home yet. There's always gonna be a place for you here. Okay. I love you. Bye."

"Francesca? Why on earth are you not picking it up. What I wanna know is, are you still planning on staying with that Adrian? I wish you'd stay with Auntie Marjorie instead. I don't trust that kid, I never did. Do you want me to come pick you up? It's only an hour's drive. Please call me back. Bye."

"Francesca?" She sounded miserable. "Please call me."

"Hello. My name is Furio. I am calling you back about the room, I'm sorry I did not get you call last night. The apartment at number 7 at 34 19th Ave in Paterson. If you need…uh, how you say, directions, call me back. If you wanna come over this afternoon or something, that will be fine."

"All I am gonna say at this point, Francesca, is that if you had to spend the night on a park bench because you couldn't be bothered to pick up the phone, I'd be glad." A pause. "Unless you're in, like, some kind of trouble. Oh Francesca, please call me back! I couldn't sleep the whole night, I was so worried."

Frankie called Furio and made an appointment to come over at 2:00. Then she settled down to the daunting task of making a call to her mother.