The Family(12)

“Antonia, this isn’t fun,” says Sofia.

“I am alone in the wilderness. Everyone has left me. I voted to stay alone because I am a women’s sufferer and I can vote. I stayed here and I wanted to be alone.”

Sofia says nothing. Antonia is unrecognizable. Her voice is coming from somewhere outside of her body. Suddenly Antonia’s calm face cracks down the middle. She melts onto the bed next to Sofia. “I don’t want to play anymore,” she says.

“Okay,” says Sofia. She is uncomfortable and suddenly wishes Antonia would leave.

“I don’t want to play!” says Antonia.

“I heard you,” says Sofia.

Antonia bursts into tears. Sofia stares, silent, desperately wishing her parents would come in.

Antonia wails. She shudders. She sits limp on the edge of Sofia’s bed and howls.

Rosa bursts into the room.

Sofia is so relieved she starts crying too.

Rosa is pregnant, and she has not told her husband. She sits between two wailing girls and hugs them both close and wishes for her own mother. She stares out the window and knows she cannot fall apart.



* * *



—

They have a funeral for Carlo, though there is no body. They bury a silk-lined, dark-brown box in St. John’s. For the rest of her life, Antonia will be able to picture the funeral in little pieces, as though a broken film is playing in her head. The day is too warm and she sweats in her black stockings and new dress. There are the bent elbows of men clasping one another around the triceps; the rustling of women stepping through long grass in heeled shoes; the nasal drone of the priest, who keeps having to adjust his eyeglasses and off of whose naked pate the sunshine glints as the afternoon wears on. Again and again, the faces of bent-over adults loom toward her like flesh-colored balloons. There is the queasy discomfort of being kissed and hugged and having to say thank you, thank you, thank you over and over again, and as the afternoon grows old the adults’ breath becomes worse and worse, soured with dark wine and fat-lined slices of lonza shipped from Rome. Antonia can feel her self separating from this day, retreating. Further and further away so by the time Aunt Rosa kisses her and holds her close at the end of the afternoon Antonia can hear her voice echoing, like there is water between them.

Lina is inconsolable for most of the funeral, reddened and teary and leaking. Carlo’s well-wishers are sympathetic, but seem wary of getting too close to such a volatile fountain of animal grief. A wife, everyone knows, should have a wan but clear face at a funeral. She should be holding herself together, in honor of the memory of her husband. So the guests at Carlo’s funeral give Lina sympathetic glances from afar, ask each other how does she seem without asking her themselves; whisper such a shame when they think they are out of Antonia’s hearing.

Lina had given everything to the conventions she was told would protect her. Get a husband, her mother used to say, and you will be taken care of. Along with get a husband went fix your hair when you go out, be polite, and don’t sob like a broken beast at your husband’s funeral. Lina has been betrayed. She sees no need to continue abiding by anyone’s rules.

Near the end of the interminable afternoon, Antonia is sitting on the couch, staring in mute exhaustion, when the crowd in her living room seems to part like a zipper being undone as three tall, gray-suit-clad, slick-haired men with clean faces and very shiny shoes walk in. One of them is her uncle Joey, and the other two look familiar: hard-shouldered, bold-eyed, faces gleaming under close new shaves, looking warily around the room. She recognizes them from Sunday dinners, from the circle of men who hunch together in the living room until the food is served.

They remove their hats in unison.

The crowd in the living room is thick with silence. Suddenly, Lina emerges from where she has been cowering under the weight of her own sorrow and fear in the bedroom. “Get out,” she says.

“Lina,” says Uncle Joey. “No one is sorrier than I am.”

“Get out. Get out of my house,” says Lina, whose own voice is strong and clear for the first time in days. “How dare you bring them here. How dare you bring this into my home.” Antonia can feel herself swimming toward the surface of this moment. There is something about it that sings with significance.

“Lina, I understand why you’re angry,” says Joey. “He was my best friend.”

“You bastard. You get them out of here right now.” Lina gestures at the men flanking Uncle Joey. Antonia cannot place them. She does not understand why her mamma is growling so ferociously at Uncle Joey, who has just come to say he is sorry, like all the other adults in the room. But she is grateful and relieved to see the light of Lina’s life shining for the first time in days, like there is still a person under there.

“Lina, please—”

“OUT!” Antonia’s mother stands up to her full height of five feet two inches and points a shaking finger at the door.

“Okay,” says Uncle Joey, deflating like a popped balloon. He jerks his head. It is subtle, but the two men with him turn and walk away at once. The silent crowd swivels its necks in unison to watch them leave.

“Lina, I’m sorry,” says Uncle Joey, twisting a hat between his hands. “I don’t know how to do this. I’ll call you—” but he stops himself at the hateful face Lina is making. “I’ll have Rosa call you,” he says. And then Uncle Joey turns to go, and Aunt Rosa clasps him around the arm as he walks past her. Antonia can hear her say, it’s okay. It’s okay.