Guido opened his mouth to speak, but it was Brando who answered, his tone subdued, but the jingle in his hands told me that he was irritated to the point of anger. “Vincenzo is Guido’s older brother.”
Guido nodded, confirming this new tidbit of information.
“I see,” was all I said as we came closer to the villa. Vincenzo was a touchy subject at that moment.
I almost breathed a sigh of relief when Chiara and Donato came out of the main entrance, standing at the top of the stairs. Friendly faces. Chiara waved at us, beckoning us forward. The diamond eternity band on her left hand caught the sun, sending out short bursts of light.
Donato briefed the men on a few things—the meetings were still on, though the times had changed, and the villa was going to be packed, though the place could accommodate all of us, and would. “It is Mamma’s birthday this weekend,” he reminded the group as he opened the door for us to enter. “She will be ninety-four.”
Internally, I seized up. The woman that went only by Mamma was the current matriarch of the Faustifamiglia. Marzio’s mother had two sisters, Mamma being one of them, along with Maria. The two who were still alive were rarely seen without the other. All three of them were the daughters of a real Sicilian princess, hence the expansive villa standing tall and regal before us. Marzio’s mother’s family was one of Italy’s most noble, with roots dating back to 325 AD, when Roman Emperor Constantine the Great reigned. Their ancestor was mentioned in some sort ofdecretus.
I had found Maria to be sociable enough at Marzio’s funeral, under the circumstances, but Mamma (whose real name Aunt Lola had told me was Maddalena) could tear you to shreds with her shrewd eyes.
She didn’t care for me.
Brando, though, was her favorite—and she had no qualms about making it known either.
This, Aunt Lola had also told me, stemmed back to Marzio and Luca. They were also her darlings. When Luca had been incarcerated, she wept for months. Meeting Brando had seemed to restore her to some degree—she felt eighty again, not one hundred!
Mamma and Maria were as shriveled as raisins, and I couldn’t help thinking that Mamma’s heart resembled the same. I often tried to imagine Mamma when she was younger, but it was hard for me to imagine the woman as being beautiful in her youth. I wasn’t sure if eyes could change. Hers were sharp and piercing, unless you were a favorite. Then, and only then, a glimpse of some kindness could be caught.
She didn’t even like Aunt Lola.
“She tolerates me,” Aunt Lola had whispered in my ear at Marzio’s funeral. “She fussed over Marzio as she fussed over Luca. Brought them all the best gifts!Ah!” She had made a dismissive noise, the memory of her brother getting the best gifts still hurtful to the child inside. “I think this is because my Mamma was a stunning woman. I resemble her.”
Brando released his hold on me while he and his brothers went to Mamma andZiaMaria, embracing their aunts. He knew the woman made me anxious. Rosaria and Chiara dallied in the back with me, not wanting to approach her until we absolutely had to.
The villa seemed even grander from the inside. Vaulted ceilings with frescos, angels on high painted, resembling heaven instead of a mere roof over a home. Marble floors. The furniture and decor was antique, but possessed an old-world charm that was more inviting than overwhelming.
I wished the same could be said for the woman pinching my husband’s cheeks. She wasn’t going to let me pass without getting a dig in. Her perpetually suspicious eyes flicked to me every so often, probably to make sure I wasn’t venturing too far in—perhaps she thought my sticky fingers were going to pocket the good silver in my oversized bag.
“Brando! Brando! Brando!” she exclaimed with a thick Italian accent, almost in a loud song. Then she fussed over his hair, his face, pinching at him again. She ordered an older woman—an aunt or cousin—to fix him a plate of food becausehe looked too thin. For a man of his size, he needed to eat! Was he sick?
“Here it comes,” Chiara muttered in my ear.
“You are still married toher.” Mamma nodded at me, and then lapsed into a branch of Italian that was foreign to me. However,she is not Italiano, she does not know how to cook, how to feed you, this is the reason you are so thin!is what I had gathered she said.
Sicilian was the language spoken in Sicily, and I didn’t always understand it, though sometimes I caught the gist of it. It also varied from village to village, each dialect different in each region, which made it harder to keep up.
Mamma called Brandobidduzza, which Donato had once told me meantbeautiful.
“This is no good!” she said in broken English. “You eat. I have the woman to feed you!”
My attention snapped to. She called for a woman named Rosa, who had on a tight flowered housedress—it was clear she had been cooking, her spoon was tucked into her pocket—and was attractive and young. When she caught sight of Brando, she quickly started to fix her hair.
“No good,” Romeo said, coming to stand between Chiara and me. “I gave her a bracelet once and she said it was not good enough.”
“What?” I said, glancing at him. His face was close to impassive, but I could tell he was replaying the scene in his mind. “Shedidn’t.”
“Shedid.” He grinned. “Hard to please. Whines a lot.Romeo,” he said in a low voice, but high enough to make it nasally and whiny. “I want! I want! I want!” He stamped his foot against the marble. “She is like another woman we know that shall not be named. Her last name is…Caffi,” he coughed out.
“Did you like her?” Chiara asked him.
“No. Rocco attempted to arrange our marriage. I told him unless he wanted to bury her or me directly after vows were spoken, my answer was a firm no. That was a marriage that would lead to murder. I would have begged her to stab me in the ear after a day or two.Romeo,” he whined again.
The four of us turned to look at Rocco. We laughed when he glanced at us, and then back to his aunts, and then back to us again. He rolled his eyes,rolled his eyes, when he realized we were laughing at him. Only a Fausti man could pull off an eye roll and still make it look tough.
Mamma shoved Rosa in front of Brando. Rosa fixed her hair once more. She had a demure face, with long lashes that she knew how to fan.
