Death 5 Rape （Marriage） #27
They went to mass at the Basilique Notre-Dame—a cathedral, the meaning of which word Stella finally understood.
The building was bigger than the emigrant ship Countess of Savoy, its distant ceiling supported by muscular piles of swooping stone.
Stella would have happily sat through a second mass so she could continue staring at the sparkling stained glass.
After the mass, as they ate lunch on the Rue Notre-Dame, Carmelo told Stella about the great cathedrals of Italy, the inspiration of all church architecture. “This cathedral is beautiful,” he told her. “But Stella, ours are ten times more beautiful.”
She could not imagine even the Vatican more opulent. “You’ve seen them?”
“Only the cathedral in Genoa. When I was fourteen, the afternoon before I got on the ship to come here.” He was squinting in the sun. “It is very old, Stella, eight hundred years old. Like nothing they have in the Americas.” He paused. “I hope it is still there. After the bombs.”
A sentimental man. Stella looked down at the crumbs of her sandwich.
“But Rome,” he said after a moment, his voice clear again. “The Vatican, St. Peter’s—they are the most magnificent in the world, certo. We’ll go there someday. We’ll walk through St. Peter’s together.”
Carmelo was wrong. They never would.
THAT SECOND EVENING OF THEIR HONEYMOON, Stella and Carmelo went to see a movie with Carmela and Paolo at a cinema that looked like a palace.
There was only one movie in English, a love story about two pianists.
Stella didn’t understand the fast-talking actors, but the movie was full of wonderful music.
On the walk back to their hotel, Carmelo took Stella’s hand in his, and the anxiety she had set aside for the entire beautiful day came rushing back to her.
She had let her guard down, she had been kind to him—how would she say no to him now?
She was almost hyperventilating as Carmelo fumbled with the hotel key.
Still wearing her winter coat, she rushed to the drawer into which she had unpacked her clothing, scooped it all up and locked herself in the bathroom, as was her custom.
Sucking calming breaths through her mouth, she assembled a night outfit for herself: her long-sleeved honeymoon nightgown over a pair of long underwear bottoms. She had the latter because Za Filomena had given her a married lady tip a few weeks before the wedding: when Filomena wanted to signal to Zu Aldo that it wasn’t a good day for her, she wore long underwear to bed to indicate there would be no access down there for him.
“It’s not a problem anymore, now that we’re old and I went through my change,” Za Filomena had confided, “but when I was younger I sometimes put them on even when I wasn’t bleeding, if I just didn’t want to be bothered that day.
” Stella had made sure to include three pairs of long underwear with her final trousseau.
There wasn’t much else with which she could armor herself, although Stella had the notion to pull a girdle over the long underwear, which made her pelvis feel protected.
It would be quite a lot of work for anyone to get through—impossible without her cooperation, she thought.
All right. That was the best she could do.
“I am very, very tired,” Stella announced as she stepped out of the bathroom.
She was alarmed to see Carmelo wore only his trousers and a sleeveless white undershirt.
The contours of his torso, revealed for her now, reminded her of her father’s; he had large, smoothly muscled arms, the arms of a strong man who would become stocky, not stringy, with age.
Stella’s mouth was dry and her girdle throbbing. “I—I am very tired,” she said again. Her voice sounded weak. She hated herself. “I am going to sleep.”
“Stella—” Carmelo began.
“Good night,” she said, and turned off the light.
Fearfully, Stella peeled the covers back in the darkness and tucked herself in. For good measure, she took the pillow out from under her head and put it between them in the middle of the bed.
No sound came from where Carmelo stood, and at first Stella was afraid she had failed to track him in the dark over the pounding of her heartbeat, which splashed over her eardrums like unrelenting waves against the hull of a boat.
But after a long time he gave a noisy sigh, and she heard him undo his belt buckle and step out of his pants.
She was paralyzed by panic, waiting to see if he was going to respect her or if he would try to touch her anyway, for the terrifying period until finally, finally she heard him snore.
She lay in the dark, her head flat on the mattress and her ankles throbbing from walking the cobblestone streets in her heeled shoes, and felt her heart race. It was an immeasurable amount of time, hours, before she fell asleep.
ON TUESDAY, SHE NEEDED TO ESCALATE HER EFFORTS. She had come too close yesterday. Today she would have to be mean, to pick fights, to go out of her way to repel him.
She’d been so nervous even when she was asleep that she had woken with the first light of dawn and dressed defensively.
In that meditative silence of morning, she’d hit on the idea that if the honeymoon went poorly enough, Carmelo might return her to her family when they got back to Hartford.
If the marriage wasn’t consummated, it could be annulled.
There was a shred of hope—she just had to make him hate her.
For this third day of their honeymoon, Carmelo had arranged a surprise for Stella: he had hired a horse-drawn carriage to take them around the city.
As they rode in silence, staring out opposite sides at the quaint streets and parks, Stella imagined Carmelo’s internal monologue of disappointment, having wasted a week’s salary on this silly experience his new wife refused to enjoy.
She savored her own bad mood, nurturing her grievances and resentments, hoping that Carmelo would catch her malignance like a poisoned wind.
The day dragged, and even Carmelo was deflated in the face of Stella’s sullenness.
But the worst, for everyone, was yet to come, at dinner with the Martinos.
Carmela’s warm, solicitous chattering made Stella’s head spin.
She needed to clip any budding blossom of friendship Carmela perceived between them.
Stella refused to speak throughout the meal, ignoring questions and avoiding eye contact.
Her most hostile behaviors were thwarted, though, by Carmelo, who shamelessly covered up for her, laughing and telling weak jokes, apologizing profusely to Carmela and Paolo for subjecting poor Stella to such a tiring day.
Not enough damage was being done; Stella had to foment her aggression.
The opportunity came just after the arrival of the main course. Carmela was saying to her brother, “It is hard for us to get time off, but we will come and visit you in Hartford when you have a baby. I hope it’s soon.”
This was Stella’s moment. Here she had the tools to be nasty. “I don’t really see why,” she said, surprising everyone with the bell-clear sound of her voice, “you’re so interested in our future children when you haven’t done the work of having your own.”
The moment of silence stretched so long even Stella, the author of it, felt disoriented. Paolo looked down at his plate.
“We’ve been trying since we got married,” Carmela said. The habitual warmth was gone from her voice. “I . . . I have had bad luck so far. But God knows what’s best.”
“Bad luck?” Stella put down her fork. Mean, she was going to be mean. Her stomach clenched in anticipation, in warning. She opened her mouth and willed the words out. “It’s true God knows what’s best. Maybe God doesn’t think you deserve to be a mother.”
“Stella,” Carmelo said. He was shocked, his eyes wide. “How can you say that?” She knew that he was thinking of Tina, whose face Stella banished from her mind.
“I just think it’s rude,” Stella said, loudly enough that the tables around them hushed.
She fixed Carmela with a stare, narrowing her eyes so that she would not accidentally blink or look away.
“Attacking us with questions about our children. Some people need to learn to mind their own cazzi.” Stella was glad for the low lighting, because she couldn’t make herself use that vulgar expression without feeling her face heat up—she’d never said it out loud before, only heard her father and Joey use it. But it had the desired effect.
Carmela had turned to Paolo, her face haggard as an old woman’s. “Is it all right if we leave?” She didn’t wait for an answer, dropping her cloth napkin over her plate as she rose from her chair. Paolo was standing, too, pulling out his wallet as Carmela headed toward the coat check.
Carmelo stood in protest. “Paolo, please don’t, we’ll be fine.”
“No, no,” Paolo said, his voice as soft and unprepossessing as ever. “Please, allow me. Carmela only means well.”
Carmelo tried to fend off Paolo’s generosity, but Paolo dropped bills on the table and followed his wife out the door.
Carmelo stood as if dazed. Stella’s heart was pounding, her ears throbbing.
They would have been hot to the touch, she knew.
Some of the other diners were openly staring.
Stella consoled herself that most of those French-speaking people probably had no idea how awful she’d been.
She ate a small piece of her pork, trying to appreciate the flavor.
When Carmelo took his seat again, he was silent for several minutes. Stella persevered with her pork, but she had to cut tiny bites and chew them many times. Her stomach was tender, almost sore, because of what she’d done.
“Let’s go, Stella,” Carmelo said finally.
“No,” she said, making her voice brash and disrespectful. She couldn’t look at him. “Why should we waste all this expensive food? That doesn’t make any sense.”