After he’d told me that, I’d spoken to my wife more passionately than ever before, loud enough that the famiglias of other patients cast me dirty looks, but I couldn’t have cared less. If my farfalla needed me to scream at her for motivation, then I would do it. And I did. To no avail.
The only silver lining that remained to me was that Lucia had not miscarried. They’d been anticipating it heavily on those initial forty-eight hours, but when she showed no bleeding or other signs, they’d become cautiously optimistic. I clung to that sliver of hope as if it were the last ounce of water I had while stranded in the desert. It was all I had.
And yet, I didn’t want that to rescue our baby from Lucia’s womb like some ancient artifact excavation. I needed her to wake and to become an active participant. Although I’d had a wonderful mother, I’d grown up most of my life without her, and I’d felt the damage that had caused. I wanted better for this baby. I also knew that if I had to do this alone, there was no way I could ever be enough. What if the darkness in me crept into this child, warping and twisting it? I didn’t want this baby to grow up only to break its mother’s heart.
After the second week passed, Angelo came into the hospital. They’d moved Lucia into an adjacent wing to the ICU, a location where they could maintain her constantly while taking her out of the hotbed of beeps and incessant noise. I’d been pleased by this when they’d told me. Excited to regain a bit of peace. But this backfired on me. All the muted quiet only served to remind me that I hadn’t heard Lucia’s voice in far too long.
When my father entered her room, I didn’t acknowledge him. Apparently, this pissed him off.
“I have had enough of this. You have been neglecting your duties, and I won’t stand for it anymore.”
In the past, I might have punched him. Or at least shared an explosive argument with him. But my priorities had transformed so much that when he made his threat, I simply let him.
“Don’t then,” I said, favoring him with my gaze but also stroking Lucia’s hand.
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t stand for it. Disown me. Make Marcello the heir. Go open a MacDonald’s, if you want. I. Don’t. Care.”
“You are a Cavetti. You have a legacy to uphold, and I’m not going to allow you to squander it on a woman who’s essentially garden mulch.”
The sheer callousness of his words knifed through me, leaving me full of holes. And yet, I’d come close to being him. The thought was sobering. If the worst-case scenario did come to pass, I knew in that instant that I had to choose to be better than him. If Lucia died and our baby lived, I had to provide that child with a healthier, more compassionate role model than the one I’d been given. Even if that meant walking away from everything I knew.
“That is not your decision to make,” I told him, imminently sedated.
“Like hell it’s not.”
“No,” my voice grew a backbone of steel. “The decision that’s open to you is whether you’ll be patient enough to let me do whatever needs to be done for Lucia. That’s the only one you have where she is concerned. And this will go one of two ways. Either you will back off and give me space and time to see how her condition bears out, or you I will leave you and the famiglia behind forever and start over on my own.”
Then, I delivered my next and most persuasive blow. “Just remember that you have been using me as your main business lifeline for years. I know everything. I know where all the offshore accounts are hidden. I know the accounts numbers and how many funds each of them contains. I know what the secret caches of the Bonifacios are and how to access those, as well. I know the workers in every warehouse and manufacturing facility we own by name. I know how to collect the chemicals, make and refine each of the ingredients necessary to create every product we sell. So if you want to dump me, your most valuable asset, the one person you’ve invested in the most, Father, feel free. Because I’ll be staying right here.”
I turned back to the love of my life then, shutting out Angelo for good. And though he did knock over a table by the door which held a stack of metal kidney-shaped trays, causing quite a clatter, I maintained my vigil.
I would maintain it from now until eternity, if necessary.
29
Lucia
I had been through a few traumatic instances in my nineteen years, but not one of them was as simultaneously frustrating and enlightening as being in a coma. Everything existed as a duality. I was both aware and unaware, awake and asleep, able to see the living but able to interact only with the dead.
My hospital had been crowded. In the chair sat my anguished and dedicated husband, showing me new depths to his spirit and soul by the minute. If I had ever doubted that this man had turned over a new leaf, or that he might not love me as much as he claimed to, those weeks in a coma had provided a mountain of evidence to the contrary. He would talk to me nonstop, and I adored hearing his voice. It was such a balm to me.
Even if more than once I also witnessed him just barely avoiding an emotional breakdown. He’d skirt right there next to the cliff, but he’d fight his grief back without giving into it. Stuff that despair right back into its hiding place. I was dying to hug him. Or to say something to him. Or even to twitch my thumb so he knew I could hear him. But I wasn't capable of doing any of those things.
Not a one.
Giorgio also popped into my room on occasion, as did the twins. But their stays were short because Romeo consistently monopolized me. I couldn’t blame him. If our roles had been reversed, I would’ve done the same. Wild horses couldn’t have dragged me away. This might’ve seemed selfish of him—and maybe it was—but he was also the one I most wanted.
Having Antonio, Mama and Papa in my room felt even more otherworldly. Perhaps because they’d already left this world. It had felt so ordinary seeing them there. Papa had stood on my right side, while Antonio and Mama had stood by my left next to Romeo’s forlorn chair. We opened up long-winded discussions anytime Romeo fell silent. Antonio would tell me stories he remembered about me growing up.
My brother reminded me of the chess games he would engage in with Giorgio where I would play the winner. He told me not to worry about him, and that while his death had not been pleasant, now he was at perfect ease. It gave me great solace to know that. Mama was similar. She told me she loved me and was proud of the woman I was becoming. Of the three of my lost family members, it was her I missed the most.
And yet, now I knew they weren’t missing at all.
Papa remained the most reticent. Of the three, my relationship with him had been the most uneven and the most fraught. He’d used me as a pawn rather than loving me purely as his daughter. Papa was also the only one who refused to stand next to my husband, but considering Romeo had been the one to shoot him, I couldn’t say I minded.
But as much of a gift as it had been to have additional conversations with those I had loved and lost, watching Romeo going downhill without being able to help was driving me crazy. I tried to force my mouth to speak and even a millimeter of my body to move. But I couldn’t. It was like attempting to drive a car from the backseat. I could suggest and even demand all day long, but since my hands weren’t on the wheel and my feet weren’t on the pedals, it did no good.