Page 9 of Mafia Queen
Before the bullet, the error is the first ache in my chest. Then I see Gia, and the pain bursts through me. The heat. The pressure. The life pushed out of my lungs in a blast of air. I feel myself go flat and weightless.
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I am in a shroud of noise. It’s everywhere, like God. Thick as all my sins against Him. Loud as the crunch of a footstep to the insect it’s about to crush.
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Falling backward into the pool, the last thing I see is Violetta in the window with her mouth open. I can’t hear her, but I know she’s screaming from a different time, a distant place, tying the spaces between us with her voice. But then all I see is sky.
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When I see Gia pointing a gun at me in my own house, I understand their plan. In that moment between when I drop my gun and step back, it’s so clear I could write a book on it.
If I’m dead before Violetta collects her inheritance, Damiano can marry her, and he will have access to it.
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I go down with empty lungs. Face up. White foam closing off my route to Violetta.
Though I know what’s happened, who did it, and why, my body takes a breath before I shout to my wife.
Wait for me.
I’ll be there. I’ll come. I’ll swim. I’ll crawl. I’ll fly on wings of fire.
My lungs fill with water. It’s excruciating. My limbs jerk, but my mouth forgets and breathes and breathes. The water sucks me down into solid silence, and I breathe liquid because I have no choice. I will die unredeemed.
My last thought is that Violetta was right.
This all could have been avoided if I’d outlawed‘mbasciatathe moment I saw her cry.
* * *
It all flashesbefore me so fast, I have time to remember everything.
My mother is sad, then she is happy. Her hair is tied back, but half of it has escaped already. I follow her up a mountain. Vesuvius. She’s going to heal herself at the opening of a dead volcano. It’s been days uphill, grasping at rocks and scrub, and we’re barely a quarter of the way. I am hungry.
Paola visits me in a place with many children. She promises to take me home one day. Then she keeps that promise.
Mario sleeping on the couch. Fighting with his wife about how much I eat.
The street. Damiano. The oranges. Mario blames me for the mess.
I open my best friend’s face. Blood everywhere. I’m in trouble, but my uncle stops yelling. He pats my head.
Emilio pats my shoulder. He says I have a certain something, then he steals it for his own purposes. I will marry his daughter to protect his interests. Then I am at his funeral, and I have to keep the promise he made for me. I’ve been sold for it, and I know I’m worthless because Emilio is a stingy man.
Violetta in the hallway. Part of me shifts. I never understand what it means, because Rosetta is crying. The boy cries when I kill him. Rosetta cries in relief when I give her the ring. I’ve made someone happy and soon—dead.
I can’t stop thinking about what I stole from the girl in the hallway, then I marry her, and I fuck her, and I love her. I protect her. Shield her. I make her life about me and what I can do for her. She won’t understand. She fights and resists. But she loves me anyway.
And now there’s light everywhere, and I know I am forgiven.
I am clean. My God, I am clean.
This is what they mean when they say your sins are wiped away.
I wish Violetta could know this. I’m not a devil. I’ll never be good enough for her, but I have a chance to not be bad for her.
