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Giusy’s halo of massive black curls was obvious in the front row. She turned back to look at me along with the rest of the room, all of them clearly waiting for “the American” to arrive. Giusy was a vision in a perfectly fitting white suit with a low-cut black blouse beneath, her boobs pushed up to within inches of her chin. A gold chain, its links the size of quarters, hugged her neck like a dog collar. She strutted down the aisle in impossibly high red heels while carrying a matching bright red cane in her right hand, which she tapped onto the stone floor in a staccato symphony as she approached me. The sound of the cane reminded me of Agata’s story about what happened to Giusy’s husband, Giusy’s furbezza, her devious intelligence. Giusy would do whatever it took to survive, and I knew I should never forget that.
I still allowed her to take my elbow and escort me to her row like a reluctant bride. She was the only friend I had in this town.
I sat between Giusy and Raguzzo, the notaio. He offered me a smile, his braces gleaming in the fluorescent lighting. In the aisle behind us, I spotted the men who assaulted me the other day, Armani Belt and his slob of a friend.
When I sat down he whispered: “Porca puttana.” I didn’t turn.
“He called you a pig slut,” Giusy translated for me.
“Yes, I know,” I hissed back, adding, “Why didn’t you tell me your cousin owned that land?”
Her eyes widened in mock innocence. “I thought I told you.”
“You didn’t.”
“You must have forgotten.”
“I didn’t.”
Giusy turned to her cousin with a wide smile and a flick of her fingers beneath her chin. “Vaffanculo a chi t’è morto.” Then she said to me, “I told him to go screw his dead relatives.”
“Aren’t they your relatives too?”
“I meant he could screw the relatives on the other side of the family. You look good. Did you get a tan?”
“I got some sun. You look spectacular.”
“I know. So that man, right there.” Giusy pointed to the front of the room. “The little one shaped like an avocado. He is the mayor.” Giusy gave a wave to the mayor by wiggling the same four fingers that she had previously used to tell the other men to fuck off. The mayor walked to the podium, where a young woman, a secretary who appeared to be barely out of high school, brought a wooden box for him to stand on so that he could reach the microphone.
He cleared his throat and greeted the crowd before bowing his head.
“He’s so dramatic. He’s praying,” Giusy said.
Once he was finished blessing us, the mayor spoke in a mixture of Italian and dialect that would have been difficult for me to follow if Giusy didn’t provide a steady stream of narration.
“The land just below the village containing the remains of the old abbey and village hospital is under consideration for purchase by Sheikh Khalid Al-Falih.” She pointed to the group of Middle Eastern men across the aisle from us. Four of them wore gray suits, white shirts, and ties. They sat confidently with their hands in their laps. They flanked a fifth man in a long flowing robe with a red-and-white-checked scarf over his head—the sheikh, I assumed.
“The mayor is saying that the sheikh is looking to purchase the land in addition to the adjoining parcel in order to build a new seven-star resort with a golf course and a spa that will bring tourism to the region and save us all.”
“That’s what he said?”
“Essentially. Most of the land belongs to the Puglisi family, that donkey fucker sitting behind us.”
“Your cousin. What’s his actual name?”
“Antonino. But we call him Nino. Now the mayor says the other parcel of land in question may belong to you. He says the town council will decide if you are the rightful owner and if you are allowed to sell it to the sheikh.”
Nino and his compatriot stood up and walked to the podium. His friend kept his mirrored aviator sunglasses on and clutched a bulge in his belt that I knew was his gun, as if he might have to prevent an attack at any moment. I would have laughed if everyone else in the room were not so deadly serious and silent.
“Nino is saying the land has always been in his family, since the very early days of this village,” Giusy said once her cousin began speaking. “He says they defended it against invaders from far and wide. The Normans, the Germans.”
“And you thought the mayor was dramatic.”
“Sicilian men are so emotional. Haven’t you seen the Italian soccer team when they’re playing in the World Cup? Always falling to the ground and crying. Women do not have time for that kind of emotion. We have too much to do. Now my cousin is saying that he welcomes the partnership with our Arab brothers, the kind of friendly alliance that will usher in the rebirth of Sicilian commerce and tourism. Who wrote this for him? He says we cannot allow an American capitalist to come in and steal land rightfully belonging to a Sicilian. He says your deed is fake, that you created it on a computer with Photoshop and that you are nothing but a scammer and a fraud.”
In the wake of this character assassination all eyes in the room fell squarely on me, most of them narrowed into slits.
“Don’t worry,” Giusy whispered. “We will get our chance to speak.”
