The Possibilities of Sainthood (25 page)

I was so grounded. So. Grounded.

There should be a Patron Saint Against Getting Grounded, I thought, tuning out the yelling and cursing in Italian coming from my mother's bedroom. I consoled myself that if the Vatican didn't go for the kissing specialty, maybe this could be my next proposal. They loved saints who were against things—against demonic possession
(perhaps a saint I should start praying to on behalf of my mother), against wild beasts (mental note for future reference: I wondered if boys like Andy count as wild beasts?), against scurf (no idea what scurf is—perhaps some sort of disease?), against scrupulosity (whatever
that
is—against having scruples? Aren't scruples supposed to be good?) And then one of my all-time favorites, the Patron Saint Against Twitching. Should you find yourself with a little twitching problem, St. Cornelius is your man.

Alas, there was currently no Patron Saint Against Getting Grounded, since if there was I would have been praying to him or her fervently from the very moment that Maria led me back down the stairs and out of the library. In between feelings of fear I kept thinking: My first kiss! Finally! For the first time in my entire fifteen years and counting career as a girl, I'd been kissed! And well kissed. Movie-star-kissed. By a boy who
really, really
liked me. And how?
How
did I not realize sooner that Michael was
The Boy
? And when? When? I wondered, would we get to kiss again? My mother was waiting to tell me that I wasn't leaving the house again for social reasons until I turned eighteen.

Would I really have to wait for my second kiss for more than two years?

I was hoping Ma would cut the sentence back to seventeen.

Have I mentioned yet how much I hated Veronica?

Not only had she told on me, but she was waiting with my mother to witness the scene when Maria and I arrived
in the lobby. I wanted to scream when I saw her, arms crossed, a smug look on her big Italian-nosed face.

“There they are, Aunt Amalia,” she exclaimed, pointing at us. “Thank the Lord,” she added dramatically.

“Veronica really has it in for you, Antonia,” Maria muttered as we crossed the lobby.

“That's the truth,” I whispered back, holding my head up, determined not to cry or look frightened, depriving Veronica of any additional satisfaction to her already obvious and odious triumph at breaking up my tryst with Michael.

“We were so worried, Antonia,” Veronica lied, faking concern. My mother looked ready to explode. “I'd just driven over to your house to suggest that your mom and I could bring some spinach pies and cookies over to the Romanos for your girls' night with Maria. You know—
as a surprise.
And she thought it was a great idea so we hopped in my car and drove off. But then Mrs. Romano told us that you both were at the dance.” She was unable to hide the wicked gleam in her eyes. “So we rushed right over to make sure you were okay. I'll let your mother fill you in on the rest,” she added, turning to go.

“Thanks so much for the concern, Veronica,” I spat, pretending to lean in to give her a hug goodbye and whispering in her ear, “There'll be payback for this, Veronica. I swear to you.”

And there would. I meant it. Someday . . .

At this point my mother explained the many reasons why she was beside herself, which included the fact that
not only had I (a) snuck out via Maria's house which to her was unthinkable, (b) gone to an event I was forbidden to go to, and (c) put my idiot cousin in a position to embarrass my mother by knowing more about my whereabouts than she did,
but in addition to all of this
(d) when she arrived to humiliate me in front of everyone I know and don't from both HA and Bishop Francis, I was nowhere to be found,
and then, finally
, (e) in her hunt for me she came upon Maria, who basically had her tongue down John Cronin's throat and vice versa. So in addition to ruining my life and deciding that both Maria and I were fellow
puttanas
-in-training, she was making a stop on our way home to inform Mrs. Romano that Maria was all but having public sex on the dance floor.

I tried to talk her out of it. To no avail.

“All these years I've thought Maria was a nice friend for my little girl and then I find out she's having sex with a
boy
!” This was my mother fuming to Mrs. Romano when she dropped off Maria on her way home to scream at me.

“Mom! They were
just kissing
,” I protested, giving Mrs. Romano a don't-listen-to-her-please look.

“That didn't look like kissing to me!”

“Not like you'd remember,” I muttered under my breath.

“Antonia! What did you say? This is not the time to answer back to your mother!”

Luckily, Mrs. Romano was a little less uptight than psycho-lady.

“I apologize again, Amalia Lucia,” she said, shaking her
head in what I hoped was false solidarity with my mother. “I didn't realize that Antonia wasn't allowed to go to the dance. And I'll be having a chat with Maria. Thank you for bringing them home,” she added, closing the door, leaving my mother and me outside on the steps. “Maria! Come down here now!” Even through the door I could hear Mrs. Romano yelling.

“Good thing I was able to let Cara know her daughter is headed down a road of carnal sin!” My mother spat the word
sin
as if it were a pestilence as we walked back to the car.

I finally heard my mother's footsteps padding down the hall, and she finally emerged into the living room. She gave me a look of death as she settled in to give me a good dose of serious Italian mother-love.

“So, how long am I grounded, Ma? For real.
Please tell me
,” I begged.

“I told you,” she growled from the antique chair where she sat like a queen presiding over one of her rebellious subjects, i.e.,
me
. “Until you go to college.”

“Amalia Lucia?” Gram's voice called from the kitchen. “Might I have a word?”

“What do you need, Ma? Antonia and I are having an important conversation.”

“That's what I wanted to talk to you about actually.”

“Well, don't do it from the kitchen.”

“Are you sure? I just thought . . .”

“Ma, just come in here. Say what you have to say.”

“Okay,” she said, shuffling in wearing her fuzzy blue
slippers and robe, her hair in curlers. “I thought you might want me to say this to you privately, but since you insist”—Gram paused to take a deep breath—“I wanted to remind you that when you and Gino started going out on dates you were fifteen, just like Antonia.”

Insert my mother's reddened, angry face
here
and my eternal gratitude to Gram
here
. Score one for Gram. She may have not remembered what happened last week, but she sure remembered every detail from twenty-five years ago.

“And I know it's difficult to see her all grown up so quickly, what with Gino gone and you raising her all alone. And then she's turned out so beautiful, especially in that gown—you'll have to tell me where you got that later, Antonia—which must make you think about how maybe someday soon
she
will meet
her
Gino.” Gram was on a roll. “And then your baby will be off before you know it and you'll wonder where all the time went and you'll miss her so much you won't even know what to do with yourself.”

Was that a tear rolling down my mother's face? And one rolling down Gram's too?

“I know you must be so angry at her for lying to you tonight, which was
wrong
,” she said, giving me a stern look, “but I think it's time, sweetheart, that you started to trust Antonia Lucia. She's a good girl. A smart young
woman
. I remember how hard it was for me to let you go out with Gino, but I knew you would make good decisions. And I know deep down you believe the same about Antonia Lucia.”

I stood frozen now, my attention bouncing back and forth between Gram's speech and my mother's anger dissolving into teary affection, for who—me or Gram or both—I wasn't yet sure.

“I'm so sorry, Mom,” I said once I was sure Gram was finished. “I just really wanted to go to the dance—I swear it was my first one—and I'll never go behind your back again—”

“I remember what it was like to be young, too, you know,” my mother said with a deep sigh, her voice wistful. “And worrying that your grandmother wouldn't let me go out with your father because he was older and I was still so young.”

“You do?” Now
I
was tearing up.

“And I know your grandmother is right, that I've been too strict with you.”

“Really?”

“I'm going to have a spinach pie,” my mother said, since they were on the coffee table still sitting in the bag with the cookies, and since when Italians are in distress we eat. “Do you girls want one, too? They're so fresh. Just out of the oven. I was making them while you were at the dance, Antonia,” she added, giving me a wry smile.

“I'll be right back,” Gram said, waddling off to the kitchen and returning with a stack of plates and napkins, at which point we tearily proceeded to devour the entirety of the bag's contents.

“Be careful not to drip oil on that dress,” my mother said in between bites. “You
do
look lovely.”

“You think?” I smiled wide and then hoped that I didn't have spinach stuck in my teeth.

“Next time you need to get dressed up, though, your grandmother and I will find you something
really
special,” she said, with some haughtiness.

“So there will be a next time?” I asked. She ignored this question, however.

“You know your grandmother used to be an incredible seamstress. She used to make Italian lace. I'm sure she still could.”

“I know I could,” Gram said. “That's the kind of thing you never forget how to do. Like riding a bike.” Of course, Gram had never ridden a bike, but still, she made her point.

“
Next
time”—my mother was getting excited now—“we'll have to make you a dress, won't we, Ma?”

“A beautiful one for my beautiful granddaughter,” Gram agreed.

“We'd have to find a way to fix your lack of cleavage, though,” she said. “The family bosoms seem to have skipped a generation.”

“I could just sew in some inserts . . .”

“Could we please get off the bosoms subject?” I pleaded. “But I'd love it if you and Gram made me a dress, especially if you'd also let me wear it out somewhere, like the prom,” I dropped hopefully, since I figured that at this point, what did I have to lose? Our conversation had taken the last turn I'd expected, thanks to Gram.

“Well, I'm going to bed,” Gram said, yawning suddenly.
Then she gave me a big smile and disappeared from the room as quickly as she'd entered. “Good night, my two sweethearts,” she called back to us.

“Good night, Ma,” my mother responded.

“I love you, Mom,” I said finally, looking into my mother's tired eyes. It was late and time for us to go to sleep.

“I love you, too, Antonia Lucia,
bella mia
,” she said. “But you're still grounded for lying to me and sneaking around.” She mustered a stern tone in her voice again.

“Until college?”

“Maybe not college,” she said, a little smile on her face. “O
Madonna
, I need this day to be over. The drama!”

“Me, too,” I said, giving her a kiss on the cheek. “Good night, Ma.” I watched as she headed off to her room, still teary-eyed. For the first time since I was little I thought there might be good things to come between my mother and me. And I couldn't wait to see what they were. Especially if they included hand-sewn dresses of beautiful Italian lace that I could wear somewhere with Michael!

Underneath all the fighting, the screaming, the guilt, the melodrama, and, of course, all of the endless eating, I thought, as a yawn escaped me, there really
was
love after all.

Michael and I sat across from each other on my bed. Between us lay my Saint Diary, open to the section where I kept my proposals to the Vatican. Petitions, some long, some only a single line on a strip of paper, were strewn across my quilt, mixed among photographs of me from when I was eight, twelve, and from just last month. A white candle sat on a metal tray with a book of matches next to it.

“The Patron Saint of the First Kiss and Kissing,” he said, surprise in his voice. This particular letter more than all the others fascinated him. He held it in both hands as if it were fragile, as if it were me or even my heart laid bare. He read the words,
my words
, taking his time, while I waited for him to finish and say something.
Anything
.

Michael was his typical, disheveled self again, even though he still wore the same clothes from the dance. His jacket was draped over the vanity chair. His tie was loosened.
His shirt had a gray smear of dust from climbing through my window and standing in the shadows of my bedroom, waiting, waiting, until I came in to sleep, scaring me to death when I walked into the room, shushing me so he wouldn't have to face the wrath of my mother if she found out tonight, of all nights, on top of everything else, that I now had a boy in my bedroom.

“I couldn't just let the night end there, Antonia,” he'd said to me eventually.