I knew there would be no intervention.
Cannolis.
As I cut into that bloody steak, I tried to visualize cannolis. Crunchy tubes stuffed with ricotta . After this torture I would eat five in a row. I sawed at that steak for an interminable length of time until I finally held a hunk to my lips. I closed my eyes and rammed it in fast, tiny chunks of pistachio that would stick in my teeth , but all I could taste, feel, smell was blood. That copper-penny, rusty-nail, corrugated-toolshed smell of blood mixing with the Body and Blood of Christ still undigested in my belly. Jesus’s finger or toe prodding my spleen. It was a sacrilege beyond endurance. I spat the hunk out and it plunked on top of the saltshaker, knocking it over.
“Dio mio.” Nonna grabbed the shaker, spilled several grains in her hand to toss over her shoulder.
“I can’t do it,” I said, real tears springing to my eyes.
Grandpa picked up his knife and fork to resume eating, and I thought, That’s it?
That wasn’t it.
He took a forkful of potato and jammed it in his mouth. When he spoke I could see the starchy goo clinging to his teeth, his tongue. “Angelo. You spank this child and send her to her room. That’ll teach her to obey.”
“What?” Mom and I both said.
“You heard-a me. She need a good spank.”
Nonna leaned back in her chair, shoulders slumped, as if she knew how this would end.
Dad knew how it had to end too. He stood up and actually came toward me.
“Angelo,” my mother said in a voice that sounded like rushing wind as Dad shrunk another inch right then and there. “Don’t you dare spank her!”
Uncle Dom sealed my fate. “Not only does your wife bring home the bacon, but she calls the shots.”
That was that. Dad swooped over and scooped me up, but not in the tender way Mr. Giordano had held Donata. He sat on my stool and draped me belly-down over his lap, and the heart-shaped box in my chest tipped over too, spilling out the few warm memories of Dad to rattle around in my rib cage. Dad lifted my dress and layers of itchy petticoat, exposing my little-girl underwear and the Cannibal Isles mauling my backside.
I don’t even recall the spanking, how hard or how many. I just remember the shame, my secret geography revealed to Grandpa, Uncle Dom, and Ray-Ray, who snorted the entire time.
I darted down the hall to my room when it was over, slammed the door behind me, and yanked that stupid dress over my head, along with the veil, which was tainted by proxy. I wadded up the unholy vestments and shoved them as far under my bed as I could, tangling them up with dust bunnies, stale sandwich crusts, dirty balled-up socks, unspoken I love you s, and my shrinking faith—not in God (yet), but in miracle-worker me.
TAPE SEVEN
Electricity
Son-ama-beetch! I just tried to sneak out to the grocery store, but now reporters from the Sweetwater Herald are camped outside along with the pilgrims. I’m glaring at them from the carcass room surrounded by stuffed bison and elk heads. An entire bear hovering in the corner. A musket hanging over the mantel, which I would love to aim at the press, because someone (a meddlesome priest from Baaston, perhaps?) spilled the baked beans about the Vatican’s interest.
(Miss Ferrari! Just a sentence or two for the eleven o’clock news!)
They’re using bullhorns now?
(Garnet Ferrari! Is it true you can cure shingles?)
(And conjunctivitis?)
(She can-a! I see it with-a my own eyes!)
(Nonna! What are you doing down there? Don’t talk to them! On second thought , talk to them! She’s the real healer, people. It’s not me!)
(It’s a-no true! She is the descendant of Santa Garnet del Vulcano. My granddaughter. Mine! Just look at-a her face!)
This is ridiculous. All I want is my Ding Dongs, and now—
(Pop! Pop! Pop!)
—shit! The light bulbs in the lamps just blew, all of them. I have to fumble around in the dark. Ow! Fucking humidor. CAN YOU STILL HEAR ME? I’M JUST . . . LOOKING IN
Cannolis.
As I cut into that bloody steak, I tried to visualize cannolis. Crunchy tubes stuffed with ricotta . After this torture I would eat five in a row. I sawed at that steak for an interminable length of time until I finally held a hunk to my lips. I closed my eyes and rammed it in fast, tiny chunks of pistachio that would stick in my teeth , but all I could taste, feel, smell was blood. That copper-penny, rusty-nail, corrugated-toolshed smell of blood mixing with the Body and Blood of Christ still undigested in my belly. Jesus’s finger or toe prodding my spleen. It was a sacrilege beyond endurance. I spat the hunk out and it plunked on top of the saltshaker, knocking it over.
“Dio mio.” Nonna grabbed the shaker, spilled several grains in her hand to toss over her shoulder.
“I can’t do it,” I said, real tears springing to my eyes.
Grandpa picked up his knife and fork to resume eating, and I thought, That’s it?
That wasn’t it.
He took a forkful of potato and jammed it in his mouth. When he spoke I could see the starchy goo clinging to his teeth, his tongue. “Angelo. You spank this child and send her to her room. That’ll teach her to obey.”
“What?” Mom and I both said.
“You heard-a me. She need a good spank.”
Nonna leaned back in her chair, shoulders slumped, as if she knew how this would end.
Dad knew how it had to end too. He stood up and actually came toward me.
“Angelo,” my mother said in a voice that sounded like rushing wind as Dad shrunk another inch right then and there. “Don’t you dare spank her!”
Uncle Dom sealed my fate. “Not only does your wife bring home the bacon, but she calls the shots.”
That was that. Dad swooped over and scooped me up, but not in the tender way Mr. Giordano had held Donata. He sat on my stool and draped me belly-down over his lap, and the heart-shaped box in my chest tipped over too, spilling out the few warm memories of Dad to rattle around in my rib cage. Dad lifted my dress and layers of itchy petticoat, exposing my little-girl underwear and the Cannibal Isles mauling my backside.
I don’t even recall the spanking, how hard or how many. I just remember the shame, my secret geography revealed to Grandpa, Uncle Dom, and Ray-Ray, who snorted the entire time.
I darted down the hall to my room when it was over, slammed the door behind me, and yanked that stupid dress over my head, along with the veil, which was tainted by proxy. I wadded up the unholy vestments and shoved them as far under my bed as I could, tangling them up with dust bunnies, stale sandwich crusts, dirty balled-up socks, unspoken I love you s, and my shrinking faith—not in God (yet), but in miracle-worker me.
TAPE SEVEN
Electricity
Son-ama-beetch! I just tried to sneak out to the grocery store, but now reporters from the Sweetwater Herald are camped outside along with the pilgrims. I’m glaring at them from the carcass room surrounded by stuffed bison and elk heads. An entire bear hovering in the corner. A musket hanging over the mantel, which I would love to aim at the press, because someone (a meddlesome priest from Baaston, perhaps?) spilled the baked beans about the Vatican’s interest.
(Miss Ferrari! Just a sentence or two for the eleven o’clock news!)
They’re using bullhorns now?
(Garnet Ferrari! Is it true you can cure shingles?)
(And conjunctivitis?)
(She can-a! I see it with-a my own eyes!)
(Nonna! What are you doing down there? Don’t talk to them! On second thought , talk to them! She’s the real healer, people. It’s not me!)
(It’s a-no true! She is the descendant of Santa Garnet del Vulcano. My granddaughter. Mine! Just look at-a her face!)
This is ridiculous. All I want is my Ding Dongs, and now—
(Pop! Pop! Pop!)
—shit! The light bulbs in the lamps just blew, all of them. I have to fumble around in the dark. Ow! Fucking humidor. CAN YOU STILL HEAR ME? I’M JUST . . . LOOKING IN
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