Page 138 of Ruthless Sin
The Cajun lilt is full. The pretense is gone.
I cross the kitchen. She pulls the stool out from the island. I sit.
She turns to the stove. Pours warm milk into a mug. Slices bread. Sets both in front of me.
“Eat. Drink. You don’t gotta want it. The body still gotta have it.”
I look at the milk. I don’t pick it up.
She sits across from me. Reaches across the marble. Puts her hand on mine.
“Mon p’tit cœur.Look at me.” My little heart.
I look at her.
“My mama died when I was younger than you,” she says. “I thought I would not survive it. I told myself,pauvre p’tite, you don’t get to lay down. Not today.”
I don’t answer.
“You think you don’t get to lay down neither. Not yet. Maybe one day. Not yet.”
Her hand on mine is warm. Steady.
The last time a woman touched my hand without wanting something from it, I was small enough that I can’t name the year. This is just — a hand. Old and warm and patient, pressing down on mine with no requirement attached.
My tears come quietly. I don’t fight them.
“Your mama. Your sister. They love you,chère. That don’t die when they do. That stays. You carry it. You carry them. You let them be in the room with you.”
My throat closes. The tears come again. Quiet. Steady.
She doesn’t wipe them or reach for me beyond her hand on mine.
“I lost Lucia,” she says. “Niccolò’s Mama. Cancer took her. Slow. I helped care for her at the end. She died in this house and I didn’t get up for weeks. Weeks I lay in that bed and Salvatore brought me food and I didn’t eat it.”
She pauses.
“Then I lost Salvatore. He never got up after Lucia. He carried it for years and then he was gone too. Two losses in this kitchen. I thought I would not survive either one.”
She squeezes my hand.
“I got up because his babies needed somebody who could stand. I’m tellin’ you that not to ask you to stand for nobody but yourself. I’m tellin’ you because the body does get up. Even when you don’t want it to.”
I’m crying harder now. Not loud. Steady. Tears running down my face into the milk.
“Ma fille.Drink.”
I lift the mug. I drink.
Warm. Sweet. Honey in it. Real cream.
She slides the bread closer.
“Eat.”
I eat. Half. Then the rest. I haven’t put this much food in my body in days.
Nonna doesn’t say good or reward me. She just keeps her hand on mine while I eat.
