Chapter 9 - The Plan
“Mama. Mama. Wake up, Mama, wake up. Please Mama, please wake up.”
Giuseppe sat crouched beside the body of his mother. He behaved like a seal cub, lying next to the washed up body of it’s dead mother, still naively trying to find milk.
He pleaded woefully, “Mama, Mama, please wake up. Please Mama, don’t leave me alone, don’t leave me. Please Mama.”
Giuseppe moved to liberate his mother. Maybe it was the chandelier lying on her back. He crawled over to it and slowly, painfully dragged it off her. Then he crawled back to examine her face. To see if this had woken her up. But no. She did not move.
Giuseppe then decided that the rope around her neck must be the problem. He slowly, carefully peeled it away from her head. He was frightened by the blood on her face.
Then little Giuseppe, awkward little Giuseppe, broke down in tears. He sat all scrunched up by his mother and cried. He cried out of fear and he cried out of pain. Mostly he cried because instinct now told him that there was something terribly wrong. Nothing he did would wake her up. And he was so afraid of being alone, in this room, with it’s blood red walls and dark furniture. He never felt so alone. And the more he cried the more his head hurt and so he cried yet more.
He could not understand the silence. God, even the screaming and shouting he had to withstand was better than the silence of this house. The only noise he could hear was his crying echoing around the abandoned home.
Finally, Giuseppe became tired with all the crying and the throbbing of his head. He lay down by his mother, up close to her, and snuggled. He stopped his sniveling. And the silence was chilling, even with the afternoon heat.
“Giuseppe, Giuseppe. Giuseppe, are you ok?”
Angela slowly awoke. She could feel her son’s body trembling against hers. And now she was looking at his beautiful face with eyes closed. Then slowly, with fear in his eyes, he looked up at her. He looked up at her as if awakening from a terrible dream and he smiled. As his mouth stretched across his little face his eyes opened wide. And he, for once, experienced true relief and total joy. It was as if he was watching the most perfect sunrise for the very first time. The dark room lit up and his mother’s face was a painting. A slightly cracked painting but none the less a master piece.
And Angela struggled with all her being to figure out whether they were in heaven or in hell or still in Girotondo. Once she had the courage to look around her and she spotted the chandelier on the floor all broken and the rope next to it, she knew that she had failed. She had failed and she could not have been happier. Her face lit up with the realisation that she had bungled her own hanging and was now reunited with her son. They were both alive. And nothing else could possibly matter, not even the fact that she was a murderer. She hugged her son hard, harder than she had ever hugged anything in her life. And he felt it. He lit up inside. Finally she was protecting and holding him like he always needed her to and it felt great. He grinned like a Cheshire cat.
Than Angela started laughing. She laughed as she recalled smacking herself around and she laughed at the thought of her bungling her own hanging. And she laughed at the now broken Grimaldi family chandelier. The old relic had finally been broken. And it felt great.
Amidst all of her laughter Angela discovered a new desire. This was a desire that had died within her a long, long time before. Now she was going to not just survive, her and her son would survive and thrive. She just needed a plan. She needed a foolproof plan and she needed one fast. Then she would make sure to give her son a great life and a free one. No one would smother them again. No one would take anything from them ever again. No one would control or frighten or imprison them. No one.
And as if rising from the ashes with this new found strength, Angela conceived of her plan. And it was so simple. She would just pretend like nothing had happened, only that Bruno had fallen ill. It was a very rare disease diagnosed by a doctor friend from out of town who had visited them the day before. And his disease was contagious to most blood types, but not to hers. So she could stay and nurse him these next few months, but Giuseppe would have to move in with her parents. Their neighbors would be fine so long as they never entered Bruno and Angela’s house. In fact for the sake of being overly cautious no one could enter the house until Bruno was given the all clear. The only two permitted to enter was Angela and the friend doctor. Bruno would survive so long as he was well nursed and medicated. He also need peace and quiet.
And so Angela cleaned her husband’s stiff corpse up while she rehearsed her plan over and over. She would clean Bruno up and then get him into his arm chair, his favorite arm chair with wheels so that she could easily move him around the house and show him off sitting in the windows facing onto the piazza for everyone to see. And when she didn’t need him to be placed in one of the windows she would wheel him into her walk in freezer to keep him in tact. After all, she didn’t want the body to decompose. And she knew just enough to know that she would have to keep him frozen for as long as possible.
So, for the next couple of days she commenced her new ritual. She decided not to leave the house until she had her routine down. And she would not take Giuseppe to her parents house for another day or so. She had to master her story and her routine, she mumbled to herself as she wheeled Bruno into the freezer. Then she turned to her son. She had left him in his room to clean up while she prepared Bruno. And she spun her story for the very first time.
“Darling, Papa’s not well. He needs to sleep and rest a lot. Papa’s ill and so Mama needs to look after him and you will need to go and stay with Nonno and Nonna. Mummy will come and be with you every day. Ok, my darling, ok? It won’t be for long, I promise. And you know how Nonna spoils you so.”
Giuseppe looked at his mother sheepishly. But when she gave him another of her new and powerful embraces it was somehow all ok. He was ok with it. His new mother made him feel strong and happy for the first time and so everything was fine. Angela could feel it too and she knew she was doing the right thing.
So the next morning as Piazza Rimazza woke up and commenced it’s daily routine Angela began. She wheeled Bruno out of the freezer and placed him in the window of their living room. Then she pulled the curtains back for everyone to see. She knew that the inhabitants of Piazza Rimazza would look up at the window. They always did. It was a sign of respect to the Grimaldi family. And so, as the Piazza Rimazza neighbors started leaving their homes like rabbits exiting their warrens Angela got in position. She kneeled next to Bruno and with one arm she waved at the eager passers by while her other arm directed his. She grabbed him below the stiff elbow and waved his stubborn arm up and down. She even managed to growl a “buon giorno” using her husbands voice. She was instantly impressed at how well she had mimicked his sounds. It felt good.
The success of her first mornings maneuverings emboldened her for that afternoon. As everyone left their homes on the Piazza after their afternoon siesta, she was there with him waving again. But this time she feigned a conversation between the two of them. She ensured that his voice was hoarser than usual so he sounded ill. And they conversed well. In fact they had not conversed so well for many years. So she had to ensure that it wasn’t too fluent. She had to control herself.
But as that day ended and she watched and played to every inhabitant of the piazza she knew she was safe for now. No one suspected anything. No one had heard her fight with Bruno and no one imagined his death. She could see it in their faces as they passed by and she could see it in their actions. Even the old nosey Signora Malaventa from opposite suspected nothing. Even this watch woman of Piazza Rimazza had not unearthed her misdeed. Angela was safe and for perhaps the very first time in her entire life Angela felt almost free.
She went to bed that night knowing that the next day she must venture forth and face the world outside. Now she was ready. She could put it off no longer. So the next day would be critical. Giuseppe’s and her future depended on it. She prayed with all her heart that her act in front of her son had worked. That whenever he had seen his Papa he believed her stories about him sleeping. She even explained that his father had a kind of sleeping disease. And fortunately their son never went too close to his father to check. He was much too frightened of him. But she would find out if Giuseppe was convinced the very next day. So Angela went to bed early that night after cleaning herself up one more time. After cleaning her scars up and covering them over. And her stomach was a little anxious, but not in the usual way.
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