Free An Italian Wife by Ann Hood Page B

do it.”
    â€œThose girls,” Angelo said, “are called whores.”
    Carmine shook his head. “They’re not Catholic,” he explained. “That’s all. Girls who aren’t Catholic like it. They want to do it all the time.” He had no evidence of this, but Carmine believed that Anna’s nos and stops came from her fervent belief in Jesus Christ.
    â€œPuttanas.” Angelo laughed. “You’ll see.”
    ALL DAY, CARMINE worked on machines that tore fingers from hands or broke arms or sent fumes into the air that made you cough and turned your eyes red. The noise in the mills was loud enough to get inside your head and stay there even after you had gone home. The mill was dark inside, and damp, and by the end of a shift you felt like your back could break and you might lose your mind if you didn’t see sunlight.
    Carmine had worked in the mills since he was seven years old. The pinky finger on his left hand was flat above the first knuckle from an accident when he was nine. His ears rang on and off all day, even when he was asleep or out of the mill. From where he stood that summer, seventeen years old, a war about to claim him and all the other boys he knew, his only hope was Coney Island.
    THE NIGHT BEFORE he left, Carmine took Anna for a walk beside the river. It was eight o’clock, but still light, and the river flowed by them fast and murky from a spring heavy with rain. She let him hold her hand as they walked, and he liked the feel of her small smooth one in his big calloused one. They didn’t speak, but Carmine kept sneaking looks at her. She was beautiful; that was for certain. Her hair wasn’t curly or straight but fell in thick, luxurious ripples all the way past her shoulders and down her back. Most girls tied their hair into braids or buns, but Anna showed hers off, letting it hang loose like that. Her eyes were so dark that when he stared into them, Carmine couldn’t distinguish the pupils from the irises. But everything about her was small. Her tiny waist, her almost boyish breasts, her hands. As he held her hand now, Carmine slowly massaged it, as if he could count each thin bone.
    â€œHow do I know that you won’t meet a girl in Coney Island and fall in love with her and marry her and never come home?” Anna said finally.
    â€œBecause I love you!” Carmine said, surprising both of them. Once he said it, he knew it was true. What else could it be when he thought about her constantly? Dreamed about her? Tried to see her every day, at least once?
    â€œIf you love me—”
    â€œI do!” Carmine said, feeling giddy with it. “I do love you.”
    They had stopped walking and Anna was peering up the length of him, frowning. Shouldn’t she be smiling? He loved her. But no, Carmine realized. This was that thing again. Frowning when really she was happy. He bent and lifted her up so that her mouth reached his, and then he kissed her harder than he had ever kissed her before. He kissed her with his mouth open and his tongue finding hers with such delight that he groaned.
    Anna pulled away. “Stop!” she said, but Carmine knew that meant go, so he kissed her again, harder still. He knew that the way he held her to him, she could feel his cock straining, and boldly he pressed it against her.
    Anna gasped, a small sound of surprise.
    For some reason, when she did that, Carmine slowly lowered her to the ground. The river whooshed by them and his ears began to ring with the mechanical sounds of the mill.
    â€œWhy would you leave me if you love me?” she said. She had her arms folded across her chest, as if it were cold. But it was a beautiful June night. The moon was yellow and full above them, bright even in the still-light sky.
    â€œIn Coney Island,” Carmine said, breathless with possibility, “I’ll make a fortune and come back and marry you.” He could suddenly imagine this: