Daisy Peonia Mary Parker
July, 2025
Castello dell’Fiero, Calabria, Italy
The first few days at the villa were pure hell.
I spent my nights in a cold sweat, always on the verge of a panic attack the moment the lights went out. Alone in the dark, I felt exactly as I had when I was at the psychiatric hospital. It was as if the nurses were circling my bed again, ready to trap me inside my own mind with medication that left me unable to react. Aunt Lizzie had had me committed to prevent the worst from happening, to save my life, but the truth was that I lived through horrors in that place.
The nurses and doctors always thought that the medication was enough to keep me unconscious long enough not to understand their conversations or remember them, yet they couldn’t have been more wrong. I heard everything, unable toreact. The jokes they made about us. The horrible things they said. My skin still crawled when I recalled the clinical director’s words. ‘When your roommate is discharged, I’m going to have some fun with that little pussy.’ Fortunately, my roommate, a depressed woman who had lost her son in a school shooting, wasn’t discharged before me. Moreover, I believed that with the pain she carried, it was quite likely she’d still be there to this day.
Even so, even with her in the room, I spent my time in the hospital fighting the medication, and every night, when the lights went out, I forced myself to stay awake, afraid the medical director might show up. My skin prickled at the thought of being touched, of not being able to defend myself. I’d never had the courage to tell Aunt Lizzie about the incident, not even Olivia. They believed the hospital was the best thing that had ever happened to me, but the truth was that my recovery came from fear, not medication or therapy.
After being discharged, I had never been able to sleep alone in a house again. If Aunt Lizzie wasn’t under the same roof, or someone else I could trust, I’d spiral into paranoia. I imagined the medical director and the nurses somehow breaking into the house and subjecting me to the most heinous things. And I never dared to tell anyone about that fear of mine, until Camillo Vicari took me to that place.
Being locked up in his house in Mississippi hadn’t seemed terrible to me, even though common sense assured me it should have been. Camillo Vicari didn’t scare me—not in a creepy, disgusting way. But as soon as he told me that there, at the villa, I would be staying in a separate house, alone, the panic was toomuch and I couldn’t keep my secret. Unfortunately, he didn’t take pity on me at all. According to his mafia mindset, I had to face my fears, so that’s what I did for the first four days.
Amid copious tears in the early hours of the morning, wrapped in the sheets, I managed to survive the nights at Castello dell’Fiero. It was a struggle, but I did it. I used to think about my aunt, Oliver, and Liv, of what would happen to them if I showed weakness. And I also remembered Lester, and that night twelve years ago…
Fear controlled me once, and made me lose everything. I swore to myself that would never happen again.
It was my fifth day in Italy.
I opened my eyes with difficulty, feeling them dry, as if I had sand under my eyelids, and I touched my face, realizing how swollen it still was from the night’s crying. I stared at the walls painted a shade of salmon pink, managing to make out the white tulle curtains and the shape of the window.
The day was breaking.
I turned over in the modest double bed and reached out toward one of the chipped wooden nightstands, grabbing an old-fashioned alarm clock. From the clock hands, as much as the dim light in the room allowed, I could tell it was already a little past six in the morning.
I lay back in bed, taking a deep breath with the alarm clock pressed against my chest and my gaze fixed on the wooden-beamed ceiling. With no sound other than the steady tick-tock, I allowed myself to absorb the world beyond those walls. Birdswere chirping melodies heard only at dawn, and the cicadas were already joining the party, heralding a hot day.
Rolling over once more in bed and rubbing my face against the pillow dampened by the night’s tears, I inhaled the clean, sun-dried scent of the sheets. Despite everything, I was finding small pleasures in my stay. Especially when it came to nature.
Southern Italy was more beautiful than postcards could ever capture. There was always something in the air that lulled you, and a tranquility that even the little birds seemed to enjoy. The vegetation there mingled with rock and hills, made up of twisted trees with wrinkled faces, rustling bushes, and cacti stretching as far as the eye could see. Then there were the herds of goats and sheep that always seemed cheerful despite the fate that awaited them.
Just like me.
Every day, things got easier.
I supposed my soon-to-be murderer, Mr. Mafioso, was right. We were all going to die; some of us just hadn’t realized it yet.
I set the red alarm clock back on the nightstand and got up, pulling back the curtains and opening the window and the shutters. The sun hadn’t risen yet, but light was already flooding the garden and the air was warm. I took a deep breath and smiled, my hands resting on the windowsill as I enjoyed the scent of the citrus and laurel trees. The garden was full of orange, tangerine, and lemon trees, as well as laurels, and in front of the little house stood a full-grown laurel tree, while nextto my bedroom window a modest lemon tree graced me with its presence.
I went back inside, closing the little window behind me, and pulled the oversized T-shirt off my body. It wasn’t mine, and the owner probably hadn’t even noticed it was gone. I smiled mischievously at the sight of it crumpled on the bed.
It could have been worse. I could have decided to wipe my butt on all of my captor’s T-shirts, but no. I was a very polite, very demure prisoner. During the daily cleaning I did at the villa, I took the opportunity to steal a T-shirt from him to sleep in. Just that. A small, little pleasure in the form of theft.
I washed my body under an archaic shower. It was a plastic fixture, yellowed by age and marked with rust, hanging on the wall in front of me. Its stream of water barely covered my whole body, forcing me to twist awkwardly to wash myself properly, yet I didn’t complain. Everything there was old, but I found a certain charm in it. Sometimes, I even caught myself imagining the former housekeeper—surely some lonely old Italian lady—knitting at dusk and heating tea every morning, and I felt a pang of something between tenderness and pity, realizing that even the white bathroom tiles, chipped in several places, were evidence of her time there.
The clock was already striking half past six, so I went out into the garden wearing white overalls and, underneath them, a pink strappy top. As I always did, I chose comfortable shoes. A simple pair of white sneakers. There was one thing I couldn’t complain about: my kidnapper, except when it came to pajamas, had stocked my closet quite generously.
With my hands in the pockets of my overalls and my hair loose, tossed by a passing breeze, I took long strides across the grass, winding my way past the trees that dotted it, and headed toward the far end of the garden, which ended at a small stone wall.
Papa…
My father’s face filled my mind the moment my eyes met the clear sky. Whether in the United States, Italy, or China, during a storm or on the most beautiful day, I would always wait for dawn, for as long as I lived. Because I was certain that my Papa was with me in all those moments.
The first rays of sunlight pierced the blue sky, and it didn’t take long for the immense golden orb to rise before me. As hard as it was for me to admit, the sunrise in Calabria was probably the most beautiful I had ever seen in my entire life.
