The Wine of Youth by John Fante Page B

another one.
    â€œEver hear the one about the farmer who wanted to get married?”
    â€œNo,” Coletta said. “Please tell it.”
    â€œWell, this farmer wanted to get married.” Papa paused, looked around, as if he suspected eavesdropping. He saw us there on the floor. It was as though he didn’t know we’d been there all the time.
    â€œWhat the hell you kids doing here?”
    We had been making a feast of the beauty of Coletta. We were not ready for his question. We could not answer him. “Beat it,” he said. “Go outside and play.”
    We retreated heels first to the dining room, where Mamma’s fretful hands snatched at the soiled dishes, the blood sucked from her pale lips. We stood there, content to listen to the melody of Coletta’s voice.
    â€œYou too, Hugo,” Papa said. “Beat it.”
    Hugo went reluctantly, looking over his shoulder a couple of times. Then from behind us we felt it, each of us at the same time, and before we turned and looked at her we knew that agony coming from behind us, flowing into us, and we all turned at once, and she stood there looking at us, and she seemed a million years old, Mamma, our mother, and we her children had felt her broken heart, she there in the kitchen door, an apron hiding the tumbled misery of her churning hands, little rivers of vanished beauty wandering vainly down the wasteland of her cheeks.
    Once I too was like Coletta, said the speechless lips, but all that I ever was has gone into the four of you, and into him, andthere you stand, my burden and my reward. We felt her message, but we could not understand it, for it confused and terrified us; and rather than suffer with her we fled past her and through the back door, while tears tumbled down her cheeks as Papa’s laughter rattled through the house. But Clara stood there holding Mamma’s hand.
    We tiptoed around the house, through the strawberry and mint beds, until we were at the front-room window. I was tall enough and so were Mike and Hugo, but even when he was on tiptoe Tony’s eyes didn’t reach the top of the sill. We shushed him to be quiet, but he gasped and clawed to lemme see, lemme see, tearing at our shirts and raging with tears, and then he began to kick us, and he knocked Hugo down, bawling hysterically, screaming for us to get him a box to stand on, or else he’d spoil everything. It scared me: he pulled his hair and bit his fingers like a boy gone insane. I ran to the coal shed and hurried back with a box. He climbed up on it, and immediately he was quiet as he gazed and gazed at the beauty of Coletta Drigo, the last of his sobs trailing off into a kind of crooning contentment.
    I shuddered at what I saw. Coletta was still seated between Papa and Dino, with her knees crossed, and I could see even more of the knees from the window. A paroxysm of sensual shocks staggered me as I devoured their roundness incased in golden silk. It was murkily sinful, and I wanted to enjoy it in secret; the presence of Mike and Tony and Hugo irritated me. It made me angry that perhaps Mike too was enjoying the same sensations, and maybe Tony too, but he was so little. All at once I wanted to punch Mike in the nose, the evil-minded little fool.
    â€œWhy don’t you beat it?” I said.
    â€œSo you can have the whole window to yourself? Nothing doing! We’re staying—aren’t we, Tony? Aren’t we, Hugo?”
    Hugo barked, and Tony warned: “I’ll cry again.”
    â€œOkay,” I said, pinching his arm viciously and butting Hugo out of the way. “Stay, and see if I care.” Hugo got hold of my pants leg and started tugging, growling and shaking his head. I patted him and he quieted.
    Papa was talking. Not only that, but Papa had his hand on Coletta’s knee now, patting it and roaring with laughter. “So theminute Pat got under the bed, Mike came in.” He laughed some more, bending over