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THREE
EIGHT GIRLS, ONE THING ON THEIR MINDS
Lea
I returned to the little brown house on Hughes Street soon after dark. It wasn’t much different from other houses in Belmont, most of them wedged between townhomes and apartment buildings exactly like ours was. It was full of mismatched furniture my grandparents had been collecting since they married in the late fifties, the cream-colored walls scattered with old family portraits, religious iconography, and the occasional “beautiful scene” Nonna sometimes found at the mall and had framed. The wood floors were scuffed, the rugs faded, and there was always a pile of jumbled shoes near the front door.
But it was true home, safe and warm. And considering that I still remembered what it was like not to have one, I was grateful every time I stepped inside.
I hung my jacket on the hooks next to the front door and removed my sneakers before making my way through the living room and down the narrow hall leading to the kitchen and dining room, where I could hear my sisters’ ever-present squabbling.
“Was he there?” Nonna asked once she spotted me.
Sofia Cirino Zola was in her favorite place—the kitchen—cleaning up from dinner while three of my younger sisters did homework at the dining room table.
In some ways, my grandmother was as much of a rebel as any of her grandkids when it came to disobeying the head of the Zola household. When Nonno informed us that he was helping Father Deflorio rehabilitate another parolee and that we were under no circumstances allowed to visit the garage until he had ascertained the guy’s character, she and I had glanced at each other with the mutual understanding of two rebellious good Samaritans. As soon as Nonno called to let her know he had to chauffeur tonight, she wrapped up a plate of ziti and sent me over to feed the newest stray.
I wasn’t afraid. I never was. Father Deflorio wouldn’t have sent anyone capable of real harm to the garage, and even if they were, no one would dare harm Mattias Zola’s family. Not in Belmont. My grandpa was an institution here.
I rounded the kitchen counter to deliver a kiss to my grandmother’s not-yet-wrinkled cheek. Sofia Zola was a black-haired beauty in her youth, and honestly, I couldn’t see much of a difference even though she was going to turn sixty later this year. Her hair—still black, even if it was dyed—was never out of place, her nails were always done, and I had never seen her wear sneakers unless she was out walking with friends. On top of her beauty, she did all the things a nice Italian wife was supposed to do: raised her son (and then his children), took everyone to church, cooked up a storm, and loved her husband. My grandpa was a very fortunate man, and so were the rest of us.
The example was a little hard to live up to, though.
“He was there,” I said. “His name is Michael. I don’t know why Nonno is always so worried. Father Deflorio never sends him anything but pussycats, and this one is no different.”
My skin prickled at the lie. I hadn’t sensed that Michael Scarrone would ever hurt me. But the way his dark-eyed gaze had raked over my body and left a trail of goose bumps in its wake had felt anything but safe.
“Mimi, gimme that! I want to draw stars this time!”
“No, I need it for my math, though! Otherwise, they’ll all be in different colors.”
“Please, like that matters. You won’t get the answers right anyway.”
My sisters took up one end of the oval-shaped dining table on the other side of the room as they scuffled over their homework. It was a familiar nightly scene at the Zola household: six-year-old Joni and seven-year-old Marie bickering over who got to use the pink pen while Frankie, only a few years older, served as the de facto babysitter. Our other sister, Kate, was probably avoiding dish duty in our shared bedroom. The other missing family member was my older brother, Matthew, who only came home to sleep now that he was in college at CUNY and otherwise working full time.
“Gattinas!” Nonna barked from the sink. “Joni, wait. Marie will be done in a few minutes, and then you can use the pink pen after her.”
Frankie looked relieved when she spotted me, clearly hoping for some assistance. I shook my head. Frankie was finally old enough to help, so now it was her turn to share the load.
“Let me,” I said, gently pushing my grandmother away from the sink. “If we finish by six, you can have a nightcap while Kate and I get the girls to bed.”
I pulled on a pair of rubber gloves to scrub the ziti pan while Nonna scoured the stove. It was a nightly routine, helping her like this. We all took turns, but I did it more than the others. I couldn’t have said why—maybe as the oldest girl, it sort of felt like my place. It was one way I could give back to them for all they had done over the years.
After our father was killed in a drunk driving accident with our mother behind the wheel, you could say the family was broken. They weren’t exactly model parents before that, but after Dad died, Mami checked out for good. Once Nonna caught Matthew and me skipping school to sneak food from her pantry to feed the babies, that was it. She brought us home with her that night, and two weeks later, the courts made it legal after our father went to heaven, our mother to prison. We’d been here ever since.
That was almost six years ago, only six months after Joni was born. Now we had a real family. A whole family.
Did I think my grandparents’ house was perfect? No. My nonno couldn’t use a vacuum cleaner if his life depended on it, and I was pretty sure he’d never cleaned a single dish. Sometimes, they fought like cats and dogs. And then made up just as loudly when they thought the rest of us were asleep.
But it was a hell of a lot better than some of the other families I saw. Half my friends’ parents had never been married. Too many others had never even met one of their parents. We honestly had it pretty good, watching Mattias and Sofia Zola’s sweet, old-fashioned love story in this chaotic little house.
How many times had I heard the story of how, in 1957, Mattias Zola had spotted his future wife from across the subway platform, ridden the train with her all the way to Brooklyn, where she worked, and then waited for six hours to escort her back to the Bronx? All to get a few hours with her.
He’d fallen in love at first sight. She’d fallen soon after. And neither of them had ever looked back.
It was a far cry from my parents’ story—people I didn’t think had ever wanted to fall in love, much less raise a family of eight together. They had met at a similarly young age but had gotten married only after Mami got pregnant with my brother. She was six months pregnant when Nonno dragged his only son down the aisle to do the honorable thing. The other five of us came after, probably the results of more drunken nights where someone was too drunk to remember a condom.
Accidents, all of us—or so my mother would yell when she was too hungover to think straight. Sometimes, she even cursed herself for falling for a no-good lout who would never amount to anything. Daddy tried to get back on the wagon a few times, but he’d always fall off again to appease her. Drink, get pregnant, have another baby, misery, drink. Rinse and repeat until you drink yourself right into an accident where you kill your husband and the couple in the other car, then land yourself in prison for your third DUI and three counts of vehicular homicide.
