The mafia's arranged bride

"Get ready for your wedding in four days. You're marrying a Salvatore." Papa's words cut through the dining room like a blade through silk. I was mid-bite, the fork suspended between my plate and mouth, the rich tomato sauce of Nonna's lasagna suddenly coating my tongue like copper. The chandeliers above; Murano glass, shipped from Venice before I was born, seemed to dim. My ears began to ring, that high-pitched whine that always came before something in my life shattered beyond repair. 'What?' The word came out strangled, barely a whisper. I set down my fork carefully, watching it clatter against the gold-rimmed china. My younger sister had gone still at the table. Poor little Zina, only seven years old, knew enough to stop chewing. The guards stationed by the doors; Franco and that new guy, Luca or whatever his name was shifted their weight but kept their eyes forward. They'd learned long ago not to witness family business. Papa didn't look up from cutting his veal. The knife scraped against his plate with deliberate precision, the sound making my teeth ache. 'You heard me.' 'Papa, you can't—' I started, but he held up one hand. The hand that had stroked my hair when I was small. The hand that signed death warrants with the same pen he'd used to write my tuition checks. The diamond pinky ring, Mama's engagement stone, reset after her death, caught the light. He grunted. He didn't reply, but I couldn't stop. My chest was caving in, my carefully built future crumbling like the stale bread Zina fed to the birds in the garden. Anything not to get married. Not yet. Not like this. I still wanted to be a doctor. I was so close, only two years in, but I'd aced anatomy, and had gotten the highest marks in my biochemistry class. Professor Moretti said I had a gift, that I could really help people. 'Papa, you promised Mama.' My voice cracked on her name. I could feel my sister's eyes on me, warning me to stop, but I couldn't. 'You promised her you'd let me be a doctor. You swore it at her funeral. In front of everyone.' For a moment, his jaw tightened. Something flickered across his face; regret, maybe, or just indigestion. 'Yes,' he said finally, still not meeting my eyes. 'I did.' The silence stretched. I could hear the grandfather clock in the hall ticking, counting down the seconds of my old life. Outside, a car door slammed, probably Sal bringing in tonight's collections. The smell of garlic and oregano that usually made me feel safe now made my stomach turn. 'But when have I ever kept my promises, anyways?' The words were casual, almost light, but they landed like punches. He finally looked at me then, his dark eyes, the same shade as mine, the same shape as Mama's, completely flat. 'I've tried enough for you, you ungrateful bitch.' He said it conversationally, like he was commenting on the weather. 'Two years in that damn college. That's more than enough to learn the important s**t. Isn't that enough? How to stitch up a bullet wound, how to spot internal bleeding. You can play nurse for your husband if he needs it.' My throat closed. Around the table, my sister had become a statue. 'Your tuition is also costly. Forty-five thousand a year, plus all those f*****g books you're always buying.' He waved his fork dismissively. 'You being a doctor is useless to me right now. The Salvatore family, they're expanding into our territory. North Jersey, parts of the waterfront. We merge the families, nobody has to die. Well, nobody important.' He smiled, and I felt cold all over. 'So yes, I've signed the contract. You're marrying a Salvatore. I don't know which yet. Word is they are all good-looking, went to Columbia, smart enough. Could be worse.' He shrugged. 'Get ready. Four days. Courthouse wedding, nothing fancy. Just appear with your prettiest smile on your face and shut the f**k up when your husband talks, like a good lady should. Like your mother did.' That last part was a knife between my ribs. Mama had smiled. Mama had shut up. And look where it got her. Tears filled my eyes, hot and furious. I wouldn't let them fall. Not here. Not in front of him. Instead, I stared at the vacant rectangle of darker wallpaper above Papa's head, where Mama's portrait used to hang. The portrait we'd commissioned after the wedding, her in her white dress, her eyes full of hope and that smile, God! that smile. Like she didn't know what she was marrying into. Papa had destroyed it about a year ago, coming home past three in the morning, drunk and wild with rage after losing nearly a quarter million to Big Tommy Ricci in a poker game. A stupid, reckless game he shouldn't have been playing. I'd heard him downstairs, his voice booming through the house like thunder. The sound of furniture overturning. Glass shattering. That day, my younger sister, Zina, had crept into my bedroom, her small body shaking, her pink nightgown twisted around her thin legs. We'd scrambled into my bed together, her face buried in my shoulder, my arms locked around her. Away from him as usual, because angry Papa meant someone died. A guard who looked at him wrong. A maid who didn't move fast enough. Sometimes people we didn't even know, people who'd made the mistake of crossing him on the wrong day. And once, God! once; our mother. The night he took her life, I'd heard the gunshot around 3:47 AM. I knew because I'd been watching the clock, counting down the minutes until he'd either pass out or kill someone and go quiet. But this time, there was just the one shot, then silence. Complete, suffocating silence. Usually he yelled until he fell asleep, his voice raw and hoarse, eventually dissolving into those loud, rattling snores that meant we were safe until morning. But not that night. That night, the house went dead quiet, and somehow that was worse. Two hours later, after Zina had finally cried herself to sleep, I crept downstairs. My bare feet were silent on the marble, my heart hammering so hard I could feel it in my throat. I found him first, passed out on the leather sofa in his study, an empty bottle of Macallan on the floor beside him. Then I saw the destroyed portrait, the frame smashed, the canvas torn. Then I saw the blood trail leading to the kitchen. It was Mama. I had gotten into a coma thereafter, almost missed her funeral and… Papa, how I have longed to make him suffer for what he did. She'd been dead for three years by the time papa shattered the portrait, seeing her portrait destroyed like that felt like losing her all over again. I stood there in my nightgown, surrounded by broken glass and the acrid smell of gunpowder, and gathered the pieces of the canvas. Her face was torn right down the middle. Now, sitting at dinner with my future being sold off like a racehorse, I stared at that empty space and felt something inside me go cold and hard. I wouldn't be my mother. I couldn't be. But I didn't know how to be anything else.