The Possibilities of Sainthood Read online

  “Gram! Sshhh,” I pleaded, giving her a meaningful look. “You’re not helping.” Gram had lived with Mom and me in the apartment above the family store since Dad died when I was seven. She was partly to blame for my saint obsessions. Her bedroom was filled with icons, mass cards, and pillar-candle shrines. A glass-domed porcelain baby Jesus dressed as a king with a big fancy crown and flowing red robes—the Infant of Prague—sat center stage on her bureau. Gram’s room was like a shrine.

  “And after you find those socks you are going to unroll that skirt until I can’t see even an inch of thigh!” Mom stepped toward me as if she was going to do the uniform adjustment herself.

  “Ma! Seriously. I’ll fix everything when I get to school,” I said, but my pleas were futile. She was staring at my waist with the look of a bull about to charge. “Nobody else goes to school in uniform. You should see Veronica and Concetta . . .” Concetta was Veronica’s sister, the middle child of my wicked trio of cousins. Francesca was the third and the oldest.

  “I don’t care about your cousins and that is your aunt Silvia’s business if she wants to let her daughters leave the house half-naked.”

  My mother had gone to a Catholic girls’ school, too—starting in sixth grade, when her family immigrated from Napoli—and in every picture she’s in textbook uniform: sensible brown shoes, kneesocks stretched until the threads are about to snap, plaid skirt lengthened to below the knee, so that bare skin is totally hidden, long-sleeved oxford shirt buttoned up to her chin. My mother always looked perfect and virginal. I might be technically virginal, but that didn’t mean I needed to look that way.

  All Normal Catholic Schoolgirls had creative ways of sluttifying our pure-as-the-driven-snow required attire.

  Catholic Girl’s Guide to Uniform Alteration

  1. Most important is rolling your skirt so that it is a virtual mini (you keep folding it over at the waistband).

  The key to successful skirt rolling is to be sure your Catholic pleated plaid is already hemmed at least two inches above the knee. Otherwise, if you have to fold it over, like, twenty times at the waist, you end up looking as if you’ve got a serious amount of extra inches around the middle. Not attractive. If you have a mother like mine who insists on skirts at least to the knee, then you have several possible options: get out the ironing board and iron the desired hem, then either tape said hem or carefully safety-pin it all around the bottom, ideally so that none of the pins show through to the front. Why not just pull out a needle and thread and hem it for real? Because you always need to be prepared for emergency hem-letting-down when your mother wonders why your skirt seems so short. If she realizes you illegally hemmed it, getting grounded is almost inevitable.

  2. The question of boxer shorts: to wear or not to wear boxer shorts underneath your skirt?

  Catholic mothers across the nation hate this trend of girls wearing boxers even more so than the rolling up of the plaid. Preferably, you should buy your own boxers. It’s weird to steal from Dad, though some girls do it. I don’t know when or who started the boxers craze, but it’s been going on for as long as I’ve been at Catholic school (which is always). To be honest, I don’t know why wearing boxers is cool, because sometimes, frankly, it looks kind of bad, but we do it anyway. Still, depending on how much you want the boys to see, boxers are a good preventive measure for the accidental flashing factor.

  3. Legs: as bare as possible. Wear socks only when you are made to, and when wearing them, make sure they are scrunched down to the ankles. Never, I repeat, never wear tights.

  4. Standard white oxford: ideally two buttons undone and never buttoned all the way to the neck. Cute, tight-fitting tank top underneath for before and after school when you are hanging out in the parking lot.

  The tank top allows you to remove the required oxford entirely if you so choose and transform yourself into the ideal sexy Catholic schoolgirl that every Catholic schoolboy wants to go out with. Note: Never ever let your mother or teacher/principal see you in just a tank top or you’ll be in trouble for sure.

  “In my day, the nuns used to measure our skirts!” My mother waved her right hand as she launched into her familiar uniform lecture. I dropped my backpack onto the dark tile of our foyer. It made a satisfying thump when it hit the floor and I struck my best here-we-go-again pose, which involved some hip-jutting, impatient sighing, and foot-tapping. “We had to kneel down on the floor, and if the hem didn’t touch the ground we were sent home.”

  Oh, the drama.

  “Yeah, Ma. I know. You’ve told me. Like eighty times.”

  “You don’t learn to dress like a respectful Labella girl soon and I’m going to make you kneel down every morning before leaving the house to measure your skirt! You just wait.” Her hand buzzed around her like a fly. “If your father were still alive . . .”

  “Don’t even go there, Ma” I said, interrupting, feeling hurt that she would pull the Dad card. “If Dad were around he’d spend more time telling me to have a good day and less time freaking out over stupid things like whether or not I am wearing socks and the exact length of my uniform skirt.”

  “No respect,” she muttered. “You used to be such a nice little girl. What did I do wrong? O Madonna!”

  I sat down with a huff in an old wooden chair to put on my green socks. Anything to get Mom off my back and myself out the door. I said a quick prayer to St. Denis, the Patron Saint Against Strife and Headaches, for added assistance (who, incidentally, is usually portrayed holding his head in his hands because he was, well, beheaded, and therefore the perfect poster boy for people worrying about headaches).

  “St. Agnes, help this child,” my mother rambled on, under her breath. St. Agnes is the Patron Saint of Bodily Purity and Chastity, and one of her favorites.

  “Pull. Them. Up. Antonia.” Mom didn’t like the fact that I’d squished my kneesocks down to my ankles. She was in front of me now with hands on hips, her “Kiss the Cook” apron tied around her middle. Dad gave it to her for Christmas one year. She always wore it. There was a smear of flour on her face, which meant she’d been making pasta. She got up at ungodly hours to make it from scratch.

  Time to raise the white flag, I decided, stretching my socks to my knees. I stood up and marched toward the door, hoping to get out without any further assaults on my attire.

  I had to give Mom credit on at least one count: despite the psychotic behavior, no one else could make pasta like she did. A few pinches of this, a little bit of that, some flour, eggs, and poof! It was like magic. The whole state of Rhode Island pretty much agreed with me, or at least our neighborhood did—Federal Hill, where my family opened Labella’s Market more than three decades ago. Between the tourists looking for “authentic Italian” and the neighborhood regulars, we almost couldn’t keep my mother’s pasta in stock. She inherited that amazing Italian cooking intuition: knowing when whatever you’re cooking has “just enough” of this and “just enough” of that. The key to good pasta is “just knowing” the right feel of the dough. There are people in this world who’ve only had pasta from a cardboard box, who have never felt the warm, soft, floury ball of dough before it is rolled out to be cut. I am sad for these people. When it is made just right, pasta dough is as soft as a down pillow. And despite Mom’s constant chastising, I admit that seeing a smear of flour across her forehead gave me a thrill. There was nothing, nothing like Mom’s fresh homemade pasta.

  “Antonia! You’ll be at the store at four p.m. sharp, eh?”

  “How could I forget, Ma? I have to be there every day, same time.”

  “I don’t want Francesca working by herself. She always confuses the pepper biscuits with the tarallucci, stupid girl.”

  “Mom, Francesca can’t help the fact that she’s a total airhead.” I couldn’t help agreeing with her about that particular branch of our family tree. I opened the door and felt the cool air that signaled freedom.

  “Be there at four,” my mother said, unable to resist another reminder. />
  “I’m leaving, Mother.”

  “Four!”

  I was almost outside when I heard an angry “Antonia!” I froze, afraid to turn around. “Yes, Mother?”

  “What do we do before leaving the house?”

  I took a step back.

  “Sorry, Mom, I forgot.” I sighed, dipping my finger in the bowl of holy water Mom kept by the doorway and crossing myself.

  “You may forget Jesus, Antonia, but he never forgets you!”

  “Okay, Ma.”

  She was out of control.

  “Bye, Ma,” I yelled, exasperated, marching down the stairs and out the side door of Labella’s Market without looking back at the giant sign that advertised where we lived. And cooked. And grew figs.

  3

  I RUN INTO MICHAEL, THE PSEUDO-ARCHANGEL, WHO IS SO NOT ANGELIC

  You’re probably thinking that I don’t get along with my mother, but that’s not exactly true. It isn’t that Mom and I have a bad relationship. We really love each other and I know she’d walk to the ends of the earth for me if she had to and all that and vice versa as far as I’m concerned. It’s just that ours is a typical Italian mother-daughter relationship.

  The Top Five Ways Italians Express Love

  1. By always being totally honest with one another, i.e., fighting.

  2. Occasionally we scream at each other, which, for Italians, especially between family members, is how you express the fierceness of your love for the other person.

  3. Imparting guilt is another popular sign of affection: making someone feel bad about skipping Sunday Mass or admonishing your daughter for not making wise decisions about her outfits and potentially embarrassing the entire family, which, of course, she would never want to do.

  4. Intense bodily animation, most commonly articulated through incessant talking at the person you love without giving them a chance to get a word in edgewise while at the same time gesticulating wildly with your hands.

  5. Eating each other’s food. And lots of it. Ideally until you can’t get up from your chair. Nothing says love to an Italian more than an overfull stomach.

  I thought about this, wondering if these lessons in love had scarred me somehow, as I hurried down Atwells Avenue. My books bounced against my back, a reminder that I still had to finish my algebra homework before first period. A gold Mustang raced by, laughter spilling out its open windows. Concetta was driving and Veronica sat on the passenger side. It never occurred to them to offer their poor, only-child cousin a ride to school. I waited at the corner of Atwells and Murphy for a walk signal.

  “Antonia! Hello! Over here!” a familiar voice called out.

  “Hi, Mrs. B,” I said, turning to wave. I couldn’t pass our neighbor Mrs. Bevalaqua without a quick hello. Mrs. B had been in a wheelchair because of arthritis for as long as I could remember. She was out catching the last rays of fall sun on her front porch. In full makeup, I might add.

  “How are you, carina?” Carina is Italian for “dear one.”

  “I’m fine,” I said, a little out of breath from leaping up the old wooden staircase. Mrs. B took my hand, squeezing hard. Hers felt bony and brittle. It was spotted with age and blue-gray veins webbed through her skin. Mrs. Bevalaqua’s first name was Cecilia, which also was the name of the Patron Saint of Singers and Music, a fitting title for a former opera soprano. Though Mrs. B hadn’t been able to sing for years now.

  “Do you want a cough drop? I’ve got your favorite flavor,” I said, pulling a lemon one from my bag with my free hand.

  “You’re such a nice girl, thank you,” she said, smiling, her pink lipstick cracking across her lips. She took the cough drop and slipped it into the pocket of her thick brown cardigan.

  “Tell that to my mother next time you see her, Mrs. Bevalaqua.”

  “Don’t worry, I will, carina. Go on now. I know you need to get to school, but you are sweet to always stop by.” She gave my hand a final squeeze before letting go.

  “I’ll see you later,” I said, heading down the stairs two at a time, when suddenly I stopped. Why, I wasn’t sure. I ran back up to Mrs. Bevalaqua, sitting there in her wheelchair, dressed to the nines as if she were waiting for a date to take her dancing, and my heart filled with what—sorrow, sympathy, helplessness? I bent down and gave her a soft, quick kiss on the cheek. “It’s going to be okay,” I whispered, and was down the stairs again in a flash, bag strung across my shoulders.

  “Your mother already has my list,” Mrs. Bevalaqua called out, referring to the grocery request she’d phoned in at the beginning of the week that I would deliver tonight. “You think there is a fig or two left or are they all gone?”

  “I’ll see what I can do, okay? We might have something hidden in the kitchen. Have a nice day, Mrs. B,” I said, walking backward, waving goodbye until the trees blocked her from view.

  A cool breeze picked up, blowing my hair so that I had to keep beating it back from my eyes and mouth, hoping it wouldn’t be a tangled mess by the time I got to school. I prayed to Mary Magdalen, the Patron Saint of Hairstylists, for help, but it wasn’t doing any good. (Yes, that Mary Magdalen.) The fall chill reminded me of the daunting task I had ahead of me this weekend: burying the famous Labella fig trees in the backyard. It would take all day Saturday to prune the thin lattice of branches that hung low around the trunks and almost all day Sunday (not to mention the help of half the neighborhood) to bend what was left of the trees’ sturdier but still pliable limbs until they reached the ground. Imagine a person touching their toes with their fingertips, but replace the person with two beautiful old trees reaching their oldest, thickest branches all the way to the soil beneath, a position they would have to endure for an entire season filled with ice and snow. That’s basically what it meant to winterize the fig trees, with the final touch of burying them underneath a mountain of canvas and cardboard to protect them from the winter weather until, come springtime, they would yawn and stretch and burst with figs once again.

  Sounds poetic, I suppose, but it was a lot of work. Which was also why a Patron Saint of Figs was a great idea.

  “Antonia, Antonia!” Little Billy Bruno barreled out the front door of his family’s town house. “See,” he said, pointing to his elbow, where the outline of a Band-Aid was still visible. The skin inside the rectangle was as good as new. “It’s better already!”

  “Well, look at that!” I said, laughing. “I told you I could kiss it and make it better.”

  “You did. It doesn’t hurt at all now!”

  “Billy, Antonia needs to get to school.” Mrs. Bruno appeared on her front porch.

  “Hi, Mrs. Bruno,” I called out, watching as Billy disappeared back into the house as quickly as he’d come out.

  “Thank you for taking care of Billy when he fell yesterday,” she said. “He was practically healed by dinnertime. It was so strange . . .”

  “Well, you know how kids are . . . crying one minute and fine the next,” I said out loud, but inside I was thanking good old St. Amalburga, the Patron Saint Against Arm Pain and Bruising, for her help with Billy. “See you later.”

  Bright leaves—yellow and red and orange ones—fell like confetti from the trees lining the sidewalks as I passed through the heart of Federal Hill, near Our Lady of Loreto, the church where my mother met my father back when she was still a Goglia, not a Labella. She was just fifteen at the time and a member of the youth group Dad ran two evenings a week. It was all very scandalous—that my dad was fraternizing with a girl he was supposed to be leading away from sin, not toward it. I loved to remind Mom that I was now the same age she was when they started dating. This did not change her opinion about when I could start dating, however.

  I hurried by Jimmy’s Bike Shop, Russo’s Grocery (our competition and therefore a place that no one in my family was allowed to patronize), and Antonio’s Restaurant, supposedly the best Italian restaurant in all of Federal Hill (they served our homemade pasta, of course). Two old men from the neighborhood were sit
ting outside at a metal table playing a game of chess, sipping tiny cups of espresso.

  “Antonia, bella,” Mr. Montasero said as I passed. He was about to pick up his queen. “How’s Amalia Lucia?”

  “She’s good. Making pasta as usual,” I answered without slowing down.

  People were always asking about my mother, Amalia Lucia, always using both of her names. (All three of us—Mom, Gram, and I—had the same middle name, Lucia, which means “light” in Italian and which made the feast day of St. Lucia, the Patron Saint of Light, particularly special in our family.) Ma was kind of a small-town celebrity because of her cooking. Everybody knew her. And everybody thought she was the greatest. Of course, I had a more nuanced opinion about the woman who disagreed with my dress code, barely let me out after dark, kept me slaving away on a daily basis at the market or otherwise saddled me with something store-related, usually along the lines of food preparation. “Antonia! I need help making the eggplant! Where are you going?” she would yell. Or, “Antonia, will you help me roll out this pasta dough for the lasagna?” Or, “Antonia, tonight I am going to teach you how to make the braciola (pronounced like “bra” + “shawl” with a tinge of a z sound when you say the “sh” part and you always drop the final a) because if I die tomorrow this recipe dies with me and then what would you cook for your children? Tell me! What? What!”

  My hand bumped along the fence bordering the park where my best friend, Maria, had kissed John Cronin a few weeks ago after a dance. It must have been romantic—the streetlamps giving off a soft glow, the two of them flirting, pushing each other on the swings, both knowing the evening was certain to end with a kiss. At least that’s how Maria told the story. I was at home with Mom and Grandma making meatballs for a sauce at the time, a slightly less romantic evening. The only kiss awaiting me was a good-night peck on the cheek from Gram when I wandered off to bed, smelling of meat and olive oil and simmering tomatoes.

  You’d think I’d be chubby from all the food, but unlike the other women in my family I’m pretty skinny. I didn’t inherit the massive Labella family bosoms like Mom and Grandma either. Even my three cousins got them, while I am particularly lacking in the boob area. The only substantial thing about me is the thick black curls that hang all the way to the middle of my back. Keeping my hair under control was almost as difficult as keeping fig trees alive through the winter, which, by the way, is exactly why the world needs a Patron Saint of Figs and Fig Trees, ASAP.