No Exit

More from my book. Here, my protagonist, aboard the Serenade, is translating his Latin as two Egyptian policemen watch him from a concrete pier.

Gravior, the adjective, means “heavier” or “graver.” It is in the nominative case so it has to modify the noun exitus, which is also in the nominative case. “A heavier death” or “heavier fate.” Exitus best translates then as “death” or “fate” even though an EXIT sign does not suggest that everyone who leaves a building is about to face a tragic ending. I always like to think that exit actually breaks apart in Latin as ex + it, or as “out” and “he goes.” So exit means “he goes out.” But sometimes at the end of a scene in one of Shakespeare’s plays, he’ll write exeunt instead of exit, which is a plural verb for “they go out.” So, for example, if Benvolio leaves the stage alone, Shakespeare will use exit but if Benvolio and Mercutio both leave, the text will read exeunt. What I find amusing is that when I watch two people leave a room together under a doorway, I’ll remember Romeo and Juliet or King Lear and I’ll want to correct that overhead sign to EXEUNT to fit the violation. Two people cannot exit a room as one person. I’ve shared this bit of noun-verb agreement with a few friends who usually take great pleasure in pointing out to me that I am a dork and that if I keep it up, I’ll probably always be alone in life. So I’ve learned to keep most of my quirky observations to myself.

The exitus gravior here for “heavier fate” relates to Ovid’s flameless fax as a funeral torch and not as a happy marriage torch. Exitus auspicio gravior, to complete the line, then means “this fate was rather heavy in portent.” I prefer the sound of “rather heavy” than “heavier.” They’re both comparative adjectives, so it’s up to me as translator to decide which word(s) I want to use. Auspicio is in the ablative case, so it takes a preposition. Auspicio is the noun for “augury” or “portent,” so the line could read “the fate was rather heavy in portent” or “by portent” or “with portent,” or with any other suitable preposition. I prefer “in portent” because it implies that the danger lies within the flameless torch itself. Hymen’s torch does, in fact, carry this terrible omen for the newlywed couple.

The next line looks quite easy to translate. Nam nupta per herbas vagatur. Nam means “for.” Nupta means “bride.” Per means “through.” Herbas means “grass” and the “s” at the end makes it a plural noun. Vagatur is a verb because of –atur, and –atur is a passive verb form in the 3rd person singular for “to wander.” But my Latin dictionary cites vagatur as having the deponent principle parts of vagor, vagary. It can not then be a passive verb. Since a deponent verb takes the active voice and not the passive form, the verb means “wanders.” Of course, vagatur shares the same root as vagabond, which is often how I see myself. A vagabond translating a narrative about wandering. Anyway, nam nupta per herbas vagatur translates as “for the bride wanders through the meadow.” I think “meadow” sounds more poetic than common “grass,” so that’s how I will leave it.

It is not too difficult to visualize the young bride draped in a sheer tunic with some ivy leaves in her hair running across the meadows of Greece with the accompanying train of bridal celebrants. The sun is shining happily down on their exuberant smiles, and the tall grass, carpeted with yellow and red poppies, sways elegantly across the Thracian fields. It is slightly difficult to stay focused on this festive scene, however, with those machine guns pointing only a few yards away. Outside my cabin window stand two young military men on a concrete pier. The Serenade must be slowly heading through another lock or we have docked for some reason or another. Both the men, whom I guess to be around age 20, are chatting away as if the guns they hold are plastic toys and they have no official duties to perform. As they turn to look at me in my comfortable room surrounded by my books and papers, I wonder how many dollar bills I may have to relinquish not to get shot in the head by one of their alloy-barrel incentives.

A Tale within a Tale

Today in La Jolla, while working on my novel, I embedded my story with another story.

An outburst from the corner of the room had broken my concentration. Brick and Carol were sharing a carafe of red wine and getting sloppy in their Scrabble game. Carol had dropped some fallen tiles and was reaching down to pick them up as Brick began to sing a bawdy song about women sailing on the high seas. Carol, giggling over his lyrics, bumped her head on the edge of the table as she was straightening up, which just added to their laughter. My concentration was completely gone, so I got up to stretch. Being able to overhear them better, I was drawn into their revelry, and I wasn’t the only one caught up in their mess. Three elderly British, sitting nearby, were watching but not smiling.
“When she’s twenty, give her plenty!” Brick sang. “When she’s a gramma, give her the hamma! Take thee to a nunnery, and bring me along!”
Carol tried to shush Brick but he paid her no mind.
“I must sing, my lady! Would you prevent the birds above from singing their tales as you do hinder my voice? Do you want to strangle my bird?”
Carol got the innuendo and slapped Brick on the arm. Brick, seeing me watching their game, brought me over to their table.
“Sit down. I was just about to relate to my gentle lady here a tale of a bird who wouldn’t be silenced.”
I pulled up a chair, and Brick called out to the bartender for another glass. When it arrived, Carol poured some wine for me and addressed Brick.
“Listen, dummy!” she said, looking over to the British. “Make it short. And keep it clean!”
“For you, my lady, anything.”
“I’m not your lady.”
“Then I shall relate to you a tale of inspiration. One in which a lady maintains her virtue after succumbing to the flight of a noble young man.”
“Drink up,” Carol said to me. “This oughta be good.”
“It just so happened that in a tiny village in Italy many years ago,” Brick began, “there lived a young virgin of such remarkable grace and beauty that all the youths from miles around would gather just to steal any glimpse she might bestow. A smile. A glance. A wink. They all competed for her attention, but this young virgin, known to her neighbors as Graziella di Pomponi, had eyes only for a certain young cobbler’s apprentice named Galeotto, who had not a cent in his pocket. Whenever Graziella saw the young stud pass by under a window or gallop down the cobblestoned street, Graziella would sigh and imagine a green meadow upon a hill where horses run free and delight in one another.”
“Good grief!” exclaimed Carol.
“But their love was forbidden, owing to a long-lasting feud between the two families.”
“Brick, this is Romeo and Juliet!”
“Not at all, my lady.”
Dr. Olebowski and Finneas had entered the bar and approached our table.
“Sit down, Eileen. Brick’s telling us about Romeo and Juliet.”
The Olebowskis joined us and ordered another carafe for the table.
“As I was saying, this young Galeotto’s affection was so great for Graziella that despite the unfortunate feud which kept them apart, he would often hide away in the bushes underneath her balcony to sing sweet words to his lady. But one day, frustrated from sneaking about, Galeotto decided to speak to Graziella’s father and convince the old man to accept him as a rightful suitor, worthy of the young virgin’s lawful hand in marriage. But Graziella knew her father’s quick rage and his hatred of her lover’s family so she dissuaded Galeotto from exposing himself too soon. So she said, ‘Dearest husband of my dreams, whose life comingles with my own, lay silent for now, for I have a plan that will allow us to publically embrace love’s ecstasies without the threat of your death. Come this night to the garden, as quiet as the cats preparing for night’s promise of furtive love, and await my arrival. I shall take care of the rest.’ No sooner had Graziella spoken these reassuring words to her eager lover, she stole away to her father, who was shining his steel sword as he did every afternoon, and addressed the old man. ‘Father dear, the only man I adore, as is right and proper, relieve me of this terrible heat which plagues us all this summer. I did not sleep at all last night, for the heat in my body keeps me awake. Allow your devoted daughter to sleep on the balcony tonight to cool my fiery restlessness.’ Her father thought this request was amiss and turned to his wife, who now was handling his sword, and said, “Wife, I think our daughter is half-queer, for this is but strange.’ And to this, his wife responded, ‘Husband mine, the heat indeed is unbearable, for I myself tossed and turned all last night as heat enveloped my troubled body. Although I, a mature woman, know means to alleviate my pain, young maidens do not, so let the girl sleep outdoors if she wishes. She is chaste and devoted to the Virgin, so I see no worry.’ With coaxing kisses upon his forehead, the old man hesitantly agreed to the arrangement and ordered his servants to move her bedding out onto the balcony. When he had seen the bed placed outside, the old man said, ‘I do not know how this indulgence will assuage the heat that consumes your body, my child, but make of it as you will.’ His virgin daughter then said, ‘Anything to help me, father. Besides, I am sure that the song of the nightingale will lull me to sleep.’ Her mother, knowing very well the sweet song of the nightingale, replied, ‘She has a point, husband. It is well-known that young girls are drawn to the nightingale.’ ‘So be it,’ replied Messer di Pomponi, who retired to his own chamber to polish his sword as was his afternoon custom. Soon night approached, and Graziella began to stir with a burning deep inside, for summers in Italy can be very coctile. And at last, even though the sun had retreated for the day, the land was left covered in a blanket of unwanted heat, as when a bowl of pastina, removed from the fire, still sustains its scorching appeal until devoured. So the young virgin carefully undressed under the winking of the stars and slipped completely naked underneath the sheets on her bed. No sooner had she sighed quite loudly over the garden then Galeotto, receiving the cue, crept up the trellis, brushed aside the overgrowth of the night-blooming vines, and removing his own clothes, found his lady-love waiting with outstretched arms. Their loud embraces were as triumphant as a choir of angels, for never had the bushes, flowers, and trees of the garden ever heard such an exchange of rejoicing. And forgetting the call to sleep, the couple swore to Love’s delight all night long, causing the nightingale to sing out three, four, and even five times under the moon’s full reign. Finally, worn out from their youthful pleasure and no longer oppressed by the heat, the two lovers retired into dreams, with arms and legs happily intertwined. When morning once again introduced its scorching rays upon the earth, Graziella’s father, eager to know how his daughter’s outdoor remedy for restlessness had soothed her fervid spirit, entered her room and sneaked out onto the balcony. There atop the sheets, he found Graziella and her Galeotto, still asleep and in naked embrace. Taking in more than he could handle, Messer di Pomponi rushed to his own chamber to reach for his polished steel sword, and upon seeing the rage in his face, his good wife asked, ‘Husband, why so frantic? Have you seen how our daughter gets on? Has not the nightingale’s sweet song relieved the girl of her restlessness?’ Her husband, unsheathing his sword, replied, ‘Good wife, come see how your daughter loves the nightingale, for she still has it firmly grasped in her hand!’ Upon distress, Messer di Pomponi and his wife rushed to the balcony whereupon they found the entangled Galeotto and Graziella with the caught nightingale in the girl’s grasp just as her father had reported. Seeing him raising his sword and preparing to strike them both, the girl’s mother quickly grabbed her husband’s arm and whispered, “Husband, dear, do not be so hasty. Why this boy may make a worthy husband for Graziella. Have you forgotten that although he is now merely a cobbler’s apprentice, his own uncle, Messer Boccarossa, is an Uberti, and that family’s favorable influence may secure you a top position within the magistrate and save our mounting debt?’ Considering the wise words of his wife, Messer di Pomponi weighed how a top position just might save the mount, so he tapped the youths with the edge of his sword, thereby awakening the pair of lovers and spoke his mind. ‘Rise, my son, and let not this erect sword chase you from your lover’s garden. Make my daughter a lawful wife, sparing us all from public shame. The girl is yours, for do you not see for yourself how delighted she is to sing the praises of the nightingale and what a faithful wife she shall be?’ Graziella, realizing the impropriety of the situation, quickly released her hold on the nightingale, for it was now morning, the blissful breath of day brought on by the lark. So with all parties dressed and upstanding once again, the young couple exchanged two golden rings borrowed from their seniors’ own joined hands until a more official ceremony could unite their winged love in marital bliss. And as for the nightingale, why, it perched its proper place upon the happy couple and was never too far from their side.”
At the closing of Brick’s tale, all those drinking heavily in the bar that afternoon praised his fine story of clever lovers and their devotion to the song of the nightingale. Finneas ordered a round of drinks for us and we stayed afloat until the dinner hour, in which we continued to honor Brick at a center table by claiming the chicken with capers was really nightingale cordon bleu.

INT. THE THRONE ROOM OF POSEIDON - TEMPLE OF POSEIDON - UNDER THE SEA - THAT EVENING

The throne room of Poseidon is a white-washed room encircled with an inner colonnade. The columns are embedded with green and blue sea gems. There is a shallow pool of water in front of Poseidon's throne, which rests on a raised platform.

Poseidon is sitting on his abalone throne. He is drinking and watching a real-living chess-like game in the shallow pool. Young, healthy MERMAIDS and MERMEN stand in the pool on the underwater board. They slide to different squares when Poseidon directs them with his trident. He controls both teams, for he is playing alone.

Amphitrite ascends the platform and sits at the feet of Poseidon.

AMPHITRITE
Who's winning?

POSEIDON
I am.

Poseidon waves his trident at a sexy Mermaid, who slides to another square.

Demeter has entered the room and stands beside a column. She is completely soaked from her journey under the sea. Water drips everywhere.

AMPHITRITE
(seeing Demeter)
It's your sister.

Using his trident, Poseidon, signals her over. To approach, she must walk past the board game with the Merpeople.

DEMETER
(r.e. his trident)
Don't use that thing on me!

POSEIDON
You don't want to play?

DEMETER
No, I do not want to play!
(addressing Amphitrite)
Hello, poor dear. I pity your nuptial bed.

Demeter wipes off the water dripping down her face.

DEMETER
Listen to me, Poseidon! Damn you if you are responsible for the abduction of my only daughter, Persephone! The only flower from my garden. She is gone and I seek information - or a confession! - from you.

POSEIDON
My dear sweet sister-

DEMETER
The sweet sister you don't deserve!
(remembering her recent encounter with him)
God of great equestrian skill.

POSEIDON
Demeter, it was not I. Your prized blossom is not here. My word.

Demeter sits down on the platform, exhausted. Amphitrite hands her a glass of wine.

DEMETER
(defeated)
I am lost without her. Where is she, brother? Which evil god or doomed man must I hunt down and destroy with my black torch. Help me lay barren his own seeds in deserved repentance.

POSEIDON
August sister of our Mother Earth, you will know the truth, for I do know of your grief.

AMPHITRITE
Go on. Tell her.

POSEIDON
No mortal man is at fault. In truth, it was a god. The Cloud-gatherer Zeus--

DEMETER
Zeus?! Zeus took my love?

POSEIDON
(continuing)
The Cloud-gatherer Zeus has decreed the rape you so seek to avenge.

DEMETER
His bolts. Your tridents.

POSEIDON
The Olympian Father has given his consent to his own brother Hades to take Persephone, she with the lovely ankles, as his underground bride. She has been seized and carried off, sealed away in the gloomy depths of the Land of the Dead.

Demeter throws her glass across the room.

POSEIDON
But desist in your great anger, goddess, and control that impetuous fury.

Demeter picks up a nearby pitcher and drinks from it.

POSEIDON
Indeed, Hades is a fit husband for your daughter. He is your own Olympian brother. As he is mine. Born with the same ichor blood that flows through our divine bodies. And as for divinity, does he not rule over the populated lands of kings, heroes, and athletes? Can he not give Persephone the honorable title of Queen?

DEMETER
Queen of the Dead? No! I will not have it!

POSEIDON
But you must have it. She is his now, Demeter. Our lonely brother Hades now has the bride needed to propagate his own kingdom.

DEMETER
Zeus, the loud-thundering tyrant. And Hades, so deep in the earth. How will I go after both?

POSEIDON
Desist, Demeter. Let the course of events the Fates have spun even for us gods unravel. Your comely daughter has been chosen for great things.

Demeter turns to contemplate the Merpeople in the water.

DEMETER
Those there are great things. Beauty, strength, youth. Prized ideals. Not death, darkness, and decay.

AMPHITRITE
Come, Demeter. Let me comfort you.

Demeter takes one last swig and exits with Amphitrite.

POSEIDON
There goes an undiluted dame.

Poseidon directs a Mermaid to another square.

POSEIDON
Right there, sweetheart.

Sailing in Egypt

An excerpt from my novel. Here, the group of Americans does its best to sail around Aswan without any more booze.


We all laughed at Finneas’ remark and drank some more. The Coke and whiskey was still cool in Dawn’s pouch and it went down smoothly and warmed my stomach. The combination of this coolness and warmth comforted me nicely for the rest of the bus ride and while I was eager to reach the river, I was perfectly content sitting in the back of the bus with my drinking companions. Kirk continued to relate his midnight wanderings to us as Dr. Olebowski instructed the rest on the bus about some interesting history on Aswan and the islands. Kirk’s excursion, however, took us down a dark labyrinth of dark alleys and streets not mentioned in our initial brochures. As he followed his newfound friend from the suq through town, Kirk nervously looked back over his shoulder in case insidious brigands or outlaws, shrouded in the darkness like the conspirators of Cassius, waited to ambush the misled American. Kirk expressed how nervous he was as he passed a group of men in an alley who suddenly stopped their smoking of a shared hookah as he neared. Was this the end, he thought. Would he be robbed and killed and never heard from again? But the enticement to see forbidden, naked belly dancers was too great for our college instructor, so he bravely pushed on.

Kirk was no Genji. It was funny to me how dangerous he had described the evening, and I thought about Lady Murasaki’s Genji, the fearless lover-prince who spent his nights roaming the gridded streets of medieval Japan looking for illicit rendezvous. Genji flourished at night like a prowling cat and only the most secretive of maidens does he visit and seduce in the narrative. This wasn’t our Kirk, and we all knew it, which is probably why his harrowing tale became so entertaining to us. The only victim would be his wallet, for Egyptians are culturally adroit at inflating unmarked prices and then convincing travelers that negotiating fixed rates is unheard of and mortifyingly insulting.

Kirk did arrive safely at the show and he did see three or four voluptuous dancers who didn’t really take it all off as promised. The evening cost him eighty dollars, which Kirk was convinced was a fair price for a verboten evening of danger, hookah, and skin. Frankly, he probably paid twice as much as it was really worth, since everything here in Egypt is negotiable. But the adventure made Kirk happy and gave him years, if not decades, of relatable stories for his friends and colleagues back home.

When our bus stopped at a pleasant curb lined with palm and date trees, the group began to disembark, and Dawn alerted us to a disaster of colossal proportions: her pouch was dry. Until we could find a duty-free shop or return to the ship that night to refill her backpack with more whiskey, she informed us that we would only have water to drink. This made Dawn a tad moody because it wasn’t even noon and as she said, “It’s so nice to sail around with drinks.” I reassured her that I had plenty of bottled water in my backpack which she was welcome to share. Dawn thanked me politely and stroked my shoulder, and we all caught up with the group being led to a fleet of feluccas awaiting us on the pier. Two of them were for us, and as we boarded, we were asked to remove our shoes and find a seat. My felucca held me and my drinking companions, Kirk, Dawn, and Andrew, along with the Hoskins and Margot. The other skiff accommodated Dr. Olebowski, Finneas, Brick, Carol, Chip, and an unknown German couple in baseball caps and pink noses who had been waiting on the dock to join a sailing party. When Brick heard them speaking to each other in German, he introduced everyone in his vessel with “und das ist” and “und dies ist” and everyone shook hands.

Our felucca captain and his sailing mate were a silent pair, so once we began to move, the details of our sights were left unexplained, leaving us to imagine the historical significance of ruined temples here and fallen pylons there. No matter how ancient the stone structures seemed, healthy green palm trees flourished on these tiny islands, marrying old civilization with new life. The disparity intrigued me, as did the large formation of rocks which resembled bathing elephants. Gigantic effigies emerging out of the seas. We sailed around these mighty mammoths in our assailable boat, and I felt incredibly insignificant as a momentary creature passing around their solid domain. It was one more incident to convince me that we tourists weren’t needed for Egypt to continue to thrive. She had done so for thousands of years without us and whatever would become of me and my companions, the land would outlive all of our passages. I once heard in English class that it takes a reader for a book to exist but I don’t think that this applies to places. Elephantine and the other islands with their nesting birds and swaying date trees would all survive just fine without us.

Dawn was drying out quite well during her unprepared prohibition, and as our boat caught a powerful gust of wind, she ran her fingers over the top of the rippling water and uplifted her face to the sun. The Nile had calmed us all. The warmth of the day and the movement on the water had soon transported me to a far-off place and I began to daydream about nothing at all. I might have sailed far off on my own if it had not been for the rattling of a tambourine which broke my trance, and as I looked up, our captain was shaking a rusted instrument in the air and singing a quick tune. We had left our ship the Serenade only to be captively serenaded.

Winter's Trick

I tried my best to write a short story without the intertextuality of literary allusions but somehow I once again yawed my course toward "The Odyssey." That one epic poem seems to have influenced me more than any other. The three bars in "Winter's Trick" are reinterpretations of certain episodes found in Homer's poem.


Winter’s Trick

It was most likely the expired eggs that sent the Van Hausers to bed for a week. Carol had mixed six of them into her zucchini bread batter on December 14th and she and Ron ate half the loaf that night after dinner. The kids wouldn’t touch the bread because zucchini was “disgusting” they had all agreed. They stuck to the candy canes off the tree and the sugar cookies brought over by Pat, the neighbor lady with the five barking terriers with reindeer antlers atop their furry heads.
On that upsetting evening, Ron and Carol had spread lots of butter on the zucchini bread and Ron had even toasted his slices, so when the Christmas vomiting began, Carol threw out the rest of the loaf and the two of them crawled painfully into bed. Carol lamented her decision to use the old eggs because she knew that they had been sitting in the back of the refrigerator since before Halloween, but what she didn’t know was that Ron had a co-worker at the plant who repeatedly failed to wash his hands after using the restroom and liked to enter the employee kitchen to make turkey and provolone sandwiches with the contamination of a modern Y-pestis. It was Ron who had cut, buttered, and served the zucchini bread that night.
At first, the kids protested when told they would have to spend a few days with their grandparents while Ron and Carol recuperated. They loved Papa and Nonni but the television was never turned on at their house (they read books) and besides it was Christmas and the kids wanted to be near the presents under their tree just in case that brother received one more than the others or that sister got one twice the size of the rest. The Van Hauser kids kept score at Christmas, and two of them would make damn fine lawyers one day.
Bridget was the second oldest of the Van Hauser kids and she wanted her own bedroom for Christmas because her sister Sophie, the youngest of the brood, often woke her up playing Ray Conniff Christmas songs like “Count Your Blessings” while singing to her dolls (Truth be told, Bridget really wanted a Little Miss Manhattan Make-up Set for $27.99 but was told by her parents, “Young lady, girls in the 3rd grade do not wear that stuff!”). Sophie wanted everything. The eldest, Barry, just wanted video games, and Duncan asked Santa for a magician’s kit with disappearing ink. When the kids arrived at their grandparents’ house, they worried that those presents back home would never arrive. Zucchini bread had ruined Christmas.
Papa and Nonni did their best to make the kids feel comfortable during the week their parents were sick in bed. Nonni got out all of her best holiday decorations and made Papa assemble a 24-piece Nativity set that hadn’t been touched for over ten years. When Papa couldn’t find Baby Jesus, Nonni remembered just why the set had been boxed up for years but improvised quickly by putting a green army man in the wooden cradle in front of the Holy Family. When Papa saw the scene, he laughed and said that it was an appropriate tableau for the two thousand year-old reign of Christianity, but Nonni hit him in the arm to shut him up before the kids overheard (Papa had been a scientist at the university before retirement).
During her infirmity, Carol telephoned three to four times each day, usually enquiring about the kids’ whereabouts or sometimes just to give an update on Ron’s escalating temperature. When Nonni heard that it had reached 103˚, she dressed the kids up in their warmest winter sweaters even when sitting around the house, and for precaution’s sake, threw out any vegetables slightly resembling a zucchini. On these rainy and windy December days, as the kids immured themselves in front of the television set which Nonni said might do them some good after all, their grandmother busied herself in the kitchen preparing various pasta dishes and baking more batches of almond cookies. Papa said he had never seen Nonni cook, clean, and hum so cheerfully in all her life. The Van Hauser kids were catered to quite nicely under the solicitous hospitality of their welcoming grandmother.
Of course, Nonni had given Papa lots to do as well. She instructed him to crawl into the attic to take down all the Christmas decorations: antique glass bulbs for the tree, ceramic snowmen candles for the tables, silver and gold bells for the doors, artificial wreaths for the mantle, twenty years worth of saved Christmas cards (plus three Happy Hanukkah ones) to line the dining room threshold – so much, in fact, that when Papa’s golf buddy, Cap’n Jerry, entered the house, he exclaimed, “Holy Kringle! What’d Santa do – explode?” That made Sophie worry just a bit.
The children were allowed to explore the entirety of their grandparents’ house but were restricted from entering Papa’s library without his permission. Papa had hundreds of well-worn books on five dark brown shelving units and a stuffed tortoise resting on the floor next to a very uninviting chair. Since there was no television set in the library and the tortoise smelled funny, the Van Hauser children preferred to avoid the room altogether. But on December 17th, the rainy day when the kids were gathered around the television in the back family room to watch Emmet Otter’s Jug-Band Christmas one more time, Papa considered ushering them into his library to introduce them to Swift, Verne, and Dumas.
As he sat in the corner reading the newspaper, waiting for the silly program to end, Papa peered over the Op-Ed section to wonder how a stuffed otter and an impoverished jug-band could entertain these lazy grandchildren in such a way. Nonni had gone to the store to buy some things, so Papa had shepherded them on the floor near the Christmas tree not knowing what else to do with them, and it was he who had relinquished the remote control to Barry.
Half way through the program, Papa was pleased to see the children’s feet tapping to a somewhat tolerable song, “When the River Meets the Sea,” but when the Christmas show finally ended, he told Barry to turn off the television and he gathered them all on the sofa near his chair.
“Now, isn’t that nice,” Papa said. “Quiet. That’s what a good Christmas is. Right, Sophie?”
“I guess.”
“So tell me, children. Are you having a good time here?”
“Yes,” Barry answered.
“And what about you, Duncan? How are you holding up?”
“Fine.”
“Well, good. Now, um, has any of you ever read The Count of Monte Cristo?”
“No, Papa,” Barry said. “They make us read other things in school.”
“I see.”
Sophie sneezed and wiped her hand on the sofa.
“Well, I was thinking that it might be a good idea for us to all read a book while we’re here. Right, Duncan? What do you think?”
“I can’t read, Papa.”
“Oh, you can’t read. What about you, Bridget? Can you read?”
“Of course I can read! I’m nine.”
“Yes, of course.”
“And Duncan, too, can read,” Bridget corrected.
Papa scratched his head and stared blankly at the children.
“Papa?” Sophie asked.
“Yes, Sophie?”
“Why don’t you tell us a story.”
“A story? Well, I don’t know if I know any.”
“Yeah, Papa!” Duncan jumped in.
“Tell us a Christmas story!” Sophie exclaimed.
“A Christmas story? Well, there’s got to be one hanging about in this tired, old cranium. Hmm … Let’s see. A Christmas story. You know, I think I do have one but first, Barry, go and turn on the Christmas tree lights and, Bridget, dim those lamps over there, and, see, see how nice that is.”
“And, Papa, it’s raining outside!”
“Yes, Sophie. Isn’t that nice with the rain and the Christmas lights and no television noise. In fact, it was a quiet December afternoon just like today, just like all of us sitting here in this warm house in winter --”
“Just tell it!” Duncan blurted out.
“In a warm house in winter,” Papa continued, “when Little Mary, who was eleven years old, sat in her bedroom and looked out the window at the falling rain …”

The rain had been falling for three days over E. 187th St. and brown puddles of water and dirt filled the cracked asphalt. The scene would have reminded a romantic reader of the opening pages of A Tale of Two Cities when the French peasants rush out onto the downsloping street to scoop up in their hungry hands the muddy wine which had spilled forth from fallen barrels onto the cobblestone road. But Mary was only ten years old in 1960 and the only wine she had ever known was a sip here and there at New Year’s Eve feast when her parents felt especially generous and hopeful for the coming year. The Bellaforchettas, see, were a poor family with only one black and white television and a cat cursed with three legs.
The Bellaforchettas lived in a tiny two-bedroom apartment in the South Bronx. In the humid summer, there was no escape from the suffocating heat and in the winter, the apartment walls were as cold to the touch as the frozen grapes in the freezer which Mrs. Bellaforchetta swore tasted like just like ice cream. Mary, being the only girl in the family, was fortunate enough to have her own tiny bedroom, but the one window which overlooked E. 187th St. also sat above Fantozzi’s fish market, so each morning, Mary would awaken to the salable stench of flounders, fillets, and flukes.
Her two older brothers, Johnny and Carmine, shared the other bedroom and fought every other day. The walls of their room were marked with soiled hand prints and punched in from fists and thrown objects like shoes and baseballs (but never books). Johnny had just entered the 10th grade and thought he was very important, not that that really mattered since schooling did not define his mien. The cracked asphalt under Mary’s window did. He treated his younger brother of two years like the torn up street’s deterioration on vulnerable Royals – detrimental. This would eventually wear down the resistance of patient Carmine but in 1960, Carmine still strove to placate his brother’s impetuous irrationality and save the family from the insobriety of this infuriating Heracles. Johnny Bellaforchetta usually always got his way and usually always got away with it, whatever “it” happened to be.
From the chair near her bedroom window, Mary listened to the light rain bullet off of the metal garbage cans down below so when a thud from a dodged catcher’s mitt hit the opposite side of her wall, she heard nothing. Mary loved the rain, especially at Christmas time when she sat all bundled up in her room looking out the window, singing Christmas carols to herself. Since the Bellaforchettas were too poor to afford their own record player, Mary had to rely on the tunes she heard once in a while on the radio or in Mass. The blue-gray light of this December’s late afternoon entered Mary’s room and softened her disappointment that the sparse Christmas tree decorating the family’s living room this year contained no strung lights, just tinsel.
In this disjointed holiday mood, Mary looked out at the muddy puddles in the cracked asphalt of the street and hoped that Santa’s reindeer would not twist their hooves come Christmas Eve.
“Be careful, Santa,” Mary said.
“Santa – shit! There ain’t no Santa!”
Johnny had busted through Mary’s bedroom door and bullied his way in and over to her bed and plopped himself right down.
“So you ready, Mare? Ready to make some dough?”
Mary withdrew in her accustomed recessive manner to the washed-out lace coverings of her window and ran the delicate material through her thin fingers. Carmine followed Johnny into the room and stood near her dresser.
“Johnny, leave her alone.”
“Why? You have a better plan?”
“This doesn’t make sense. It won’t work.”
“The hell it won’t!” Johnny turned to Mary with a big grin on his olive face. A feint trace of hair above his upper lip quivered like a slithering snake, especially when he spoke with obvious uncertainty. “Mare, you are gonna have some Christmas this year!”
Mary, for some reason, felt like crying at this disruption in her late afternoon solitude but found no time to do so, for within three minutes, she had been de-cloistered and was now standing in front of the unlit Christmas tree as Johnny pulled up the red skirt from under the tree and held it up in the air. Christmas was coming undone. Mary was horrified at this holiday unhinging as Johnny wrapped the skirt around her shoulders. Johnny stepped back to take a look.
“Yep. That’s how it’s gonna be. Now, Mary, go put on some red dress and put your hair in two pig tails. We’re going out.”
At 7:48 p.m., the three Bellaforchettas were heading out the door of their second-story apartment and onto the wet, gray pavement of E. 187th St. Carmine was the first to descend the dilapidated steps and he watched in horror as Johnny ushered out an eleven-year old girl in pig tails wearing black boots, a faded red dress, and a red cotton Christmas skirt pinned around her shoulders. She clutched a brown wicker basket in her right hand.
“Look out, wolves! Little Red Riding Hood has got the moves!”
Carmine stared in apprehension at the sight of his sister and in disgust at his brother, who stood akimbo inspecting his ridiculous creation.
“Johnny, I’m cold,” complained Mary.
“Don’t worry, Mare. We won’t be outside for long.”
Watching his sister shiver in the blowing wind, Carmine ran quickly inside and re-emerged with a brown wool coat to wrap around Mary.
“Fine,” said Johnny, “but it comes off when we’re there. Let’s go.”
In December 1960, the sight of Little Red Riding Hood being dragged down the wet streets of the South Bronx at Christmas time would have perplexed any bocciagalup’ or passerby but because this one wore a brown coat with a missing top button, she resembled a truly troubled creature displaced from a fairy tale land quite unrelated to a borough’s graffiti-sprayed cement, metal trash cans, and store fronts displaying foot-long pepperoni and salted bakkalà. Charles Perrault and the Brothers Grimm would have been very displeased.
For most of the way, the three walked in silence. Johnny rubbed his hands nervously and Carmine frowned.
The Bellaforchettas passed their last over-spilling trash can on E. 187th St. and rounded the corner to Arthur Ave. where Mary’s eyes beheld powdered pannetone and svogliatelle pastries in a shop called Mama Tortelli’s. Mary paused to take in the pretty colored bulbs illuminating the display windows in yellows, blues, and reds but was hurried along by Johnny’s insistence.
“Forget about it, Mare,” he said.
Johnny’s command over his brother and sister extended both outside and inside apartment 2B and on some mornings when Carmine prepared to use the family’s bathroom before anyone else, Johnny would throw a shoe at him as he walked down the hall and say, “Forget about it, Carmine!” The one time Carmine actually defied his brother with “a fa Nabila to you, too, Johnny!” Johnny jumped at his throat and threw him against the wall. Since their parents, Sal and Teresa, were often absent from the home due to long hours at the tailor shop up on 196th St., Carmine learned to resolve his issues with his older brother by submitting to Johnny’s stronger will. On December 17th, Johnny’s sway led his brother and sister through the night rain and under the winter moon down a street polluted with uprooted pavement, rats that scurried over them, and the opportunists who preyed on any vulnerability above the cracks.
“Quieres candy?” asked a Hispanic behind a shoe shine kit.
“Oh, Johnny, I want some candy,” Mary begged.
“No, Mare, you don’t want any of that kind of candy.”
The shoe shiner’s kit contained more than just black polish and Johnny knew the streets a little too well. He recognized the Hispanic as Luis but avoided any contact because the mission was underway.
As the two brothers escorted their costumed sister up Arthur Ave., the beastly silhouette of Luis the shoe shiner disappeared into the darkness and what emerged next a few paces later was that of Zio Pappalecco, an ancient Sicilian who sold religious trinkets outside of Mt. Carmel Church. Every weekend, regardless of weather, Old Zio leaned on his sturdy cane in front of the church to lure in the repentant with his Vatican snow globes and Holy Father postcards. Sometimes he would hold up a blue ashtray illustrated with a distorted Colosseum and a suckling she-wolf in its arena and look at you with those sad, beseeching almond-eyes. Mary didn’t smoke in 1960, but just as sure as she was that there would be a bowl of pastina for breakfast, one of those ashtrays would one day be hers.
“Johnny --”
“Forget it!”
Under the light of a wreathed lamppost, Carmine noticed that Mary’s threadbare brown coat barely covered her shaking knees and it wasn’t hard to guess that she wouldn’t be getting a new one for Christmas.
“Hey, Johnny, listen,” he stopped and said. “If this works out, maybe we could get Mary a new coat.”
The idea delighted Mary, but Johnny, ignoring the suggestion, grabbed her tightly by the arm and hastened their step. Within thirty seconds, they had stopped in front of a large green door and Johnny positioned Mary directly under a flashing neon beer bottle.
“Alright, Mare, you know what to do.”
“I don’t wanna, Johnny,” she said.
“You listen here! There’s no other way and you can’t back out now!”
Ah, come on, Johnny!” rang in Carmine.
“Stoo gatz, Carmine! What do you want to be forever – a mammon’?”
“This has nothing to do with me!”
“Mama’s boy!”
“Damn you, Johnny!”
Neither the rigidity of Johnny nor the protestations of Mary would determine the actual initiation of this Christmas plan, for at that very moment, a downpour of cold rain fell on the heads of the three Bellaforchettas, deciding the next step for them. Johnny acted quickly, pulling off Mary’s coat and shoving her to the door.
“Go!” he ordered.
And in she went.
Polly O’Feemie’s Tavern on Arthur Ave. was a dimly lit cavernous hole in the wall with little cheer and even less camaraderie. Patrons rarely fraternized, opting instead to drink alone at their own isolated tables or mumble sotto voce to themselves. Despite the foot-high silver tree placed at the corner of the bar, Christmas passed happily over Polly O’ Feemie’s and left these spiritless individuals to imbibe their own preoccupations. So when Little Mary Bellaforchetta entered the darkened bar on December 17th, dressed as Little Red Riding Hood donning a felt Christmas tree skirt around her shoulders, not a soul blinked nor stirred.
“Trick-or-treat, mister.”
Mary stood at the table of a man in a mechanic’s shirt. He looked up and Mary held out her basket.
“What’d you say?”
“Trick-or-treat.”
“Beat it, kid.”
The man turned his back to Mary, leaving her conspicuously alone and unsure but Mary persisted by approaching another man at a table with three empty beer bottles.
“Trick-or-treat, mister.”
“Scram.”
The man picked up a beer and drank from it. Mary watched him slowly place the bottle back on the table before burping up a slow, deliberate release.
Mary was frightened and stood in the middle of the room and the paralysis of the unknown crept over her stiff body. How could Johnny have thought that this plan would work? These men were so miserable in their loneliness that no amount of trick-or-treating at Christmas would melt their frozen hearts.
Seeing his customers becoming annoyed, the bartender, a short, stocky man resembling an Albanian from Chicago, glared at Mary, but before he could react and throw her out of the bar, a “psst, kid” from the corner of the room attracted Mary’s attention. She turned to see a cloud of thick cigar smoke dissipate in the air and behind it materialized an old man with a white beard. He signaled her to approach.
Mary walked up to the old man’s table.
“No luck, hey, kid?” he asked.
“No.”
“Whadda you expect from a bunch of chooches? No one here -- ya know what I mean?”
The old man blew more smoke in the air, and for a few seconds he disappeared into the darkness. Mary stared. When the old man re-emerged, he was laughing.
“Go ahead, kid, try me.”
Mary took a deep breath.
“Trick-or-treat.”
“Trick-or-treat! Now that’s a good one but you’re a little late, sweetheart. But I like your’s guts. You got guts, kid.”
The old man smacked his hand down onto the table and pushed it over to Mary. When he lifted up his palm, Mary beheld a dozen or so dollar bills.
“How much is there, kid?” he asked.
Mary counted four one-dollar bills and one five.
“Nine dollars.”
“That’s right. You’s an honest girl. Take two of the dollar bills, sweetheart.”
Mary slowly reached in for the dollars and sneaking a look at the man’s face, she noticed that a milky gray film covered the old man’s eyes.
“Did you get ‘em?”
Mary nodded in the affirmative.
“Sweetheart, I may be blind but I can see when a little girl needs a bit’a charity at the holidays. Now you better beat it before they kick you outta here.”
Mary turned to go but remembered her manners.
“Thank you,” she said.
The man laughed and disappeared once again behind a cloud of smoke.
Mary stepped out of Polly O’ Feemie’s Tavern and into a puddle. The rain had ceased its shower but the street was wet, and looking into the water, Mary saw the reflection of the flashing overhead neon beer bottle. Johnny grabbed her hand.
“How much?”
Johnny’s grip released her fingers and he took the two dollars.
“Two bucks?! That’s it?”
“Johnny, let her go. See, I told you it wouldn’t work.”
“Shut up, Carmine!”
Johnny shoved the money into his pocket and paced up and down Arthur Ave. Carmine wrapped Mary in her coat and brushed off scattered tiny beads of rain. Johnny returned.
“Look,” he said. “Don’t let it get you down, Mare. We’ll have better luck next time.”
“Johnny, can we go home now?” Mary asked.
“Home? What are ya’ -- kaputz? Mary, look. You got no cash. I got no cash. Carmine’s got no cash. You want Mama to cry at Christmas? You want her to have nothin’?”
“But, Johnny, they’re not so nice in there,” pleaded Mary.
“That’s cuz we went into the wrong one. Polly’s ain’t no good. Ever’body knows that. Buncha’ drunks. Stick with this, Mare. Just one more. You’re gonna make some good money tonight. I promise.”
Mary dreaded the idea of walking into one more bar asking for money but as Johnny had earlier explained, there was no other way to have enough money to buy their parents any presents. She was resolved to listen to her older brother but Carmine’s objections confused her acceptance of the plan.
“Even Carmine thinks it’s a bad idea.”
“And how much cash does Carmine have in his pockets?”
Johnny did have a point, Mary thought. Their parents were never around; they worked most days at the tailor shop and in order to give Johnny and Carmine their own bedroom, they slept on the sofa in the living room. They deserved a nice Christmas gift this year, and Johnny was right in saying that none of them had any money to buy anything.
“Come on, you guys,” Johnny urged. “Just one more.”
Carmine turned to Mary.
“One more, Mary?”
“Alright,” the disheartened girl responded.
So the three Bellaforchettas worked their way up the street with Carmine walking close to Mary and Johnny a few paces ahead.
“What exactly did you say to them, Mary?” Carmine asked.
“Trick-or-treat.”
“How’d you say it.”
“I don’t know. I just said it.”
Carmine and Mary followed Johnny past a grocer’s known for selling the best olives in the neighborhood. During the day, he displayed them in a large barrel outside of the store but on this night, all Mary could savor in her mind were the jars of confetti almonds in his indoor display case. But before she could calculate the price of a handful of pastel candy with the money she might be able to pocket, they had arrived at their next destination.
“Okay, Mare,” Johnny said, “This one’s the one.”
Carmine helped Mary out of her coat and straightened out the skirt around her shoulders.
“Push ‘em, Mary, push ‘em!” goaded Johnny.
Sometimes Mary just hated Johnny. He bossed her around and made her do things she didn’t like to do. But what could she do about it? It was best just to obey Johnny now rather than face his hostility for weeks to come, so handing her coat to Carmine, Mary looked up at a wooden sign reading Auntie Noose’s, with a bow and arrow crisscrossing between Auntie and Noose’s.
Thinking of her little success inside Polly O’ Feemie’s and how cold it was outside, Mary actually hoped that the experience in this next bar would prove the same. If she could exit without having received any money, maybe Johnny would abandon the scheme altogether and within fifteen minutes or so, she’d be back in her room alone with her dolls and the Christmas postcards she had found in a box on 186th St. Mary had a slight feeling that Christmas could be saved.
And in she went.
Auntie Noose’s Bar on Arthur Ave. celebrated the holidays with lots of strung Christmas lights on the ceiling and a stuffed Santa next to the coat rack by the front door. From the moment Mary entered, loud conversation all around rang in her ears but could not drown out the clinking glasses and ceramic bowls of pretzels and peanuts. It was a Bacchic revelry quite dissimilar to the loneliness Mary had previously found, and the good cheer uplifted her downcast spirits.
Sensing a congenial welcome with all this holiday celebration, Mary walked up to a man counting out coins at his table.
“Trick-or-treat, mister.”
The hunched-over man looked up at Mary, trying to understand the sight of this caped girl before him. He returned to his counting.
“Trick-or-treat, mister,” Mary repeated.
“Get lost.”
This unexpected Scrooge contradicted the spirited setting, and Mary stood there quite confused. But then from a nearby table, a voice like a toad trying to sing soprano slung its bow and shot an arrow at Mary as if hitting through a dozen axe heads.
“Come here, sweetie, come here.”
Mary turned and beheld a middle-aged woman with a pile of hair atop her hair to rival the length of her own face. She wore red lipstick and her large boobs rested on the table next to a glass of red wine.
“Oh, look at you, honey! Look at that costume. So ready for Christmas. Look, Lou! Look what we got!”
“God dammit, Louise!” said a man at the bar. “Give the kid a break!”
“Shut up, Harry! I know this kid. We’re like twins, right, honey? I used to be just like her – all cheeks and pony tails. Cutest thing in Queens!”
“Hanging out in bars even back then, eh, Louise?”
“Fuck you, Harry!” she said, but then with a smile, the toad disappeared and the soprano returned. “So sweet!”
The sounds within Auntie Noose’s Bar seemed not to match the festive sights Mary had first encountered and she looked to the door to see if Johnny or Carmine had entered to call off the whole thing.
“Come closer, sweetie,” said Louise, drawing Mary in by the hand. “Let me take a look at that dress.”
“Try it on, Louise!”
Louise swung her head toward the bar and shouted, “Fuck off!” She then turned to Mary and felt the material of the cape. “Oh, you’re so pretty. Just like me. Don’t pay any attention to those guys.”
From the corner of the bar, someone had made kissing sounds with his lips and Louise took it personally.
“God damn you’s guys! Can’t you see I’m talking to the little girl?” Regaining composure, Louise straightened out her blouse and said to Mary, “Never mind them, honey. Son of a bitch, he is.”
Mary felt like running away.
“What a pretty dress. What’s your name, honey?”
“Mary.”
“Mary. Such a pretty name. That’s a Christmas name, it is. Do you like Christmas, honey?”
“Uh, huh.”
Christmas bells on the handle of the front door rang as a man entered Auntie Noose’s and made his way over to sit at the bar. Seeing Mary in her costume and Louise stroking her hair, the man scrunched up his nose and picked from a bowl of peanuts.
“What the hell’s that kid doing here?” he asked the bartender.
“She wandered in. Thinks it’s Halloween or something.”
“What’d she order?”
“Nothing. She’s trick-or-treating, I guess.”
“Give her a fuckin’ calendar!”
The bartender leaned over the bar and addressed Mary.
“Hey, kid! You’re gonna have to leave. This ain’t no playground.”
Harry added, “Take Louise witch ya’!”
“Weren’t you ever a kid, Lou?” asked Louise.
Louise then mumbled “fuckin’ loser” so Mary wouldn’t hear but Mary heard.
Mary wondered if this would be a good time to say “trick-or-treat” and leave but the battle of words between these adults intimidated her.
“Now, Mary,” Louise continued, “you probably should be on your way. These damn drunks ain’t no place for a little princess like you. But you’re so pretty, honey. Just like me. Like a Christmas angel.”
The bartender was still watching Mary. Louise tried to stall Mary’s inevitable eviction.
“Where’s your manners, Lou?” she said to the bartender. “Can’t you offer Little Mary here some eggnog or something? Where’s your manners? Come on. It’s Christmas.”
“Ain’t got none.”
“Take this then, honey,” offered Louise. She took two dollars out of her deep brassiere and placed them inside Mary’s basket. “From Louise. Buy yourself a dolly or some skates. Now off you go, Mary. Merry Christmas, sweetheart.”
Instead of approaching any more of these people, Mary turned to exit and as she neared the door, she heard Louise still speaking.
“Just like me. Angel, she is, that one.”
“‘Cept she ain’t no drunk.”
“Fuck you!”
Mary stepped onto the wet pavement where Johnny and Carmine were waiting. Carmine, himself shivering, approached with Mary’s coat and helped her to bundle up. Johnny opened up Mary’s hand and found nothing.
“Nothin’, Mare!”
“No, I got it in the basket. See?”
Mary and Johnny looked inside at the two dollars. Johnny grabbed the money.
“That’s it? Dammit, Mare! What are you been doing in there?”
“Johnny, I try.”
“Let it go, Johnny!” Carmine defended.
“Let what go? Christmas? Christ! It’s the time for giving. She should be getting lots of cash! There ain’t nothing wrong here but the way she’s doin’ it!”
“Johnny, it’s not Halloween. These people probably aren’t used to seeing a kid in a costume asking for something. And besides, people usually give out candy at Halloween – not money.”
“Exactly, stunad’! That’s why this should be working. If they don’t got candy, then they’re gonna give money. That’s the plan!”
All three of the Bellaforchettas stood on Arthur Ave. angry and frustrated. Christmas was never a truly festive time for the family, especially with their parents usually at work and the family too poor to afford joyous gifts and relief from crippling fiscal burden. This year there was the nice five-foot fir tree in the living room but without colored lights and an angel on top, its presence brought little holiday cheer. Mary and Carmine had done their best to string it with tinsel and colored popcorn but the tree still stood quite destitute.
“Mary,” Johnny directed. “Mary, I want you to think that if we don’t make any money doin’ this, Mama and Papa are gonna have a rotten Christmas morning because we ain’t getting’ them nothin’.”
The cold December air began to slap Mary in the face and she wanted to cry. On the one hand, Johnny was so mean to her but on the other, she felt a tinge of comfort and belonging because here she was in the cold drizzle working on a project with her older brothers. She felt so many things at once: frightened of the bars and being out on the streets at night and safe in the Christmas company of her brothers. With their parents so often absent, at least the Bellaforchetta children had each other.
“One more, Mary?” Johnny asked.
Mary shook a little but knew that Johnny wasn’t really asking a question.
“Or else we got nothin’.”
Mary turned around to see Zio Pappelecco way down the street shivering all alone in the light rain.
“Alright, one more.”
The Bellaforchettas walked silently up the street until they reached an eastern section of the neighborhood unknown to Mary. The hardware store, the model train store, the shoe repair shop this far up Arthur Ave. – these places were not part of her familiar surroundings. But neither were the bars at night. And Mary now looked up to where Johnny had taken them, and without speaking, she prepared for one more uncomfortable experience and handed her coat over to Carmine. The long wooden sign above their heads read O’ Dizzie’s and Us Restaurant and Bar, and Mary took a deep breath, glanced at her brothers, and held tightly onto her basket.
And in she went.
Little Red Riding Hood had less trouble traversing the deep, dark woods than Mary had upon entering these smoky places with adults too drunk to fork out a dollar or two to a poor girl at Christmas. While she actually wanted to accommodate her brother’s scheme on earning some money to buy Christmas presents, Mary still longed to be back in her bedroom, out of the cold rain, and surrounded by her dolls and books and procured Christmas decorations. She had recently found a Nutcracker soldier in its original box next to a green Chevy parked on the street. Someone had just left it on the curb with some other moving boxes and Mary took it home because she had the perfect place for it by her window, and besides, she figured, she would put tinsel all around it and make it look Christmassy like no one else would ever be able to do.
The Nutcracker served as more than just a holiday decoration for Mary. It became her hiding place, and in its mouth, she stashed away little bracelets and bobby pins. Sometimes as she would sing “Jolly Old Saint Nicholas” to herself, she would lift the wooden handle on the back of the soldier to make its mouth open and pretend that Santa had brought her fancy jewelry and engagement rings. Her idea now was to hide her Christmas money in the Nutcracker’s mouth, and no one, not even bossy Johnny, would find it. Unfortunately, Johnny was not letting her keep any money to hide.
Maybe O’ Dizzie’s and Us would be different, she hoped. It sounded different, that’s for sure, which she noticed when stepping into the bar. Music was playing and Mary could identify Christmas songs like she had heard in the department store up on Tinton Ave. What she didn’t know at the time, though, was that her entrance was timed perfectly to Ray Conniff’s “Christmas Bride,” a tune which would become Mary’s favorite every December even years later as a mother and grandmother.
O’ Dizzie’s and Us dazzled Mary. Colored light bulbs hung from every corner of the bar and miniature Christmas trees in silver and pink and blue stuck out of emptied Chianti bottles on every table. A large felt “Ho Ho Ho” banner stretched out across the room and under it ran little children with cookies in their hands. This was quite a place, Mary thought – a bar for children. It suddenly donned on her, though, that this was some kind of private party because everyone seemed to know each other and there were about thirty people greeting an old woman at the head of a long table in the middle of the room. Mary suddenly felt very silly dressed up as Little Red Riding Hood, intruding in on this celebration. She knew it would be best to leave the bar but the party looked like so much fun that she couldn’t walk away.
A man carrying a bottle of wine brushed past Mary toward the old woman and addressed the crowd.
“Quiet! Quiet!” he yelled.
Conversations stopped and people turned to listen to the man.
“I want to thank you all first for coming tonight. Every one of you is in our hearts this year.”
A couple sitting nearest to Mary kissed each other and a little girl in a frilly dress jumped up onto the man’s lap.
“This is no ordinary Christmas as you all know,” the man continued. “This year marks the 80th birthday of my mama, Michelina Tortelli!”
The man raised his glass into the air and everyone followed. Cheers of congratulations poured forth and various people moved over to the old woman and kissed her on the cheek and forehead.
The man issuing the toast settled everyone down with his hands and continued by saying, “You are all a blessed part of the Tortelli family and we wish you the best and merriest Christmas this year of our mama’s 80th!”
Applause and whistling filled the room and Mary felt so good to be part of the celebration.
Then, the old woman slowly stood up from her chair and half leaning on the table, began to speak. The room went silent.
“God’s blessing,” the old woman said. “Tanks God for my bee-yoo-tee-ful son, Vincenzo.”
The old woman grabbed her son’s face in her hands and kissed him on the mouth and the room exploded in more applause, more kissing, and tanti auguri, which Mary recognized as “happy birthday.” The man looked like he was about to cry. Mary was in Christmas heaven.
But then the little girl sitting on the man’s lap in front of her turned around and pointed her finger at Mary.
“Daddy, what’s that?”
The man looked at Mary, shrugged his shoulders in puzzlement, and said, “bo.”
But his wife was not so indifferent. She slapped the shoulder of the old man next to her and said, “Peppy, who’s the kid?”
An old man with a toothpick in his mouth spun around to Mary, looked her up and down, and answered, “It’s Little Red Robin Hood.”
“Little Red Riding Hood!” corrected the little girl.
“I think it’s the Busalacchi girl,” the old man said. And then to Mary, “You’s Gina Busalacchi, right? Nick and Maria’s kid.”
Mary didn’t know what to say. She had never heard of these people.
“No, that ain’t Gina Busalacchi,” said the woman. “Gina Busalacchi’s twenty-five years old and pregnant again with Bobby Balistreri’s baby. This kid’s someone else.”
“Well, who are you, kid?” asked the old man.
Mary was too terrified to identify herself since she had no relation to these people and the awkwardness of standing there at this party where she truly didn’t belong spilled out of her as “trick-or-treat.”
Confusion furrowed the old man’s face.
“What the hell she say?” he asked.
“Just who are you, little girl?” asked the woman.
“Mary.”
“Mary Busalacchi?” considered the old man. “There ain’t no Mary Busalacchi.”
“Peppy, she’s not a Busalacchi. Who are your parents?” asked the woman.
Mary confessed in discomfort, “Sal and Teresa Bellaforchetta.”
“Who the hell’s they?” said the old man.
“They’re no one, Peppy,” answered the woman, now becoming quite annoyed. “Girl, are you supposed to be here?”
Fear overcame Mary. Why were these people picking on her? She wanted to run out of there but the old man leaned over the table and yelled out to Mama Tortelli, “Michelina, who the hell’s Bellaforchetta?”
The old woman did not understand the old man. She looked up at her son and said, “Che detto?”
The old man, as if to be better communicate, yelled even louder, “This kid says she’s a --.” He paused and asked again, “What’s you name?”
Mary was mortified but got out “Mary Bellaforchetta.”
The old man yelled, “Sherry Forchetta!”
The old woman shrugged her shoulders. Either she didn’t know the family or she hadn’t heard the question.
Poor Mary. This back-and-forth commotion reminded her of all the times this December she had pulled down on her Nutcracker’s handle while its mouth and big white teeth opened and closed, and at this moment standing inside O’ Dizzie’s and Us, Mary felt as if she were the one trapped inside its clenching jaws. Sometimes as she looked out her bedroom window at the rain or even the light snow falling on the fish guts lying in the gutter, Mary would involuntarily open and close the Nutcracker’s mouth and once she even snapped in half a plastic beaded anklet wrapped around the soldier’s teeth. Mary was now that shiny, conspicuous piece of jewelry caught between these two old, confused people.
Why did Christmas have to be so scary, thought Mary. And why wouldn’t her legs cooperate with her heart’s desire to flee?
“Little girl! Little girl!”
Someone at the end of the long table had called out to Mary, and when she turned, she saw the birthday woman herself summoning her with a beckoning finger.
“Come here.”
In accordance with a terrifying need to run (and run anywhere), Mary proceeded toward the old woman whose birthday celebration had gathered together this bombastic group. The woman resembled Louise from Auntie Noose’s: big hair, big boobs, big voice. But this one with her warm hands on Mary’s arms reminded Mary more of Mrs. Claus on Christmas Eve – and, best of all, without the drunken “fuck you’s” which had earlier spooked the jingle bells out of Mary.
“What is your name, sweet girl?”
“Mary.”
“Meddy, what are you doin’?”
“I’m trick-or-treating.”
“Bellissima, ragazz’! But you should be home with your mama and daddy.”
The old woman held up the Christmas tree skirt wrapped around Mary’s shoulders to admire the holiday costume and kissed Mary on the cheek.
“Meddy, I am Mama Tortelli, capito? You bring your mama and daddy to my pasticceria at the corner next week. Do you like cannoli, Meddy?”
“Oh, yes.”
“And maybe a rum cake for your daddy,” Mama Tortelli said. “Now you must go home, Meddy. You must go to be with them tonight.”
Mary was more than pleased to be released. This night of trick-or-treating had not gone well and strangers from all over had distressed her to no end. Maybe Johnny wasn’t such a good brother after all.
But before Mama Tortelli turned her out into the cold winter’s night, she shouted to her son Vincenzo to fill up the basket of this precious “Little Red Robin Hood.”
“Vinci, Vinci, piu, piu!” she instructed. “Give Meddy that pannetone!” And to Mary: “You like cannoli, Meddy? From my store, see? The most bee-you-tee-ful desserts in the village.”
Mama Tortelli’s family gathered around Mary, and with the old woman smiling in approval and kissing the cheeks of her grandchildren, she oversaw the abundance spilling into Mary’s basket.
The Tortelli family blessed Mary that Christmas evening with a basket overflowing with homemade cookies, cannoli, crispy pizzelles, and rum babas. Under the matriarch’s protection, Mary benefitted not with dollar bills but with sweet words and kind pastries. Christmas had arrived for Mary and as she stepped out of O’ Dizzie’s and Us and onto the wet pavement of Arthur Ave., a light snow began to fall on her red velvet shoulders. Tiny snowflakes touched her warm cheeks and powdered her basket of baked goods. Mary was proud to be seen so decorated in her Christmas costume with food to bring back home to her family, and the walk home through the dark forest of wolfish shoe shiners, packs of smoking stunades, and drunken bocciagalupes would not molest the Christmas blessings that danced in Mary’s head.
“Shit! What took you so long?” snapped Johnny, grabbing the basket and peering inside. “There better be over ten bucks in there!”
Johnny ran his paws through the pastries and upon finding nothing, shoved the basket back into Mary’s hands.
“Four bucks all night?” he screamed. “I coulda done a better job!”
Carmine wrapped Mary up in her winter coat but Mary refused.
“No, I don’t need it,” she said, pushing it away.
Carmine, deciding that Mary had had enough (that they all had had enough for that matter), took her by the arm and began walking briskly back down Arthur Ave. Three bars was the deal they had made with Johnny, and now that ten o’clock proved to be the time when only the worst of the faccia brutts populated the streets, Carmine saw to it that his little sister should be spared this trash. Johnny, incidentally, now showed little to no interest in his own plan and followed the two through the snowy night with his head down.
The three Bellaforchettas walked silently homeward. The scowl on Johnny’s face precluded any conversation, a stifling limitation that would cripple every significant relationship in his upcoming adult life. But on this winter’s night, the trick would be on him, for Mary and Carmine delighted in the sugary smells coming from the basket and imagined how happy their parents would be with such wonderful pastries for Christmas.
When the three Bellaforchettas approached Mt. Carmel Church, the baying laughter of Luis the shoe shiner echoed off the church’s façade and into the receiving ears of Johnny. He took the four dollars out of his pocket, making sure it was all there, and ran off toward Luis and two other Hispanics. There was no farewell; there was no acknowledgement; there was no turning back. Johnny was just gone. So Carmine and Mary continued to walk home without their older brother, the instigator of the evening’s failed money-making scheme. But Mary did turn around to take one last look. She saw Johnny laughing with his friends and smoking some kind of cigarette. Mary held tightly onto her basket and smiled at Carmine.
“You, okay, Mary?”
“Uh, huh.”
And Mary was okay. With Carmine at her side, Mary placed aside the horrors of the evening and delighted in the wintery snow now escorting them home. It was a light, fluffy snow that seemed to explode upon collision. Mary watched it coat Carmine’s dark hair, and under the outdoor colored Christmas lights of Mama Tortelli’s pastry shop, she thought her brother looked quite handsome and strong. But then, Mary did always enjoy the snow.

The wet snow on the branches of an overgrown pine tree splattered down upon the wooden eaves of the roof. The Van Hauser children jumped at the crash, and Sophie snuggled up closer to Barry on the sofa. The snow was falling outside, but in the warmth of the house, Papa had finished his story and sat looking at his grandchildren. With the lights of the tree blinking in the background, the children stared at Papa in silence.
Now, it would be preposterous to imagine that a man of Papa’s tact and erudition would relate such a vulgar story to such fine children as the Van Hausers without the learned gift of omission. One of Papa’s greatest talents, in fact, was the ability to think and not speak, so the story the kids actually heard was quite an abridged version (although Papa got a kick out of recalling to himself the verbatim narrative of chooches and stunades that he had known for almost forty years). Naturally, the story of Little Mary Bellaforchetta had made a frightening impact on the children, and the travails of Emmet Otter now seemed somewhat trivial in comparison.
A faint motorized sound filled the silence of the room. It came from the porcelain angel atop the illuminated Christmas tree and Sophie looked up to see its outstretched wings brush against the green needles. The lights of the tree twinkled off the silver tinsel and the angel’s wings retreated toward the automaton’s white gown.
“See how nice it is when the only sounds come from the falling snow outside,” Papa said.
Sophie considered the moving angel. She wished that she could go trick-or-treating as an angel for next Halloween.
“And we’re so warm and safe inside,” Papa added.
“But not Nonni!” protested Duncan. “She’s out there.”
The children looked toward the front door.
“Your grandmother’s fine. She’s used to the snow.”
Papa was correct. Nonni was used to the snow, but, still, who wants to stand in it as it gets in your eyes as you’re trying to manage bags of groceries? So Nonni, unable to retrieve her keys, rang the doorbell. The Van Hauser children flew off the sofa and ran to the front door. Barry got there first and yanked it open with the door knob hitting the wall. In the stark yellowness of the porch lights, the children beheld their grandmother’s eyes peering over supermarket bags. They could see that Nonni’s coat was covered in snow and when she entered the warm house, the children threw their arms around her cold clothes and welcomed her home with hugs and greetings. Barry and Bridget took the bags from her arms and they all followed Nonni into the kitchen.
Surrounded by blinking red, green, blue, and yellow, the perched angel continued to flap her wings and the motorized sight pleased Papa. He stood alone in the glowing quiet of the family room and gazed down at the wrapped presents for the kids under the tree. Nonni seemed to add ten more gifts each day during the Van Hausers’ visit. Zucchini bread may have ruined Christmas for Ron and Carol, Papa thought, but it certainly wasn’t going to mess it up here with Nonni around.
“It’s going to be a busy Christmas,” Papa said.
The multiple voices of laughter from the kitchen redirected Papa’s reflections and drew him to rejoin the others. He found the children helping Nonni unpack the groceries as she sorted out certain ingredients on the kitchen counter. Duncan was trying to get her attention by showing her a new judo kick with an “ahh!” and he nearly knocked out of her hands a small bag of candied fruit. Nonni placed the fruit next to some pistachio nuts which she then began to chop. Bridget opened up a carton of ricotta cheese for Nonni, and Barry collected the emptied plastic grocery bags and stuffed them into a Santa cozy behind the fridge. Sophie, singing a new song she had learned in school, stood next to Nonni and helped her measure out a tablespoon of vanilla.
There was no need for Papa to enter the kitchen and assist with Nonni’s holiday baking. Nonni had all the help she needed to make her special Christmas cannoli, and besides, with her loving grandchildren all around in the warm kitchen, Christmas had already come for Nonni.

Praying on Purple

I wrote this poem in honor of Pygmalion, who sculpted the perfect woman, fell in love with her, but suffered in the horrible truth that he had fallen for a mound of wax. Venus stepped in, however, and animated the clay and restored his faith in love -- kind of a weird myth.


Praying on Purple

Pygmalion had his Cyprian ivory,
praying on purple for wax and for flesh.
His Galatea concealed his art
with the blessings of beguiling foam from the sea.
A portent of sorrow he avoided.
No fired clay-gift like Pandora
breathed life from a lame workman
possessing of iron and metal
but of his violet-crowned beauty,
acceptor at holy feast.
Pygmalion owed his libations
to the Golden of the beautifully-fired chamber
and kissed Love as often as his chaste island sculpture.

Exogamy

(a poem in response to Minoan mythology)

Exogamy

Still I lie awake with preoccupations of love
for doomed Phaedra and her savaged son,
far too distant from Crete to drop the spear,
the lair, the knife, the net, to catch and kill
and stop the terrible fate of Minos’ iniquitous house.
Amazonian blood yet flows at Troezen
and traps the daughter of a bull-lover.