The Complete Series

by Angela Scipioni

  It pains me enormously to admit that the time has come to sever the branch, lest your disease spread to the entire tree.

  Gregorio

  Iris placed a hand over her mouth to stifle her cry. After so many years of trying to conform to Gregorio’s idea of a good wife, of believing that making him happy was enough to make her happy, of thinking he would wither up and die if she ever left him - and now he was simply axing her out of his life, out of his home, out of his family? Everyone said a good, clean cut would be less painful, but what did anyone know about her? Spasms gripped her gut, sending her rushing back down the hall to the bathroom. She sat on the same toilet she had sat on for years, the same one Gregorio had used that morning, as tears streamed down her cheeks, and her womb sloughed off its waste. She wept at the sight of the “Anestesia Oggi” magazine on the windowsill; and at Gregorio’s razor and shaving cream and deodorant and dental floss and toothbrush staring at her from the shelf, reminding her that whether or not she thought of him, whether or not she wanted him, whether or not she was there, Gregorio was carrying on with his life. She sat there until her body had been voided and her tears cried. She opened the medicine cabinet in search of a tampon, and found her side had been cleaned out: There was no trace of a wife in this bathroom.

  She staggered to the living room, dazed by the rapidity with which the life she had managed to keep glued together for so many years, had fallen apart and its pieces been swept away. She stopped to stroke Zenzero, snoozing contentedly on a chair; she wished she could take her away with her, but knew that if she were a cat, she would prefer to stay, too.

  She reached behind the sofa and grabbed her dust-covered guitar, then headed out the door and down the stairs, juggling luggage and instrument, past and present, pain and relief, regrets and dreams. She managed to squeeze her suitcases into the Seicento, but had to open the sunroof to accommodate the guitar. Maybe the drizzle would not turn to rain like the forecast said; all she could do was hope. Iris looked back at the house that had (not) been her home for so many years, and could have sworn she saw Isabella peeking out from her upstairs window.

  As she drove through the gate, she noticed that the lilac bush she had planted by the entrance to remind her of her faraway birthplace was no longer there.

  6. Lily

  “If you ever need to establish cruel and unusual punishment later on - as part of divorce proceedings, for example,” Lily’s mother had told her after the initial Family Court hearing, “having documentation in your medical chart is priceless.” Of course, a doctor’s visit might also be in order simply because you’d been through hell and might need a little extra care and attention.

  Lily’s check-up resulted in a diagnosis of anxiety disorder, and a prescription with a name that Lily could only remember as “Xanadu” and that was supposed to “take the edge off,” although since she was living her entire life on the edge these days, she wondered exactly what effect it might produce. She had the prescription filled and then tucked the small brown bottle into the back of the medicine chest, behind her diaphragm, relegating both of them to the “just in case” shelf, since the use of either would be, at the least, imprudent at this stage of the game. Being diagnosed as needing medication due to the abuse would work in Lily’s favor with regard to divorce proceedings. Actually being on the medication could quite possibly work against her in matters regarding the children. Lily was determined to get through this without the little brown bottle. Even if it killed her.

  Donna’s friendship had been one of the few things that had managed to traverse the rickety bridge from Lily’s perilous past to her fragile present. Lily’s life had been basted together at the seam by her visits.

  “Can you believe this weather?” said Donna. She stepped onto the mat in Lily’s foyer and pounded the snow from her boots. Wishes chomped at the snow with a snuff. Donna’s rosy cheeks and cheerful smile reminded Lily of Mrs. Claus, and of Christmas, which was rapidly approaching. With it, there would be demands to make cookies, shop for presents, decorate, and pressure to wax on about joy, peace, and love. Blah, blah, blah.

  “Oh,” said Lily, from her spot on the couch. “Is it snowing?”

  “Old man winter is upon us!” said Donna.

  Lily parted the drapes with her fingertips. The bright reflection of snow stung her eyes. “Ugh,” she said, letting the drapes fall closed again. “I hate snow.”

  “Lily, in the summer you hated the heat,” said Donna. “Last month, you hated all the rain we had. It’s not the weather, you know. Anyone can see that you have a case of good ol’ depression. It’s plain as day.”

  Donna scurried about the living room, first picking up a cup with a dried film of milk in the bottom from the coffee table, then an empty can of Diet Coke and three granola bar wrappers from the computer desk, and finally an ashtray overflowing with crushed Merit UltraLight butts sucked down to the filter.

  “Donna, really,” said Lily with as much compunction as she could muster. “Don’t do that. I can take care of it.”

  “Hush now,” said Donna. “I don’t need you to do a thing ‘cept stay out of my way, do you hear me?”

  Lily happily acquiesced. Who cared about the house anyway?

  Lily peeked out through the drapes again to see the mail truck roll by. “I’ll go get the mail,” she said hoisting herself from the couch. “That’ll keep me outta your hair for a minute or two.”

  Lily pulled on her snow boots over bare feet and stepped out onto the snowy front stoop. The snow completely covered the small hedge of lavender she’d planted along the sidewalk when she and Joe had first moved in. Next summer when she felt better she would clear more space in the garden, maybe even add in some rosemary or thyme.

  The melody from “Scarborough Fair” began to play in her head, tempting her to sing along. She refused. She hadn’t sung a note since that night in the recording studio. Nick had mixed and mastered her demo and sent it to her in the mail, weeks ago. She had no interest in listening to it, in being reminded of that night and of how it caused her entire world to unravel. As far as she could see, singing brought her nothing but pain and suffering, and she wanted as much distance from it as she wanted from Joe. She hid the unopened package from herself in the liquor cabinet, along with a half used fifth of Cuervo and an unopened bottle of vodka. It was an appropriate place to store the CD; it would be at home with the other devices of addiction that promised escape but that inevitably only delivered on new problems of their own.

  Lily stepped down onto the sidewalk. The snow was so deep that it climbed over the tops of her boots and slid down inside, melting against the bare skin of her legs. The neighborhood was covered in white, bright snow. The rumblings of street plows and the scrape-scrape of metal shovels against asphalt echoed in the stillness.

  She trudged down the driveway and across the road, landing in the tracks left by the mail truck. She opened the door to her box and retrieved the phone bill, the cable bill, the gas and electric bill, the car payment statement, and a brown eight-and-a-half by eleven envelope bearing the return address of Joe’s lawyer.

  Lily tucked the bills under her arm and pinched the metal butterfly clasp on the larger envelope, which was sure to contain documents written in secret lawyer code that would need interpretation by her mother, but that she was compelled to read immediately nonetheless. Lily reviewed the contents as she made her way back up the driveway, enjoying the iciness against her skin as her boots filled up with snow.

  Lily’s mother agreed to come by that evening to read the documents and deliver a meatloaf that Tom had cooked for Lily and the boys.

  “Can they do that, Mom?” Lily’s mouth was still sticky hot with panic.

  Betty Capotosti pulled a plate of food from the microwave and set it down in front of Lily. She took a seat next to her, put on her eyeglasses - which dangled from a cord she wore around her neck - then flipped through the pages of the packet of papers.

  Without looking up she sa
id, “Well, they can write whatever they want in a letter. This gist of this is that if you want the separation, you have to sell the house and move - basically he’s saying if he can’t live here, no one lives here. Says here you have to be out by the end of April, and that this house will be rented to a third party if a buyer hasn’t been found by then.”

  “Where am I supposed to go? I don’t even have a job yet. He is so far behind on his child support, I have a hard time keeping food in the house, let alone being able to find money to move.”

  “Did you report that?” snapped her mother. “They’ll put a garnish on his wages if he doesn't pay. You can’t let him get away with that, Lily. You have to go down to the Child Support Enforcement Unit and file a complaint.”

  “And what about his children? Doesn’t he even care that this is their home, too?”

  Betty set the papers down on the kitchen table and removed her glasses. “Lily,” she said. “You have to stop doing that.”

  “Doing what?”

  “Expecting him to act civilly. He is trying to wear you down, flush you out. This is a war, and he intends to win. That’s all he cares about.”

  “No matter what it costs me, or his children?”

  “The greater your suffering, the greater his victory. The children are collateral damage as far as he’s concerned.”

  Lily looked down at the dish of food in front of her, a perfect rectangle of meatloaf, covered in a thin mushroom gravy. Mashed potatoes, steamed broccoli. She pushed the dish away.

  “Are you going to go to the CSEU and file that complaint?”

  “I don’t know Mom, I can’t think about that right now.”

  “You can’t afford not to think about it, Lily. And you can’t afford to just lie down and give up like this.”

  “Mom - please!” Lily screamed, thrusting her leg out under the table and kicking the chair across from where she sat. It toppled and fell to the floor with a thud. “Call the legal aid office, file a complaint with child support, apply for emergency aid from social services, write a fucking letter to the fucking editor of the fucking newspaper - how about you come over and just be my mother for a change? Hold me, let me cry... tell me everything is going to be alright!”

  Lily stood up and stomped over to the counter, shaking the last Merit from a pack that was lying there. With the cigarette between her lips she turned the knob for the front burner on the stove, and it ignited with a burst. She bent down and lit her cigarette, the end of which caught on fire, singeing her bangs, filling her nostrils with the smell of tobacco and burnt hair.

  Any moment now she expected to feel her mother’s arms around her. She would bury her face into her shoulder and cry and cry. Her mother would comfort her and dry her eyes, maybe feed her an imaginary “smile pill” the way she used to when Lily was small. Then Lily might even bring herself to eat some of Tom’s meatloaf. It would be her first meal in two days.

  “Lily,” her mother said, putting the papers aside, but not rising from her chair. “Come. Sit.” She patted the chair where Lily had been sitting. Lily dutifully walked over and sat down.

  “Crying is a waste of energy, and you don’t have any to spare, if you want to have a snowball’s chance in hell of surviving this. I am being your mother, and I could tell you that everything is going to be alright. I wish I could promise you that. But I can’t. The truth is that you have a long hard road ahead of you, and you are going to have to learn to take care of yourself, to advocate for yourself, to stick up for yourself, for Pete’s sake. Otherwise, he is going to eat you alive. Just like your father did to me.”

  A loud boom! shook the ceiling, and was followed by a scream as Pierce came bounding down the stairs, tears streaming down his face, shouting, “Mommy! Mommy! Joseph pushed me off the bunk bed!”

  “I did not, you big crybaby!” said Joseph, following his brother into the kitchen.

  Pierce scrambled up into Lily’s lap, screaming.

  “I am not a crybaby!” Pierce wailed, flailing his arms, his clenched fist colliding with Lily’s nose with such force that it caused her to lose her equilibrium, and she grabbed for the edges of the table to keep from falling from her chair, with Pierce in tow.

  “Crybaby, crybaby,” taunted Joseph, as he ran around the table, Wishes at his heels. “PJ is a crybaby!”

  Pierce squirmed in his seat, a deep guttural roar rising up from inside him. Lily felt his small body tremble against her belly. He wriggled himself free from Lily’s grasp and darted after Joseph, who continued to chant, “Crybaby, crybaby, PJ is a crybaby!” Joseph ran down into the family room, a screaming Pierce and a chortling Wishes chasing close behind.

  “I’d better go take care of that before they kill each other,” said Lily, relieved to draw a definitive close to the conversation. “Thanks for coming by.” Lily sniffed, not sure if her nose was running from the blow that Pierce delivered, or from the realization that her mother was no longer in the business of making it all better.

  “There’s just one more thing,” said Betty, reaching into her purse.

  Oh, thank God, thought Lily. It must have finally occurred to her mother to offer Lily some money. A car ride to Dunkin’ Donuts for hot chocolate and a stop at 7-11 for a pack of cigarettes would provide a welcome distraction and get her through till bedtime. Another day would soon be done. She had survived one more.

  Betty pulled a brochure out of her purse and handed it to Lily.

  “Choices for Battered Women?” said Lily.

  “CBW. If you only do one thing tomorrow,” said Betty. “Call them. They keep records of each woman who attends those support groups. If Joe’s lawyer ever questions the extent of the abuse you endured, the counselors there can provide credibility.”

  Lily tossed the brochure onto the kitchen table. “I hope you don’t mind letting yourself out.” It was the nicest thing she could think of to say. She hoped her mother would take her up on the invitation to leave before she lost her temper again. Betty closed the front door behind her, and Lily held the plate of food over the garbage can and tipped it, watching as meatloaf, potatoes, and broccoli slid off the plate and into the trash.

  The next morning, just after the school bus pulled away, Donna poked her head in through the front door. “I’ve got cinnamon rolls!” she sang.

  “C’mon in - I’ll be right down,” Lily called from the bathroom. Another sleepless night had sketched a new layer of gray exhaustion over her face, its effect all the more disturbing against her bloodshot eyes. She fastened her belt, feeding the buckle past the spot where it usually landed, to a new as yet unused hole. She was disappearing. If only she really could.

  “Coffee?” Lily asked Donna as she entered the kitchen.

  “Yea, sure,” said Donna. “Thanks.” She was reading the brochure for CBW. “Where did this come from?”

  “My mother.” Lily rolled her eyes. “Apparently she thinks I’m battered.”

  “You seem irritated.”

  “I know I’ve been through an awful time, but it’s not like Joe beat me up regularly or anything. He’s basically just an asshole with a short temper and a gambling problem.”

  “Is that all?” said Donna.

  “I don’t belong with those women, Donna - did you see that photo on the inside?” Lily jiggled the basket of coffee grounds, then pulled it out of the coffee maker and dumped it into the garbage. It landed on top of the meatloaf. She didn’t want to have this conversation right now. Or ever. All she wanted to do was put this nightmare behind her, get a separation before the Order of Protection expired, and get on with her life.

  Donna unfolded the flaps of the brochure. “I’m lookin’, but I don’t see where these women look any different than you do, sweetie. They’re just sittin’ there in a circle, talkin’ and cryin’. You’re great at both those things.”

  “Ha ha, very funny,” said Lily. Donna was one of the few people who could get away with poking fun at Lily these days. Lily filled two mugs with cof
fee and brought them to the table.

  “I’m serious, Lily,” said Donna. The cinnamon rolls had baked themselves into a round loaf. Donna grabbed it with her bare hands, worked to pull a single roll free, and smeared a glob of butter on it. “This CBW might be just the place for you.” Donna smacked the icing from her fingertips. “They’re having a meetin’ tonight - doesn’t Joe have the kids on Wednesdays? You should go. You could use the support.”

  “I have you,” said Lily.

  “It’s not the same, Lily. Now, I can make you some cinnamon rolls and I can babysit your kids, and I can even quote you a scripture or two. But I have never walked in the shoes you’re walkin’ in now. And there isn’t anythin’ like the voice of experience when you’re hurtin’ like you are.”

  Donna took her purse from the back of the chair, extracted her wallet, and pulled out a crisp twenty dollar bill. “This here is for gas and parking,” she said, slapping the bill down onto the surface of the table. “Now let’s have our coffee.” She picked up her cinnamon roll, plunged it into the coffee then retrieved it again, taking a lusty bite as the brown liquid dribbled from her chin, bringing a smile across her face.

  Lily looked at the twenty. She could put the gas on her Mobil card (Joe at least allowed her the means to drive - especially since her inability to do so would mean that he would have to provide any transportation the children needed for school, or Little League, or play dates with their friends.). And it was likely that the meters downtown would be free after six at night. With twenty dollars, she could buy cigarettes, a loaf of bread, a carton of milk, a dozen eggs, a jar of tomato sauce, a box of pasta, a couple envelopes of Kool-Aid, and some generic cereal. It would get them through a day or two, at least. Of course, if she took the money, she would have to go to the support group meeting. But at least then she could prove to everyone once and for all that she didn’t belong there. She imagined sauntering into the room pictured in the brochure, her hair pulled back into a neat ponytail, wearing fresh lipstick and a smile. She would sit politely and quietly listen as the others told their tales of getting beaten up and cheated on and threatened at knifepoint. Then when she told her story, they would see how different she was and they would tell her that she really didn’t need to be there; she was much better off than any of them. Then Lily’s mother and Donna would have no choice but to drop the matter and leave Lily alone.