Free An Italian Wife by Ann Hood

or Eva Peretsky’s hair. It was the yellow of this lemon. Sometimes he could almost smell the citrus over the sour smell of his sheets and his small room. When this happened, Carmine smiled. If he could free his hands, he would have made the sign of the cross in thanks to the Virgin for helping him get this far: Eva Peretsky’s hair. But he could not free his hands because he knew where they would go and what they would do and he had not earned that yet. He had not yet worked his way back to Eva Peretsky.
    Lemons.
    Carmine imagined a knife slicing into the lemon, cutting through its yellow flesh to the skin below. Then he imagined lifting that lemon to his mouth and biting into it. If he had done everything exactly right, the counting, the lemon, the cutting, when he took that bite, his mouth would fill with saliva and the glands behind his jaw would ache and his lips would pucker. And Carmine would smile and release his hands finally and reach for his cock, which was by now hot and throbbing. He could actually feel it throbbing from inside, could feel the blood coursing through it.
    Still, he could fail. Sometimes, as soon as he wrapped his hands around his cock, he came, too fast. Then the night would stretch ahead of him with its smells of sweat and dirt and dead bodies left in the sun. Instead of Eva Peretsky, he might remember his buddy Angelo Mazzonni. They had signed up together and traveled by train all the way to Kansas for basic training. Angelo was going to marry Carla Zito, and Carmine was going to marry her cousin Anna. The girls had seen them off at the train and pressed white handkerchiefs soaked in rose water into their hands as the train pulled away. This was to remind the men of them while they were at war.
    â€œHave you kissed her?” Angelo had asked as the train headed west, smack into the sunset with all of its pink and red and orange. Carmine felt both excited and terrified. He thought the train might take them right into the sky. His heart pounded, and he shook his head, lying.
    â€œYou might be dead in a few months,” Angelo said. “You should have done it.” He leaned forward. “If you tell anybody this, I’ll cut your throat, but Carla gave me a farewell present.”
    He pointed to his crotch and grinned. They were eating provolone and salami and good hard bread that their mothers had packed for them. When they unwrapped it, two men already in uniform walking past their seats had said, “Shit, wops, they sell real American food in the next car.” The men had laughed, patting each other on the back and shaking their heads. “Stupid wops,” one said.
    â€œShe took all of it in her mouth,” Angelo said, lowering his voice. His chin was shiny with oil. “She sucked until I exploded.”
    The strange thing was that Angelo really had exploded, right beside Carmine. His head had opened up like a melon, spitting gray juice and pieces of bone and flesh all over Carmine. Without thinking, Carmine had grabbed his friend’s hand, and told him in Italian that he would be all right. When Angelo squeezed his hand, Carmine thought maybe he still had a chance, so he kept talking to him, promising him things. Even when he saw that the thing that he thought was an egg in his lap was actually one of Angelo’s eyes; even when he lifted his free hand and wiped brain and blood off his face; even when he realized that what he was looking at was a fragment of Angelo’s head—no face, some hair curling around an ear—even then Carmine whispered about Carla waiting at home for him, about the French whores in the next town, about how right then the grapes hung heavy on their vines, ready to be picked.
    This was what happened if he came too soon. If he was lucky, if he had done everything right: the counting first, 1, 2, 3, seeing the numbers clearly, then 3, 2, 1; the lemon; the cutting into its flesh; the biting; the salivation; allowing his