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As if this were a common occurrence, Maureen finished washing her hands at the sink and reached to the cabinet below, just beside the window cleaner and dish detergent, and pulled out a bottle of Irish whiskey.
Colleen found a cup quickly and filled the glass with two fingers then threw it down the hatch. “Christ that’s good.”
“Hello, Mary. How are you today?” Maureen shouted at the small Italian woman.
The little woman, whose hair was blacker than onyx turned to her sharply and said, “Do you believe the doctor still cannot find a damn thing wrong with me?” She told Maureen, outraged. “I have been through a’fifty-five exams and they cannot find a damn thing.”
“Be grateful for your health, Mom,” Colleen groaned.
“Health! What health? I wake up feeling as if I have been dragged by a pack of mules. What healthy woman wakes up a’feeling like a’that?”
“Yer not ill. Yer old!” Morai snapped, appearing equally as irritated as her daughter Colleen.
Samantha actually shied away when she saw the look the little Italian shot Morai. “Who are you calling old?”
“You! You got bollocks in your ears?”
The other woman shouting a stream of Italian at Morai and Morai, appearing to understand every word of it, puffed up her chest and shouted back, “Sod off! Yer older than me, ye’are. Look at ye, visitin’ every chemist in town tryin’ to ken the antidote for agin’. I’ll tell ye it now, Mary, like I’ve told ye before. It’s grace and ye got about as much in ye as a stone. Quit yer bellyaching and get on with it like the rest of us and stop actin’ like a gobshite!”
“Oh dear,” Maureen muttered, reaching for the whiskey her sister was still holding.
“Vaffanculo!”the Italian woman shrilled.
Samantha wasn’t sure what the word meant, but she knew it was bad.
Luckily, Colleen stepped forward calmly and said, “That’s enough now. Mum, go back to what you were doin’ and Mary, why don’t you start heating the gravy?”
Mary the Italian pressed her red lips together and pulled in a tight breath, but reached into the bag Colleen carried in with her and yanked out an old apron, the kind that looked like a smock and buttoned up the shoulders.
The angry Italian continued to mutter in disgruntled Italian, but pulled a large pot from the cabinet to cook with. She seemed to be playing the martyr, commenting here and there about what a bother it was to cook for a bunch of unsophisticated Irish palates, yet needing to provide her services so there was something decent for everyone to eat.
Sam stood watching, afraid to move and perhaps be noticed by the angry woman, as she lifted a huge jar of red sauce onto the counter and began spooning it into a large pot.
“I’ll tell you what the problem is, I’ll tell you,” Italian Mary mumbled. “You are just bitter, Mary, that Arthur sat next to me in church.”
“Sat next to ye, aye? Are ye out of yer bloody mind? Ye gave him no choice shoving yer boney arse down the pew until he was wedged against the rail. Arthur is a gentle man and ye frighten him with yer pushy ways.”
“You gotta’ know how to treat a man. That’s your mistake. Men like being a’told what to do. And I’d rather be boney than built like an ox!”
Colleen and Maureen fit unbaked piecrust to two pie tins and were having their own conversation as if the women were not about to kill one another again. Morai came over to where Sam was sitting and began collecting the peeled apples and slicing them precisely with nary a look to where the blade landed.
“I may be built like an ox, but yer the one who acts like ye were raised in a barn.”
The sound of a metal spoon being forcibly dropped onto the counter filled the kitchen. Mary the Italian turned, mouth open, prepared to fire at Irish Mary, but suddenly stilled when her gaze fell on Samantha.Not good.
“Who are you?” She pointed accusingly at Sam.
Maureen dusted off her hands on a rag and came to stand beside Sam as if her presence could somehow protect her. “This is Samantha, Mary,” she shouted. “She’s Braydon’s friend from college.”
Italian Mary frowned as she thought about Sam’s orientation to the family and then her expression changed entirely, morphing into a painted red smile and glad eyes. She clapped her hands together happily, her knotty knuckles decorated with fancy ruby rings and gold bands.
“Braydon’s friend you say? How a’wonderful! Come here child and let Nonna have a look at you!”
“Better go,” Colleen mumbled and Sam stood to slowly walk to the little woman.
Italian Mary clasped her hands in her own, her jewelry clacking together like teeth.
“Aren’t you just beautiful!” she said in a thick Italian lilt.
