The Star-Crossed Sisters of Tuscany(15)

My father’s face lit up. He raised his glass of Chianti. “To Ignacio and Paolina. I never thought it would happen.”

To my family, it was settled. I would go to New York and marry Ignacio, a hot-tempered forty-one-year-old who needed a young bride to cook and clean and wash his filthy clothes. I shuddered. “Never!”

“Please, Paolina,” Rosa said, her hands folded in prayer. “You must accept his proposal. If you are engaged to a man in America, immigration into the United States will be easy. And best of all, we will travel together to America.”

My fork clattered onto my plate. “I will never marry this man. He is too old. I do not even know him.”

“Hush,” my mother said. “You are the second daughter. Do you not realize how lucky you are that someone is willing? Think of all your cousins who would jump at this chance.”

I threw my napkin on the table. “I do not believe in that curse. I never did.”

But as I spoke, my thoughts drifted to my great-aunt Isabella, my aunt Blanca, my cousins Apollonia, Silvia, Evangelina, Martina, Livia. All second-born Fontana women. All single.

“And what about children?” my mother said. “You finally have a prayer.”

I nearly upended my chair when I stood. “I no longer have an appetite.”

I was halfway up the stairs when Rosa grabbed my arm.

“Paolina, please forgive me. I thought you would be happy about Ignacio. Now we can go to America together.”

I felt trapped. Yes, I wanted to help my sister. And I longed to go to America. I yearned for the freedom and opportunities. Perhaps I could even go to college. But I would never marry a man I did not love.

“I do not need a husband. I am happy to be single forever.”

“Do you not see? This is the easiest way for you to get into the country.” She pulled me close and whispered, “Who is going to make you marry this man once we are in America?”

I looked into her mischievous eyes. She was right. Rosa and I would arrive in America at least a year before my parents. America was the land of the free. Women actually had a voice. They smoked and drove automobiles and some even took pills for menstrual cramps that were rumored to prevent pregnancy. Once there, I could do anything, be anyone I wanted. The idea left me breathless . . . and hopeful. I grabbed Rosa into a hug.

“I love you, my clever sister.”

In late September, Rosa and Alberto were married in a sober ceremony that seemed, to my young heart, completely void of passion. But Rosa was deliriously happy. “I finally have him,” she told me. “The man of my dreams is all mine, and nobody can take him away.”

Two days later, she and I applied for visas to America, Rosa as a young wife whose husband would soon be living and working in the United States, me as a woman engaged to an Italian American who had already gained his citizenship. We were told it would take months, maybe over a year, to get approval. Until then, we would work and save our money for the passage—the ship’s fare to America was expensive.

I was almost twenty years old, curious about everything—languages, history, science. But I had no skills or education. I found work as a laundress four days a week, a dreadful job steaming linens in the basement of a hotel in the neighboring town of Fiesole. When I wasn’t at the hotel, I was home with Mamma, helping her prepare enormous meals and clean the house and take care of the chickens. She taught me to darn socks and mend clothing, so that I could assist with the sewing jobs she took in for extra money.

But sewing was a bore. I was a dreadful cook. And cleaning the house? Who wants to spend their days on hands and knees, half the time with your head in a bucket? I was restless in the home, so I lost myself in fantasies. I dreamed of going to the university, once I got to America, and becoming an architect one day. And a physicist the next day. And a professor the next. La mia sognatrice—my dreamer—my mother would call me.

Rosa, a married woman of twenty-two, had more options. Her new husband, Alberto, had a cousin whose friend worked at La Galleria degli Uffizi in Florence. If Rosa could pass the test, she would be hired as a tour guide at the famous gallery.

I was so envious! The Uffizi Gallery housed one of the finest collections of Renaissance art in the world. My lucky sister would have a prestigious job in the city, a job that was stimulating and exciting. But first, Rosa had to pass her examination, which was no small feat. Her eyes would glaze over each time she tried to study the sixty-page manual the museum’s curator had given her. Poor Rosa had little curiosity and absolutely no interest in art.

Each night after my long day of work, she and I would sit on the little bed we used to share in the attic before Papà put up the partition creating a separate space for her and Alberto. I would quiz her, asking about Leonardo da Vinci’s Annunciation and Michelangelo’s Doni Tondo, the dates and history of every major piece in the museum. But Rosa never seemed to remember. Her mind was too fraught with worries. She fretted over Alberto’s upcoming departure, bombarded me with questions that had no satisfying answers. Would her new husband forget about her once he left Trespiano? And what about the ship that would one day carry us to America? What if it sank? What if we arrived in New York and Alberto was not there to greet us?

Finally, the night before the exam arrived. But this time, I was the one with the knot in my stomach. My sister knew nothing. She confused her dates, couldn’t distinguish the sculptors from the painters. I flung the book onto the bed and took Rosa by the arms. “Do you not understand how important this is? You must get this job, Rosa, so we can save money to get to America, and you can be with Alberto.”