Last Dance, Last Chance

there when he performed in one of his avocations: boxing. He boxed at Lehigh and was a champion in his weight class. He’d won the Eastern Regional NCAA middleweight tournament in his junior year, and he’d lost only one fight in thirty.
    In 1980, he was so sure he would win his final college boxing match that he insisted Debbie be there at ringside, bragging to her that he’d seen the other finalist and had no doubt he was going to win. He promised Debbie he would give her the championship trophy over dinner afterward.
    Instead, Anthony received the worst beating of his life. His eyes were blackened and swollen, and he could barely see out of the slits between his eyelids. Debbie had rarely seen him lose at anything. His obvious discomfort and humiliation only made her love him more.
    Anthony graduated from Lehigh University in May 1980. Debbie attended the graduation ceremony with his parents, Dr. Ralph and Lena Pignataro. Henry Kissinger was the commencement speaker. It was a glorious, sunny day, and Debbie was very proud of Anthony.
    Despite their intense attraction, Debbie and Anthony were to have a very long courtship. He explained that he didn’t want to marry her until he knew what he was going to do with his life, and he was having difficulty settling on a career. Debbie accepted that. She found Anthony so intelligent and realized that he could do any number of things well; he just wanted to be sure that he chose a profession suited to him. They spent a lot of time discussing Anthony’s future. He knew that his father wanted him to go into medicine. His sister, Antoinette, was already in her first year in med school. Dr. Ralph was happy about that, but what he really longed for was to have his son follow him into medicine.
    Anthony told Debbie that he didn’t want to let his father down, but he explained that he didn’t want to let himself down either. He believed that he had been blessed with special gifts and had intellectual capacities far beyond most men. He saw the tremendous future there would be in computer science, an embryonic industry in the late seventies. Most people had no idea how important computers were going to be, he told Debbie—and he knew he would be a natural. But he was also fascinated by the prospect of becoming a doctor. He admired his father tremendously, and Anthony liked the idea of two physicians—father and son—working side by side.
    Anthony believed he could do anything. He was supremely self-confident. Debbie admired that in him, but she also saw that some people they knew were turned off by Anthony’s ego. He could be full of such braggadocio. In the first years of their being together, she chose to see his confidence as strength rather than an overblown ego.
    In the end, Anthony decided to apply for medical school. His father was very pleased. Neither of his brothers had showed an iota of interest in becoming doctors, but once he had decided, Anthony glowed with enthusiasm about his chosen career. He filled out applications to several top medical schools, wondering which one he would choose when the acceptances came in.
    Dr. Ralph had always been very kind to Debbie. Anthony’s mother, however, was another matter. They had dated for weeks before he took her home to meet his parents, and Debbie would never forget the first time she went to the Pignataro home in West Seneca. She was impressed with how beautiful it was, with the landscaping and the swimming pool, and she wondered whether she would ever fit in. As she stood somewhat hesitantly in the foyer, she heard shouting from upstairs. It was Anthony’s mother, Lena. She was shouting at her husband: “What do you think I am? Stupid? I saw you with her!”
    Debbie and Anthony had come at a bad time. Anthony’s parents were having a fight. Debbie was so embarrassed that she wished she could sink into the floor.
    “But his father was very warm,” Debbie remembered, and she recalled what he said about Lena. “He told me that she had no manners—but that’s just the way she was.”
    Anthony had some of Lena’s bluntness as well as her lack of tact. As Debbie began to feel more secure with him, she also saw him with clearer eyes. She was humiliated sometimes when he made loud remarks that hurt people’s feelings. He never seemed to understand that he had done anything wrong. But they had been together for so long. She loved him and considered his occasional rudeness as one small part of his confident