My mamma had been raised with brothers. I’d heard her story many times throughout my life, and until now, I’d never paid much attention to it. It was only a story. My uncles were all thrilled with the possibility of adventure and action. They couldn’t stay home when war and the defense of Italy to them were so sacred. Only two of them ever returned home. Her precious Michaele, her most intelligent brother Giacomo, and her eldest, the laughing Franco; all gone forever. I was going to leave her, just like her brothers had done. And now I would take that same path, adding pain to her life.
Mamma held her head so high she could have worn a crown upon it. She jerked her palm away from my father’s worn hand, picked up the broken comb, and walked past both of us. She swept up the stairs without a word, never looking back at either of us. The fight was finished, and I knew she had not surrendered one inch.
I understood now what Father Sabastiani had meant about Mamma. He didn’t want to betray my mother. She would hold him responsible, and that truly was serious business. The room we sat in changed when she walked away, as if all life had been sucked out of it. The air grew stale and quiet as my father and I sat in silence.
He didn’t expect my mother to alter her decision, and he didn’t try to change my mind either. We sat together in quiet and watched the fireplace spark. Small twigs sizzled as first one ember, and then another flared and joined the shadowland of burnt ash.