Vico cast a twangy line through the steam to ERUPT. “Separelle!” PIZZA flew in like lampoons through the strings of cheese, just the word. Hooking onto me, all over my body, they pulled: PIZZA PIZZA PIZZA. These people trace their lineage to a siren who could seize men with only her voice: they know sound is real—soundwaves. It’s impressive, they can really wrangle you, slap you, throw you, they know what ACTION is. You do things with words. This isn’t a flaccid entreprise.
The dramatic nature of man about to take off, I have to hold back the Hoover dam—them. Me. The whole thing. I must. This is a sport, not dinner. Also, theater. That’s first. We’re in Naples, Italy, not Florida. We’re on the boot, not the pointed toe. Sports, theater, they are the same. Field, stage, what’s the difference? Tear down the set, charge the field, save the smuggling revolutionary. This is our basic thought process, and I would garner crowd support, literally, for speaking like this. That’s not joke, and we might attack as one, in a wave if one were to suggest it was. I would receive bravos, applause, and “brav,” in the end, bref. We will revolt? We will. It’s just like the film Three Men and a Baby, when Selleck reads to the baby in “soothing tones.” The tone is all that matters, not the content. It’s the same THE SAME THE SAME except the tone would be revolutionary or revolt. We are the whole sport: the players, the commentators, the referees, the stadium itself. You can get “the point,” if you succeed in getting to the point, and you can loose the point along the way. We’re playing to WIN. Even the argument. This isn’t footsie. I was not prepared.
My plate dropped under the weight of a calzone, as big as a football. Vico chimed “splendido!” He sprinkled fresh basil on the bounty before us. “Splendido,” his daughters made fun of him. He ignored them. With mesmerizingly sparkly blue eyes, Vico, the the family siren signaled to me at the head of the table as we do not need words here, that it all came from his farm.
I started with the calzone, you see, that felt like a content block. I wanted to take it slow, and if there was one thing I couldn’t forget, it was how much they ate. I couldn’t eat pizza and then calzone. I’m a moderate, and I was nervous because it was only December fifth, something like this, and Christmas had begun… these are a sneaky people. This is a strategic land.
“Calzone primo,” I said. CALZONE first.
The words flew in all at once. PIZZA, MARIA, PIZZA IS, the PIZZA MARIA, NOT, COLD, MARIA? PIZZA NOT, COLD, GOOD, it is not good cold. PIZZA Maria is. NOT — GOOD GOOD, BAD, MARIA, PIZZA IS NOT GOOD COLD. NO IS BUONO MARIA.
They piled the pizzas onto my plate. I bought the flavors emanating from the steam into my nose from the pizzas. That’s it. Please. I loved the mess of Naples. The chaos. “We are united by fromage!” I was thrilled and shook away the French word I had just inserted instead of Italian, as it was my second language, not Italian. “Ancay Francay,” Vico came in, fast, instructional, I was in the right. Naples was “also French, eh?” He reminded me, always, chic in navy. Giggino didn’t UNDERSTAND my enthusiasm. BOOM: undercut. Seated next to Vico at the head of the table, he was one to include others in his public discourse—esatto, eh brav. A senate member alligator, that’s his spirit animal, they were a comedic pair, the two Gigginos side by side at the head of the table.
They were the husbands of my cousins, sisters, Diodora and Assunta.
I was swept away, regardless of where I was. In a real sense. The first time I walked into my second surrogate family’s house, I was eight. I held a tape recorder as I was recording the “show of life” as I had just come out of a real show.
The sex scandal on Miracle Mile that I was in between the ages of four and eight became a spectacle, so real life, real personality, family, in particular, appeared like a show to me, so I just tried to go with it, whatever it was,.I was someone who could blend in a sense, a kind of chameleon. The Neapolitans were intense, so I matched them, not to say I can’t be, but this was the big leagues, be real.
Naples is almost like a telephone operator game, in that, many lines are happening at once. We can almost plug in and out of a main switchboard to whatever line we wanted. We go in another direction like the winds, but anyone can switch back or start a new line without any warning or hesitation. You’ve never seen such quick footwork, SLAM, BAM, Diodora’s ring vibrating through. “Maria?” Clear tone, cartoon worthy. Spontaneous doesn’t begin to describe the Neapolitans. They are entertainers; they expect to be entertained.
I asked Cristina what she did.
“Wedding planner,” she dragged in English. Ohhhh, I thought that was smart. Rosa was so happy I was back. My “fantastical hands” had captured their attention—the POINT.
“Abstract,” Diodora said. “Creative.”
I was always like this.
“Really?”
“Si, si,” Diodora’s famous “si, si.” Vico didn’t care. It was time to move on to the next musical number, feeling the song in the air, feeling it.
It was all about “MOHNEY,” Giggino said. He rubbed his fingers at me because I did that at Christina over her “good business idea.” He caught that: “Neapolitan.” So one line developing between Giggino and me is my Neapolitan-ness, it’s connected to my “strange enthusiasm,” to him, but not necessarily the same conversation. He asked me to break up Carmine’s band from within, no transition, on that note. NO! I cried. He made two little birds “tweet tweeting” on sweet little branches in the trees at his middle child and me.
We were eternally a pair, Carmine and I. He always sat directly in front of me at the dinner table to facilitate communication between me and the rest of the table. His cheeks were so cute back when we were kids with his owl eyes behind round spectacles. I call him the Neapolitan at Hogwarts, that’s what he looks like. He’s a wizard of some kind, even to his family. The tweet tweet referred to our “secret language,” irritating to Giggino. “Tweet tweet,” we could communicate without words, somehow. “ARTISTS,” the bane for Giggino’s existence bringing it before the SENATE. But he could, of course, hockey stick slam me down on the ice, CHANGE mood. Cute now. We were two little cute cute birds speaking a language no one else can UNDERSTAND. Now, Diodora could motion, referee.
“IO SONO ARTISTI,” I said, “WHATEVS,” Giggino threw me to the dogs, tapping the table, allowing the WAVES of voices to topple me, no chance. “Where’s your money,” he’s asking, and he doesn’t need to use words. He’s not too sure there.
Vico dropped it on the table, just like that, with his hands.
“What happened to you? Where have you been?”
Giggino took the lead. Apparently, my father had Alzheimer’s. He threw it down on the table with his chin. I stuck my fork in and sliced this belly right open. Fior di latte burst forth and across my plate, rising in a pool, with bits of salami.
“Piscine,” I said.
“Eh brav. Eat, eat, eat.”
“You see she doesn’t eat,” Giggino said. Quick move. He mocked the “laser beams” shooting out of my eyes. Yes. No. This. He interjected that, apparently, my father had “Alzheimer.” And I’m on trial, already. I had told them earlier.
“Alzheimer?” Vico’s eyes widened. Everyone said “AlzhEImer,” which was funny. “What does that mean?” I swallowed. I laughed. “BUON,” I said. “You see, she’s joking,” and why would I joke about a disease? I couldn’t say that though. But this was my mother, Joy, always dying of some disease.
“You were ten, correct?” “Ten” flew in from everybody. “This is what she said,” Giggino gave me a palm and tapped the table. “But you were here at this time…”
“I poof no?!”
They laughed at poof as if I really spoke like that. Quick— Carmine. He was already in position, his nose lifted: an interrogation mark, yes? In other words. I was charged, getting revved up. I had to be positive though, strictly speaking.
“WHA-AT POOF?”
THEY GOT THE CONCEPT Maria. What an entertainer. Giggino got onto his elbows, my personal coach. He put his chin into my fight, approvingly, very good. “You see? You see,” he said to the Senate. “Her poof, there’s something to it.” Pass — from the judges. “NO POOF!” I cried! Carmine nuzzled his nose at me. “How do you say…” I began. They threw out guesses, amusing themselves. The tension over Carmine and his band reentered the equation. Giggino rooted him on in a state of conflict with a chin. I had to — pointing — “ARTEEST IO— WAIT ME —” the force of their current were too strong.
“POOF, Meri?”
Quick foot-change, bam, I needed the word for “word.”
Vico’s eyes widened. “Alzheimer?”
“TWEET TWEET.”
I saw explosions in Carmine’s eyes. “What is the…” word for WORD!” Big hands. Big feelings. I gave myself an objective, to learn the language through this with a fist.
“Disappear,” Carmine snapped.
“Oh really?” Positively, I asked, “thank you, really?”
We all huddled in to support one another. I dipped my finger into that word. The crowd liked my gestures, always fantastical. They mirrored it, cute. Not Carmine. “What is this?” I laughed. Why is she laughing? I tapped the table. “Neapolitan, how can this be?” I kept tapping, you have to get strategic in these parts to get to the end of a sentence. Look at the finger, and they did. Tapping large. Decoy.
“BUT WHY? Look at that…”
“Type, teep…grammaria…” I didn’t want to ruin Italian. “The structure of the LANGUAGE.” Carmine did not break. “Grammatica, Carmine. What is the GRAMMATICA of to disappear?” His brows raised, he looked over at them, voices shooting, enjoying charades.
“WHAT — IS IT?”
“A verb…”
They disagreed.
“SI,” I scooped up that word and brought it back with my shoulders into a fist.
“She has a quality though doesn’t she?”
I continued with air-quotes, pointing at everything. “LIKE CALZONE LIKE TABLE LIKE PAPA LIKE LIKE—A VERB IS?”
“Maria?” Diodora rang low.
“What is a VERBE COME HERBE…” I SHOT OUT MY HAND — spouting any word that came to mind. Comments. Suggestions. Guesses. Fouls. Carmine shifted his eyes.
“A LANGUAGE is CONSTRUCTED WITH WHAT? CARMINE…”
“Word…?”
“WHAT?”
“YES!” I pointed. “The word, Carmine! The word! Thank you!”
“This is what you want to know? WHAT IS THE SIGNIFICANCE? THANK YOU?”
Boom, they took me to the ground. I got up. I made “shush shush” sounds with my finger. “Shush shush.” This was utterly nonsensical, conceptually, to the Neapolitans. “Shoosh shoosh.” What was this? “Shoosh.” I couldn’t help but laugh. They undercut me. I clapped at Carmine. Only compliments. Comments. I had to hold it. Not laugh.
“What is the WORD for the contrary of one person?”
“AHHH,” Diodora adjusted her glasses like Carmine. She understood what I was doing. Maybe she didn’t. Giggino said something that made Diodora laugh and alerted me.
“The word,” I wagged my finger. “PER…”
“PER, PER? Meri PER?”
“QUESTO.”
Carmine pulled back.
“No person,” I tried to mime “around” and flashed “one.”
“No one.”
“YES!”
We applauded Carmine.
I boosted him as “my professor” at his father who received it begrudgingly.
“He said nothing to a person!”
“How was he supposed to tell a child? How was…”
“Scouge,” Giggino said, not scusa, even suave.
“No!”
Giggino said that it was I who didn’t want to accept it, heavy in his delivery. I was a child. He couldn’t tell me. “IO,” my hands shot forward for “live,” a word that was not there, “with HIM.” It didn’t matter. Rosa, Cristina, and Assunta got up because it was just a story to pick up the plates. I shot up. “HELP?” Obnoxious move. They threw me back in the ring. “Secret,” Carmine said, looking off, because he kept getting it. “It’s THE SAME, is it the SAME? THE SAME.”
“And what about it?!”
“NOH, noh, noh…” They insisted as if they had been there.
“HEY!” I started swinging wide with English just to knock them down. “THE DOTTOR!”
“Dottore Meri DOTTORE…”
I threw my finger down. “I speak Neapolitan.” Which means no endings in Italian. It’s not “dottore,” it’s “DOTTOR.”
“Brav.”
Giggino gave the assembly a palm. I had a style. I slapped my palm into the great beyond. It was done, I put down my glass.
“Brav.”
I shot out “diagnose” which passed. Giggino and Vico were doctors. Everyone confirmed “the importance of Latin” in how they said “diagnotici…”
“DIAGNOSED” POW, POW POW. DIAGNOSED.
“HE SAY TO ME —”
INTERRUPTION.
“When I was twenty years old that he…”
“WHO, Maria, who?”
“DOTTOR!” I gripped my fist for the past participle. I opened myself up for attack. This was a boxing ring. “HAS EU,” it was English and French, “Alzheimer when I was ten.”
“Ancay Francay,” Vico reminded me.
“Alzheimer?” They said as if they heard it for the first time.
“MA PARKINSONS PRIMO…” Throwing out three fingers, I tried to say “neurologia.”
THREE FINGERS, what?
Carmine raised his brows.
“When you were twenty or ten?”
“Ten,” I brought a fist back to me in a large curve on “MA.”
“Told ME when I was TWENTY.”
“Do you want meat,” Assunta came in with a sincere elegance.
I became bright, grateful, and I had never been so full.
“Maria, eat, please.”
“I don’t SPEAK,” I said, “Italian!”
They reassured me that I did. Giggino gave people “looks.” How was he supposed to tell a child? About all this?
“THE DOCTOR SAID!”
“THE DOTTORE MARIA THE DOTTORE!”
“The dottor,” I became revolutionary, “was not happy!”
It was I who was not happy. Giggino even expressed sympathy and understanding. “SPEAK,” Giggino shoved me with his forehead. “SPEAK to your mother?”
-
BOOM. I was getting creamed out there. And look, this is a sport, so they’re not going to go easy on me. This was the All-Star league—the Neapolitans don’t give a shit if I can complete my sentence. They’re rising to their feet. They’re blowing me away. Toast. I experienced so much resistance the second I opened my mouth, and I had to be positive. I was provocative without being transparent about it. Snapping at Carmine, getting into this goddamn game. YES! I can’t get angry. And they’re so comedic, skilled, and entertaining, which mirrored the Brazilian-Jews, the family who protected me from my father for four years, and there’s danger in it. This isn’t a TV show, though it is. I’m entangled in a complicated web. Why? Why the disbelief already? Now, today, I would already be out ther door, leaving. “Bye.” And BOOM— a punch in the nose. “And your mother?”
-
I was wild, in-between states of awareness, frozen. My eyes shuffled like sheets of paper. No one remarked on my state as abnormal or out of control. Chaos, haha, Assunta would later laugh. That’s Naples. Nothing to bat an eye about. Giggino made goggles over his eyes and gave them to me as questions. “What are these eyes for?” Diodora was deciding how to call it. I was irritated.
Everyone huddled in to participate in charades with Maria and Carmine. They threw their guesses in with weight and volume. Hard to keep the thread. I swam. Carmine nuzzled at me. “NO,” he said as I laughed at their picking apart my moves, the commentators. I made the universal symbol for talk. “The word,” I said into his owl eyes. We were going down, spiraling.
“THE WORD, Carmine!”
They shot in—scusa. Guesses from left field.
“He did not TELL…” “Nothing. He said nothing,” Carmine said. He pulled his cheek back, which communicated that I needed to pull this along, a bit tense here. He didn’t understand, with owl eyes. Just the swirl of the crowd. Carmine pulled his whole body back from the table, eyes over there at the judges. I took the floor. I wiped my mouth, remembering my father, laughing a little. Of course not.
"HE SAY,” I was too angry to find “what.”
“What Maria, SAY WHAT?”
I floated, my pinched fingers remained. They didn’t know anything about the story. I had to remind myself. Giggino pointed. “Neapolitan.” “HE SAY WHAT about the MY MOTHER to you?” I twinkled my head even, “he say,” wide eyed, I tried to be positive. “He say,” I opened my hands. “What? About the my mom to you,” nice, curious, bright, can’t get ANGRY, can’t get ANGRY. They are innocent, I am not. I hadn’t been back in fifteen years. I can’t get angry. A platter of my hand now scanned the way. Giggino took the lead on this one because my father spoke to him the most…
I tossed Carmine “what” instead of “how much.” “La quantità, Carmine…of the WORDS.”
“Not much,” Giggino said.
Others joined, obviously.
“Only that she wasn’t never really in your life.” His sincere brow — his sympathy— infuriated me. This, right here, circle it: kill it. This, here, circle it. It was part of the problem. This was a FUCK THAT BITCH situation. Not a “aww poor Maria.” So, we grow up in a world, and people could get affected by this story and apply conventional logic, and I didn’t have the space or room to develop my own idea. I tended to get that shoved down my throat.
Why are they asking me this, then? I looked at them. They got pushy. “How were they supposed to know?” I laughed. I had to give that to them. “No, I do not SPEAK…!”
“Aw, how sad, sorry.”
“No…”
They searched for a day, any day, that I spoke to my mother.
“No, no, no” not this…
“Weekends? Birthdays, Christmas, holidays…”
“NO!”
“Not even on her name day?”
I had to laugh. “NEVER!”
“But she’s still your mother…”
“Mai, mai, mai,” my Italian pinches were in full force, one in each hand. They noticed. I was entertaining. Needing, probably to break up this tension, I was in a boxing ring. I said “never” with an increasing satisfattivo. Satisfaction, I think. I gave them two hands—the number of times that I saw her let alone spoke to her almost pleading with them, a bit of an act, on an edge, because I was trying to communicate that they were going too far.
“Christmas, weekend, name days, you called people…”
I threw my hand—I cast it long and sharp.
“Oilloc,” Vico poured me another glass.
“SHE!” I held my hand, held it, just trying to find the word for “to give.” I handed anything and everything to Carmine for the VERB. Time to pump up the play — getting into this game right? How FUN it was FOR ME. RIGHT? This goddamn story. Gotta keep it light, gay, couldn’t get affected, could literally break out into a little dance. I had to understand. I didn’t know that I could get hurt. That’s a rage problem. I felt plenty of feelings but I was pulling the reigns, swerving around anger. Quick changes. Then I felt bad. I was too quick, and I could be even quicker. They don’t even clock that I didn’t speak ITALIAN, that’s how quick and skilled I was. I couldn’t offend them. They were innocent. I got it. They loved it! Carmine took it, simply, not knowing what this was — brilliantly. His father got it, too, indicating to Diodora—her son.
“When a person does this…the ACTION. VERBE!” “She’s got a style no?” “Brava Meri!” How could I not laugh? They didn’t get how FUNNY they were, but anytime I laughed, they thought I was joking. “She gave me….” I hated this point, hated this moment. Once this story came out, it was over. CHOICE, meaning, I had a CHOICE, I didn’t have to do this, but I had a whole journey with “audience.”
Carmine came in, knocked out by Giggino. “SHE GAVE YOU? GAVE YOU WHAT?” A palm, Giggino, WHAT? His giving me his cheek. WHAT?
“To another person!”
Cristina took a deep breath.
In short, my mother gave me away, not gave me, to another person when I was four years old.
“So what, people give their babies to people…” Boom— Giggino. He handed a baby to a person as if it were stupid, even, how common it was. “Si, si,” Diodora seared, this time, with her frown, right through me. Looking at them, they gestured, indicated, scanned. “NORMAL, NORMALE.” This is not a reason not to call someone, your mother. Si, si. Patch things up.
I got up from the table. Carmine’s head grained back slightly as I threw open an invisible cage in a self-mocking step. “NORMALE…” I bent my knees, took on an asymmetrical pose. GIGGINO was a fan. “NORMALE,” I said. “Normal, Maria, yes, normal.” They agreed. They were too funny, too skilled. So their enjoyment infuriated me; it felt like this.
And like, this guru came into my life around this time talking about “the SHOW,” my show, when it was about the AUDIENCE. Not me. This dick even started playing psychologist guru with me! Pointed to me across a goddamn living room when I didn’t even know the guy and projected all over me. That’s step one of my story.
“And?” They don’t give a shit. “Good mime, and?” I went into the cage, took out a baby, and gave the baby to someone—over there. I indicated, “over there.” Carmine made little wings without changing his face but there was a question beneath it. I opened up a pigeon coup in my mind. He even got the image. His father snapped at him.
“What did this have to do with birds?”
“Tweet tweet!” “MetaFOR!”“She’s joking!” “No!” “Then why?” “YOU!” “YOU!”
“TELL THEM MERI!” Assunta cried.
I gave the “BAMBINE” to a woman “over there.”
“What about the BIRD CAGE Maria?!” I was putting her, pushing her, over there. Vico kept saying “OBI LAN.” He’s just hearing songs. I felt terrible for taking up this space, developing the idea, having lost the line myself. It was over. With a fist to Carmine like we could do this, I fired at him. “WE!” I have to continue, I have to explain. Carmine repeated what I blurted, becoming less and less verbal. He adjusted his glasses. “Confusion,” he could see that. They all did. He asked everyone with a palm to back up. He was in charge. It didn’t work but it did. He got mocked, the crowd got interested, his father came closer, bringing in the people. With moving, without inflection, Carmine spoke.
“Meri is giving a baby to someone…in confusing circumstances.” His brows lifting…me up. “A foreigner, Meri, or someone…” He paused. “Or someone you did not know?” I snapped at him; I got a word I needed and flashed “TWO.”
“Both,” he confirmed with a peace sign. He left the space between us open; there was a missing piece of information that everyone tackled to fill with his eyes on me and “over there.” I shot four fingers at them, my body surging with electricity.
“FOUR YEARS!”
Yes, that detail. He nodded.
“FOUR YEARS?”
“FOUR YEARS OLD OR YOU LIVED WITH THIS WOMAN FOR FOUR YEARS?”
YES!” became bigger, happier, and wide-eyed as they hit me with “no, no, that’s not what happened.”
“No, no,” Diodora said with a tone. “You don’t remember.”
If there was one thing that could have made me blow, it was that. I heard “remember me” in my head when I was four years old, lady, and at four, I had that bite, and I did bite—watch out. I threw punches. I couldn’t forgive myself for going there in feeling, so I masked that, so I was in a carriage out of control, which was particular to this group of people, so it’s not that I wasn’t in touch with my feelings, I just didn’t know what they were. If I was repressed, as the guru said that to me in a most creepy way, I don’t know what that means, considering the sex scandal I was in. And I was aware and unaware of that. I always TRIED to use the words, the delicate WORDS, but people didn’t GET IT. I always felt dismissed, first, pushed to points where I didn’t WANT to pull out evidence, but that’s where I was.
I had a strong mask. Very.
They kept going. No, no. They just didn’t stop. No, no. No, no. Only one woman — my fire lit — could bring down a team of Neapolitans single-handedly. You want fire? I channeled her fire—the mother who stepped into my house in a tennis skirt and legs shaped by the Gods and took me home for a day that turned into four years. I kicked my feet like she did.
“HEY! My Brazilian Mama!!!!”
Their heads sort of flew back.
“TELL YOU—OKAY?”
I set off Nettuno (the puppy Neptune)—barking out back: what the fuck is going on?
I felt terrible. Guilty. “Now who’s this?” Carmine moved his eyes but not his face. “O—kay…” They bounced off my okay, rhythmically. “O-kay, o—kay.” I gave them her sassy finger in her Brazilian accent. “Pay attention.” I remembered that phrase in the moment. The table paused. They were impressed…by how I became this other person in front of their eyes. Giggino especially. “Si, si,” they all agreed, but why didn’t I do theater anymore? How could I not laugh? “She’s good, not bad. Do it again.” They got that she was real—they felt it.
“DO IT, Meri, DO IT AGAIN.”
I laughed.
“She’s joking…”
“Pay attention,” I said.
Is this where I lost the reality of it? I didn’t say, why are you doing this? I’m going to have to leave. I had evidence, you see, it’s true. That was my automatic response. “SHE SAID NOT ME, SHE SAID.” I chewed gum like she did, smiling really nice, fake nice, at them. I flashed the four jazzy fingers she gave me at the tennis club which they mirrored. They commented, zoomed in on the gesture, amused.
I began on my pinky! I showed it to them. Held it. They waved their little pinkies at me. I had to PUSH through the laughter. “SHE SAID, no me, SHE said to me,” I said, as her, which they could legitimately see. I counted all the way up to four beginning to say “the bad names” about my mother. Giggino had to laugh. They called my foul.
“The bad things! CARMINE! About the my mom.” Carmine looked at me with owl eyes so I could follow him. “This woman didn’t like her mother,” reading me, “more…hated, Meri?”
“SHE SAID—FOUR YEARS!”
“It’s not true.”
“SI!”
For the love of GOD. “I DO NOT SPEAK!”
Giggino didn’t want to accept it. Carmine slipped it in. “You don’t put the definite article in front of family members…” “MAYBE,” I blurted in French. “PAR CONTRE.” They called my fouls. Vico said, gravely, through all this. “Ancay Francay.” “It is more true,” with shoulders, “PER me.”
The math added up, at least, to Giggino. “And then,” I came here for the first time…after these four years. “Yes.” I laughed, taking that hit. Giggino accepted my statement that he didn’t believe a child, putting his chin into it. “Was this not unbelievable?” He had no clue why was I laughing, but “unbelievable?” Looking at them, you see, I lived on an edge they didn’t notice but I was wrought about it. Is this unbelievable? NO! It’s NOT. I didn’t want to do this. I laughed, rinsed. I was coming to my senses. I hated my story.
“She was Brazilian, this woman?” Giggino asked. “She said that.” We tackled Giggino for fun. “SHE SAID, SCUSA,” Cristina said. Giggino defended himself. “My Way Brasiliane,” Vico silenced the crowd. “No…” Rosa said. “Baby no…”
“Si,” Vico figured, nodding. The whole time. He followed me perfectly. “My way Brasiliane” (as in Frank Sinatra’s “My Way, a Christmas institution). My eyes shifted. “Was this her? The woman you told to get out of My Way?” “Her cugine,” I said. “CUGINA,” they corrected. Vico said “esatto,” still grave, looking up at me. The siren.
“Sorry…”
Their faces—what word was this? “SORRY?” Diodora called my foul in sounds. “Why is she apologizing? Carmine?” Please, his father reached for him. Pause: He didn’t know. No one did. Well, I sort of flipped out, albeit strangely. “Um,” I tried to bring my voice down, they wouldn’t let me. Caring Giggino — leading with a sincere brow. “What? What do you want to say? SPEAK!” “What is stronger than scusa?”
Meri, Carmine got real without words suddenly near me, which made me realize I was standing. Why do you want to know this? “YO HOO ARTISTS TWEET TWEET YOO HOO.” Giggino dangled his wrist. I was standing by the Cubist painting of Maria with a veil and two faces. Oh, I smiled, um, switched feet, haha. “Meri,” there she is, Giggino with a tight alligator smile. “We can see her, no? At four.” “Yes, yes, we can. We can.” “Mi dispiace,” Ivana broke her silence, seated beside me, and gave me the word that’s stronger than “scusa.”
“NOH,” Rosa said. “Baby NOH.” Giggino looked at me as if I were a complete alien. Assunta said “MERI,” so tenderly. She was happy that I was back even elegantly. Everyone was. I was “allegra,” according to Assunta’s coach-like pout—joyful, happy, lively. I blinked. “Allegra?” Diodora frowned, took a breath. “Si,” Giggino ushered me to get off this train of thought. “Of course you’re allegra.”
Vico brought himself forward as if he sensed it. “I am coming down,” he showed it, his eyes sparkling, “from the mountain,” he said rhythmically, “with a story of misfortune.” There were many songs, he indicated, no words. His sparkles grew distant, misty, so many. He shrugged at my nonverbal reaction as if it were tiny. I hadn’t moved. “Anche brute,” he said. “Naples is both,” he turned on the charm now, “brutal and belle,” in French. He flipped the two words, understanding on some intuitive level that he had said it in another way before, just out there, earlier, on the first song that we sang, so meaning was made, you see. Flipping the two concepts, forever linked with his pointer finger and thumb, he flipped it. The story was unfolding now, he tapped the table, so anche brute,” he said, magically. His eyes. Tough, Vico, he was a brute. Staccato arrival of his hands— we were here, not knowing, his eyes elsewhere where we were. Shrug. “Eh brav.” No one else caught that — this was a siren in action. There were many songs. Eyes sparkling. He got the picture. My performance, the whole thing. Nonverbally.
“My way Brasiliane,” he said. It was the Brazilian “My Way.”
I couldn’t believe these people. “We wondered where you went…” which wasn’t linked, I guess, with anything I just said, so they might have wondered where I was, in fact, as I didn’t come to Naples until after these years. I was nine.
Now, I was recoiling, “WHAT IS THIS SHYNESS?”
Giggino was so funny, receding into himself. “WHO IS THIS?!”
“Si,” Diodora called it.
“Si, scusa.”
“WHY IS SHE SAYING SCUSA?” Giggino.
“This is what family is for.”
Right.
-
I’ll unpack that, but I’m the one apologizing in the end when they crossed a line. This just came with the territory for me. And like, no, the response is no, don’t do that to me. Snapping back. This was a real journey, this statement right here: I do not have to understand YOU. Separation. I will leave now. I’m not a TV show, though this is a really good scene. The point is— would you like being told at every step — no, well, that’s not what happened? And no, from my position it’s not understandable. It’s the cue to leave. So at step one, across many scenarios, especially in my thrities, I had to adjust my entire approach. “No.” It began there. And of course, they hit me with the same questions that every one else did the moment I began….moving into the gambling round for kids.
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